KD6LAJ's Midnight
Stroll
Looking For T1
Steve and I had parked
the car at the gate to Mt Edna, and walked up to a
point about 1/3 mile up the road beyond the gate. Then
we saw that the signal seemed to be coming from down where we had been,
and
started to walk down to a ridge where the signal seemed to be coming
from. It
was getting very dark, and we had no flashlights. So I went back to the
car to get food
(for
me), flashlights, and determination.
When I got to the car & gate , I
talked a man into letting me go through the gate, with the promise that
I would
re-lock the gate on my way out. When I got back up there I couldn't
find Steve,
I called him several times on the radio, but he didn't call back. I
went back
to the gate, and then I heard Steve, and he told me he was on his way
down the
hill to T1! Scott, N6MI, stepped in and asked if I needed any help, but
Steve said he
was doing okay.
My only problem was how was I to find Steve, since I had given
him my only handheld! Of course we had 2 FRS radios in the car but
hadn't taken
them on us. So I drove back down to 243 and to T9 location, and hiked
back up
to the saddle. Steve had the only sniffer, and handheld, so I stared
shining the
light around, hoping he would see it. I called out several times to let
him
know I was there, and hoped he would be able to call back to me.
Well this went
on for about ten minutes, because Steve was down in a ditch and
couldn't see my
light or hear me. When he finally did, I was able to see a small key
ring LED.
And I could hear him. When we got together, he said that all the
bearings he
was now getting pointed back to where we had been earlier. We then
found T1 and
it was only about 100' from where we were, after finding T9 and going
up to the
saddle, when it was still light, and we had decided to go up to Mt
.Edna road.
Don KF6GQ