so ive been a ham for about two years now and finally decided to just go for it and do my first activation. picked out W6/SC-396 which is supposedly a pretty accessible hike, not too far from where I live. planning to take my FT-818 and a wire antenna I made from some instructions I found online, not totally sure if I set it up right but tested it in the backyard and it seemed to receive ok.

my main question is about the spotting thing — do I need to be on SOTAwatch before I start or can I just show up and hope someone hears me? I signed up on the website and I see there's like a spots page but I don't fully understand how it works. also not sure if I need to pre-announce the activation or if people just find you when you start calling. I know you need 4 contacts to qualify but everything else is kind of fuzzy still. any advice would be great, just dont want to drive all the way up there and come back with nothing logged

oh man good luck with this, your first activation is such a good feeling when it comes together. the spotting thing — you can definitely pre-announce on SOTAwatch, there's an alerts section where you put in your planned summit reference and approximate time and frequency and chasers will be watching for you. that said plenty of people just show up and self-spot once they're there, there's an SMS spotting option if you have cell signal or you can use the SOTA Spotter app. honestly for a first activation I'd do both, put an alert up the night before and then self-spot when you get on frequency.

4 contacts is all you need, and honestly on a weekend with a decent alert up you'll probably get way more than that. 2m FM can work if there are locals but HF is where most of the action is for SOTA, 40m and 20m especially. what antenna did you build? if you're not sure it's working right that's the part I'd double check before you go, a random wire with a tuner or an EFHW can both work great portable but the feedpoint stuff matters.

I only did my first one like 6 months ago so I remember this feeling lol. one thing nobody told me was to bring way more water than you think and also the summit can be way windier than at the trailhead, my paper log was basically useless by the end. also double check the summit reference on the SOTA database, make sure the actual peak you're hiking to matches the reference, I had a moment of panic on my first one because I wasn't sure I was on the right summit. the sotamaps site is helpful for that. you'll do great though, 4 contacts on HF with any kind of wire antenna is pretty easy to get once people see your spot