Boboyan Range VK/AC-044 - Epic road trip!
/It has been a long time between SOTA outings!
After almost no activating in a long while, I decided to put a little project radio I had been playing with, the Chinese clone USDR radio from AliExpress. After some work to get it aligned, I decided it needed an on-air outing.
Not having been to many Namadgi summits post the 2019/2020 fires that tore through much of the national park, I wanted to return to one of my favourites, Boboyan Range, AC-044. Located on top of a flat eucalypt plateau, accessed by working the contour lines filled with black wattle and other calf and ankle-poking foliage entirely off-track, navigating to the summit requires bush bashing and a keen eye on the GPX GPS track.
Finding the little rock cairn that has been added to by consecutive activators nestled amongst the juvenile gums, I wanted to mark the exact location for the future.
Setting up on my blue tarp, running a linked 20/40m end fed antenna with a QPRGuys 40-10 EFHW tuner with the long wire thrown over a hanging branch, set up could not be lighter or more simple.
Andrew VK1DA was located on a nearby summit, Mt Livingston VK2/ST-093 I was able to test the USDR’s inbuilt CW decoder - video below
The ‘other’ Andrew, VK1AD was also able to offer a summit to summit contact, located on Mt Stromlo, VK1/AC-043 and he recorded the following exchange to capture the audio quality that he received
With the K Index in the toilet, I was still happy to work more than enough stations to qualify the summit, with reports as far as the South Island of New Zealand
Following the activation and spending almost an hour on the summit, my walking compainion and I packed up and headed back to the car, thankful for the downhill run. Finding the car in the small culvet that we had left it, we headed off to the Mt Clear campground for refreshments. Continuing a short distance south on Boboyan road to the historic Brayshaws Hut.
The original plan was to continue south, stopping again at Adaminaby before doubling back to Coooma and home via the Monaro Highway. Immediately after leaving Boboyan Road where it meets the Snowy Mountain Highway, we encountered a road closure due to a tragic truck accident that had occurred approx 90 mins prior in which the truck crashed and caught fire. This meant the road home would be closed for the foreseeable future. Deciding to turn west we headed towards Tumut. Not before visiting the big trout at Adaminaby.
Dropping down the mountain pass and entering the hydo hamlet of Talbingo we encoutered 2 Emu on the side of the road, grasing in the falling dusk.
A lovely day trip out to test out the USDR turned into an 11-hour, 500km excursion taking in many unplanned sights, as captured by my APRS track from my Kenwood 710 mounted in my car.
