This month's Pathfinder almost didn't happen. It seemed that just about everything that could go wrong, did go wrong.

It started with the complete meltdown of my "primary hide box". Somehow all of the magic smoke escaped from my th78a/picon. It was an interesting experience however as I have never before actually seen a final RF power stage fail as a dead short. I thought skunks were bad....finals can really stink.

Leaving the house only a little dejected and still armed with two DJ-S11/picon boxes I set off to confuse and confound the hunters. I arrived at the location for T2. Black Star Canyon Road about 200 yards. from Silverado Canyon Road. I set to programming the Picon. Everything went well...right up to the point where the controller wouldn't start. After reprogramming twice (and eating up precious time) the pesky little thing finally fired off and I left the box chained to a power pole by the side of the road. This T was 300mw into a 1/4 wave vertical rubber duck.

On to T1. Arrived at 18:50 just enough time to program the box and set it to running...I thought. It wouldn't start. Reprogrammed it. Still nothing. PANIC TIME. 18:59 hours. Found the problem, the PTT wire was broken inside the insulation. Stripped it with my teeth, YEEEOUCH!, and wrapped it around the plug. SUCCESS! The T went on the air at 19:00 and the hunters could actually hear it. T1 was located on a high spot overlooking the intersection of Modjeska Grade Road where it intersects with Hwy 241, Santiago Canyon Road. It was running 300mw into a 4 element yagi which was constantly changing direction and polarity.

Now I had time to relax and wait for the hunters...Yeh right! At about 19:30 I started feeling very sick. Apparently something I ate didn't agree with me. I felt like I had an alien in my stomach...and it wanted out bad. Luckily the last of the official hunters arrived by 20:45 and I could go home and be sick and miserable.

One Unofficial team did check-in at about 20:15. Bob/ZHZ & Cathy/CYG did give me a call from high atop the Indian Truck Trail above Lake Elsinore. That would have put them about three hours away over some very bad, overgrown, washed out, and just plain piss-ugly dirt roads, at night. Had I felt I could last that long I would have waited for you Bob, you might have actually enjoyed the drive. I hope I got you turned around in time.

My original intent was to hide several T's along the Main Divide Road between Sierra and Santiago Peaks. I spent Friday driving the entire route and deemed it a little too rough for anyone without 4wd or high clearance, and nerves of steel for a couple of the hairier spots. But one of these days......

73 de K6SNE