Sunday 24th June 2018

After our activation of Jersey's highest point, Les Platons GJ/JE-001, we made our way to St Helier for the ferry crossing to St Peter Port.         

We drove straight up to Guernsey Airport and took some photos on the grass mound in front of the terminal building, believed to be the "summit"!  That would not have been a good place from which to activate though.  We'd had a tip that a better place was on some rough ground behind the airport on which he'd been able to establish that it was OK to do some amateur radio.  So we drove round there and took a very short walk onto the grass behind the airfield perimeter fence.

The only problem with this location was that it was a bit of a pollen trap right in the middle of peak hayfever season, so Jimmy and I both suffered somewhat!  The radio stuff was all OK though, and we both qualified the summit.  Jimmy was pleased because he managed to do so exclusively on 2m FM, something he always aspires to do!  I was on 20m CW.  We didn't do a particularly long activation as we needed to find and check in at the hotel, plus we knew we would be activating the same summit again a couple of days later.

That night we enjoyed a bit of a pub crawl around St Peter Port, taking in a Thai restaurant for supper.  We managed to annoy the regulars at the Dorset Arms pub by putting three John Shuttleworth records on the jukebox!  That night we stayed at the Marton Hotel, situated on one of the narrow steep streets up out of the town centre.

The following morning, we headed down to the harbour in St Peter Port to arrange some long stay car parking, and catch the passenger ferry over to Sark.  Our next activation would be on that island's highest point - Le Moulin GU/GU-001.

Tuesday 26th June 2018

We returned to the rough grassy land behind the airport, where we had activated from two days earlier.  This was simple, and undisturbed.

       

I tried an activation on 5MHz in order to give an opportunity to my SOTA friends in the UK mainland to work me, but it didn't really work out.  The band was noisy and not propagating well.  I made just five QSOs.  Jimmy persevered on 2m FM, making just a single contact.

The day was set to improve though.  As we returned to St Peter Port, we were still well ahead of schedule.  We discovered an outdoor seawater swimming pool on the front there - which was free and open for anyone to use.  l couldn't resist taking a dip, so went to change into my swimming shorts.  The pool was absolutely lovely, and I had a fantastically enjoyable swim.  Finally, it was time to board the ferry, and we sailed to Poole, Dorset.

       

From Poole, we headed to Uffculme in Devon, where we were booked in for the night.  The next SOTA activation would be the following day on Christ Cross G/DC-005.