Tuesday 18 September 2012

Chilicon 2012–A Resounding Success

The annual Chilicon put on by the Ottawa Valley QRP group turned out to be a resounding success despite torrential rainfall on Friday night. This didn’t dampen those hardy campers from fulfilling a superb fun filled weekend at the Rideau River Park along the beautiful Rideau River near Kemptville.

I operated by small portable station, an FT-817, my NUE-PSK digital qrp modem, and my experimental version 0.06 St. Louis vertical (construction article coming up in my next posting here). Didn’t get as much operating done due to the nature of amateur radio ops being out in the wild. Most of the day encompassed walking around to various sites rag chewing with the various operators and admiring the ingenuity of their portable setups. There was some very nice equipment and innovative antennas and Mike’s (VE3WMB) homebrewed magnetic loop gave me a few ideas for one of my own. I managed to work a station in Slovenia with 2 watts out to my St. Louis Vertical, so it’s doing a very good job of getting out for a hastily constructed portable antenna.

I met some old friends at Chilicon this year as well as many new faces and I do hope that next year’s Chillycon (renamed due to lack of actual chili, but aptly re-badged to reflect the frigid night temperatures endured by the hardy group this year and last.)

Here are a few photos that I managed to take in between operating and chatting with the QRP members.

© Bob Baillargeon OV-QRP Weekend-0869

Eric VA3AMX with K2

Graham

Graham VE3GTC 817 stand

Michael VE3WMB

Michel and his Flex1500

pat VE3EUR

VE3CLQ1

VE3CLQ2

An excellent weekend despite rain on Friday and a little on Saturday. The weekend culminated with some very large excellent pizzas from a local restaurant in Kemptville.

Conspicuous by his absence was Martin VA3SIE who had to work and we’re hoping to see him next year. Martin, there was an excellent cache of single malt scotches at one of the campsites if that’s any enticement for attending next year’s “Chillycon”.

The OV-QRP Yahoo group can be found here for more details on this year’s Chilicon.

2 comments:

recumbent conspiracy theorist said...

Nice post and great photos! Looks like a good time.

73 - Mike - W8MDE

Bob VE3MPG said...

Mike, thank you for your nice comment. Had a look at your piece of the web and really like the direction of your blog - especially the documenting of the old school houses in your area of the United States. Again thank you for the comment and reading my blog.

73 Bob VE3MPG