so i finally did my first SOTA activation saturday, been putting it off for like a year because i kept thinking i needed more gear or a better antenna or whatever. ended up just throwing the kx2 in my pack with a 20m end fed and hiking up to a local summit that was only like 1200 feet. nothing crazy. made 9 contacts in maybe 40 minutes which i guess is enough to count. the pile up wasnt massive but there were definitely people waiting which was kinda surreal. only issue was my log sheet kept blowing around in the wind and i forgot a clip or anything to hold it down so i was basically wrestling with it the whole time. next time im bringing a clipboard. also my signal reports were all over the place, some guys said i was loud and a few said i was barely readable, probably just the band conditions doing their thing. overall though i cant believe i waited this long to try this, its way more fun than sitting in the shack

yeah the clipboard thing is real, learned that one the hard way too. i use a cheap plastic one from the dollar store and just binder clip the paper. also if its windy enough i just log on my phone now with hamlog or whatever. took me a few activations to figure out what i actually needed vs what i thought i needed. sounds like you did great for a first one though, 9 contacts is solid especially if you were only on one band

the signal report thing is just SOTA life honestly. youre running like 5 or 10 watts into a wire thats barely in the air and conditions are whatever they are. i just accept that some qsos are gonna be rough. congrats on the first one, now you gotta do POTA too and then youll really never stop going outside lol