so i finally did my first SOTA activation last weekend, summitname was W6/CT-216 which is only a 2 point summit but figured id start easy. packed the KX2 and a random wire up the side of the hill and honestly the hike nearly killed me lol im not in as good shape as i thought

got to the top and the wind was absolutely brutal, like knocked my pole over twice before i got it staked down properly. managed 6 contacts on 20m SSB which i know barely qualifies but hey it counts right. tried 40m and got nothing which was weird, maybe the antenna was off or i was just too close to some noise source up there

already planning my next one, thinking about actually trying CW this time cause i hear the pileups are way more manageable. anyone else do a lot of portable ops in southern california, feels like theres a ton of options out there

6 contacts is totally fine for a first activation, you qualified it thats what matters. the wind thing is real, i lost a mast to a gust on a summit in Colorado and had to basically hand hold the whole antenna for like 45 minutes. not fun. CW is definitely worth learning for this stuff, i can work 10 contacts in maybe 15 minutes on a good day and just get off the summit before weather rolls in

for 40m not working, could be a few things but honestly mid day 40 is just rough sometimes depending on the path. i usually only bother with 40 early morning or late afternoon when im out portable

yeah southern california has tons of summits, look at the SOTA database theres like hundreds in the W6 association. i do a lot of POTA too and sometimes you can combine both if the park boundaries overlap with a summit which is kinda fun to log both at once. nice work on getting out there