Valjevske planine - day 1

Mali Povlen - YU/ZS-053 - 1347 m 6 points
Svilena stena - YU/ZS-078 - 1231 m 6 points
Tornička Bobija - YU/ZS-068 - 1272 m 6 points

Valjevske planine (Valjevo mountain range) is my closest mountain range, some 120 km from my home. I have SOTA summits closer than that, but they are mostly just hills, or isolated mountains. I planned to spend a long weekend there on May 22, but the weather forecast was bad - rain all the time. So I had to pospone my trip, and pay a visit a week later, during WPX CW contest. Not a good idea for a cw only qrp SOTA activation.

I arrived there late on the Thursday evening, and spent the night sleeping in my car in front of a mountain hut near Mali Povlen YU/ZS-053. As the majority of the remaining mountain huts in Serbia, the hut was closed, but camping near it is generally allowed (the hut opens only for prearranged hiking groups). Early on Friday morning I started my journey to Mali Povlen, 1347 m, the highest summit of Valjevo mountain range.

Approaching Mali Povlen YU/ZS-053

Mali Povlen is one of 3 Povlen peaks: Mali, Srednji and Veliki Povlen. "Mali" means "little" or "small", so one would asume that the other two ("Middle" and "Great") are higher. Au contraire - Mali Povlen is the highest of Povlen peaks, the other two only appear to be higher and more massive. Unfortunately, the lower Povlen peaks do not qualify for SOTA either, since the cols are to shallow.

Just below the summit of Mali Povlen YU/ZS-053

Surprised sheep grazing on the summit

View to the SOTA summits on the West

It was Friday morning and nobody on the summit except me and some grazing sheep. The summit is wide and almost flat, with a flagpole some hundred meters away from the highest point. I decided to move closer to the flagpole and use it as a support for one of my 2 x 10.5 m inverted V legs.

The flagpole used for antenna support.
The flag is missing, thorn by the wind.

My shack on Mali Povlen

I started operating at 10.40 local time. In 40 minutes I made 33 qsos, all on 10 MHz. The clouds dispersed in the meantime, and it was time to go on in order to activate some other 6 pointers in the area.

After getting back to the place where I left the car, and driving back to the main asphalt road, I headed south, to activate Svilena stena YU/ZS-078. Svilena stena is the highest summit of Mt. Gvozdac (strictly speaking, Mt. Gvozdac is not a part of Valjevo mountain range). The summit itself is the highest point on a East-West ridge overlooking Drina river below it, on the South.

Svilena stena YU/ZS-078 on the horizon.

The ridge (and the summit) is just above the meadow

The summit is almost there

The walk to the summit was mostly easy, through meadows, only the last part was a steep boulder slope in the woods. Once on the summit, I was rewarded with the view of magnificent green Drina river below me, and unknown summits on the horizon. There was not much place along the ridge, so I mounted the 14 MHz antenna (quarter wave vertical with 2 elevated radials) exactly on the edge.

View to the South from Svilena stena.
The magnificent Drina river is meandering down there.

14 MHz vertical at the edge of the cliff

My trusty MTR V2

 It was already 15.30 local time when I started operating. The previous summit was activated on 10 MHz, so I chose now 14 MHz, where I have the best performing antenna. During bit more than 60 minutes I made 36 qsos. It was hot, the insects were disturbing me all the time, and the problem with the keyer reappeared. Anyway, I was satisfied, one more summit was activated.

When I reached the car, it was almost 17.30 local time. My plan was to reach the camping site on Tornička Bobija YU/ZS-068, spend the night there, and visit the summit in the morning. I already visited this summit a year ago. There is a road all the way to the summit, but it was gated at the camping site, 5 km from the summit itself. Driving there, it occurred to me that I still have some hours of daylight left, and if the gate is open I might reach the summit just in time for a quick activation.

The camping site at Tornička Bobija is not a classical camping site - there is a forester's house with several picnic sites around it, a spring, and a small church. There is also a flat area where one can camp with the permission of the foresters. When I reached the forester's house the gate was open but there was nobody there. I left a paper with a note for the forester and headed to the summit. I reached the summit at 20.00 local time, just as the sun was setting down. I grabbed my backpack and headed to find an operating spot.

On the summit, there are some mobile network antennas, and also a VHF/UHF contesting shack of YU1BBA radio club along with the tower and the antennas. There was nobody on the summit. I decided to use the foundations of a old antenna tower (probably destroyed in the 1999 bombing) to fix my vertical antenna, and to try to operate on 14 MHz. WPX CW was going to start in 5 hours and the bands were probably already crowded with contesters warming up their stations.

Radio club Bobija YU1BAA contest location and their 

VHF antennas at Tornička Bobija YU/ZS-068

Activating YU/ZS-068 after sunset

The sun was setting as I was unpacking my gear and preparing the antenna. In a matter of minutes it was almost dark. The temperature suddenly dropped significantly, and there was a lot of condensation everywhere. When I turned on my MTR V2, it sounded very strange, like connected to a dying battery, with the cw power-on notification being keyed slower and slower until it froze. Something was very wrong. I thought that the power supply connector or the 12V SLA battery itself are affected by the moisture. I opened the rig case - inside all seemed dry and OK. But the problem persisted when I connected a spare 9V battery. A pair off-on cycles later, the rig suddenly came to life. I put the 12V battery back - and the rig was still OK. I do not know what happened. Anyway, it was almost dark, and I was not happy with the idea of disassembling the antenna and packing in complete darkness later. 14 MHz was full of QRM and QRN but I managed to make 13 contacts in 15 minutes. I am not happy at all with such short activation with just a couple of contacts. After the activation I packed the gear, nothing was missing, and headed down back to the camping area.