so i finally did my first summit activation last weekend, took the ft-818 and a wire antenna up to a local peak thats only like a 2 mile hike, nothing crazy. was honestly kind of nervous i wouldnt make the 4 contacts needed but ended up with like 14 in the log in about 40 minutes which surprised me. the summit to summit contacts are so fun, worked a guy in colorado while i was sitting on a rock in vermont eating a granola bar. hard to beat that honestly. the 20m band was a little rough early on but once i switched to 40 it just started pouring in. only real issue was my squid pole kept wanting to fall over because the ground was so rocky up there, ended up wedging it in a crack which worked fine but felt sketchy. definitely doing this again, already looking at a few more summits in the area

yeah the squid pole thing is always a problem on rocky summits, i carry one of those rubber door stops and a small bag i can fill with rocks to guy it out. makes a huge difference. 40m is usually my go-to for SOTA too, way more reliable for shorter distances and theres almost always someone ready to chase. congrats on the first one, it kind of gets addictive fast

summit to summit contacts are honestly the best part of the whole thing. i stayed up way too late one night just chasing S2S from my backyard because i could hear a pile up on a summit out west and couldnt stop. never actually activated yet but im planning my first one for this spring, been studying the SOTA rules so i dont mess it up