Saturday’s Operating Location at Wilson State Park
As I’ve done previously, I decided to do a joint POTA activation with my Expedition station for the Kansas QSO Party. This allows me an opportunity to knock out a satellite POTA, have a good operating spot with restrooms and electricity, and reserve a location that I can depend on being available.
I outlined in my earlier post about my plans that I would spend Saturday at Wilson State Park after camping there the night before and then head to an Airbnb for the night before heading to the Chase/Morris/Marion county corner which I have used in previous years for the event. This mostly played out as expected. I arrived at the park early enough Friday night that I was able to hop on two FM satellite passes and activate the park before the QSO party started.
SO-50 and AO-123 were fruitful with eight and three contacts, respectively. I consistently find AO-123 is underutilized and there were not many ops this night either. It was great to get these done so quickly since Saturday, as I would soon discover, would be challenging from a weather perspective. With my 11 contacts in the log (although only ten unique contacts), I packed up the satellite gear, set up my tent, and got ready for bed.
I didn’t sleep great, which was due to a combination of the high heat and increasing winds. By morning it was clear this day was not going to be an easygoing POTA operation. The heat came quickly at sunrise and the winds picked up to where there was a consistent 30+ mph wind all day with gusts. I brought a new Kelty shelter that is meant to use our vehicle as a support. This tent is a great option for me, but the wind really stressed it. I was constantly battling billowing side walls and material pulling and rubbing on the picnic table. But I couldn’t avoid it; the sun was just too hot without it. Later in the day, I tore it down and shifted my operation into my car for a couple hours where I could run the AC while still running a power cable for the radio to the campsite hookup.
In terms of radio operation, Saturday was considerably slower than in 2025. I initially focused on SSB as I planned and had some pileups at times, but switching to CW proved more fun. I spent much more time on CW than I expected I would. In terms of bands, 40m never really opened up for me even late in the day so it was mostly 20m and even that was not great. As I had a long drive ahead of me, I called it quits a little over an hour early that night and headed out. Overall, Saturday netted me 82 contacts on 40m – 63 SSB and 19 CW – and 181 on 20m – 94 on SSB and 87 CW, for a total of only 263.
Theodolite Screenshot from Wilson State Park
Sunday’s operating location was not new for me, but this year, I was excited to take my new Subaru Crosstrek down the minimum maintenance road to get there. Last year I had to abort the spot due to the heavy rains and my Honda Accord’s limited capabilities. I knew the Crosstrek would fare much better and even though it was dry this year, I was glad to have more clearance and all-wheel drive.
As far as operating at the corner, it was another windy day, although nothing like Saturday. I also did not see a single person at the corner this year (unlike the farmer who swung by a couple years ago). The giant 280 Ah LiFePO4 battery I brought only went down 20 percent or so during the six hours, which was a great test of it at near-contesting rates.
I didn’t try CW from the corner because I knew the exchange for a three-county spot would be a pain, so I stuck to SSB across 15m, 20m, and 40m. One of the highlights for me was working someone who was airborne mobile in a Cessna Citation. I briefly chatted with him about the avionics onboard as his plane was equipped with one of the systems I work on at Garmin. Always fun when flying and ham radio can intersect for me! I ended up making 30 contacts on 40m, 163 on 20m, and 11 on 15m. These of course each counted for three given my county corner spot. Also an interesting statistic is that I worked 193 unique call signs on Sunday across those 204 contacts.
Sunday’s Operating Location at Chase/Morris/Marion County Line
Although Sunday was much better in terms of contact rates and band conditions, this year had a notable decline in my overall score. At the time of writing, preliminary results show me considerably lower in rankings for Expedition stations as a club from Texas came up and operated several stations in my category that sat on county lines both days. The field seems competitive enough now that I probably need to forego a single-county location Saturday. Band conditions didn’t help either. I am also considering changing up my antenna setup, largely for more band flexibility since it was basically the same as last year. Perhaps I’ll give it a go in a different category too.