SOTA Mt Elliot VK2/HU-093

After activating Mt Alexandra near Mittagong drove North through Sydney, then onto the Newcastle Freeway and turned off for Mt Elliot. The temperature rose considerably as I headed North and got lower down, 10 c at Mittagong it got up to 20 c in Sydney and was a pleasant 19c on Mt Elliot.

This is a very SOTA friendly operating summit with a large open area with picnic tables in the activation zone. Picked a table with a couple of convenient trees nearby and set up the station.

SOTA shack on the table. Very comfortable

Go to 40 m. VK1, VK2, VK3 and VK4s coming in well, the QSB earlier on Mt Alexandra not so bad here. Strong signals from nearby VK2s such as Adam VK2YK in nearby Newcastle. Tried 20 m briefly, some EU DX in but no replies. Tried 30 m briefly just to make sure my antenna worked on this band, loaded up ok but no replies. Packed up. Before leaving had a look at the nearby lookout, good view over the coast.

SOTA Mt Elliot VK2/HU-093

After activating Middle Brother drove South on the Pacific Highway, past Newcastle, turning off to The Entrance town for the night.

In the morning drove to Mt Elliot. I had worked this summit many times as a chaser and was curious to see what it looked like. It is located at the end of Toomeys Rd in the Gosford suburb of Mt Elliot.
Drove to the end, as pointed out in activators blogs a communications tower and a private house there.

The activation zone is fairly large, and covers Katandra Reserve, with picnic tables. There are some walks here, I took Toomey Walk to walk out of and back into the 25 m activation zone.

Some nice ferny forest. Heading back up to the picnic area.

Set up on one of the picnic tables. Used a rubbish bin stand for one dipole leg

The other end tied to a tree. Plenty of space here.

Shack on the picnic table. Nice and comfy for a change...

Got on 40 m. As a Saturday and now not that far North lots of contacts, from VK1, VK2 and VK3. A S2S with VK2BJP/3 on VK3/VE-007 Mt McKay. Spoke to some of the locals who have activated here, VK2YK Adam ,VK2IO Gerard. This summit has had 30 activations previously so pretty popular...

As had a tough drive through hectic Sydney to get home didn't linger, packed up after 16 contacts.