so i finally did my first SOTA activation last weekend, W6/NC-471 up near tahoe area, and man i was not prepared for how cold it gets up there even in like late september. had my KX2 and a random wire strung up in a tree which took way longer than expected because i kept picking the wrong branch angles and the whole thing just looked terrible. ended up making contacts though, got my 4 so the summit counted but it was close. wind kept messing with my paper log too, had to put rocks on everything. also forgot sunscreen which was dumb. anyway just wanted to share because everyone makes it look so easy on youtube but its really not the first time out

ha yeah the first one is always a bit of a disaster, dont sweat it. i forgot my coax adapter on my second activation and had to pack everything back down without making a single contact, that was a fun drive home. the random wire will treat you better once you get a feel for throwing it. some people use a fishing rod or a slingshot to get it up faster, might be worth looking into if youre doing more summits

4 contacts is all you need man, summit counts. ive done POTA mostly but thinking about trying SOTA, seems way harder with the hiking involved. how long did the hike take you to get up there