On Bank Holiday Monday 28th March 2005, Jimmy, Liam and myself observed Macclesfield Town FC gain a point against Boston United courtesy of a late equaliser, which no more crossed the line than Geoff Hurst's second "goal" in the 1966 World Cup Final did.  Following the match, we drove our pre-loaded car directly along the M56 and M53 to Birkenhead for the ferry crossing.  We have gone to Northern Ireland various ways in the past - Manchester to Belfast City Airport, Liverpool to Belfast International (Aldergrove) Airport, Cairnryan to Larne ferry amd the Heysham to Belfast ferry.  This was the best of the lot, with excellent food (3 course dinner and full breakfast) and comfortable en suite cabin.  I liked not having to drive a huge distance, having the convenience of my own car when I got there, and most of all, killing the journey time through eating and sleeping.

The only slight problem, was a technical one with the ship, which resulted in arriving in Belfast around 5 hours late on Tuesday 29th April 2005.  I was on board with my mobile, but had left Colin GI0RQK's numbers in the car!  We were due to meet Colin at 9am for a joint assault on Divis GI/AH-004, the mountain that stands tall over Belfast.  However, thankfully the 'phone rang, it was Colin, calling from the summit of Divis, wondering if he had missed me!  Colin decided to descend without activating, go home, and meet me at a later rearranged time to walk up jointly.

Although the maps indicate that the Ulster Way runs over Divis, the hill is not yet public access.  However, National Trust recently bought the land, and will open it to the public in August following work on fences, signs etc.  A series of emails and 'phone calls secured the necessary acceptance of our intentions.  We met at J267769, as suggested by Colin, and parked with agreement in a builder's yard there.

   

We followed in a SE direction around the western slopes of Divis, heading for the coll between Divis and Armstrongs Hill.  We picked up a decent track which provide some welcome relief from the boggy ground, and followed it up and then left until it petered out 68m (vertically) shy of the summit.  We ascended the remaining grassy banks until we were greeted by the hideous sight of the tall wire fences enclosing the MOD installations at the summit.  It was pretty foggy, so we couldn't see much of what was inside.  We walked around to the Belfast (East) side of the summit and set up by some rocks at the side of the tarmac access track which provided a little shelter from the cold easterly wind.

Then the trouble really started.  I put out my initial CQ call, to be suddenly greeted with a wall of S9+ jamming, reminiscent of the infamous "buzzer" on 4625kHz (is it still there?).  "Did I mention the blocker?" asked Colin, and things were looking bleak.  I tried calling on 70cm and 2m SSB, but the blocker found me within milliseconds wherever I went.  Apparently, there have been letters in Radcom from disgruntled GI amateurs about this thing.  The fog cleared, and we could see the full intimidating detail of the MOD installation behind us, with even moving cameras that appeared to be tracking our every move.  Perhpas the automated blocker was in there too.

Fortunately, there were stations on 2m that we could hear and work, although we had to work in microscopically small over lengths in order to keep the blocker's disruptions down to seconds at a time rather than minutes.  I qualified the summit with two Scottish stations, and three from Northern Ireland (including the legendary George GI4SRQ who had now worked me on all five on my GI-SOTA activations to date, including the four in 2003) to claim the first ever SOTA activation of Divis.  Colin then claimed the second with a couple of QSOs as I started to pack away.

The descent was more or less a retracing of the ascent.  We then drove over to Colin's QTH in Ballyclare for a cup of tea, and a look at his splendid collection of morse keys and paddles.  I am learning CW now, but I had never had a key or a paddle in my hand before, so I had a little play.  Realising exactly how a paddle works gave my confidence a huge boost, and the goal of being able to operate on CW looked that little bit closer.  We then drove from Ballyclare to my father-in-law's house in Larne where we were staying.  Perhaps unconventionally, Marianne was remaining in Macclesfield while Jimmy, Liam and myself stayed with her dad in Ireland, but we get on very well, and he greeted out arrival with two large plates of freshly roasted ham and chicken, and two large dishes of roast potatoes and roast parsnips.  Jimmy, Liam and myself devoured this most welcome feast, while my father-in-law (also called Jimmy) 'phoned Marianne and tried to stitch me up by telling her "...and these poor wairns are starving..."!

Thanks to the following stations, all worked on 2m FM with 2.5 watts: