While on my “mini-moon” the weekend after my wedding, I was able to sneak away from the Arizona Biltmore resort while my wife was at a yoga class to get on a satellite pass from the DM33/DM43 grid line. Luckily, we had a rental car, and there was a good public trail access point where the grid line crossed only about 15 minutes away. Even better was that I could park within 50 yards of a good operating spot!
I got there about thirty minutes before the pass to find a nice parking lot at the trailhead with a bunch of cars. I jumped out with the GPS, found the grid line, and went back to the car to get set up. I was able to find a spot that was clear of brush not far from the car but off the trail and decided to make that my spot. I planned to get on a 14 degree maximum elevation ISS pass to the northeast. There is plenty of significant terrain this area, so I knew the beginning and end of the pass would be obstructed for a few degrees.
For this operation, I used my Kenwood TH-D74 as the downlink (my standard) and a Baofeng K5PLUS, which is a decent 10W radio, for the uplink alongside the trust Arrow Antenna. The Baofeng is a bit clunky to use as you’d expect (and lately has been randomly shutting off and requiring the battery to be removed and reinstalled which is annoying), but for these trips where radio is not the main focus, I prefer to travel lighter this way. I simply hold the transmitting radio and put my receiving radio on a lanyard around my neck instead of bringing my larger camera bag-based chest rig with the Yaesu FT-817. This FM-onnly setup is pretty small and comfortably fits in my carry on without consuming much space.
The pass was typical for a Saturday morning ISS pass – busy! I was easily able to make it in and put five QSOs in the log, though. I almost made a sixth, but wasn’t able to squeeze it out in the end. After the pass, I quickly tore down, hopped in the car, and met my wife back at the resort for lunch. Neither DM33 or DM43 are rare, but if you’re in the Phoenix area and looking for a good spot to hang out on the grid line and work a few passes, I would recommend this spot just north of Piestewa Peak. Just be mindful of the obstructions for low passes!
