Its been awhile since my last writing. I want to make an effort to do it more often. After every hiking, every activation, there are so many lessons learned. I really need to start #1 actually learning from said lessons and #1 writing them down so I don’t forget them.

2 years ago Hannah and I hiked this summit. Its about a 2 hour car ride from Hayward and her car is more gas efficient so we usually take her car. This year we decided to come back. Much has changed in two years. Friendships fall apart, I got married and became a paramedic with a job in that time. Ill keep it short and sweet this time and maybe ill change the format later.

#1: Leave early. like 5am.

This is my fault. I asked her to pick me up at 6 and she did, but I had not transferred everything from by day pack to the backpacking backpack since I wanted to take the buddiepole with me. There were a few items that I found were missing (more on that later) and It took me 45min to get ready and finally get on the road. Also, the earlier you leave the more radio time you could potentially have.

#2 Bring water (Not just for me)

This is my second offense. My hike before this I ran out of water once I reached the peak (or close to but not close enough but anyway whatever) so this hike I brought the same 3L camelpak. The danger with this is, unless you look at your pack its harder to keep track of how much water you consume. Hannah had brought 3 bottles and ran out when she got to the top. I gave her one of my 3 liters and eneded up running out after 3/4 of the hike. ****Bring water not just for myself but an extra bottle as a just in case for me, or another hiker.

#3 Audio recording is a must

One of the missing items was the brand new audio recorder. I still don’t know where it went. But some alternatives could have been the go pro or my phone. Which leads my to the next point.

#4 Check the storage level on your phone and don’t overheat it.

I started recording video on my phone since it was the only on-the-fly way i could record the audio of my CW. Since i suck at it. I usually write what i can make out on a piece of paper and write the time and double check when I get home. Well the phone was in full sun, overheated and or recorded the first 5min of the activation. This is not the first overheating issue ive head. Last activation it was the my mcHF radio that reached 148 degrees before it wouldn’t transmit anymore in order to protect itself. Once I got the phone cool enough, I didn’t have enough storage to record anyway.

#5 make a list

This one seems time consuming and I think ill remember everything. I won’t. I left the 2m J-pole at home and one of the 3 handhelds ended up being dead anyway. Most of the items to the HF station are crucial. Any one missing part of it could turn my activation into a 2m only activation.