So I finally did my first activation last weekend, took my ft-818 and a linked dipole up to a small summit about an hour from home, W4T/SU-something, cant remember the exact reference off the top of my head. Anyway I was pretty nervous about making the 4 contacts minimum but ended up with like 11 in the log which felt amazing honestly. Mostly 40m but threw out a couple on 20m too once the pile settled down a bit.

Few things I'm not sure about though. When I was spotting myself on SOTAwatch before heading up, I noticed some chasers had already seen my alert from the day before and were kind of waiting on frequency when I got there which was cool but also a little overwhelming at first. Is that normal? Also someone called me on 2m FM partway through and I wasn't set up for it, I had a handheld but wasn't monitoring anything. Do most activators run both HF and VHF or is that more of a regional thing?

Also one activator in a group I follow online mentioned something about unique summits mattering for awards, so if I activate the same summit twice does it count again for points or just the first time? I looked at the rules page but it was a little dense.

congrats on the first one, 11 contacts is a solid start especially if you were nervous. that pile waiting on frequency thing is totally normal once you start posting alerts the night before, chasers take SOTAwatch pretty seriously and some of them have you on a schedule basically. dont let it rattle you, just take your time, go QRS if you need to, they'll wait.

on the 2m thing — it really is regional. out west a lot of activators bring a handheld just for local VHF chasers who can't do HF or are just nearby, and sometimes it's the only way to get your 4 contacts if propagation is being stubborn. but plenty of activators never bother with it and do just fine. i usually toss my vx-6 in the bag just in case but honestly most of my contacts are on 40 anyway.

for the points question — yeah each unique summit only gives you activator points the first time you activate it, after that it still counts toward your log and you might need it for a specific summit if youre chasing a complete range or whatever, but the activator points are one-time per summit. the full rules doc has a table that explains it but the short version is: unique summits = unique points.

welcome to the addiction lol. I just did my 10th activation last month and I still get that same nervous energy waiting to see if anyone comes back to my first call. there's something about being on a hilltop with a wire in a tree that just hits different than operating from home.

one thing i'd add about the 2m FM thing is that if you ever activate somewhere with good line of sight coverage, it can be surprisingly fun to work a few locals on VHF between HF contacts. I did a summit last fall where i got more 2m contacts than HF just because the takeoff was so good, had people calling from like 80 miles out on a rubber duck which surprised me.