WQ6X Runs a randomly reasonable Winter Radiosport Weekend

The 3rd weekend in December brings a trio of radiosport GiGs.

• [X] - The OK DX RTTY Contest
• [X] - The Canadian RAC Winter Contest - run QRP
• [X] - The Croatian (9A) DX Contest

You'll notice that I struck out the RTTY contest, as I was unable to make it work this year.

Having access to STN-1 in Anza (WA6TQT) makes for more satisfying QRP runs - Ops are
frequently surprised to know I'm running QRP - the strength of QRP signals from Anza surprise
even me.

As it turns out operating logistics made it not possible to run the RTTY contest, leaving more time
to focus on running mixed-mode QRP in the Canadian Winter contest followed by the 9A Croatian contest after the Canadians wind things down.  Because running Cw saves my voice, the decision was made to run mostly Cw, taking the opportunity to search for Ssb multipliers on Saturday afternoon.

Except when looking for Dx stations, the stacked arrays at WA6TQT were almost overkill. 
Considering the weird Space-WX conditions, it was amazing to encounter openings to Europe
on 40-meters (and even on 80-meters Saturday evening).  The disappointment was lack of JA
and Caribbean activity - even KH6 was notably lacking during the weekend (maybe they were
playing around on RTTY).

After 2.5 hours running remote from my Alameda office, the trip was made to Concord to continue operations there.  By 08:00z most N. American Ops were sleeping soundly, encouraging me to join them.  A brief run at 10:53z for an hour put a handful of VE & JA stations in the log.  Then just as quickly it was again quiet, sending me back to bed.  

At 18:00z 10-meters seemed to be open, but not for long.  When 10-meters dissolved into oblivion, moving down to 15-meters and 20-meters when there was no one new on 15.   Time was split between the S&P operations and running frequencies.  Eventually my QRP signal would get moved in on so I would find another "clear" frequency and doit all over again.  When the run-rate dropped to near zero, it was
time to look for S&P mults on Ssb in order to
rightfully claim running a mixed-mode operation.

At the 00:00z RAC contest end, the focus shifted
from USA & Canada to Europe (as well as the rest
of the world).  Amazingly, thanks to a pair of stacked yagi's, Europe was already being heard by 00:30z on 40-meters in Anza.  Except for 9A (Croatian) stations, the contest exchange is a serial #, which can be tricky during marginal reception moments.  Using well defined N1MM function key definitions make it relatively easy to send repeats and/or brief queries.

As the evening progressed, 80-meters and even 160 were scouted for Q&D (Quick and Dirty) contacts - every 2-points add up.  While running 80/160 meters, the challenge was to play with antenna directions to discover the best signal paths - something sometimes not so obvious.

Making things more difficult as the evening progressed were frequent 1-second internet dropouts.  Even if your signal was S9+, if your callsign (or number) got "clipped", a repeat was necessary.  Occasionally the dropout would last 10 - 20 seconds, confusing everyone.  By 08:30z, EU was
waking up and fading out in North America.

With 20-meters not yet open, the 9A DX contest was effectively over.  At least WQ6X made it into
over 100 logs.  According to N1MM statistics, nearly 7-hours was spent running the 9A GiG while
over 10 hours was spent chasing Canadians.

DiD YOU work the 9ADX or Canadian Winter contests?

Is WQ6X in YOUR Log?