Russell Range (East) ZL3/CB-731

 Having driven past this summit dozens of times on the way to other activations, we thought it was time we climbed it! Dave ZL3DRN did the research and contacted the farmer to arrange access which was readily granted. Saturday dawned cloudy and generally yuck in the city but got better as we headed further West. 

Access is from the end of Springfield Road and we ran into the farmer moving stock along the road. Just as well Rick wasn't with us when he asked: "did you see a cattle beast on the road?"!

Access gate to the right, summit centre-left. Route along paddock and up gully past the sheds

We parked near the yards and set off. Dave had planned two routes and we chose the slightly longer one to avoid a paddock full of heavily pregnant ewes. They lamb fairly late up here and this is the last week of access until after lambing. I christened Dave's new boots by leading us straight through a bog... It's a nice walk up a gully to the ridge and along to the summit past one falsie. Just a couple of steepish bits to keep you honest... We arrived at the trig nice and early (as is our custom), taking us just on an hour (as predicted by our planning app).

Dave at the top, Torlesse Range in the background

Weather was great, just a very light breeze and plenty of blue sky. The plan was for me to try a contact via the ISS repeater so I stepped back out of the AZ and we made a 2m contact to ensure Dave gets the First Activation credit. As it turned out, the ISS repeater hadn't been turned on after docking of a re-supply rocket so that was a bust.

HF antenna of the day was the faithful 44' doublet, erected roughly North-South with the trig used to support the pole. The feeders ran down to a nice sheltered spot out of the breeze.

Getting the doublet set up. Private summits are great, it's safe to use the trig!

Dave got stuck in on 2m and worked a good pile of stations. I tried 70cm but only worked two so headed to HF. 40m produced plenty of customers around NZ including Summit to Summits with Phil ZL1PSH, John ZL3MR, Warren ZL2AJ and Rick ZL3RIK, Kevin ZL3ABY, Roly ZL1BQD portable in Parks. 20m was fairly quiet but worked Australia and Japan. Moving to 15m  things were better with a couple of contacts into Japan and one to California. 10m produced another couple of JA contacts.

Nice operating spot

The wind came up around 12:30pm as predicted so we packed up and had lunch just down off the summit in a bit of shelter and then headed down to the car. The compulsory coffee stop at Springfield tied the ribbons on a great day on a new summit, definitely one to add to the regular list.

Quarry bottom-left. Car is parked where the road turns sharply to left. City obscured by cloud. 

Getting there: Drive right down Springfield Road to the yards at the end and park out of the way

Permission required: Contact Dave ZL3DRN for details

Time: 1 hour - 2.6km and 440m of vertical gain

Trig Marker: Yes

Cellphone: Spark and Vodafone good, Skinny patchy

Mt Crawford ZL1/WL-153

 The NZART annual conference was in Wellington this year, a perfect opportunity to get my first WL summit activation under my belt. Pete ZL2SLD offered a lift and Wynne ZL2ATH was keen to join the fun so after checking in at the Brentwood, Pete and Annie picked up Francie and I and we were off!

Upon arrival at the summit, Wynne was there to meet us and show where he normally activates. Being a weekday the carpark was empty and, as it is in the activation zone, he threw a rope through a convenient tree and strung up Pete's Sotabeams Linked Dipole.

The seats and camp table were set up (completely foreign to me!) and we were on air - 40m CW was a bust, not a single contact to be had. I switched to SSB and worked ZL3MR, ZL3RIK and ZL3QR. With that, Pete asked if I wanted to work parliament on 2m?! Steven ZL4CZ popped up from his courier van and gave us a solid 4th contact (using Pete's nice Diamond 5 element 2m Yagi). 

Pressure off, I went to 20m CW and worked VK2IO, VK3PF and VK5HAA, all good signals to me but I was obviously really light with them.

See, I can use a mic!!

About this time, a security guard arrived and we all thought - "here we go!" As we were right beside the prison walls, he asked us what were doing, said "cool" when Pete explained and went away happy, wishing us good luck!

Guard departing happy with our operation (behind the gum tree)

Pete then hooked up his KX2 with new Digirig interface to try some FT8. After a bit of messing with settings he was away and made plenty of contacts throughout VK and ZL. He was being reported in the US and EU using just 5W. He also worked Brendon ZL1ALF on 2m - that yagi works very well.

Pete in action on FT8 (and multi-tasking!)

This is a really unusual summit - you can catch a bus to the top!! In fact we had a bus-jam up there with two head-to-head!

Bus stop outside the old prison wall, in the AZ!

The guys caution that although this is a good one to do if you are in Wellington for a business trip etc, it's very tricky on 2m only unless you pre-aarange contacts and have a good antenna - bring your portable HF gear.

Thanks to Pete ZL2SLD and Wynne ZL2ATH for their hospitality and welcome - Francie and I enjoyed our afternoon out immensely.

Getting there: drive up - follow the sign to the summit from Miramar or catch a bus!

Permission: Not needed, public carpark

Notes: Busy summit, be prepared to explain what you are doing and try not to have wires all over the place!