so i finally got off my butt and did a summit activation after talking about it for like two years. drove up to a local summit, nothing crazy just a 6 point peak, and honestly it was way more fun than i expected but also a few things caught me off guard

first off the wind. i knew it would be windy up there but my end fed just kept getting blown around and i had a hard time getting it up in the trees. ended up just kind of draping it over some brush which worked i guess but it looked terrible. also my KX2 battery died faster than i thought it would and i was running pretty low power too. made enough contacts to qualify but it was close

anyway the actual operating part was great once i got set up. pileup on 40 was wild for about 10 minutes then it died down. spotted myself on sotawatch and that helped a lot. anyone else have tips for getting antennas up in open summit areas where theres no trees? thats probably my biggest problem to solve before next time

yeah the no-tree summit thing is a real issue, ive done a bunch of activations above treeline and what works for me is just a telescoping fiberglass mast, mine is a 7m sotabeams one and it fits in my pack no problem. you can guy it out with some thin paracord and tent stakes and it holds up in most wind, not all wind but most. the end fed just hangs vertical or you do a slight sloper and it works fine. honestly once you switch to the mast you wont go back to screwing around with trees

also on the battery thing, what were you running for capacity? i switched to a 3ah lipo and even at 10w on the kx2 i can do a full activation easy. might be worth checking if your battery is actually at full charge before you head out, mine had a bad cell and i didnt know for a while

the pileup dying after 10 min is totally normal dont worry about that, happens on basically every activation once the chasers who were watching the spot all log you. after that its mostly S2S contacts and random passers by. i usually switch bands at that point, 20 or 17 can get you some dx chasers if the band is open and that keeps it interesting