SOTA Arthurs Seat VK3/VC-031

Arthurs Seat is a mountain on the Mornington Peninula that I am very familiar with, having grown up in Mordialloc and my parents had a weekend place at nearby Shoreham. As a CBer and ham would often pop up there to chase DX in the 1980's. Was interested to see how it had changed.

From my overnight stay in Frankston took the Mornington Peninsula Freeway, turning off at Dromana, onto Arthurs Seat Road. You really can't miss it as the mountain is very obvious, and there are tourist signs directing you to the summit. Drove to the top and parked near the picnic area. Walked over to have a look at the summit. Sign for Arthurs Seat, 305 m high.

In the past there was a lookout tower nearby here, this was gone...Also the old chairlift was gone, although still a restaurant on the top as was in the past, the new one looked a bit fancier.

Arthurs Seat's seat :)

Sign on the seat.

There were some picnic tables nearby but didn't operate from here as I knew there would be heaps of RF interference from the nearby towers. So returned to the picnic area, after a stroll down the hill to leave and reenter the activation zone set up the squid pole on a picnic table in the park.

Had to use my pack and some items to pack out the bottom of the squid pole at the base of the seat so it was vertical. Even so the wind threatened to topple the pole now and then, so had to sit near it and grab it when about to fall over.

Shack on the table.

Got on 40 m. Unfortunately a solar storm was on, knocking out most of the close by NVIS signals. Struggled to work Ron VK3AFW not that far away in Melbourne. After a while the band picked up, managed to work an S2S with Andrew VK1DA/2 on VK2/SW-027 Mt Tumorama. He wasn't too strong.

11 Stations worked, 4 before rollover.

23:50z VK5WG 7MHz SSB s57 r55
23:53z VK5PAS 7MHz SSB s55 r58
23:57z VK3AFW 7MHz SSB s57 r32
23:58z VK2YW 7MHz SSB s58 r52
00:10z VK3UH 7MHz SSB s52 r51
00:26z VK3RV/5 7MHz SSB s58 r55
00:33z VK5EE 7MHz SSB s58 r54
00:49z VK2IO 7MHz SSB s53 r55
00:50z VK1DA/2 7MHz SSB s53 r53 s2s vk2/sw-027
00:52z VK3PF 7MHz SSB s58 r52
00:53z VK5BJE 7MHz SSB s52 r52

Tried 20 m with no luck. Gave it away around noon as several family picnic groups had arrived and were eyeing off my picnic table...

This activation was rather special, as it was the 100th summit activated that I have also chased, meaning I can apply for the 100 SOTA Complete Summit Award.

A sign nearby indicated the park was in Arthurs Seat State Park

I wondered if this park counted for WWFF award purposes. Looked it up later, the park is VKFF-0750. Checked the park boundaries, the picnic area is within the park.

On the way down the hill stopped at Murrays Lookout, good view South down the Mornington Peninsula towards Port Philip Bay entrance.

A memorial to the naming of Arthurs Seat by Lieut John Murray nearby, he named the mountain  after a hill in Edinburgh Scotland.