QRPxpedition with a damselfly for an op?

'Let's see, is this the dah paddle or the dit paddle?' I offered to serve as control operator and let the damselfly have a go at a QSO, but it politely declined in favor of taking a tour of a new portable paddle I was breaking in.

I was born and raised in southern California, where folks justifiably bragged about being able to hit the beaches in the morning and the mountains in the afternoon. Of course, they meant afternoon of the next day, given LA’s traffic. But I that’s another story.

Folks here in the Bay State can come close to making the same statement, with some adjustments for traffic. Today’s QRPxpedition to activate Halibut Point State Park for the first time for Parks on the Air (POTA) highlights the briney end of that beach-to-mountain itinerary.

The oceanfront park, just north of Rockport, Mass., occupies a site that once served as a granite quarry, the quarry pit now a deep pond in the center of the 54-acre reserve. The park is joined at the hip to another 17 acres of state reservation. Wandering through the small Visitors Center prior to setting up my station, I was intrigued to learn that the point’s original name was Haul About Point — a moniker sailors pinned on the granite prominence in the heyday of sail. How it got from Haul About to Halibut? A “name that homonym” contest, maybe?

For World War 2 buffs, the site hosts a fire-control tower that was used to support coastal artillery.

The park's Visitors Center made good use of the artillery fire-control tower used during World War 2. The tower not only affords great views of the park. The New Hampshire coastline to the north is easy to track on a clear day.

I arrived at the park at about 11:00 a.m. with the nagging feeling that the coffee I drank on the way was demanding freedom.

Just my luck. The two, small, gender-specific restrooms in the Visitors Center had been commandeered by an untold — but from my desperate vantage point, significant —  fraction of 55 elderly women who had traveled from the Boston suburb of Newton on a chartered bus to take in the park.

What’s a guy to do but stand, chivalrously, legs tightly squeezed, until the last woman leaves the room marked Men? “Why, thank you, young man.” That’s how you know they are elderly — when they tag as  ”young” a man into his third 20-year tour and sporting a silver (or so my wife says) beard.

Relief, then station set-up, came at last: The increasingly familiar orange Jackite pole for antenna, if not moral, support. The FT-817ND, tuner, key, keyer, and paddles (yep, I switch back and forth between straight key and paddles).

I know I’m hardly the first to observe this, but each outing seems to add a bit of refinement to one’s operations.

A couple of for-instances:

For instance 1: I’m a big fan of the FT-817ND. But as it sits on a table as delivered, gets peg legs to lift the front (slightly), or rests on a riser made from a discarded CD case, its display is still tough to see.

So I said to myself: “Self,” says I, “Why not set it on top of the battery case you put together for the 7.2 amp-hour battery that powers this get-away special?”

“But it slides around up there,” I replied. (Note: The sign of senility is not when you talk to yourself; it’s when you talk to yourself and reply.)

“Well, how about using some nylon straps?” came the reply. A quick trip to the hardware store netted a pair of eight-foot straps, which I installed around the battery-radio stack, then trimmed to manageable lengths. And, so, we have this:

QRP stackers

For instance 2: I recently picked up a new set of mini paddles to go with my “mint” keyer. The damselfly at the top of the page is sitting on the new paddles. Now, the paddles have a slick feature — a base into which the paddles slide. Mount that base onto the Altoids-tin keyer, and you get this:

N0SA's TIP-1 mini paddle with its base mounted on my portable-station electronic keyer.

Which becomes this:

The TIP-1 mounted on the keyer -- and at a better height for working the paddles. Part of the inspiration for this came from a photo I'd seen of a Rock Mite QRP rig, built and modified by Bob Leach, AF2Q, with what looked like an American Morse Equipment Porta Paddle affixed to the top.

The paddles are now at a better height for my hands, the keyer buttons are right at hand, and the paddle can be removed and stowed separately — and carefully — when it comes time to stuff the station back into my lumbar pack. Works for me.

As for the contacts? Five, count ‘em, five, in three hours and 10 minutes. The bands were awful. With the same set-up, I had bagged six contacts in the first hour of operation at the Blue Hills State Reservation on Monday, and with time to spare for chats with visitors. Today, one could run up and down the bands and hear virtually no one.

That’s not necessarily a bad thing, if you have all day. I didn’t. My wife needed the car by time certain.  I had to factor the two-plus-hour drive home into my operating plans. Thank heavens for K4ZLE, who answered my CQ just as I was about to pack up for the day. He was contact No. 5, the final one needed to qualify the park for POTA.

For the record, the hale and hearty few who answered the calls today include:

N4EX — North Carolina — 20 meters (Rich is another POTA ham)

K0ZK — Maine — 20 meters

W4MPS — North Carolina — 20 meters (We exchanged howdies when I was on Mt. Holyoke last week)

N4DSP — North Carolina — 20 meters (a fellow user of Xlog, logging software for Linux)

K4ZLE — Ohio — 20 meters (who capped the day as a success)

Yeah, there’s definitely a Midwest/North Carolina thing going on here. Now, where’s my barbecue??

CORRECTION: In the original post, I misidentified the bug in the top photo. I have been informed that the attractive bug is a damselfly. My apologies to both dragonflies and damselflies in the hope that neither was insulted. And thanks to KD5ONS for pointing out the difference.