This was a long and full weekend, the radio part of which actually began while still at work on the Friday! Jimmy 2E0EYP joined me in my classroom in Stoke-on-Trent as this week's visiting radio amateur to my Radio Enrichment class, who are studying the Foundation Licence course.  Jimmy and I then set off south for Milton Keynes, arriving at Horwood House hotel in good time. We had a good time dining, drinking and socialising at the MLS Welcome Buffet, before retiring to our twin room for much needed rest ahead of our first presentation.

   

For we were in the first slot, a 9.30am start for our general presentation about Summits on the Air. To our surprise, this basic introduction to SOTA was still in demand, and we attracted a decent sized audience who wanted to find out more and have their questions answered about the programme.  If anyone wants to see the presentation, or save a copy to edit/customise it, here it is:

http://prezi.com/-h4r0ax4vadn/sota-summits-on-the-air/?res_nr=2&sis=2825753144

We then both went to the T32C presentation, and then separated as Jimmy went to see about the HK0NA DXpedition, while I went to the Trainers Forum. We joined Ken GM0AXY, Christine GM4YMM and John GW4BVE for lunch, before spending some of the afternoon time operating the Yaesu demonstration station including an FT5000.  In the late afternoon session, we went to the presentation about the Rockall DXpedition, which appeared to be daring to the point of lunacy! The evening was taken up with the DX Gala Dinner, in which the food was first class. We were drinking in the bar with a certain G3WGV until well past midnight, until we remembered that we were first on again on the Sunday morning - so had really better go to bed!

Sunday morning 14th October 2012 came around, and after a cooked breakfast we needed to set up quickly as we were on first again - this time at 9am! We had a large room, which was nearly full, for our new talk about the developments and achievements in the last year or so of SOTA. It was good to see many familiar faces from SOTA activating and chasing in there.  Again, this presentation is available to be viewed online, or save a copy to edit/customise it, here it is:

http://prezi.com/h0ncptfeqklr/sota-summits-on-the-air/?res_nr=1&sis=2825753144
[NB: There is a lot of media content embedded in this presentation. It may take a few minutes to fully load on older PCs].

   

We were then free to enjoy the rest of the Convention howsoever we wished, so I went to the HK0NA talk on Jimmy's glowing recommendation, and then later to the Contest Forum. At the start of lunch, we met as arranged with John G3WGV for the final piece of the jigsaw - to get SOTA's illustrious Founder and President - to do his first SOTA activation for 7.5 years!  To his credit, John did not try to escape. He followed us up the M1 and around the back roads to Vercor Close, Coalville, the unlikely suburban start point for a SOTA activation.

   

It was a familiar walk for Jimmy and I, but a first-time unique for John. We ambled through the field and wooded area before cutting uphill by the quarry face edge. We turned right at the transmitters and through some trees to the summit, marked by a trig point, jutting out high above the surrounding quarry.  Jimmy 2E0EYP did 2m FM as usual, making 13 QSOs. John G3WGV did 40m and 30m CW, making 23 contacts. I went for 20m CW and made 24 QSOs including two into North America. After descending and bidding farewells, it was time to go home at the end of a long but productive weekend.

       

Thanks to everyone that came to one or both of the SOTA talks at the RSGB Convention, and thanks to all the chasers that worked any of the three activators on Bardon Hill G/CE-004.