Whitby Abbey and Lighthouses

Thanksgiving is a typical American holiday: stay at home, relax, and spend time with family... and don't forget the food! Lately, I can't seem to stomach turkey or ham, we don't have any family around, and we had no plans to spend the holiday with anyone. This year, we decided we'd head out and take a trip on Thanksgiving. My wife is a big history buff (she'll have her graduate degree in a few weeks) and loves to visit the abbeys in ruins. She decided that we'd stop for the night in Whitby where Bram Stoker was inspired for his famous book, Dracula, and the next 2 days we'd spend in York. I did some searching on the English Castles and English Lighthouses and found that if I'm sitting at Whitby Abbey (G-01916) on the hill, I'm within 1 km of the 2 lighthouses (ENG-163 & ENG-165). Score! 

We left early on Thursday morning towards Whitby and arrived at the abbey in the early afternoon. After getting checked into the English Heritage visitor centre, I parted ways with my family to catch up in an hour or so. I knew that it was projected to rain around 4 pm so I figured I had about 2 hours before the weather turned. I had brought my FT-891 and M1ECC SlideWinder DX antenna and after getting set up, I set out for 40m SSB for the first half hour. My family stopped by and hung out for a few minutes while I activated and they headed out to explore some more.

When the contacts slowed down, I switched over to CW (my favorite). I had made a few quick contacts and had a little pileup going when I had some visitors. I sent AS AS AS to standby and spoke to a couple of gentlemen who had spent time in the British Army and were familiar with UHF and VHF. We spoke for 5 or so minutes about radios and Morse Code. I love chatting with folks when I'm out activating, it may get someone else into that hobby. When the face-to-face conversation was over, the pileup was gone. No matter. I called CQ some more and was able to pull out 4 more CW contacts when I got a FaceBook message that I should switch to 20m SSB. A quick slide up the coil on the SlideWinder DX and I was ready to go. 

I made a few contacts and the sky started to turn dark. I figured I had a little more time since it was only 3 pm. I made 2 more contacts and it started sprinkling. A familiar callsign, SP7SZC, called and I took Marcin's contact quickly and told him the weather was turning and I needed to go; we finished up and as I was about to call QRT, one more station called for a quick contact. By this time, it had turned into rain, like real rain, and I knew I was in trouble. I didn't even know how many contacts I had made but knew that it was time to go.

The M1ECC Antenna is brilliant and it is relatively quick to set up and tear down compared to some others I have. It certainly is not the quickest to tear down and when it's raining, it seems like it takes forever. There was about a half mile walk back through the grounds and around the abbey to the carpark. By the time I made it to the car, I was soaked and tired. Pro tip: wearing running shoes in the wet grass on hilly ground will put you on you behind (nothing was bruised but my ego). 

Luckily, before the rain started my wife texted me that she and kids had walked to the hotel to check in so I didn't need to wait for them and I could head over that direction... except that they were already headed back my way because they couldn't find some of my son's medical equipment and were hoping it was in the car. By the time I had gotten to the car and messaged her that it was there (thank goodness he didn't leave it at Greggs), they had already started walking in the rain. Every one of us was drenched by the time we all met up again but it was a successful day. I ended up with 53 in the log after spending about an hour on the air.

Until next time, keep your batteries charged and your bags packed; you never know when the portable mood might strike.

de M0NZZ