2. Ham Radio

Prosser Hill (W6/NS-236) SOTA Activation 8/16/2013

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To get to Prosser Hill, head north on Highway 89 from Truckee. Turn left into the Prosser Hill OHV Staging Area (there is a sign for this turn on the highway). Continue through the paved parking area and onto the rough 2WD dirt road shown in blue. Bear left at points PJ1 and SAGELOOP. Continue to point PHILL and turn left onto the even rougher road (4WD is handy but not essential). Drive to the end of the road where a dirt berm blocks it off and park at the Park point. GPS Coordinates:<br /> <br /> PROSSERHILLOHV - 39.38662N, 120.1862W <br /> PJ1 - 39.38574N, 120.19284W<br /> SAGELOOP - 39.3821N, 120.1972W<br /> SAGESPUR - 39.37763N, 120.19972W<br /> PHILL - 39.37947N, 120.20844W<br /> Park - 39.37618N, 120.20759W
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To get to Prosser Hill, head north on Highway 89 from Truckee. Turn left into the Prosser Hill OHV Staging Area (there is a sign for this turn on the highway). Continue through the paved parking area and onto the rough 2WD dirt road shown in blue. Bear left at points PJ1 and SAGELOOP. Continue to point PHILL and turn left onto the even rougher road (4WD is handy but not essential). Drive to the end of the road where a dirt berm blocks it off and park at the Park point. GPS Coordinates:

PROSSERHILLOHV - 39.38662N, 120.1862W
PJ1 - 39.38574N, 120.19284W
SAGELOOP - 39.3821N, 120.1972W
SAGESPUR - 39.37763N, 120.19972W
PHILL - 39.37947N, 120.20844W
Park - 39.37618N, 120.20759W

Topo

  • To get to Prosser Hill, head north on Highway 89 from Truckee. Turn left into the Prosser Hill OHV Staging Area (there is a sign for this turn on the highway). Continue through the paved parking area and onto the rough 2WD dirt road shown in blue. Bear left at points PJ1 and SAGELOOP. Continue to point PHILL and turn left onto the even rougher road (4WD is handy but not essential). Drive to the end of the road where a dirt berm blocks it off and park at the Park point. GPS Coordinates:<br /> <br /> PROSSERHILLOHV - 39.38662N, 120.1862W <br /> PJ1 - 39.38574N, 120.19284W<br /> SAGELOOP - 39.3821N, 120.1972W<br /> SAGESPUR - 39.37763N, 120.19972W<br /> PHILL - 39.37947N, 120.20844W<br /> Park - 39.37618N, 120.20759W
  • Continue past the dirt berm on foot until you intersect the motorcycle trail that climbs up onto Prosser Hill. Follow it into the activation zone, then cut through the trees and brush up to the summit. Note that it branches at the TrailJunction point and you can take either branch since they form a loop at the top. Per my GPS, my hike today was 1.07 miles long with an elevation gain (per the topo map) of approximately 470 feet. GPS coordinates:<br /> <br /> MotorcycleTrail - 39.37473N, 120.20668W<br /> TrailJunction - 39.37495N, 120.20922W
  • Sign along the motorcycle trail, not far up the hill from where you will join it.
  • Up on top with my 88' doublet on a 28' Jackite pole.
  • My operating position in the shade near some fir trees.
  • I tied off one end of the doublet to my hiking pole crammed down into the manzanita.
  • I tied the other end off to a small dead branch on a tree.
  • Castle Peak (W6/SN-038) to the west.
  • Mt. Pluto (W6/NS-138) at the Northstar ski resort to the SSE. I've <a href="http://www.grizzlyguy.com/HamRadio/SOTA-Activation-MtPluto">activated it a few different times on skis</a>.
  • Truckee-Tahoe airport down in the Martis Valley. My home QTH is along the top of one of the forested ridges that you can see on the other side of the valley.
  • Tinker Knob (W6/NS-121) and other summits along the Sierra crest to the SSW. <a href="http://www.grizzlyguy.com/HamRadio/SOTA-TinkerKnob-W6NS121-2013">Activating Tinker Knob was fun with fantastic views</a>.
  • My SOTAWatch spots.
  • RBN spots.
  • Logbook page 1. There was a minor geomagnetic storm going on while I was operating and the bands were noisy. The K index was at 4. There were no signals on 10, 12 or 15 meters but I called CQ on each of those bands for good measure. I was spotted once on 10m, but the spot was from N7TR's RBN skimmer down in Reno NV (ground wave).
  • Logbook page 2. I checked SolarHam.com while I was on the summit and wrote down the solar-terrestrial data along the left margin. My only summit-to-summit contact was with Fred WS0TA (a.k.a. KT5X) who was down in New Mexico on W5N/PW-006 (Santa Fe Baldy).
  • Logbook page 3, including my only DX contact with JA4DND who called in on 17m. I wasn't expecting to make many more contacts, so I used the back of a page so as to conserve pages (these most excellent logbooks from Adventure Radio are out of print and I'm now on my last one). Naturally, since I didn't plan to make many more contacts, I made a bunch. :-)<br /> <br /> 33 QSOs overall, thanks to everyone who called in today!
  • Solar-terrestrial data that I screen captured after getting home in the afternoon.
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