Tom and I were honored to welcome our first international participant to the cliff this morning (well, OK, Nick of Victoria, BC). Fortunately we had the Highway 101 turnoff to ourselves for antenna setup this morning, but Nick encountered a typical Rockwork 4 session featuring rain, wind and Murphy's Law. I was separated from Tom and Nick by about 10 meters, and my south side of the turnoff was crammed with the usual 4 large FSL antennas, Ultralight radios and digital recorders. Having learned the hard way that 1017-Tonga has only one late sign-off per week (on their late Saturday night), a determined effort was made to set up my largest (17") FSL immediately upon arrival at the cliff (at the bizarre hour of 0330 local, or 1030 UTC). The effort paid off with fairly good reception of foreign language from the station around 1130, while all of us were still setting up our antennas in the predawn darkness. The propagation once gain favored New Zealand (so what is new?), with very potent signals from the usual regulars (including an awesome signal from the 2.5 kW 765-Kahungunu). From my standpoint the more obscure Kiwis (576, 585, 936 etc.) seemed to be playing hard to get, though, while Australian signals seemed to have fallen off of the cliff. Nick and Tom were both able to record various NZ signals 1 kHz away from domestics (such as the 1 kW 549-Trackside) which were fairly hopeless with my rudimentary-filtered Ultralights, but Murphy's Law's typically has no chance to knock out such crude radios (which depend on live human operation-- a stone age concept). At one point in the session Nick came over and inquired about the DU signal on 729 (a prime frequency for all of us, with the reduction in "Vancouver traffic"), but I needed to admit that my Ultralights weren't exactly the optimal gear to filter the 730 splatter. As usual there were minor weather challenges, with stiff wind late in the session rocking the Financial Sinkhole Loops back and forth (and causing no lack of consternation in their creator). Finally, although 738-Tahiti certainly has a reputation of being a blowtorch on this cliff, this morning it was a blowtorch on steroids. Its French language program at 1230 was so overwhelming that its splatter was drowning the usual pest 740-KCBS, to the extent that the Frisco station was struggling to be heard. Later today we welcome the first Japanese DXers to participate in a Rockwork 4 DXpedition (or possibly, the first to participate in a west coast MW-DXpedion?)-- Hiroo Nakagawa and Satoshi Miyauchi. Highly skilled in both Perseus-SDR and Ultralight radio DXing, our two honored guests will be participating in the ultimate wild DXing experience for the next couple of sessions. 684 Rhema Gisborne, NZ Fair level Christian contemporary music at 1247 (log them while you can, according to Tony W.) https://app.box.com/s/691ddrcehygaiko5pgpll2jp1nu1en91 702 Magic Auckland, NZ Oldies music at blistering level pounding in at 1223; garbled ID between songs https://app.box.com/s/gtd8u8zxduwpirycbso99kigyum2ja5c 738 Radio Polynesie Mahina, Tahiti French program at near nuclear level threatening to crunch my Ultralight's front end at 1233 https://app.box.com/s/pw2gpfgh7vd19b33yz8ag7466y18462t 765 Radio Kahungunu Napier-Hastings, NZ Beautiful Maori female vocal music from this 2.5 kW overachiever at 1230 https://app.box.com/s/qnmsxpgqdntk772vt8rbc3rfnvfjweuw 1017 A3Z Nuku'alofa, Tonga Rushed antenna setup pays off with a good-level logging of male speech at 1130 (the only non-English DU on the frequency). Not quite as strong as Bill W.'s classic sign off MP3 from a few years back, but I'll take it anyway https://app.box.com/s/jz35gvlr8re5ldfqol9h6ux0kd04dea5 1044 Newstalk ZB Dunedin, NZ Good level call-in talk program getting through the splatter // 1035 at 1210 https://app.box.com/s/z7flaydc0if63v9qhro7deyvp3rno67d 73 and Good DX, Gary DeBock (DXing at the Rockwork 4 ocean cliff near Manznita, Oregon, USA) 7.5" loopstick C.Crane Skywave Ultralights (3) +17" and 15" DXpedition FSL antennas Detailed photo from this morning's wild session is posted at https://app.box.com/s/k95omx4nhsihrizqimagkwm825bpebe7 _______________________________________________ IRCA mailing list IRCA@hard-core-dx.com http://montreal.kotalampi.com/mailman/listinfo/irca
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