It's one of those things, as with all the most interesting reception - and it never seems to fail for me! "Was it?", "Wasn't it?" Well, I am 99% convinced that it was!
Last year, I adjusted my record of having received Cape Verde by marking the entry in capitals thus: "TENTATIVE". I'm almost 100% certain back then that what I received on 93.9 was indeed Cape Verde, backed up by hearing the same music I heard on their web stream, but the signal I received was so weak and badly splattered that I couldn't be absolutely certain. I hate that uncertainty with loggings, but the received audio and the surrounding facts and figures for the time of my reception seemed to back it up perfectly.
With my Armenian reception, the audio I received on 87.5 was clearly that of a lady speaking in quite a monotone voice and it sounded identical to that of their web stream. The station was Hayastani Azgain Radio 1 from Jiliza. The language caught my attention to begin with and not something I had heard before. There was also the fact that I had managed to check the audio from all the relevant web streams on that frequency , i.e. all Turkish web streams, Cyprus, Lebanon, Ukraine, etc., all of which were distinctively different. Just about all of them were playing music of one kind or another and none of them had a woman talking. The fact that the lady on the Armenian web stream had the very same monotone style of speech as the audio from their web stream nailed this for me.
Then I studied the propagation paths in place at the time. The Es MUF map was a solid mass of yellows, reds and purples, covering most of the European mainland and extending nicely in the direction of Armenia. Double-hop activity was prevalent at the time and I had logged Adana in Turkey not long before this. There had been several hours of Afghan TV reception at carrier level in northern Europe around the time of my reception. Propagation lower down on the ham frequencies also suggested that the path may have been open, though more so on 10m than 6m. Finally, when I looked at the propagation path symmetry of my reception around that time, it showed a classic pattern of the kind I always see during my Es reception.
Adding all this together appears to back up the fact that this was Armenia, apart from one thing - the one thing which was lacking. The fact that I did not hear a station ID. Nor did I have the Armenian web stream running at the same time as my reception, though there was only five or ten seconds in it. My Armenian reception had just faded when I found the matching web stream. Nonetheless, this was the only stream I found where there was a female voice and one which sounded IDENTICAL.
The woman was talking in a language I did not recognise. The signal was very weak, but surprisingly stable. I could hear the speech quite clearly at times and this lasted for two, maybe three minutes at most.
Did I get a recording? No! I was too busy checking web streams to be bothered with recording. In any case, my new motherboard still has problems whereby I cannot record audio from web streams, so I wouldn't have been able to demonstrate that side of things at least, but a recording would have been useful. I must get this fixed as soon as possible.
Concluding, in the same way I always do with this type of reception, I have to say that the logging will have the usual big, fat TENTATIVE badge slapped on it due to the lack of concrete evidence, but everything surrounding this reception held up sufficiently to convince me that this was almost certainly Armenia. The lack of ID or RDS data just adds that little bit of "Could it have been something else?" uncertainty. I could dispute that, but then we're back to square one. Make up your own minds, but the 16th June was truly a special day for sporadic E reception and one of the best I have known.
There are many files I still have to check from the 16th and I am now at that stage where I am starting to get well behind with these, so the annual catch-up process has begun!
Good DX!
Showing posts with label DX Articles. Show all posts
Showing posts with label DX Articles. Show all posts
Friday, 16 June 2017
Monday, 26 December 2016
Isle Of Skye DXpedition 2016
The cottage at Totescore. Small but beautifully put together!
It was the same a year ago, this was not a DXpedition as such, but a relaxing 'get away from it all' family break. Naturally, I took along my Perseus SDR receiver again and half a flag antenna. Yes, only "half"! All will be revealed.) However, unlike last year, conditions were quite good! There was a little West coast North America. A little Canadian Prairies. Also many interesting catches, some of which are seldom heard domestically, and a few which I have not seen reported before at all.
A better cottage
Jane (my wife) and I rented different accommodation to last year, between December 3rd and 10th, in the north of the Isle of Skye. The place, a cosy little thatched roof cottage, was set back from the main road, overlooking the Atlantic ocean and the Outer Hebrides in the crofting community of Totescore, just a couple of miles north of Uig. There was sufficient land around the cottage for the erection of Beverage antennas too and in a number of key directions. There were also two conveniently placed fences on which wires could be supported, giving more than 500 metres towards 300 degrees (another hundred metres or so would have the wire terminated into the sea!) and 300 metres and more towards 30 degrees.
The view from our cottage
Electrically quiet too!It was nice to hear noise free conditions and high strength DX from the Americas. The flag antenna was erected on the front garden, attached to the fence and beamed mainly towards 300 degrees. This path cuts straight through Iceland and Greenland and on to the west coast of the USA.
Unusually, our trip was also accompanied by good, settled weather! The north-west of Scotland is known for its wild weather where one can experience four seasons of weather in a single day! For me, this is part of Scotland's charm. It's a stunningly beautiful country. Everywhere you go seems to be a tourist attraction. But there was hardly a breath of air movement for the first three days of the trip as high pressure was strongly in charge. This produced cool temperatures just above freezing, with frosts on the ground at night. The skies were crystal clear with amazing views of the stars. Come the middle of the week, the weather broke down. It was wet and windy, but still nothing out of the ordinary by Scottish standards. The temperatures rose to 12C in the daytime and throughout the night.
Flag Vs Beverage
I wasn't initially planning to devote much time to running out Beverage wires, even though I had brought plenty of wire with me. This trip was a holiday and 'Radio' was not going to play a part. 'Radio' was going to sit quietly in a corner of the room, recording away to itself. My plan was to record the tops and bottoms of the hours, from early evening through to late morning. My laptop's hard drive was not quite big enough for this, so I had to delete many mid-hour files during the process. In the afternoon, I would move all the files I wanted to keep to my portable hard drive, thus freeing up the laptop drive ready for the next session.
A windswept flag antenna
I also wanted to put the flag antenna to a thorough test. For some time I have had a strong feeling that the flag antenna would perform just about as well as a Beverage antenna. Of course, the flag will not have anything like the gain of a Beverage, but the flag is a low-angle receiver, exactly like the Beverage, maybe with a better front-to-back ratio - critical in removing the unwanted UK and European stations to the rear. I wanted to put these aspects to the test.
The resulting log told me all I needed to know. The flag antenna, while relatively compact and stealthy, brought in plenty of impressive signals, many of which at high strength. Noise levels were super-low, as you would expect from a flag.
The flag I took along was the very same flag I use on my garden at home, but with a few modifications which allowed me to erect it in just a few minutes. I included some telescopic fibre glass poles to support the wire. were. They were perfect for the job and the flag was literally 'thrown up' in five minutes.
Entry into the cottage was simple. No need for an awkward coax-through-side of window entry. The coax fit comfortably under the entrance.
Transatlantic Conditions
Solar terrestrial conditions were very quiet around the 3rd and 4th of December with lots of Ks if 0 and 1, increasing with many Ks of 3 by the 6th and 7th. So conditions weren't necessarily 'ideal', but there was scope for at least 'some' high latitude DX. I wouldn't know exactly what I had received until I had returned home.
Zero Oriental DX
I tried the flag at 40 degrees, looking for East Asia, but nothing was heard AT ALL! Not even CRI on 1521! This really surprised me. Maybe the mountainous areas of the Quiraing were blocking the signals. These impressive "Monument Valley" style peaks rise to 543 metres above sea level and were only 8 km in the same direction. It's probably reasonable to expect that the terrain would have had more than a passing effect on medium wave signals arriving from the north-east.
Part of The Quiraing Mountains
Now here's the embarrassing bit
There is always at least one. I wouldn't be John Faulkner without some minor cock-up. Something just has to go wrong. This time, it was my flag antenna. Belatedly, I discovered that my My beloved flag was not quite the flag I thought it was. Everything seemed to be working correctly at first. There was a significant null on stations arriving at the back of the antenna. Transatlantic signals were good. These to facts alone suggested that the flag was performing exactly as it should ... or so I thought.
The flag brought in many good DX catches between the 3rd and the 7th, but suddenly stopped working during the daytime on the 7th. There was a break somewhere, but the weather at this time, strong wind and rain, didn't offer much encouragement for me to go outside and investigate. Furthermore, pressing matters at home dictated that we needed to leave early again and travel back to Skegness during the wee small hours. I just went outside and took down the flag, packing it away in advance of our journey home.
Looking east towards the Scottish mainland from the Quiraing Mountains
It wasn't for about a week that I discovered what was wrong with the flag antenna. Apart from a break somewhere in the wire, I discovered that there was a dry joint in the transformer box where the wire was soldered to the secondary turn. How long had it been like this? It wasn't until I fixed the problem and saw the difference in signal strength that I realised that this dry joint had been there for some time. Months in fact! The difference in gain was a lot more than substantial. So I had, more or less, been using only half a flag antenna on the trip. The only saving grace was the fact that there were still good nulling capabilities with the two vertical components of the antenna. The pattern would surely have been degraded to a degree, but it still produced a decent DX log.
FM DXing?
I took along my Degen DE1103, using only it's telescopic antenna. This was used only in the cottage. The local Skriaig transmitter was strongly received, but no local stations were received at all. This is quite different to last year's location, in the north of Skye, where I could receive local stations:
96.6 MFR, Aviemore/Cairngorm Summit
102.7 Cuillin FM, Skriaig
103.0 Isles FM, Eitshal 2 (Isle of Lewis)
106.2 Cuillin FM, Portree (Isle of Skye)
106.6 Two Lochs Radio, Cliff Hill.
While driving around the locality, I could receive RTE 2FM on 90.4 from Truskmore. I didn't check for other outlets from Truskmore.
The Skriaig transmitter, near Portree
So to the log. The following are the pick of the bunch. Regular stations are omitted.
560 0100 06-12-16 USA WGAN Portland ME. ID - WGAN Portland and two other calls given.
ABC News Weak 4571 km
580 0100 06-12-16 CAN CFRA Ottawa ON. CFRA call letters heard, weak in 585 splatter
4772 km
610 0701 06-12-16 USA WIOD Miami FL. OD - Newsradio 6-10 WIOD 6650 km
630 0800 05-12-16 PTR WUNO Noti Uno, San Juan PR. Noti Uno ID. V weak but alone 6509 km
640 0900 06-12-16 CAN CFMJ Richmond Hill ON. Online and on 6-40 AM. This is Talk Radio.
CFMJ Toronto 5141 km
650 0658 06-12-16 USA WSM Nashville TN. On the highways of America. It's the All
Nighter on 6-50 AM WSM. News and information you need from
the heart of America's music city. Sung WSM jingle ID.
ABC News. Weak 6155 km
670 0100 07-12-16 VEN YVLL Radio Rumbos, Caracas (dcf) OM shouted "Radio Rumbos" ID
under Cuba 7301 km
670 0900 04-12-16 USA WSCR Chicago IL. Presumed with Chicago sports talk 5732 km
680 0400 04-12-16 CAN CJOB Winnipeg MB. ID - Winipeg's News and Information Leader ...
Six Eighty CJOB Weak 5594 km
740 0400 04-12-16 CAN CBX Edmonton AB. CBC News 6040 km
750 0801 05-12-16 USA WSB Atlanta GA. WSB ID in news (Exact time of ID 08:01:48)
Weak 6192 km
760 2201 07-12-16 USA WCHP Champlain NY. Daytimer! Muffled audio. Religious music,
French OM presenter with ID, as confirmed by Matthias Gatzke.
Thank you. Weak 4658 km
770 0300 04-12-16 CLM HJJX RCN, Bogotá. OM ID Fair 8268 km
790 0700 06-12-16 USA WPRV Providence RI. ID - Imus in the morning ... on ...
WPRV Providence, a Cumulus Station. Weak 4775 km
800 0900 04-12-16 CAN CKLW Windsor ON. This is AM 800 CKLW. The Information Station
Weak 5435 km
830 0900 04-12-16 USA WCCO Minneapolis MN. WCCO call letters just audible behind CBS
News jingle on WRCN 5756 km
840 0700 05-12-16 USA WHAS Louisville KY. ID - ....'s breaking news, weather and traffic
station. Newsradio 8-40 WHAS Louisville. An i-Heart
Radio Station. ABC News Weak 5885 km
850 0400 07-12-16 USA WFTL West Palm Beach FL. WFTL call letters heard under WEEI 6623 km
870 0700 05-12-16 USA WWL New Orleans LA. ID - ... news, Talk and sport, this is the
Big 8-70 WWL New Orleans. CBS News Weak 6885 km
890 0900 06-12-16 USA WLS Chicago IL. ID for WLS and WLS FM 5750 km
920 0500 04-12-16 USA WHJJ Providence RI. ID - Newsradio 9-20 WHJJ Providence. Fox News
Radio 4778 km
920 0500 07-12-16 CAN CKNX Wingham ON. This is mid-western Ontario's most trusted source
for news ... CKNX. News from the Canadian Press. Weak 5199 km
920 0701 06-12-16 CAN CFRY Portage La Prairie MB. OM ID - This is CFRY, 9-20 AM, Portage
La Prairie. A Golden West Radio Station. Sung jingle. YL
temperatures report of -5C. Weak 5628 km
930 0156 04-12-16 CLM HJCS La Voz de Bogota, Bogotá. Football commentary with slogans. ID'd
with the kind help of Andrew Brade, Kai Mauseth and Henrik
Klemetz at Real DX. Weak 8264 km
930 0500 07-12-16 USA WDLX Washington NC. ID - This is Pirate Radio 12-50 WGHB Farmville-
Greenville, Pirate Radio 9-30 WDLX Washington Greenville Newburn.
Thanks to Paul B Walker and Andrew Brade for help with this one.
Possible first logging in the UK. Weak 5626 km
930 0900 05-12-16 USA WBEN Buffalo NY. ID after ads - Newsradio 9-30 WBEN Weak 5129 km
940 0300 05-12-16 MEX XEQ Ke Buena, México City. El Vergel (dif) Ke Buena ID 8361 km
940 0758 05-12-16 CAN CFNV Montréal QC. ID - CFNV Neuf Quarante AM. New station testing
Fair 4641 km
950 0255 04-12-16 USA KJR Seattle WA. KJR-AM and KJR-FM IDs Fair 6944 km
950 0600 05-12-16 USA WTLN Orlando FL. ... 9-50 WTLN ID heard on CKNB fade 6489 km
950 0700 06-12-16 USA WWJ Detroit MI. WWJ call heard mixing with CKNB. Weak 5451 km
960 0200 04-12-16 CUB Radio Reloj, Guantánamo. Time pips and ID 6868 km
970 0300 06-12-16 MEX XERFR Radio Fórmula 1, México City. ID - Formula ... Noticias Weak
8357 km
980 0900 04-12-16 USA WCUB Two Rivers WI. ID ... on the legends of country music. Country
Classics on 9-80 WCUB Two Rivers Manitowac. Fox News Radio
5538 km
990 0500 04-12-16 CAN CBW Winnipeg MB. Clearly a separate programme to CBY, then
simulcasting with the news. Slight echo present. Two carriers.
Looks like CBY 990.001 and CBW 989.991. Weak 5595 km
990 0500 04-12-16 CAN CBY Corner Brook NL. CBC News jingle, YL This is CBC News ID.
Mixing second North American station, presumably CBW as slight
echo on news. Weak 3466 km
1000 0300 04-12-16 USA KOMO Seattle WA. This is Komo News One Thousand ID Fair 6940 km
1000 0757 05-12-16 MEX XEOY Radio Mil AM, México City. ID - Lo mejor de Mexico esta es Mil
AM Fair 8357 km
1020 0300 05-12-16 CUB CMLE Radio Reloj, Victoria de las Tunas. Dominant over KDKA wth vocal ID
and time signal Weak 6901 km
1040 0300 06-12-16 MEX XECH Radio Capital, Toluca. Radio Capital IDs. Thanks to Matthias
Gatzke for help. It's listed with 5/0.75 kW, so I have to assume
they were using the full day power. Weak 8397 km Potential
first logging in the UK **
1040 0900 04-12-16 USA WHO Des Moines IA. Newsradio Ten Forty WHO Des Moines. Fox News Radio
Weak 6047 km
1060 0801 05-12-16 MEX XEEP Radio Educación, México City. OM Radio Educación ID Fair 8354 km
1070 0500 07-12-16 MEX XESP Radio Noticias, San Pedro Tlaquepaque. XESP ID. Thank you Andrew,
Chuck and Alessandro at RealDX for listening. Andrew Brade
provided a translation. ''XESP más cerca de tí, donde quiera que
estés, 25,000 watts. ''etc. Recording on my YT channel. Weak
8482 km. Potential first logging in the UK **
1090 0330 04-12-16 USA WBAL Baltimore MD. ID - The Lars Larson Show. WBAL Newsradio Ten
Ninety, committed to bringing you the most in Baltimore ,,, etc.
Weak 5290 km
1130 0800 06-12-16 USA WDFN Detroit MI. Mention of Detroit. Area code 213 and Fox News Radio
under WBBR. Presumed WDFN Possible call given but splashed out
by WBBR. 5442 km
1140 0500 07-12-16 MEX XEMR Radio Esperanza, San Nicolás de los Garza. Detailed ID in the
hour including call sign, city and name. Possible first logging
in the UK. Fair 7835 km
1140 0901 04-12-16 CAN CHRB High River AB. ID ... Southern Alberta's Community Radio
Station, AM 11-40 Weak 6265 km
1150 0500 04-12-16 CAN CKOC Hamilton ON. CKOC ID. Fox Sports Radio. Weak 5173 km
1150 0900 04-12-16 USA WHBY Kimberly WI. ID - Where real local radio comes alive. WHBY
Kimberly, Appleton, Fox Cities. A Woodward Radio Group station.
Good 5559 km
1160 0201 04-12-16 CLM HJOC Fuego AM, Bogotá. Esta es Fuego AM IDs Weak 8254 km
1170 0400 04-12-16 USA WWVA Wheeling WV. This is Newsradio Eleven Seventy WWVA Wheeling
Weak 5470 km
1170 0500 04-12-16 CLM HJNW Caracol, Cartagena. ID, long CARACOL jingle then ID again.
Fair 7793 km
1190 0400 06-12-16 USA WOWO Fort Wayne IN. OM ID - Indianapolis ..... right here, on
Newstalk 11-90 Wowo and now 107 5 FM Weak 5655 km
1200 0600 07-12-16 USA WOAI San Antonio TX .i-Heart Radio promo. This is Newsradio 12
Hundred, WOAI. San Antonio's ... for breaking news, traffic and
weather ... etc. Fair 7374 km
1210 0200 04-12-16 CAN VOAR Saint John's NL. Sherry G Gospel music show. Fair 3257 km
1230 2100 07-12-16 CAN CFFB Iqaluit NU. CBC News jingle, just audible in splatter. 3312 km
1250 0500 07-12-16 CLM HJCA Capital Radio, Mosquera. OM ID - Capital Radio after lively
Latin pops Weak 8265 km
1250 0922 06-12-16 CAN CHSM Steinbach MB. Presumed. Opera, possibly as 950 (same
programming but with large delay) . YL ID - You're listening to
... classic ... AM 12-50 Radio. V weak at ID but fair on peak
Fair 5595 km
1280 0900 04-12-16 USA WNAM Neenah-Menasha WI. You're listening to AM 12-80 WNAM Neenah-
Menasha. A Cumulus Station Weak 5581 km
1280 2100 06-12-16 CAN CFMB Montréal QC. Italian programming. Jingle mentioning Montreal.
Fair 4637 km
1280 2158 07-12-16 USA WPKZ Fitchburg MA. Daytimer! Nice of WPKZ to repeat their ID
sequence twice. ID - Your home for New England .... football
at K-Zone 105.3 and AM 12-80 WPKZ, brought to you by ....
Weak 4744 km
1290 0800 04-12-16 CAN CFRW Winnipeg MB. ID - CFRW AM WInnipeg ... Bell Media ... TSN
12-90. All Sports All The Time Fair 5586 km
1290 0800 05-12-16 USA WNBF Binghamton NY. ID - Newsradio 12-90 WNBF, Binghamton.
Difficult copy in pile-up Weak 5027 km
1300 0400 04-12-16 USA WOOD Grand Rapids MI. This is Newsradio Wood Thirteen Hundred and
106 9 FM Weak 5529 km
1300 0504 04-12-16 USA WXRL WXRL Lancaster NY. YL ID drop-in - Classic Country WXRL Weak
5118 km
1300 0801 07-12-16 USA WJMO Cleveland OH. This is WJMO Cleveland. W??? HD2. .... Your home
for the Get Up morning show with GET Erica Campbell ... Praise
94 5. Weak 5420 km
1310 0600 05-12-16 USA WLOB Portland ME. ID - wlobradio.com and 100.5. Greater Portland's
new ... Fox News Radio Weak 4572 km
1310 0900 04-12-16 USA WCCW Traverse City MI. ID - WCCW AM Traverse City. We are ...
sports! 5377 km
1320 2100 06-12-16 USA WDER Derry NH. Daytimer! WDER Derry ID, but only Derry easily
readable. Mentioning Life Changing Radio, then SRN News.
4691 km
1320 2200 06-12-16 USA WILS Lansing MI. ID - WILS Lansing. V weak. Thanks to Ole Forr at
RealDX for the help. 5483 km
1330 0100 06-12-16 USA WFNN Erie PA. AM 13-30 The Fan ID and mention of Fox. Weak
5269 km
1330 0100 06-12-16 USA WWRV New York City NY. Radio Vision Cristiana ID Weak 5005 km
1350 0500 06-12-16 USA WOYK York PA. ... on Sportsradio 13-50 WOYK Weak 5247 km
1360 2358 07-12-16 USA WMOB Mobile AL. OM ID - WMOB Mobile, WTOF Bay Minette. Fair 6686 km
1370 0100 05-12-16 USA WDEA Ellsworth ME. WDEA Ellsworth heard in 1368 splash Weak 4404 km
1380 0400 04-12-16 USA KRCM Shenandoah TX. Vida AM IDs Weak 7195 km
1380 0400 05-12-16 CAN CKPC Brantford ON. ID - We're .....'s radio station, 13-80 CKPC
5202 km
1380 0700 05-12-16 USA WPHM Port Huron MI. Reference to Coast To Coast, then ID - 13-80
WPHM Port Huron. ABC News. 5341 km
1380 0900 04-12-16 USA KOTA Rapid City SD. ID - This is your source for news .... Newsradio
13-80 KOTA Rapid City. CBS News V weak 6363 km
1380 2100 06-12-16 USA WSYB Rutland VT. Three WSYB IDs in very weak pile-up 4735 km
1390 0100 06-12-16 USA WLCM Holt MI. ID - Lansing's only all time ..... WLCM Holt Lansing.
SRN News Weak 5500 km
1420 0100 05-12-16 USA WHK Cleveland OH. WHK Cleveland ID heard in pile-up Weak 5414 km
1420 0100 06-12-16 USA WOC Davenport IA. OM ID - ''Ten second ID break on the Hawkeye Radio
Network. You're listening to Iowa Best .... 14-20 WOC Davenport
Tri-States. Available on the i-Heart Radio App.'' Weak 5897 km
1440 0100 07-12-16 USA WMKM Inkster MI Booming! WMKM Inkster Detroit ID. Praise the lord!
Fair 5439 km
1440 0800 06-12-16 USA WVEI Worcester MA. 14-40 WVEI ID Weak 4768 km
1450 0200 04-12-16 VEN YVKJ Radio Maria, Catia La Mar. Religious music and ID 7292 km
1450 0400 06-12-16 USA WPGG Atlantic City NJ. South Jersey's ??? Station WPGG Atlantic
City Weak 5153 km
1460 0300 04-12-16 USA WOPG Albany NY. WOPG AM and FM 89.9 ID. EWTN ID. Fair 4857 km
1460 0900 06-12-16 CAN CJOY Guelph ON. Muffled CJOY Guelph ID in splatter 5164 km
1470 0400 07-12-16 USA WMBD 1470 Peoria IL. OM ID - AM 14-70 WMBD 5926 km
1470 0700 07-12-16 USA KYYW Abilene TX. OM ID - Newstalk 14-70 KYYW. ABC News. Weak 7196 km
Possible first logging in the UK. **
1470 2100 06-12-16 USA WNYY Ithaca NY. ID - You're listening to Ithaca's Progressive Talk.
14-70 AM, 97 7 FM, WNYY Ithaca. Weak 5032 km
1470 2200 07-12-16 USA WWNN Pompano Beach FL .Caught just prior to dropping power. OM ID -
14-70 WWNN Pompano Beach .... 95.3 W237BD ... Health and Wealth
Network. 6625 km
1480 0701 05-12-16 USA WGVU Kentwood MI. V weak in Mexico fade. Mentioning WGVU and other
calls. Mentioning Downtown Grand Rapids and ID - Real Oldies
14-80 and 8-50. 5520 km
1480 0902 04-12-16 USA WLMV Madison WI. ID - La Musica con mas sentimiento ... via ...
escucha en La Movida, Catorce Ochenta AM Weak 5716 km
1480 2102 06-12-16 USA WZRC New York NY. WZRC New York ID Fair 5010 km
1480 2200 07-12-16 USA WSAR Fall River MA. ... and information you need, live and late-
breaking. This is Bristol Counties News Authority. 14-80 WSAR
Fall River, New Bedford. Weak 4774 km
1490 0300 07-12-16 USA WMBM Miami Beach FL. Several IDs over the top of the hour. Gospel
14-90 WMBM. 6656 km
1490 2300 06-12-16 USA WBSS Pleasantville NJ. South Jersey's legendary Kool 98 3 and hear
the best songs on the radio Weak 5155 km
1500 0100 06-12-16 USA WLQV Detroit MI. OM ID - On 92.7 and AM 1500 Faith Talk Detroit.
WLQV .... Salem Media Weak 5432 km
1590 0600 05-12-16 USA WAUB Auburn NY. ID - ... starts now. On 98.1 and 1590 WAUB Auburn.
Finger Lakes News Radio. CBS News Weak 4998 km
1590 0730 05-12-16 USA WAKR Akron OH. Ads and WAKR Akron ID Fair 5432 km
1590 2200 07-12-16 USA WGBW Denmark WI. OM ID - This is WGBW, Denmark, Green Bay. True
Oldies 15-00. ABC News. Weak 5523 km
1600 0700 05-12-16 USA WAAM Ann Arbor MI. Difficult copy. WAAM call letters heard. 5463 km
1660 0600 06-12-16 USA KQWB West Fargo ND. KQWB West Fargo, Fargo, Moorhead ... Powered by
.... your local .... dealer ... Cumulus station ... Fox Sports
Trending ... Now! Weak 5779 km
Location: Princes Point/Totescore, Nr Uig, Isle of Skye (IO67TO)
Receiver: Perseus SDR, MESTOR recording software.
Antenna: Flag Antenna (Not fully functioning due to dry joint in transformer box - not known at the time.)
OBSERVATIONS:
Stations logged only once, even if they were heard more frequently. Only the earliest logging of those stations appears above.
West coast (1000 KOMO) and Manitoba (680 CJOB & 1290 CFRW) were audible every night.
There was an impressive opening to Colombia on the 4th just after midnight. The Bogota area featured strongly.
Mexico was apparent each night, but had a stronger presence on the 6th and 7th. The earliest Mexican appeared at midnight - Radio Educacion on 1060.
Fade ins occurred at 1800: 930 CJYQ; 1140 CBI and 1400 CBI had very weak audio at this time. These and other regular Canadians had fair audio by 1900 or just after. The regular east coast USA stations appeared with clear audio by 2000. At 2100, the band was awash with many North American signals, many of which were stronger than the Europeans on the band.
Fade outs were typically quite early, around 0900. Only the most regular east coast North Americans were still audible weakly at 1000.
Despite regular reception of 1380 KCRM, I checked for KMIC 1590, but didn't note anything on the hours. Bollywood music was heard briefly around 0700 on the 7th, so that was probably KMIC No IDs were heard, hence it is not included in the log.
At 0700 and 0800 on the 6th and 7th, a CBS News jingle was heard on 1070. Maybe KNX Los Angeles. Thanks Barry Davies for the tip. Apparently, this was reported in Scandinavia at the time. The signal was never strong enough to hear vocals though.
Pick of the crop is undoubtedly 1470 KYYW Abilene TX, a rarely received station even by Scandinavian standards. A video of this and other stations received on the trip appear on my YouTube channel at: https://www.youtube.com/user/g1vvp
Our nearest neighbours. Plenty of room for Beverage antennas in the right directions
Having now gone though most of the files, I can state that this now feels like it has been a 'proper' DXpedition. All those high signal strengths, no apparent noise on the band, etc., made this a memorable trip, in spite of my under-performing half-a-flag antenna. There are a few half-hour files I haven't checked, but should I find any more interesting catches, I will add them to the log and make a footnote below.This cottage really is the perfect place to conduct a transatlantic MW DXpedition and I hope I may be able to visit myself again in the future. I *will* make a point of running out a Beverage antenna or two if there is a next time.
Good DX!
John Faulkner.
More room for Beverage antennas!
Crystal and Monty, enjoying their freedom at Staffin Bay
Crystal and Monty, enjoying their freedom at Staffin Bay
Monty, taking in the scenery. Luss Beach, Loch Lomond
Crystal, tired after a good walk
View east to the mainland from The Quirang
A seal pops up in the waters of Staffin Bay
Friday, 24 June 2016
2016 Mid-term Es (& Weather) Analysis
We're about half way through the 2016 Es season, so time to post my personal opinion on this year's Es season. These are my own experiences and differ from other DXer's experiences.
Like last season, this year's Es have been the worst and the best for me. "The worst", based on the sparse number of openings, the lack of intensity/lower MUF of the openings and the number of stations received. "The best" because of the frequent double-hop conditions to Turkey, plus the phenomenal opening to Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East on May 29th! So the contrasts have been quite extreme.
Being on the east coast places me closer to the European action, so I am often lucky to experience some Es openings which don't penetrate further inland.
What I am still struggling to get my head around is the fact that I have received Turkey more than twice as often as I have received Italy this season and almost four times as frequently as I have received Spain! That just doesn't happen .... well, clearly it DOES happen. This is the nature of sporadic E. You just never know what to expect, even when you think conditions are poor. It only takers a few minutes and the Es clouds can develop in the right places. But such DX is rare.
Also, just like last summer, there have been more Es openings in Eastern Europe and which didn't reach this far west, so DXers in eastern parts of Europe may argue that their season has been OK, but even there, you can see that the openings have been less frequent.
There have been many days with no Es at all here. The same could be said for the sun. Yes, I am going to moan about the weather. Cold northerly winds have often dominated our weather here on the Lincolnshire coast. The sun has been quite scarce too, with many days of cloud cover. Unusual for the east coast.
We sometimes use the term "British summer" hee to describe the weather. This is usually taken to mean "two sunny days then a thunder storm". That's about right, but storms never seem to come overhead in Skegness and are drawn into the Fenlands or into the Wolds. We are exposed to many elements in these Islands due to our geographical location. It can be oppressively hot due to high humidity levels sometimes, or the opposite, though we don't really have extremes here. It's a fairly 'temperate' and pleasant climate on the whole. Not too hot and not too cold. Personally, I do not like hot weather.
The eastern side of England usually benefits from drier, sunnier weather than the rest of the UK. Not so this season! Weather systems have been in the wrong place, so we have had a lot of cold northerly winds for most of the British summertime. It's been hard to believe that the east of England has been struggling to reach 9C at times when it should have been more than double this.
So, in conclusion, it's largely "RUBBISH" but with rare and unusually good highlights. The season has a few weeks to redeem itself, but I am not holding my breath.
Like last season, this year's Es have been the worst and the best for me. "The worst", based on the sparse number of openings, the lack of intensity/lower MUF of the openings and the number of stations received. "The best" because of the frequent double-hop conditions to Turkey, plus the phenomenal opening to Iraq and elsewhere in the Middle East on May 29th! So the contrasts have been quite extreme.
Being on the east coast places me closer to the European action, so I am often lucky to experience some Es openings which don't penetrate further inland.
What I am still struggling to get my head around is the fact that I have received Turkey more than twice as often as I have received Italy this season and almost four times as frequently as I have received Spain! That just doesn't happen .... well, clearly it DOES happen. This is the nature of sporadic E. You just never know what to expect, even when you think conditions are poor. It only takers a few minutes and the Es clouds can develop in the right places. But such DX is rare.
Also, just like last summer, there have been more Es openings in Eastern Europe and which didn't reach this far west, so DXers in eastern parts of Europe may argue that their season has been OK, but even there, you can see that the openings have been less frequent.
There have been many days with no Es at all here. The same could be said for the sun. Yes, I am going to moan about the weather. Cold northerly winds have often dominated our weather here on the Lincolnshire coast. The sun has been quite scarce too, with many days of cloud cover. Unusual for the east coast.
We sometimes use the term "British summer" hee to describe the weather. This is usually taken to mean "two sunny days then a thunder storm". That's about right, but storms never seem to come overhead in Skegness and are drawn into the Fenlands or into the Wolds. We are exposed to many elements in these Islands due to our geographical location. It can be oppressively hot due to high humidity levels sometimes, or the opposite, though we don't really have extremes here. It's a fairly 'temperate' and pleasant climate on the whole. Not too hot and not too cold. Personally, I do not like hot weather.
The eastern side of England usually benefits from drier, sunnier weather than the rest of the UK. Not so this season! Weather systems have been in the wrong place, so we have had a lot of cold northerly winds for most of the British summertime. It's been hard to believe that the east of England has been struggling to reach 9C at times when it should have been more than double this.
So, in conclusion, it's largely "RUBBISH" but with rare and unusually good highlights. The season has a few weeks to redeem itself, but I am not holding my breath.
Sunday, 12 June 2016
Low Power / Short Es To Germany: 12-06-16
On June 12th, there was an afternoon opening to the Baltic area with the best reception I have known to Latvia and Lithuania. Belarus and Poland were also received, but the highlight for me was the short skip to Germany, one of my favourite countries to DX.
Several low power transmitters were received from sites I have not logged previously, nor have I even heard of these site. Most had RDS.
Several low power transmitters were received from sites I have not logged previously, nor have I even heard of these site. Most had RDS.
87.8 MDR Aktuell, Stendal Borstel (1kW) 1631 12-06-16 (773 km)
88.4 88vier, Berlin Schöneberg (2kW) 1631 12-06-16 (877 km)
90.5 Sputnik, Jerichow (1kW) 1635 12-06-16 (789 km)
92.1 Radio Cottbus, Guben (1kW) 1635 12-06-16 (978 km)
93.9 Sender KW, Fürstenwalde (3kW) 1630 12-06-16 (926 km)
94.8 BBC World Service, Berlin (4kW) 1630 12-0-16 (864 km)
95.3 Babelsberg Hitradio, Potsdam (630W) 1630 12-06-16 (862 km)
BBC Radio Sheffield - Paul Hudson Weather Show. Discussion about the previous week's tropo
https://app.box.com/s/8ez77iec1xcivge45lxnr01cnq27pr1u
Click the link above to hear Paul Hudson and John Kettley discuss the previous week's tropospheric DX event!
Recorded from BBC Radio Sheffield, 12-06-16
Click the link above to hear Paul Hudson and John Kettley discuss the previous week's tropospheric DX event!
Recorded from BBC Radio Sheffield, 12-06-16
Monday, 6 June 2016
Sunday, 24 April 2016
Early Start To The Sporadic E Season!
This has been the earliest start to a sporadic E season I can remember, although I haven't really checked so early in April before now.
The first Es opening of 2016 came shortly before midday on April 18th with a small opening to Russia on the OIRT band. Nothing was heard on band 2.
The second Es opening reached band 2 just after midday on April 19th. Arabic programming was heard for a minute or two, very weakly on 87.6. It was definitely sporadic E.
The third opening came today, April 24th, during the early evening, when the Reggio Calabira area in southern Italy came through, the MUF reaching 90.4 MHz.
A sign of things to come? Of course not ;O) The Es will happen as and when they want. This probably means nothing at all, but how nice to have such an early start to the season.
Good DX!
The first Es opening of 2016 came shortly before midday on April 18th with a small opening to Russia on the OIRT band. Nothing was heard on band 2.
The second Es opening reached band 2 just after midday on April 19th. Arabic programming was heard for a minute or two, very weakly on 87.6. It was definitely sporadic E.
The third opening came today, April 24th, during the early evening, when the Reggio Calabira area in southern Italy came through, the MUF reaching 90.4 MHz.
A sign of things to come? Of course not ;O) The Es will happen as and when they want. This probably means nothing at all, but how nice to have such an early start to the season.
Good DX!
Wednesday, 20 April 2016
My 2015 Sporadic E Season Has Finally Finished!
I was just updating my web pages, adding the last few entries from my 2015 to my personal all-time E logbook, then it struck me - my 2015 season was finally over ... AT LAST!
2015 was the first Es season where I had used a band 2 SDR. It was something of an experimental process, resulting in me acquiring a large number of SDR files, all produced by my Elad FDM-S2 SDR receiver. It was all very exciting, knowing that I could record large chunks of the FM band, the whole band in only four chunks in fact! Very nearly three chunks, thanks to the 6MHz bandwidth!
DXing in this manner means that I am less likely to miss stations which are coming through. No more single channel DXing, it's now SIXTY CHANNEL DXING !!!
What did this mean?
* Lots of files to check through (well over 500 or 600 in my case - I didn't count them).
* Each file could take half an hour or longer if I wanted to investigate reception closely.
* There was never enough time to check the files ...
* Therefore I got well behind on log reporting - over seven months behind at times!
But there was a very big positive:
* Almost 9000 loggings!
* More double hop spotted than you can shake a big stick at!
The quantity of loggings never outweighs the quality of loggings, but I was very pleased to report double hop reception to Israel, Cyprus, Libya, Lebanon and Turkey - that's Istanbul AND Asiatic Turkey, right down to Adana, not that far from the Syrian border. Turkey was received on several occasions. One day I had GOOD signals right to the top of the band! It was like living in Istanbul.
The important question is, would I have had this double hop reception had I only had single frequency DXing? I estimate that between 60% - 90% if it would have been missed. I may have still had Cyprus and Turkey, but in limited quantity. It's possible I may have missed all of it. The Istanbul reception was only possible due to the recording facility. I was not at home at the time!
The whole thing was an experiment to find out what was possible with broadband FM DXing, finding out the pros and cons, but I had to check through EVERY single file. That now having been accomplished, I can say that I definitely WON'T be so eager in the future. It's just too much! In future I will record far less files. Yes, there are obvious benefits of recording large quantities of files, but it comes with diminishing returns. More files = more repetition of the same stations. Useful, perhaps, but probably not worth the extra effort, unless you are extremely keen or have a lot of spare time on your hands.
In 2016, I plan to record far fewer files and I will target certain countries. Checking hundreds of SDR files held my attention and remained interesting only for so long. I was determined to achieve my goal, and I am pleased to say that I did, but NEVER AGAIN! Ocverall, it was interesting and mostly fun, but there are limits.
Happy DXing!
2015 was the first Es season where I had used a band 2 SDR. It was something of an experimental process, resulting in me acquiring a large number of SDR files, all produced by my Elad FDM-S2 SDR receiver. It was all very exciting, knowing that I could record large chunks of the FM band, the whole band in only four chunks in fact! Very nearly three chunks, thanks to the 6MHz bandwidth!
DXing in this manner means that I am less likely to miss stations which are coming through. No more single channel DXing, it's now SIXTY CHANNEL DXING !!!
What did this mean?
* Lots of files to check through (well over 500 or 600 in my case - I didn't count them).
* Each file could take half an hour or longer if I wanted to investigate reception closely.
* There was never enough time to check the files ...
* Therefore I got well behind on log reporting - over seven months behind at times!
But there was a very big positive:
* Almost 9000 loggings!
* More double hop spotted than you can shake a big stick at!
The quantity of loggings never outweighs the quality of loggings, but I was very pleased to report double hop reception to Israel, Cyprus, Libya, Lebanon and Turkey - that's Istanbul AND Asiatic Turkey, right down to Adana, not that far from the Syrian border. Turkey was received on several occasions. One day I had GOOD signals right to the top of the band! It was like living in Istanbul.
The important question is, would I have had this double hop reception had I only had single frequency DXing? I estimate that between 60% - 90% if it would have been missed. I may have still had Cyprus and Turkey, but in limited quantity. It's possible I may have missed all of it. The Istanbul reception was only possible due to the recording facility. I was not at home at the time!
The whole thing was an experiment to find out what was possible with broadband FM DXing, finding out the pros and cons, but I had to check through EVERY single file. That now having been accomplished, I can say that I definitely WON'T be so eager in the future. It's just too much! In future I will record far less files. Yes, there are obvious benefits of recording large quantities of files, but it comes with diminishing returns. More files = more repetition of the same stations. Useful, perhaps, but probably not worth the extra effort, unless you are extremely keen or have a lot of spare time on your hands.
In 2016, I plan to record far fewer files and I will target certain countries. Checking hundreds of SDR files held my attention and remained interesting only for so long. I was determined to achieve my goal, and I am pleased to say that I did, but NEVER AGAIN! Ocverall, it was interesting and mostly fun, but there are limits.
Happy DXing!
Thursday, 17 December 2015
Isle Of Skye DX Trip - 05-12-15 > 09-12-15 (MW)
There's not a lot to write about, DX wise. This was n0t actually a dedicated DX trip, but a holiday ... a holiday from hell (almost)! If you don't want to read through the rest, here are the logs. But I wanted to document the experience. The entire trip was one disaster after another, but we had immense fun throughout!
Isle Of Skye Medium Wave Log: December 6th & 7th, 2015:
570 0130 06-12-15 CAN CFCB Corner Brook (NL) Long list of station calls on the
network, finishing with CFCB ID V weak 3475 km
680 0200 07-12-15 PTR WAPA San Juan (N) (PR) Phone caller, asking why Puerto Rico
cannot change in the same way Venezuela has. Would appear to
be WAPA. Thank you Mauricio Molano. V weak 6501 km
770 0300 07-12-15 CLM HJJX RCN La Radio FM 93.9, Bogotá D. C. (bdc) Mentioning web
site .com.co so Colombia, so RCN-Bogotá. Thank you Mauricio
Molano for help. V weak 8275 km
840 0500 07-12-15 CUB CMHW Doblevé/CMBQ W Santa Maria, Santa Clara/CTOM2 (vc)
Programme "Al Ritmo de la Noche" from CMHW. Thanks Mauricio
Molano for help. V weak 6952 km
950 0100 07-12-15 USA WTLN Orlando (FL) WTLN The New 9-50 ID V weak 6493 km
960 0600 06-12-15 CUB Radio Reloj, Guantánamo/CTOM2 (gu) RR morse ID V weak 6874 km
970 0100 07-12-15 USA WFLA Newsradio 970, Tampa (FL) WFLA and Fox News Radio,
mixing WZAN Weak 6608 km
1060 0030 07-12-15 CUB CMGW Radio 26, Jovellanos (ma) OM ID. Thanks Mauricio Molano
for help. V weak 6990 km
1140 0000 07-12-15 CUB CMIP Radio Surco, Morón (ca) Vocal ID on the hour in pile-up.
Thanks Mauricio Molano for help. V weak 6902 km
1160 0030 07-12-15 ATG Caribbean Radio Lighthouse, Jolly Harbour (atg) "Caribbean
Radio Lighthouse, Antigua", clearly heard on the half hour in
pile-up Weak 6396 km
1210 0630 06-12-15 CAN VOAR Saint John s (NL) Visit voar.org So easy to hear 'up
here', but splashed to bits back home. Fair 3262 km
1240 0200 07-12-15 CAN CKIM Baie Verte (NL) Pops, as 590 V weak 3303 km
1310 0100 07-12-15 USA WLOB Portland (ME) WLOB Portland and wlob.com. Fox News Radio
Weak 4576 km
1460 0100 07-12-15 USA WOPG WOPG-FM, Albany (NY) EWTN Network ID then YL ID W??? 14-60
AM and WOPG FM 89.9. Weak 4861 km
1480 0400 06-12-15 USA WSAR Fall River (MA) News ... Talk ... 14-80 WSAR ID V weak
4778 km
Jane, my lovely wife, stopped smoking exactly one year ago - she just 'stopped'. No gradual reduction of intake, etc. and she's still smoke-free today and has no wish to start smoking again. Well done her! With the money she saved in the first two weeks, she put a deposit down for a holiday. She wanted to stay in a crofting cottage over Christmas and the new year, preferably in the north of Scotland so she might catch a sighting of the northern lights and, more importantly, she wanted to book a cottage with a hot tub. I had no idea how desirable and even fashionable such holidays were. We could both sit outside on a cold winter's night, bathing in the warmth of a hot tub, looking romantically to the stars (or preferably the aforementioned northern lights) while sipping a real ale or two and just chilling. I wasn't entirely sure that the cold air wouldn't be a problem, especially the getting out of a warm hot tub and walking through freezing cold air bit, but the experience sounded interesting.
From the outset, this was NOT going to be a radio holiday, but I was immediately considering the possibility of taking the Perseus and a reel of wire along too, something Jane didn't mind me doing. The plan was for me to take a minimal amount of radio equipment and a laptop so I could record the DX overnight, leave it to get on with itself, then check the recordings after we had returned home.
We began making enquiries in early January this year and were pleased to find a wealth of chalets, apartments and crofting cottages which met Jane's needs perfectly. But we made one big mistake in not booking at that time. In the two days we spent looking around at the various holiday options available, all those we had been considering had been fully booked again by returning holidaymakers. We were left with very few options, with the few remaining places only being available at the beginning of December, and none of them had the hot tub Jane really wanted. Undeterred, we booked Greenhill Cottage in Balmaqueen, right at the northern-most tip of the Isle of Skye on the Trotternish Peninsula. The cottage was situated in a picturesque valley with a great take-off to the north, and fantastic views out over the sea. With a bit of luck we might even be able to see dolphins, eagles, puffins and all manner of fascinating wildlife the north of Scotland has to offer. That was the hope, but what followed (somewhat predictably in my life) was one nightmare scenario after another.
It all started out very calmly as we left Skegness. It was 0400 and the weather was calm and dry. But as we took our first break at Hartshead Moor services near Bradford, the rain was hammering down. Driving was beginning to get difficult as the wind got up out of nowhere and started to push the car into the next lane of the motorway. Motorway signs were suddenly warning of road closures due to high winds and torrential rain. This was a surprise. Maybe I should have checked the weather forecast more closely. I was aware there was an Atlantic weather system moving in, but nothing major. I turned on the radio and heard traffic warnings, telling people not to venture out unless it was absolutely necessary as "Storm Desmond" was going cause widespread disruption. Yes - "Storm Desmond"! This was the name of a storm system, so named by our wonderful Met Orifice. Yes, the Orifice are now naming storm systems. How ridiculous!
It's now 7am and we have just passed Manchester and joined the M61 motorway, heading for the M6. BBC local radio stations were issuing warnings of 100 miles per hour wind gusts at Shap Summit in the north of Cumbria! Nice! We would be driving over this summit in the next hour or two. Once we got past Lancaster, the car was swerving violently from side to side, forcing all traffic to slow down to a crawl. The gists were sudden and powerful. The rain had not relented at all and was getting heavier.
Northern Lancashire and the surrounding hills and Pennine mountains were shielding us from the worst at this stage, but the approaching higher ground was going to prove ever more difficult. We hit Cumbria, almost literally! The rain became horizontal and the sight of lorries lying on their side gave us a real cause for concern. Should we continue with our journey? We had no idea if the weather in Scotland was gong to be any better ... or worse, as is often the case.
We ventured further north into Cumbria. We could see raging torrents of water running through fields to our west. Many fields were completely under water. I am not trying to exaggerate any of this, but we thought it was time to stop and at least take a moment to consider our options. Lorries and even a car were lying overturned, either in a field or stren awkwardly across the motorway. One lorry had a broken windscreen. It looked like the driver may have gone through it. Hopefully the drivers of all these vehicles were OK. Ambulances were screaming up and down both carriageways, no doubt taking victims to hospitals. Surprisingly, the motorway remained open.
Tebay Mountain Lodge came into view and so we stopped for a short rest and a bite to eat. We parked rather too close to a lorry which had had its roof ripped off, the remnants of which were swaying around in the wind. The walk across the car park was unpleasant to say the least as the strong winds making walking very difficult. We were hearing people saying how they had never seen anything like this. Parts of the lodge had minor flooding as rainwater had leaked in through the roof. We thought more about continuing our journey. The weather forecast suggested the winds were primarily over the Borders region, so we expected conditions would improve not too far north of our current location. We opted to continue. The weather improved a little, but the rain was still heavy.
Back on our way and passing a few more lorries which had been blown over. The area around the Solway Firth was, predictably, very bad for the winds and we drove with the utmost care and attention. We reached the Scottish border and decided to pull off the motorway at Gretna Green to get half an hour's kip in the car. We needed it!
Several miles past the Solway Firth and the winds began to ease, but that wasn't the end of our problems. We reached Glasgow safely and without further problems, but navigating the narrow and twisting roads between Dumbarton and Crianlarich gave us new problems. The mountains were getting bigger and the rainwater had formed many waterfalls, some of which cascaded down across our road. It was like driving through a never ending succession of fords. The journey was slow and tedious at this point.
Next we travelled through the impressive mountains around Glencoe and on to Fort William. We were looking forward to seeing Ben Nevis, the UK's highest mountain, but it was completely obscured by cloud. At this part of the journey we had been listening to Nevis Radio, one of those truly local radio stations which you probably wouldn't ever have a chance of hearing anywhere else but just around this area. The radio suddenly re-tuned to BBC Radio Scotland for a traffic report. There were warnings of many road closures and landslides, "too numerous to mention", the announcer said.
Just how useless can radio be? Isn't the whole point of radio to entertain and inform? Surely the BBC should have increased their weather and traffic output to help communities? I started to wonder about is. Radio in the UK is so pointless sometimes. So much for being dependable when a serious situation arises. It's just not good enough! They had more interest in playing a Kylie Minogue song. "Oh yes dear listener, it's wild outside with total carnage forecast. No fear, just stay tuned to BBC Radio Local and forget the end of the world while we play you Kylie Minogue." I can still hear them playing the Kylie Minogue song. It was "I Should Be So Lucky"!
Interestingly for us, while we were visiting Portree, we met a lady who works for the local radio station for the Isle of Skye, Isles FM, who is shortly to move to Skegness!
The car radio returned to Nevis Radio, just as they were carrying some more localised traffic information. Unfortunately, they were announcing something we had been dreading, that the A82, our route north, had been closed due to a landslide. It's now dark. Should we take the ferry from Malaig? No, there wasn't enough time get there to catch the last one (1500) so that was out of the question. The alternatives were to turn back and go home, or to continue our journey via a 200 mile detour to Inverness. We decided on something else - to take a risk and drive to the location of the landslide, midway between Invergarry and Spean Bridge, in the hope that it might have been cleared. Kylie Minogue's Luck was on our side at this point as the road had just reopened as we arrived at that point. So we were on our way once again. There were no more problems after this and we arrived at our destination at 1730. So that was a 595 mile journey which took 15 and a half hours! Ouch! Of course, we had no idea that the return journey was going to be far worse.
We found the cottage with some difficulty. It was situated in the crofting community of Balmaqueen and not Kilmaluag as we had assumed. The exact location was not given to us until the balance of the holiday payment had been made. It would have been nice to know the precise location beforehand.
The first thing I personally wanted to do was to set up a longwire to check the conditions on medium wave. This was done but there appeared to be something wrong with the transformer connection - or the Perseus. Signals were too low, but everything was connecting perfectly well. I abandoned this and threw up the flag. Worse still! There was barely any signal and noise persisted across the band. The flag did not stand up in the winds anyway, so this was abandoned until the following day.
Day 2 and I got the flag up. There was a poor connection on the feeder in one of the coax plugs. The connection was open circuit. I fixed this but the problem still existed. The circuit was closed. What on earth was wrong? It must have been a break in the coax, yet this had a multi-stranded copper inner. Bring in the famous Faulkner "Bodgitt & Scarper" methodology. I managed to fix the problem by moving the coax until the radio burst to life. Now to tape the coax to the mast so everything stayed connected! It worked, at least until 6am, when the hard drive on the laptop had filled up. Bugger! At least I managed a few hours worth of recordings.
Medium wave conditions were dreadfuly though. The indices were high enough to ruin high-latitude reception, but weren't hight enough to spark off an aurora - exactly as Mr Pesimism here had predicted. We wouldn't have seen one anyway as the weather was almost constantly cloudy with heavy rain. It was mild though, with overnight temperatures up to 12 degrees! Phenomelnal for the time of year.
Day 3 produced the same non-event of medium wave DX activity, but I managed to record up to 1100 hours as I had deleted a few of the mid-hour files from the laptop in the middle of the night.
Another downside to the holiday. There was no mobile phone signal. There was no wi-fi either, as promised in the holiday booking. We managed to find brief pockets of mobile phone signal only in the car when parked on a particular hillside. It was unreliable though. This was going to be a nusance. When the holiday was originally booked, I was not working. During March of 2015 I started a small business and we found it necessary to take some of the work with us. The wi-fi, or at least a mobile phone signal, was necessary to continue my work. This was a problem as I was losing orders. Some of the work involves printing on very fine papers. The dampness of the cottage was spoiling the papers and the ink was splodging into the papers.
That was another thing - we paid extra to have the use of an AGA, which we were promised would transfer the heat through the cottage. The owners of the cottage would not allow the use of continual central heating and had this set up on a timer. Well, we were absolutely freezing. The AGA did nothing other than heat up the kitchen. We fixed the central heating so it was on when we needed it. We were lucky the weather had not been colder.
Day 4 and we still hadn't slept much due to the howling winds and the creaking and swaying cottage. The winds did not let up and each blast of wind got stronger and stronger. This gave us cause for concern. Although I was not unduly deterred by this, Jane was. She had not experienced the wilds of northern Scotland and felt quite scared. With a forecast of even stronger winds for that night, we decided to abandon the holiday. Midnight was calm and we managed to catch up on some sleep. But by 4am, the cottage was swaying again. It really didn't feel safe. Adding in the problems with the business, which I was unable to keep up with and orders were coming through and customer delays now on the cards, we both agreed to end the holiday and get back home.
So far I haven't mentioned FM radio. There was a local viewpoint with a car park a few miles from the cottage, on the eastern side of the island, between Balmaqueen and Staffin Bay, overlooking the snow-capped mountains of the mainland. I had planned to make a stop there to do an FM bandscan, but never got around to it. Just to add that FM reception in the cottage was sketchy at best and I can't remember much about what I did receive. The upstairs rooms gave the best reception and I remember Isles FM 103.0, Cuillin FM 102.7 (I think), MFR, which might have been on 96.8 and Two Lochs Radio, now that might have been on 103.0. I really cannot remember and I did not make notes. A shambles of a DX trip if ever there was one!
But here's a photo of the Skriaig transmitter, which I didn't know was on the island until I got there.
It was 7am and we heard that the Skye Bridge was due to be closed. We were just about packed and ready to leave. Would we reach the bridge in time? We really didn't fancy having to stay another night, especially with violent storm (Beaufort Scale "force 11") winds forecast. We made it, by the skin of our teeth! Then we had a pleasant drive back through the highlands. We reached Fort William without problem and actually managed to see Ben Nevis this time while enjoying some nice food at a local restaurant which overlooked the Nevis Range.
We decided to avoid Cumbria this time and head for the north-east of England. The worst of the weather was now behind us, right up in the far north-west of Scotland. Or so we thought. We got as far as Stirling, then we remembered that the Forth Road Bridge was closed. We had no alternative routes and did not want to go back through Glasgow and down the north-west of England. So we drove, hoping that the SatNag (satellite navigation) would find us an alternative route, which it did! This was the first and only time that the SatNag had actually done something right in the eight months we'd had it. Miracles never cease!
Could this be the end of our problems? Don't be silly! We were now heading south along the A1. We had just took the Edinburgh Southern Bypass and saw signs for Berwick-upon-Tweed, England, some 65 miles ahead. But we noticed the car swaying again. The wind had got up again. It was about 2000 and I switched on our always up-to-date, every-ready-to-inform BBC local radio stations. Aha! BBC Radio Newcastle had a local programme. It was sports, but this was interrupted at 2100 for the news and weather. By this time we were starting to see lorries on their sides again. The weather bulletin simply said "becoming windy". So either this was a repeat (typical outside daylight hours) or the Met Orifice hadn't done their job properly - as is usually to be expected. If anything, the winds were more severe than those we had during the drive up!
There were soon various road closures. We had THREE diversion on the A1 before we got to England! More lorries appeared on their sides. Was this a 'northern' thing perhaps? Maybe the lorries were having a nap, just like their drivers. Our return journey was becoming increasingly disrupted and we really did not feel safe. Furthermore, diesel levels were getting low.
We crawled to Morissons in Berwick-upon-Tweed, where the general scene was becoming quite surreal. The car was now shaking violently in the winds, which I am guessing were easily reaching storm force. I pulled up to the diesel pump and very carefully opened the car door to step outside. The wind noise was almost deafening. I looked around in disbelief as nearby bus shelter panels were bowing in and out, sounding like a certain person's wobble board (we don't mention his name anymore). I was pinned against the car by the wind. The diesel pump shook violently in its moorings, the top of which was swaying backwards and forwards by at least a couple of inches. Gusts were increasing alarmingly and a lady who had been putting fuel in her car, suddenly took off and shot through the air, whizzing past me. She hadn't finished filling up, but the wind had other ideas. She was not hurt though. I looked around in amazement as everything seemed to be moving. Lamp posts were moving more than I have ever seen. Panels were missing from the roof of the petrol station and the diesel pump clearly wanted to uproot and escape. I'd only put £30's worth of diesel in the car but decided that was enough. It was time to jump back in the car and drive away with our lives! Yes, it really was that bad! But there was no mention of this in the weather forecast.
We were both quite hungry and could only find a MacDonalds, so we got a coffee and drove off. I should have used the drive-through, but we needed to use the facilities. Leaving MacDonalds was quite an experience. No matter how hard we tried, we couldn't walk in the direction we wanted to. The winds were in charge and reminded me of the hurricane we experienced on the first Sheigra DXpedition. Any stronger and we would have only been able to crawl on on our hands and knees.
Well, I wanted to document this just for the memory. It was quite an amazing little trip in many ways, but a pity it had to be cut short. The rest of the journey home was without incident, well, apart from every single cafe we wanted to stop at and eat in was closed, probably because of the severe weather. So it was another dreaded MacDonalds when we arrived back in Skegness at midnight.
Summarising, a holiday it was not. A DX trip it was not. An experience it definitely was! and we did enjoy ourselves a lot. We took plenty of photographs, some more of which will be added below (plus a few we nicked off the net as many of our views were obscured by Scottish weather - all credits included), but the final kick in the teeth came the next day, when we learnt that a substantial solar wind shock had hit and would have probably produced visible northern Lights up in Skye. Well, weather permitting.
Peace and tranquility ... some of the time!
Isle Of Skye Medium Wave Log: December 6th & 7th, 2015:
570 0130 06-12-15 CAN CFCB Corner Brook (NL) Long list of station calls on the
network, finishing with CFCB ID V weak 3475 km
680 0200 07-12-15 PTR WAPA San Juan (N) (PR) Phone caller, asking why Puerto Rico
cannot change in the same way Venezuela has. Would appear to
be WAPA. Thank you Mauricio Molano. V weak 6501 km
770 0300 07-12-15 CLM HJJX RCN La Radio FM 93.9, Bogotá D. C. (bdc) Mentioning web
site .com.co so Colombia, so RCN-Bogotá. Thank you Mauricio
Molano for help. V weak 8275 km
840 0500 07-12-15 CUB CMHW Doblevé/CMBQ W Santa Maria, Santa Clara/CTOM2 (vc)
Programme "Al Ritmo de la Noche" from CMHW. Thanks Mauricio
Molano for help. V weak 6952 km
950 0100 07-12-15 USA WTLN Orlando (FL) WTLN The New 9-50 ID V weak 6493 km
960 0600 06-12-15 CUB Radio Reloj, Guantánamo/CTOM2 (gu) RR morse ID V weak 6874 km
970 0100 07-12-15 USA WFLA Newsradio 970, Tampa (FL) WFLA and Fox News Radio,
mixing WZAN Weak 6608 km
1060 0030 07-12-15 CUB CMGW Radio 26, Jovellanos (ma) OM ID. Thanks Mauricio Molano
for help. V weak 6990 km
1140 0000 07-12-15 CUB CMIP Radio Surco, Morón (ca) Vocal ID on the hour in pile-up.
Thanks Mauricio Molano for help. V weak 6902 km
1160 0030 07-12-15 ATG Caribbean Radio Lighthouse, Jolly Harbour (atg) "Caribbean
Radio Lighthouse, Antigua", clearly heard on the half hour in
pile-up Weak 6396 km
1210 0630 06-12-15 CAN VOAR Saint John s (NL) Visit voar.org So easy to hear 'up
here', but splashed to bits back home. Fair 3262 km
1240 0200 07-12-15 CAN CKIM Baie Verte (NL) Pops, as 590 V weak 3303 km
1310 0100 07-12-15 USA WLOB Portland (ME) WLOB Portland and wlob.com. Fox News Radio
Weak 4576 km
1460 0100 07-12-15 USA WOPG WOPG-FM, Albany (NY) EWTN Network ID then YL ID W??? 14-60
AM and WOPG FM 89.9. Weak 4861 km
1480 0400 06-12-15 USA WSAR Fall River (MA) News ... Talk ... 14-80 WSAR ID V weak
4778 km
Jane, my lovely wife, stopped smoking exactly one year ago - she just 'stopped'. No gradual reduction of intake, etc. and she's still smoke-free today and has no wish to start smoking again. Well done her! With the money she saved in the first two weeks, she put a deposit down for a holiday. She wanted to stay in a crofting cottage over Christmas and the new year, preferably in the north of Scotland so she might catch a sighting of the northern lights and, more importantly, she wanted to book a cottage with a hot tub. I had no idea how desirable and even fashionable such holidays were. We could both sit outside on a cold winter's night, bathing in the warmth of a hot tub, looking romantically to the stars (or preferably the aforementioned northern lights) while sipping a real ale or two and just chilling. I wasn't entirely sure that the cold air wouldn't be a problem, especially the getting out of a warm hot tub and walking through freezing cold air bit, but the experience sounded interesting.
From the outset, this was NOT going to be a radio holiday, but I was immediately considering the possibility of taking the Perseus and a reel of wire along too, something Jane didn't mind me doing. The plan was for me to take a minimal amount of radio equipment and a laptop so I could record the DX overnight, leave it to get on with itself, then check the recordings after we had returned home.
We began making enquiries in early January this year and were pleased to find a wealth of chalets, apartments and crofting cottages which met Jane's needs perfectly. But we made one big mistake in not booking at that time. In the two days we spent looking around at the various holiday options available, all those we had been considering had been fully booked again by returning holidaymakers. We were left with very few options, with the few remaining places only being available at the beginning of December, and none of them had the hot tub Jane really wanted. Undeterred, we booked Greenhill Cottage in Balmaqueen, right at the northern-most tip of the Isle of Skye on the Trotternish Peninsula. The cottage was situated in a picturesque valley with a great take-off to the north, and fantastic views out over the sea. With a bit of luck we might even be able to see dolphins, eagles, puffins and all manner of fascinating wildlife the north of Scotland has to offer. That was the hope, but what followed (somewhat predictably in my life) was one nightmare scenario after another.
It all started out very calmly as we left Skegness. It was 0400 and the weather was calm and dry. But as we took our first break at Hartshead Moor services near Bradford, the rain was hammering down. Driving was beginning to get difficult as the wind got up out of nowhere and started to push the car into the next lane of the motorway. Motorway signs were suddenly warning of road closures due to high winds and torrential rain. This was a surprise. Maybe I should have checked the weather forecast more closely. I was aware there was an Atlantic weather system moving in, but nothing major. I turned on the radio and heard traffic warnings, telling people not to venture out unless it was absolutely necessary as "Storm Desmond" was going cause widespread disruption. Yes - "Storm Desmond"! This was the name of a storm system, so named by our wonderful Met Orifice. Yes, the Orifice are now naming storm systems. How ridiculous!
It's now 7am and we have just passed Manchester and joined the M61 motorway, heading for the M6. BBC local radio stations were issuing warnings of 100 miles per hour wind gusts at Shap Summit in the north of Cumbria! Nice! We would be driving over this summit in the next hour or two. Once we got past Lancaster, the car was swerving violently from side to side, forcing all traffic to slow down to a crawl. The gists were sudden and powerful. The rain had not relented at all and was getting heavier.
Northern Lancashire and the surrounding hills and Pennine mountains were shielding us from the worst at this stage, but the approaching higher ground was going to prove ever more difficult. We hit Cumbria, almost literally! The rain became horizontal and the sight of lorries lying on their side gave us a real cause for concern. Should we continue with our journey? We had no idea if the weather in Scotland was gong to be any better ... or worse, as is often the case.
We ventured further north into Cumbria. We could see raging torrents of water running through fields to our west. Many fields were completely under water. I am not trying to exaggerate any of this, but we thought it was time to stop and at least take a moment to consider our options. Lorries and even a car were lying overturned, either in a field or stren awkwardly across the motorway. One lorry had a broken windscreen. It looked like the driver may have gone through it. Hopefully the drivers of all these vehicles were OK. Ambulances were screaming up and down both carriageways, no doubt taking victims to hospitals. Surprisingly, the motorway remained open.
Tebay Mountain Lodge came into view and so we stopped for a short rest and a bite to eat. We parked rather too close to a lorry which had had its roof ripped off, the remnants of which were swaying around in the wind. The walk across the car park was unpleasant to say the least as the strong winds making walking very difficult. We were hearing people saying how they had never seen anything like this. Parts of the lodge had minor flooding as rainwater had leaked in through the roof. We thought more about continuing our journey. The weather forecast suggested the winds were primarily over the Borders region, so we expected conditions would improve not too far north of our current location. We opted to continue. The weather improved a little, but the rain was still heavy.
Back on our way and passing a few more lorries which had been blown over. The area around the Solway Firth was, predictably, very bad for the winds and we drove with the utmost care and attention. We reached the Scottish border and decided to pull off the motorway at Gretna Green to get half an hour's kip in the car. We needed it!
Several miles past the Solway Firth and the winds began to ease, but that wasn't the end of our problems. We reached Glasgow safely and without further problems, but navigating the narrow and twisting roads between Dumbarton and Crianlarich gave us new problems. The mountains were getting bigger and the rainwater had formed many waterfalls, some of which cascaded down across our road. It was like driving through a never ending succession of fords. The journey was slow and tedious at this point.
Part of the Glencoe Mountain Resort
Next we travelled through the impressive mountains around Glencoe and on to Fort William. We were looking forward to seeing Ben Nevis, the UK's highest mountain, but it was completely obscured by cloud. At this part of the journey we had been listening to Nevis Radio, one of those truly local radio stations which you probably wouldn't ever have a chance of hearing anywhere else but just around this area. The radio suddenly re-tuned to BBC Radio Scotland for a traffic report. There were warnings of many road closures and landslides, "too numerous to mention", the announcer said.
Just how useless can radio be? Isn't the whole point of radio to entertain and inform? Surely the BBC should have increased their weather and traffic output to help communities? I started to wonder about is. Radio in the UK is so pointless sometimes. So much for being dependable when a serious situation arises. It's just not good enough! They had more interest in playing a Kylie Minogue song. "Oh yes dear listener, it's wild outside with total carnage forecast. No fear, just stay tuned to BBC Radio Local and forget the end of the world while we play you Kylie Minogue." I can still hear them playing the Kylie Minogue song. It was "I Should Be So Lucky"!
The studios of Nevis Radio in Fort William
Interestingly for us, while we were visiting Portree, we met a lady who works for the local radio station for the Isle of Skye, Isles FM, who is shortly to move to Skegness!
The car radio returned to Nevis Radio, just as they were carrying some more localised traffic information. Unfortunately, they were announcing something we had been dreading, that the A82, our route north, had been closed due to a landslide. It's now dark. Should we take the ferry from Malaig? No, there wasn't enough time get there to catch the last one (1500) so that was out of the question. The alternatives were to turn back and go home, or to continue our journey via a 200 mile detour to Inverness. We decided on something else - to take a risk and drive to the location of the landslide, midway between Invergarry and Spean Bridge, in the hope that it might have been cleared. Kylie Minogue's Luck was on our side at this point as the road had just reopened as we arrived at that point. So we were on our way once again. There were no more problems after this and we arrived at our destination at 1730. So that was a 595 mile journey which took 15 and a half hours! Ouch! Of course, we had no idea that the return journey was going to be far worse.
We found the cottage with some difficulty. It was situated in the crofting community of Balmaqueen and not Kilmaluag as we had assumed. The exact location was not given to us until the balance of the holiday payment had been made. It would have been nice to know the precise location beforehand.
The first thing I personally wanted to do was to set up a longwire to check the conditions on medium wave. This was done but there appeared to be something wrong with the transformer connection - or the Perseus. Signals were too low, but everything was connecting perfectly well. I abandoned this and threw up the flag. Worse still! There was barely any signal and noise persisted across the band. The flag did not stand up in the winds anyway, so this was abandoned until the following day.
Day 2 and I got the flag up. There was a poor connection on the feeder in one of the coax plugs. The connection was open circuit. I fixed this but the problem still existed. The circuit was closed. What on earth was wrong? It must have been a break in the coax, yet this had a multi-stranded copper inner. Bring in the famous Faulkner "Bodgitt & Scarper" methodology. I managed to fix the problem by moving the coax until the radio burst to life. Now to tape the coax to the mast so everything stayed connected! It worked, at least until 6am, when the hard drive on the laptop had filled up. Bugger! At least I managed a few hours worth of recordings.
Medium wave conditions were dreadfuly though. The indices were high enough to ruin high-latitude reception, but weren't hight enough to spark off an aurora - exactly as Mr Pesimism here had predicted. We wouldn't have seen one anyway as the weather was almost constantly cloudy with heavy rain. It was mild though, with overnight temperatures up to 12 degrees! Phenomelnal for the time of year.
Day 3 produced the same non-event of medium wave DX activity, but I managed to record up to 1100 hours as I had deleted a few of the mid-hour files from the laptop in the middle of the night.
Another downside to the holiday. There was no mobile phone signal. There was no wi-fi either, as promised in the holiday booking. We managed to find brief pockets of mobile phone signal only in the car when parked on a particular hillside. It was unreliable though. This was going to be a nusance. When the holiday was originally booked, I was not working. During March of 2015 I started a small business and we found it necessary to take some of the work with us. The wi-fi, or at least a mobile phone signal, was necessary to continue my work. This was a problem as I was losing orders. Some of the work involves printing on very fine papers. The dampness of the cottage was spoiling the papers and the ink was splodging into the papers.
That was another thing - we paid extra to have the use of an AGA, which we were promised would transfer the heat through the cottage. The owners of the cottage would not allow the use of continual central heating and had this set up on a timer. Well, we were absolutely freezing. The AGA did nothing other than heat up the kitchen. We fixed the central heating so it was on when we needed it. We were lucky the weather had not been colder.
Day 4 and we still hadn't slept much due to the howling winds and the creaking and swaying cottage. The winds did not let up and each blast of wind got stronger and stronger. This gave us cause for concern. Although I was not unduly deterred by this, Jane was. She had not experienced the wilds of northern Scotland and felt quite scared. With a forecast of even stronger winds for that night, we decided to abandon the holiday. Midnight was calm and we managed to catch up on some sleep. But by 4am, the cottage was swaying again. It really didn't feel safe. Adding in the problems with the business, which I was unable to keep up with and orders were coming through and customer delays now on the cards, we both agreed to end the holiday and get back home.
So far I haven't mentioned FM radio. There was a local viewpoint with a car park a few miles from the cottage, on the eastern side of the island, between Balmaqueen and Staffin Bay, overlooking the snow-capped mountains of the mainland. I had planned to make a stop there to do an FM bandscan, but never got around to it. Just to add that FM reception in the cottage was sketchy at best and I can't remember much about what I did receive. The upstairs rooms gave the best reception and I remember Isles FM 103.0, Cuillin FM 102.7 (I think), MFR, which might have been on 96.8 and Two Lochs Radio, now that might have been on 103.0. I really cannot remember and I did not make notes. A shambles of a DX trip if ever there was one!
But here's a photo of the Skriaig transmitter, which I didn't know was on the island until I got there.
The Skriaig transmitter, pronounced "Skree-ag"
It was 7am and we heard that the Skye Bridge was due to be closed. We were just about packed and ready to leave. Would we reach the bridge in time? We really didn't fancy having to stay another night, especially with violent storm (Beaufort Scale "force 11") winds forecast. We made it, by the skin of our teeth! Then we had a pleasant drive back through the highlands. We reached Fort William without problem and actually managed to see Ben Nevis this time while enjoying some nice food at a local restaurant which overlooked the Nevis Range.
We decided to avoid Cumbria this time and head for the north-east of England. The worst of the weather was now behind us, right up in the far north-west of Scotland. Or so we thought. We got as far as Stirling, then we remembered that the Forth Road Bridge was closed. We had no alternative routes and did not want to go back through Glasgow and down the north-west of England. So we drove, hoping that the SatNag (satellite navigation) would find us an alternative route, which it did! This was the first and only time that the SatNag had actually done something right in the eight months we'd had it. Miracles never cease!
Could this be the end of our problems? Don't be silly! We were now heading south along the A1. We had just took the Edinburgh Southern Bypass and saw signs for Berwick-upon-Tweed, England, some 65 miles ahead. But we noticed the car swaying again. The wind had got up again. It was about 2000 and I switched on our always up-to-date, every-ready-to-inform BBC local radio stations. Aha! BBC Radio Newcastle had a local programme. It was sports, but this was interrupted at 2100 for the news and weather. By this time we were starting to see lorries on their sides again. The weather bulletin simply said "becoming windy". So either this was a repeat (typical outside daylight hours) or the Met Orifice hadn't done their job properly - as is usually to be expected. If anything, the winds were more severe than those we had during the drive up!
There were soon various road closures. We had THREE diversion on the A1 before we got to England! More lorries appeared on their sides. Was this a 'northern' thing perhaps? Maybe the lorries were having a nap, just like their drivers. Our return journey was becoming increasingly disrupted and we really did not feel safe. Furthermore, diesel levels were getting low.
We crawled to Morissons in Berwick-upon-Tweed, where the general scene was becoming quite surreal. The car was now shaking violently in the winds, which I am guessing were easily reaching storm force. I pulled up to the diesel pump and very carefully opened the car door to step outside. The wind noise was almost deafening. I looked around in disbelief as nearby bus shelter panels were bowing in and out, sounding like a certain person's wobble board (we don't mention his name anymore). I was pinned against the car by the wind. The diesel pump shook violently in its moorings, the top of which was swaying backwards and forwards by at least a couple of inches. Gusts were increasing alarmingly and a lady who had been putting fuel in her car, suddenly took off and shot through the air, whizzing past me. She hadn't finished filling up, but the wind had other ideas. She was not hurt though. I looked around in amazement as everything seemed to be moving. Lamp posts were moving more than I have ever seen. Panels were missing from the roof of the petrol station and the diesel pump clearly wanted to uproot and escape. I'd only put £30's worth of diesel in the car but decided that was enough. It was time to jump back in the car and drive away with our lives! Yes, it really was that bad! But there was no mention of this in the weather forecast.
We were both quite hungry and could only find a MacDonalds, so we got a coffee and drove off. I should have used the drive-through, but we needed to use the facilities. Leaving MacDonalds was quite an experience. No matter how hard we tried, we couldn't walk in the direction we wanted to. The winds were in charge and reminded me of the hurricane we experienced on the first Sheigra DXpedition. Any stronger and we would have only been able to crawl on on our hands and knees.
Well, I wanted to document this just for the memory. It was quite an amazing little trip in many ways, but a pity it had to be cut short. The rest of the journey home was without incident, well, apart from every single cafe we wanted to stop at and eat in was closed, probably because of the severe weather. So it was another dreaded MacDonalds when we arrived back in Skegness at midnight.
Summarising, a holiday it was not. A DX trip it was not. An experience it definitely was! and we did enjoy ourselves a lot. We took plenty of photographs, some more of which will be added below (plus a few we nicked off the net as many of our views were obscured by Scottish weather - all credits included), but the final kick in the teeth came the next day, when we learnt that a substantial solar wind shock had hit and would have probably produced visible northern Lights up in Skye. Well, weather permitting.
Reasonable beaches!
Plummeting cliffs!
One of the neighbour's properties
Monty, who loved the wild outdoors
Monty and Crystal, relaxing after a long walk and a meal. They loved the freedom up there!
A strange bod messing around with wires
Same strange bod, still messing around with wires
Looking west to Harris and the Outer Hebrides
Monty, again, having a run around Staffin Bay
Staffin Bay
Staffin Bay
Staffin Bay
Staffin Bay, the dinosaur stamping ground of Scotland, apparently
A lone pterodactyl
The Old Man Of Storr
The Old Man Of Storr
We didn't reckon much to Scottish motorways
Nevis Radio (Fort William), the smallest radio station in the UK?
Another pterodactyl
One of millions of Scottish road bridges. This one was not affected by a landslide.
A nobbly mountain near Glencoe!
Glencoe
Glencoe
Glencoe
Monty and Crystal enjoying a walk through a Glencoe pass
Monty and Crystal enjoying a walk through a Glencoe pass
Glencoe
Glencoe
One of countless waterfalls we saw
One of countless waterfalls we saw
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