so i finally did my first SOTA activation last weekend, summit was only a 4 pointer but the hike nearly killed me because i packed way too much gear. brought the ft-818 plus the 857 as a backup (why did i do this to myself), full size dipole, about 400 feet of coax i never even used, a folding chair, food for like 3 days... it was a 2 mile hike and i was dying by the time i got to the top.

anyway once i got set up i only had like 45 mins before a storm rolled in so i was rushing around trying to get the antenna up with a fishing pole and the whole thing just kept falling over. managed to get 6 contacts on 40m SSB which technically counts but i was hoping for way more. had to pack up fast and hike out in the rain. next time im bringing just the 818 and an endfed and thats it

ha yeah the weight thing gets everyone on their first time out. i made the same mistake, thought id need backups for everything. now i just do the 818 and a 49:1 endfed thrown up in whatever tree i can find and honestly the contacts come easier than you'd think when the band cooperates. 6 contacts still counts though, you got your points

400 feet of coax lmaooo i feel this so hard. i brought like a full shack worth of stuff to my first POTA activation too and just left half of it in the car because i couldnt carry it. the minimalist thing really does work better for field ops once you let go of the idea that you need all the redundancy. also 40m was rough last weekend, signals were all over the place here in the midwest so 6 qs on a bad band day isnt bad at all