March 15 thru 28 (operated)

updated 0210z Saturday evening

Last day of a super six meter DXpedition from Jack. Evidently he was feeling well enough to operate today. Looks like he caught a "normal" Bolivian opening into Florida, Texas, New Mexico and Arizona on this last day.

1949z Ae4RO EL97	1936z W5UWB
WB5HJV EL29	1849z W5OZI
2028z K0FF	AA7A DM33?
W7RV DM33	2152z K5AM DM62

probably others......

Hope to get Jack to write up a nice 62 page story of the trip and get him to submit it to the magazines for all to read. If we can't talk him into that maybe at least a story up here. Would be great to get all of the details of the trip...the inside scoop.....the whole enchilada...the whole ball of wax......will try to get the complete log for this page as well.....Jack wanted to thank all of the guys who were constantly by their radios to letting him know there was propagation into an area even if they had already worked him before and that their short qsos didn't get in the way, it really helped him.

73 for now.......

Jack was on 28.885 this morning and said he has to leave the island earlier than originally planned. Last day of operation will be around 2300z Saturday evening. Evidently he has to catch a bus or something like that back to La Paz where he will meet with Rene CP1FQ........Conditions weren't very good today......consider yesterday and a solar flux of 107 or so.....amazing. Jack has apparently contracted the 24 hour back-leaping jungle rots and was not feeling very good this morning. He said he was barely able to hike up the hill this morning. Last I heard was he was going to try and work Rene' on six meters....evidently it's not a real good path between them. Not sure if Jack will be up to operating tomorrow. 28.885 will probably give us the answer early tomorrow. Jack has most likely made 250 to 275 qsos from CP.

Map of where Jack is in Bolivia (60k gif) Isla del Sol is located at the Southern end of Lago Titicaca

Super day! If you missed it...you missed an exciting day...Jack was S9+ into many Southern areas of the country. From Herb, W3BO: Thursday morning ~1400z, Jack unexpectedly came up on 28.885 for a semi-ragchew. Mentioned that Hawaiian sigs had been quite loud last night, but he had to QRT rather suddenly because lightning started popping around pretty close.

Early reports on 28.885 were that Jack experienced a failure with the generator. He has gone to a smaller generator not capable of running the amplifier. He ran throughout the day at the 100 watt level. The day started of as usual into Florida and Texas around 1830z. It moved across the country into Western Texas by 1850z.

It was still open to W5OZI EM00 at 2030z. New Mexico by 2120z and up into Oklahoma at 2126z WB5YWI EM25. 2143z into Kansas N0LL and K0ETC EM27. Larry, N0LL got country #93 from Jack today! N0JK heard Jack on his mobile whip in Kansas City EM28. Pretty much concurrently the band opened up to the North from Missouri to the West coast and even got as far North as Santa Rosa, 80 miles North of San Francisco. Even Dianna KB6NAN got to work Jack for a new country! It was the most exciting opening so far this cycle. Jack worked 61 stations on this opening. I ran the tape recorder for more than an hour on Jacks frequency. Will be interesting to see the logs when he gets back.. It was so good today that many of my neighbors came over to congratulate me on a great six meter opening.........yeah

We had super loud TI7WAM/4, TI5KD, TI2ALF, TI2NA/b, CX8BE, CX1CCC/b, HP2CWB, CP1/N6XQ, ZF1DC (-50 dbm) LUs and HC2FG/b and PU2WPA and the PY7ANL 50.0281 (5 watts and a GP). ZF1DC was so loud I worked him with 100 milliwatts. If there hadn't been such a big pileup I would have tried 10 milliwatts.

This day was a good indicator of what's ahead for six meters. And you thought working grid squares was DX.......

Not as good as yesterday but still alot of good DX for Jack today and this evening. Jack seems to have a pipe line into Florida and Texas...thay get all the good DX in all directions......The skilled or lucky ones were:

1913z K4PI EM73	1852z N4VHF
1955z W5OZI	CP1FQ?
?z W6JKV
0145z HP2CWB	0147z PP5JD
0132z XE1/SM0KAK	0207z AH6TM

Map of where Jack is in Bolivia (60k gif) Isla del Sol is located at the Southern end of Lago Titicaca

Jack was doing much better on 28.885 today as he had fixed the problem with the noise from the switching power supply and repositioned his ten meter antenna. He seemed to stick on 50.102 for ssb and cw today possibly avoiding the huge pileups from Argentina. Pat W5OZI, still cranked up from working Jack while mobile yesterday, was seen on his skate board going down hill in Junction Texas calling Jack with his six meter hand held....! Jack said the weather was really nice today, sunny and somewhat warm. I'm pretty sure Jack picked up a new country today as CP1FQ (15watts & 3 element yagi) was back home and on the air. That would be 20 countries for Jack so far. When was the last time anyone (excluding Peter, PY5CC) worked 20 countries in less than a week?

Well, Jack had his best day so far today. He worked over 40 stations on six meters today. Jack showed up on 28.885 with a good signal so several guys had a chance to yak with him a bit. He is sitting on the highest peak on the island towards the Southern end at 13317 feet altitude.......there's a marker on the peak. The radio is sitting on a rock........(no table) accounting for the solid signal he had today I suppose. It is moderately warm 60s+ during the day and very cold at night. There are no cars on the island. There are no showers on the island..... He running a rented 2500 watt generator on a flimsy extension cord which allows him to get 300 to 400 watts out from the amplifier. He hears very well at this location and will stay there for the duration. Last day of operation will be Sunday, the 28th. He sounded very comfortable on 885.

His "council meeting" went well.....only cost a little bit to satisfy the local population that he was doing important things......They seemed to be concerned with protecting antiquities from possible loss or damage. He gave his talk in Spanish which only some of them understand. Think about it....what would you do if some crazy fella who spoke a hither-to-fore unknown dialect of Spanish, climbed to the top of your island and set up wierd looking antennas and sat there all day long listening to noise on a radio....... on a rock......and asked you if you had a shower.....or electricity......or cable TV...?

Jack said he had made about 200 QSOs so far in 19 different countries. TR8XX was the African station he worked. In addition, he worked Tim, ZD8PC. Jack hears the XE1KK/b beacon "most all of the time". Both stations are up at the 12k to 13k elevation. He hasn't heard the XE2UZL/b beacon.

I don't have many of the 40 stations Jack worked but here are the ones I did get off the net today. He worked SC, FL,TX, LA. AZ & NM today and a couple of mobiles! He was hearing the KH6 beacon around 0300z or so.

1826z AC4TO/m EM70	1841z W3XO/5
1838 W2BZY S9 +20	1950z AA5XE EM00
0215z N5WS EL09	2222z KI5GF
W5OZI/m......! EM00

times are approximate.....corrections...rumors...guesses....info?...n6ca@ham-radio.com

Updated 0450Z 2.23.99 Monday night

Not too many reports about Jack today but he was getting into the lower US states. Had another late night opening via TEP and back scatter to Mexico City and Florida. XE1/SM0KAK was pointing North West to work Jack at 0335 and K4SUS was hearing him quite well in Florida EL95. We heard Bernardo XE2HWB calling Jack around that time, back scatter or Es(?). Jack apparently made it thru the council meeting. We can assume that since there is no electricity that Jack doesn't have a TVI problem. He was opearting at midnight his time......

2001z WB2QLP EL96	2001z? LU5WW
2106z AE4RO	1955z W5OZI heard
2000z? W5EU
0306z K4SUS EL95	0335z XE1/SM0KAK

times are approximate.....corrections...rumors...guesses....info?...n6ca@ham-radio.com

Updated 1900z 3.22.99 Monday morning

At 1400z Monday, I (W3BO Herb) have just been talking to ZF2MU on 28.885. He says he spoke with Jack 3 times yesterday. Jack mentioned that the native population of the island had invited him to a 'council meeting' to discuss his presence on the island; the purpose of his antennas; etc................

He(Jack) also told ZF2MU that the high point of his trip so far had been a QSO with TR in Africa.

Jack did pretty well from Isla del Sol on Lake Titicaca today:

2030z AE4RO	2030z N4WW
2050z W5OZI	2050z + K5IUA
2050z+ W5WS	2359z + PY2EX
0228z N6CA ssb	0208z KH7R
2211z W5UWB

XE1/SM0KAK/m heard Jack while in his car........any others?

Map of where Jack is in Bolivia (60k gif) Isla del Sol is located at the Southern end of Lago Titicaca

Great opening to South America right around sun down here. Started with CE3SAG in and out for 40 minutes then built up bringing LUs into town. Then heard Jack on ssb working LUs on back scatter. Jack built up to S5 (12db s/n) on the meter. Then he worked KH7R. Jack was easily worked with 200w along the coast. Inland stations heard Jack weakly (W6CPL & K7JA) but QRN got in way on this end. Suddenly Jack said he must QRT at once. Not sure why he had to QRT so quickly. It was about 11PM his time when this occurred. He said he would be on tomorrow. He was definitely in a much better location than before. and probably has an over the water shot to the North. After Jack QRTed at 0240z Southern California had XE1GRR from DL88 S9+ in from Guadalajara, Mexico (Sporatic E?) and the XE1KK/b in Mexico City weakly. Looks like we may have had a possible Es link up to the TEP path to South America.....either way it was exciting. I suspect Jack is all motivated.....

updated 1930z 3.21.99

email from ZP6CW from 0130z 3.21.98 (Saturday night)

Jack is on the island, I just worked him , he is working into CE/LU and is 5x9 using just a wire antenna. He plans to relocate tomorrow and have the linear and Yagi functioning at that time. Says all is just fine. He rented a generator as there is no reliable power on the island.

Jack's wife said he took two days to adjust to the altitude and all is well with him.

Updated 0500z 3.20.99

In a brief an very weak attempt to work Jack on 28.885 around 0100z it was learned with a relay from ZL2KT and WA5LIG/6 that Jack was on today and got a partial call from an HK(?). Apparently that was all he heard. He also had an electric power problem and was able to finally get the 500 watt amplifier working from their electric source. That means he has been only running the IC706 at the 100 watt power level. He definitely said he would NOT be on tomorrow (Saturday) as he will be moving to Isla del Sol near the Southern end of Lake Titicaca to commence operations on Sunday. We still don't know exactly where Jack was for the past couple of days....other than in Bolivia...and near Lake Titicaca.

See:

http://website.lineone.net/~fototrek/isladelsol.htm

and

http://www.geocities.com/SoHo/Coffeehouse/8895/sol1.html

for pictures of where Jack will be operating from on Sunday. Hopefully he will be in a better location since it looks like he will have an over the water shot to the North. If anyone can get some better information from him on six or ten meters let us know and we will post it here for all to see.

Jack had a pretty good day today looking at the cluster reports & email:

1811 K4PI	1812 N4VHF	1815 ZF2MU
2209 N6CA dm03	2210 WA5LIG/6 dm13
0030 PP1CZ	0030 PY5CC	0031 HP2CWB
0128 HP2CWB	0245 PP5PN	0245 PY5IP

zulu times March 18 & 19

Conditions were the best so far this spring for Southern US as many stations reporting HC2FG/b and HK3YH and TI2ALF & TI5KD. N6CA caught Jack as the HC2 beacon was fading for the last time and the band was shifting long to Argentina.

if I missed anyone or made a mistake(s) please email to: n6ca@ham-radio.com

After a 4 hour bus trip (see picture) Jack is working several PYs this evening and has a great signal from the reports on the clusters. He is also working into Hawaii at this time. Looks like he has the antennas up and running. We have had good propagation into South America the past two days so maybe tomorrow will be a good one for Jack as well. His grid is FH53.

Hola,

I am departing for Bolivia on Monday 15 March, and expect to land in La Paz on Tuesday morning. La Paz is the worlds highest international airport (4018 meters). My plan is to stay on the shore of Lake Titicaca, FH53. For those Jeopardy buffs, Lake Titicaca is also the worlds highest navigable lake (3810 meters).

If all goes well, I will be on the air 17 March. Equipment is an IC706 ll, driving a 500 Watt amp, into a 12 dBi yagi. I plan on hanging out on 50.110 until the band opens and then will QSY to 50.102. I operate CW and may run a beacon. I will check into 28.885 periodically. The call used will be CP1/N6XQ.

Lake Titicaca is very close to the magnetic equator and I probably will not have the TEP into the US like the LU,CX, and CE's have had. However, there is always a chance for regular F2 or backscatter. We will try. I may also be too far west to participate in the European openings that the PY's have had, but I will be looking for the openings and will be transmitting.

I may move to a new location after a week at Lake Titicaca. This location will probably be further south near the Argentina/ Paraguay border. The last day of operation will likely be 28 March.

QSL to : Jack Henry, Box 7732, San Diego, CA 92167 USA

Pray for propagation / Buena suerte Jack N6XQ

Check back here for periodic updates on Jack's schedule and location.

There may be reports his QSOs, optimal back scatter paths, etc.

for pictures and info on Jack N6XQ