Frost Road Park

The week looked like it would be a bust for getting out and activating a park. The first few days looked wet and the end of the week frozen. Neither condition is one where I would enjoy sitting outside operating a radio for an hour. Come Tuesday morning the expected rain was replaced with cloudy skies where the sun was breaking through. It wasn’t overly cold, so I called Ralph and he agreed to join me in a quest for a new park to activate. There are still a number in north Surrey we haven’t gone to so I selected one that would be an easy drive and then waited for Ralph to arrive at 12:30.

We made good time along the roads and were soon parking alongside the park. We were at the opposite end of the park from the school and here there is a nice grassy area with scattered trees and a kid’s playground. We went for a short walk along the paved walks to scout out spots where we would operate. I chose a location near the car where there was a park bench. Ralph selected a spot on a small rise next to the school’s playing field. As I was setting up my gear, a class of kids was doing a run around the park along the pathway. They seemed a bit surprised to find me there with my set up but only one asked a brief question. Once done raising the antenna and laying out the radio itself, I went to attach the power cord to my radio. As I removed the cord from its bag, I ended up with the cable separating from the plug end. It needed a quick patch if I was to get the radio going. As I was starting to rummage through my kit, I remembered I had another power cord attached to the noise filter unit which I wasn’t using at this site. So, I borrowed that cord and powered up the radio.

For today’s adventure I decided to start on the 15m band as it seems to be working out quite well for me. I scanned the list of active parks but found only a couple and I could hear neither though a few stations trying to reach them came in strong at my location. That at least was encouraging and so I chose a frequency and started calling. It was a slow start but then I got a number of stations responding, the strength reports were all mediocre. The propagation for the day was not as solid as some days had been lately. A few chaps reported that the band was very variable today with lots of fading. I continued on and after around 20 minutes of active calling Ralph called to see how I was doing he had enough in his log book I was only at 8 so we decided to keep going another 15 minutes. Soon I had 3 more completed contacts.

As I now had enough contacts, I decided I could take some time to try other bands. I moved to the 12m band and spotted myself and then started calling. I got another three in the log including one of my regulars – Dave from London Ontario. He said he couldn’t hear me on 15m but on 12m we could just barely hear each other. He has never activated any parks but has contacted operators in over 9000 parks! I got him in the log and gave him another park! I then tried the 10m band. It looked a bit iffy on the propagation charts but one never knows. After awhile of calling, I still had nothing and Ralph called to say he was packing up. I continued a bit longer and then a station from Quebec came in loud and clear! I managed to get him logged just before I shutdown. I packed the radio and lowered the antenna and was just about done as Ralph arrived back at my spot. We loaded the gear into the cart and made the short walk back to the car.

It had been a good activation we both ended with 15 logged contacts! The second time in a row we had the same number. Though the sun came and went during our time at the park it was still cool enough and the windy that we were both feeling a little chilled. I asked the navcom for the list of nearby Starbucks. There was one just under a kilometer away and one we had never visited before – a second adventure for us. So, we made for it and navigated its oddly arranged parking lot. There was one table open when we arrived and I quickly grabbed it. Now we could relax in the warmth with a hot drink. It felt good getting out last moment when we thought we would be trapped indoors for the week.