WWFF: OH1NOA/P OHFF-0170 Haapakeitaan soidensuojelualue
My 4th OHFF-activation was to OHFF-0170. It is in Finnish called Haapakeitaan soidensuojelualue, in English Haapakeidas swamp protection area. I was in the northern part of Mustasaarenkeidas which is one part of this huge 5779 ha swamp area. OHFF-0170 was now activated for the first time.
Site map
There were few options where to operate this reference but I decided to go Isojoki county, which is in the OH6 call area. I noticed from the map that there is a protected area which has forest which means that there should be some dry land for operation site plus there was a small parking area and signed nature path into the area. This place was 80km from my home, so it was like one hour drive. Landscape was nice countryside landscape. Ww were travelling through the small villages of Suojoki and Piikkilänkylä on the way, not many houses. There was also commercial summer cottage village just before the operation site.
So swamp it was and also a birding tower plus well-kept wooden path through the large swamp. I set my station up to the place were the wet swamp was starting but just to the drier forest side. Antenna was quite low, 40m dipole end not more than 1,5 meters from the ground and only meter or two off the radio. I started again operation on 40m CW. Bang – huge pileup immediately. Apparently my signal was not so good and pileup was quite rude also. Somehow I was able to manage it, longtime contesting experience helped. 40m CW produced 80 qsos in 36 minutes. 40m SSB was not productive, I couldn’t find clear QRG, so went to 80m CW&SSB for some close-by stations. Then to 30m were I got nice small pileup. Now 20m was also somewhat productive what it has not been in the previous operations. Not too many stations but some: 13 on CW and 16 on SSB. Then I tried again on 40m SSB, only 3 qsos. Then to 40m CW for few more. Finished on 80m SSB but got only one OH. Activity from Finland was not huge.
Before packing I made a short walk to the bird watching tower. On the way back to the car we saw lots of cranes above us. QRM was loud hi. Thanks for 170 qsos to everyone who called.
