Boxing Day, Monday 26th December 2011, and the next 5am get-up for Jimmy M3EYP and Tom M1EYP. The whole idea of these 5am get-ups while on holiday is to be able to do a SOTA activation and still be back at the accommodation for around 10am, and therefore not impacting upon other family activities.  This time the target was Slemish, the steep sided volcano that was the "works QTH" of a certain shepherd now known as St Patrick. Every way up Slemish involves hand-to-rock, so tackling it in darkness was going to be interesting. We arrived in the windy car park at around 6.45am, and donned headtorches and packs.

   

We had studied the forecast for gales, and were prepared therefore for a 2m handheld only operation on the very exposed summit. The other kit was carried as back-up, even though we weren't sure there would be any sheltered spot to erect it.  We climbed the relatively steep grassy slopes towards the volcano plug. But note I do say "relatively" - for it soon gets a whole lot steeper! We avoided the normal initial ascent route, which is a very steep and rather strenuous scramble. Instead, we wandered around towards the western end in order to pick a marginally more graded line upwards. It still required a bit of hand-to-rock and a couple of big steps though!

Once on the summit ridge, we were greeted by the awesome force of the gales. I would say that this was pretty close to the limit in terms of safety. But just the right side of that limit, so we pressed on, carefully. We reached the summit, but continued over to look for shelter. This was found under some rocks beside the summit, and we sat here and rested while we decided what to do next.

       

It was 0730 UTC, still dark, and there was no way that any antennas would remain standing and undamaged in that wind. So the first strategy was to try a HH+RD activation. Calls were tried by both of us on 2m and 70cm FM, but to no avail. The lack of early morning Belfast commuters was apparent. A bit of morning light began to poke through, and we could survey the scene for further operating possibilities. Bingo! Just a few feet from where we were, the land dropped sharply by about ten feet to a small grassy ledge that would take Jimmy and a SOTA Beam. It then dropped another 7 or 8 metres to a grassy area that would take me and a 40m dipole. But best of all, is that both spots were well sheltered from the wind by the main summit area. Thank goodness for that 25m activation zone concept!

As usual, the time it took Jimmy MI3EYP/P to gather his four contacts, was about the same as it took me to work 34 QSOs and clear my frequency. But that was the nice easy bit - we had the steep descent to follow. Many thanks to all callers. I finished packing away just as Jimmy was about to start, so I commenced my descent knowing that he would catch me up before the car park!

   

Walking back down the ridge the wind was even more intense. I felt grateful for my body mass, but feared that my lightweight son might be taken for an impromptu flight! Clambering down the sections of wet rocks and greasy peat was less then pleasant, but then the flatter grassy section from the volcano plug to the car park was worse, with both of us slipping and falling at some stage. Back at the car park, radio station Q107 from Ballymena (formerly Seven FM) was noted on the car radio.

We returned to the holiday apartment in Ballygally around 10am, and were served with blue stilton on soda bread and a mug of tea by Marianne - delicious. The family activity today was a tour of the north east Antrim coast. This is a stunning drive in itself, but augmented with a walk up to Torr Point and a super lunch in Ballycastle. We then enjoyed a stunning walk along a rather violent North Atlantic Ocean to the famous rope bridge, and then another to the even more famous Giant's Causeway. The towering waves that exploded against the tight tessellation of hexagonal prisms of basalt were almost as terrifying as the gales that thundered across the summit ridge of Slemish that morning!