so i finally did my first park activation yesterday at the state forest about 20 minutes from my house, been putting it off for like 6 months because i kept thinking i needed more gear or a better antenna setup or whatever. finally just threw the KX2 and a 40m EFHW in the bag and drove out there.

setup was fine, got the wire up in a tree maybe 25 feet or so, but i could barely get 10 contacts in the first hour which i know is enough to count but i wanted to do better. called CQ for a while on 40 and got a few responses but the band felt pretty dead for a tuesday afternoon. switched to 20 and picked up a few more including one guy in florida which was cool.

anyway ended up with 14 contacts total which activates it but i felt like i was doing something wrong with my CQ timing or something. do people usually spot themselves on the POTA website before they start calling? i think i forgot to do that and maybe thats why it was slow

yeah spotting yourself on the POTA app is pretty much the whole game honestly, most hunters are just watching the spots and wont stumble onto you randomly. next time get spotted before you even start calling CQ and youll probably have a pileup within a few minutes. 14 contacts is still a valid activation though so congrats on getting it done, first one is always a little chaotic

i had the exact same thing happen on my second activation lol, sat there calling for like 45 mins wondering why nobody was answering and then someone finally told me about spotting. also tuesday afternoons on 40 can be rough depending on where you are, i've had way better luck around 5-7pm local when people are getting home from work and firing up their rigs. the KX2 and EFHW combo is solid though, i run almost the exact same setup