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*              ATGP 2019 Report for COMERS Rock by Kevin, KJ4OAP         75
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Tried to beat the heat by getting up high, but the heat surely followed me 
to Comers Rock.  Great day though with no rain and/or lightning.  This year 
Kevin (KJ4OAP) captain'ed the station with great setup support from Charlie 
(K4FF) and Susan (K4TIG).  It was great to link up with them again though 
the last time I saw them it was under much different circumstances (a story 
for another time).  These two still have a cabin a couple of miles from the 
Rock and were gracious on helping carry up (too much) equipment to the 
platform at the top.  Here is the station log:

~9:45am: Arrival to "parking lot" turn around by KJ4OAP, 2 minutes later 
joined by K4FF and K4TIG as had a quick talk-in with them.  2 up and down 
trips later and most of the gear was on the summit. (Made a run back down 
for my leatherman and the solar panel afterwards.

~10:45am: First setup with D-710, easy contact with N4AZR (Glenn) on Roan-3 
on VHF and UHF at low power setting.  Also easy contact with WG3K (Eric) on 
AOMTN-5 on low power setting.  Eric even logged our QSO as a summit-to-
summit on SOTA (something I really want to get into when I'm able to get 
out hiking/backpacking more).

~11:15am: "Full" station setup including solar panel connected to primary 
battery (2nd 35 Ah battery was never used).  Also thankfully brought along 
a 10'x10' pop-up canopy that I was able to tie down to the platforms fence.  
This was most needed to beat the heat as well as relief from the sun as 
there's no shade nearby this summit.

~12:30pm: Noted Roan-3 needed to go QRT for lightning

~12:45pm: I had been watching a good rain shower slowly creep south across 
the valley towards my mountain for about an hour.  About this time, I 
estimated it may hit my mountain within 15 minutes, so I started to prep 
for getting wet on the summit.  In the process of pulling my tarp out of 
the tote I was using as a table, the D-710's control head rolled off the 
lid and cracked the glass in the display (see picture).  Now couldn't see 
part of the right half of the screen.  Doh!

1:06pm: Heard stations all the way north to Mt. Washington.  (Didn't log 
too much more on activities here as I probably should have, but in general 
didn't have too much of problems switching baud rates and hearing anyone.  
If anything, when a bulletin would come across, I would have to have Roan 
or AOMTN relay the message on UHF due to not being able to read part of 
the screen.)

3:10pm: Didn't get anything over the air, but checked e-mail via phone 
(tried not to do so very much to enjoy the view more than my phone screen) 
and noted to start securing station.  I still left the radio in the same 
setup as I thought Roan-3 was just qrt for a little bit and was going to 
try to come back.  After a while, figured he'd shut down after seeing 
the e-mail.

~3:30pm: To try to have some fun playing APRS games, tried seeing what 
I could do for trying to setup a temporary digipeater on the summit.  
Switched the TNC freq back to '4.390 and changed some settings back to 
how they were, but I don't think I was really digi-peating anything.  
I was mostly curious as I've been wondering how well a few digipeaters 
could increase coverage in our area.

3:52pm: Radio shutdown
4:31pm: Station secured and on the road

Follow-up summary:
I'd followed along the Golden Packet event for a number of years ever 
since my colleague Zach (KJ4QLP) was manning this station a number of 
years ago.  Usually the timing didn't work out well for me, but this 
year it was fairly good timing (and I had all the necessary gear with 
the purchase of a used D-710 last fall).  Like others, at the end I did 
get beacon reports in from all of the stations, but I didn't understand/
know what the actual Golden packet was.  This was my first time ever 
to Comers Rock, so I wasn't totally sure what to expect and brought a 
little much on gear/equipment.

Before my screen cracked (and even some after it did), I had a lot of 
fun sending messages via APRS to my neighboring stations.  I also 
wasn't sure if it was kosher to try to send ones to far away stations 
(I think I sent one to Mt. Washington once I got it in), but I usually 
was sending in words of encouragement/signal report.

Otherwise, since the link to Roan and Apple Orchard from this station 
is easy enough, if I did it again, I'd like to explore a location 
that's actually nearer to the AT (if not pretty much on it).  I've 
hiked a good section of the AT in Virginia (actually passed Apple 
Orchard, so I know what that peak looks like) and have a few ideas on 
places it could be.  Of course, it this was agreeable for the group 
and still seemed like good link between the 2 directions.

Also, very interesting that this event overlapped some with the CQ WW 
6m/2m contest. I was able to give out a few QSOs for that, but not as 
much as I thought.

73 and GL!

-Kevin, KJ4OAP