8Q7AT Maldives 2010

Velidhu Island
Velidhu Island

This trip brought us to Velidhu Island on North Ari Atoll, Maldives. Our stay from 24.05. to 04.06.2010 was really great.

The Hotel is just perfect – meals, service, rooms, beach, water, sport-facilities all really satisfying. The radio euqipment was with us just for fun – I never wanted to hang in the “shack” all day long – just a little operating in the evening should be enough…

Immediatley after arriving I started to hang up the G5RV antenna. In front of our Bungalow (No 140) there was a palm with a height of about 8-10 meters – just perfect for the middle of the antenna. So the coax-plug was about 4 meters above ground, and I could easily reach the desk in the bungalow with the 25m coax-cable I had with me. After installing the antenna a few cyclons from India brought not the best weather, so I couldn’t test the construction immediately.

Later on the first two stations came into the log: PI4DX from the Netherlands and UO6P from Indonesia.
The propagation was not very good the first days. Except a few QSO`s I made all my contacts in 3 PileUp`s on 26.05., 29.05. and 30.05.2010.

51 WORKED DXCC`s – TOTAL 302 QSO`s
Austria 13 Greece 8 Romania 1
Balearic Islands 2 Greenland 1 Russia Asiatic Part 13
Belarus 1 Hungary 1 Russia European Part 32
Belgium 7 India 2 Saudi Arabia 1
Bosnia-Herzegovina 1 Israel 2 Scotland 2
Canada 1 Italy 77 Serbien 2
Canary Islands 1 Japan 5 Singapore 1
Crete 1 Jordan 1 Slovak Republic 1
Croatia 4 Kazakhstan 1 Slovenia 3
Czech Republic 2 Lebanon 2 Spain 28
East Malaysia 1 Lichtenstein 1 Sweden 1
England 1 Malta 1 Switzerland 1
Estonia 3 Mongolia 1 Turkey 1
Finland 3 Netherlands 7 Ukraine 7
France 9 Norway 2 United Arabic Emirates 2
Georgia 1 Poland 10 USA 3
Germany 22 Portugal 7 Wales 1
Equipment
    • Yaesu FT-897d with LDG AT-897 tuner and 100W out to the G5RV Antenna
    • DX Microphone MD-200A8X, selfmade foot-PTT and headphones
    • iPad with external keyboard and HamLog-App for logging purposes – Thanks to Nick Garner N3WG
    • a few beam and distance-maps to get a first overview of worked stations
QSL Card

Data has been uploaded to GlobalQSL.com on June 9th, 2010

I can`t send QSLs direct because I don`t have printed QSL`s here to post.

So thanks to everybody working me and showing patience in the PileUp`s. Unfortunately not all OM`s accept e.g. working stations according to the numbers in the calls. This makes it much harder (I am new in this hobby) to copy weak stations too. Sorry for this, but time will hopefully make ears better and better in descrambling pileup-callsign-salad. 😉

Maybe work you again via my home-call OE2ATN or from SOTA
73 de 8Q7AT / OE2ATN, Thomas

As an info for everybody who is interested in – here the old content of this page (timetable for getting the license and organising the trip…):

    • 12.05.2010 – License was delivered through “Fred”, the postman!
    • 03.05.2010 – email from ministry in Male, as attachment the license!!! They posted the papers today! I´m looking forward to receiving the original.
    • 24.11.2009 – My letter with the request to get a license arrived at the ministry. They will send the papers in April/May via mail.
    • 16.11.2009 – The copy of my Austrian license and the fee of $ 10,– have been mailed to the ministry in Male. Now (7 months before we leave) there are no more free rooms on the island 😮
    • 11.11.2009 – The trip is booked. I sent a email again to the ministry in Male with reference to get the license. The island is called Velidhu: http://www.velidhu.com.mv
    • 18.03.2009 – Email from Maldives including the form to apply the license. The callsign has already been reserved: 8Q7AT
    • 11.03.2009 – My first Email to the ministry in Male with reference to get a temporary license.
All worked calls

4L8A, 4X6DK, 4ZPG, 9A1ZZ, 9A3MN, 9A7PPM, 9A7WA, 9H5PC, 9M6JC, 9V1DE, A61BM, A65CA, CT1AYI, CT1BDS, CT1EHI, CT1EHK, CT1FOQ, CT1HXJ, CT1JOP, DF2WF, DF3IS, DG8GAE, DH1PS, DJ5WK, DJ7FM, DK2JP, DK8MZ, DL1FKA, DL1MDU, DL2CHN, DL3AQJ, DL4DZL, DL4FCS, DL5RDI, DL5RM, DL5SAX, DL6BBT, DL7JAN, DL7Oz, DL9KSM, DM5DX, E73DPR, EA1ACP, EA1AST, EA1BXJ, EA1GFW, EA1KE, EA1PP, EA1QT, EA3GOA, EA3GWK, EA4APP, EA4YT, EA5EFU, EA5GL, EA5GVT, EA5GXI, EA5HKC, EA5HRM, EA5KI, EA5RD, EA6GK, EA6GK, EA7AEH, EA7GBD, EA7HRO, EA8VD, EB2BXL, EB7CIN, EC3AAJ, EC3ABB, EC7AAG, EC7AEJ, ES2IPA, ES2TL, EW7EW, F/SQ2LXK, F4EBT, F4FCS, F4FGC, F4GGD, F5ARU, F5IDJ, F5JYD, F8CVP, HA8LQF, HB0CC, HB9ELE, HZ1BH, I2ARQ, I5FBP, I8HAK, I8KNT, I8OHL, IK1AIG, IK1GPG, IK1HJR, IK1XHZ, IK2IQD, IK3VUU, IK4ISR, IK5BOH, IK5ZQC, IK6BMU, IK6NUZ, IK7MIY, IK7YZG, IK8GJR, IK8IOZ, IK8LAA, IQ5DW, IT9ABN, IT9AZE, IT9BDQ, IT9CZJ, IT9HCS, IT9KCD, IT9UCS, IV3CMW, IV3RFZ, IV3YIB, IW3HKY, IW4AOT, IW4EIQ, IW5ECB, IW7EBC, IZ0AON, IZ0BXX, IZ0COA, IZ0HQS, IZ0LKV, IZ1ETD, IZ1MYT, IZ1OSP, IZ1OST, IZ2ACD, IZ2BVL, IZ2RLO, IZ2SDK, IZ3CKG, IZ3KGI, IZ3QWV, IZ4FVV, IZ4NIC, IZ5DKR, IZ5HSK, IZ5MOQ, IZ7FMI, IZ7FMM, IZ7MFY, IZ7NLJ, IZ7NLN, IZ7PMV, IZ8CZR, IZ8DPL, IZ8ESX, IZ8GCE, IZ8GCP, IZ8GNR, IZ8IBC, IZ8LLQ, IZ8QVN, JE2PMC, JH1NBN, JH7CVM, JI4OHV, JT4DK, JY4CH, K3NTM, LA3VJA, LA8OOA, M5JON, MM0SJH, MM3LLU, MW0ZZK, OD5/DL6SN, OD5KU, OE2KGL, OE2SNL, OE2WNL/2, OE3DMA, OE3KKA, OE3VID, OE5SLN, OE6GND, OE6MDF, OE6RLF, OE8HIK, OH1FJK, OH4RF, OH7MP, OK1FGS, OK2ARD, OM3AG, ON4GI, ON4LRG, ON5JV, ON6DSL, ON7AS, ON7IS, OX3KQ, PA1BR, PA3EWP, PA3PCV, PA3WB, PD9CN, PE7URK, PI4DX, RA3AD, RA3BL, RA3GP, RA3PCI, RA3ZH, RA4CVT, RA4LFQ, RA4LHD, RA4UAT, RA6FN, RA6LOO, RD4WM, RK6AH, RK9XM, RN6BY, RU6DK, RU6DX, RU9UD, RV6FA, RV9JN, RV9LM, RW6CC, RW9CG, RX1AA, RX1AP, RX3AU, RX4HJ, RX6AN, RX6LE, RX9WN, RZ1OM, RZ3EC, RZ9HA, RZ9IZ, S51AY, S52MD, S57AT, SM6JCC, SP2GCJ, SP2IJ, SP2JFF, SP2WLB, SP3CFM, SP3CGK, SP5ARP, SP7QJF, SQ6RGH, SQ7NSN, SV1AVD, SV1EBV, SV2GJV, SV8/DL8MCA, SV8EIU/1, SV8FEB, SV8FMV, SV8IJZ, SV9/OE6YRG, TA7IJ, UA3AHA, UA3ARD, UA3FX, UA3TCJ, UA4FUW, UA4LFR, UA9CGL, UA9CVQ, UA9KZ, UA9SOR, UO6P, UR3IFD, UR4QLH, UR5ZEL, UT5PI, UT5URW, UX1IM/QRP, UX9ZB, VO1SA, VU2AU, VU2DK, W4QN, WA4CEM, YO8STB, YT2ISM, YU2VZ