In my nearly 61 years as an amateur, I have always enjoyed challenges, especially those on CW.  I guess that’s why I enjoy the FISTS CW Club so much.  It was fun to go after the various Awards which FISTS offers including the “tough” ones like Diamond Century, Platinum-500, NANFA, Rag Chewers, Worked All States, Mobile Century and 2-Way QRP.

In 2006 when the FISTS WARC Band Challenge was announced, I decided to see what I could accomplish operating on 30, 17 and 12 Meters.  I really became engrossed in working the WARC bands.  Looking back over my log for that year, I found I had made a total of 1014 QSO’s on those bands.

The great majority of my contacts were made running an Elecraft K2 at 14 Watts into a 160 Meter inverted vee antenna.  I did resort to running my Ten-Tec OMNI 6 at 90 Watts when conditions were marginal.  While operating mobile CW I ran a Ten-Tec Scout at 50 Watts into a Hustler antenna

I worked 75 countries on 30 Meters on all six continents and I worked 86 countries on all six continents on 17 Meters.  Twelve Meters was seldom open, but I did have the thrill on December 23, 2006 of working 3XD2Z on that band.  I was continually surprised with the propagation on the 30 Meter and 17 Meter bands.

Rob, M0BPT announced that there would be a WARC Band Challenge again in 2007.  So, I made myself an additional challenge by limiting my operations to running QRP.  For most all of the year I ran my Elecraft K2
at 5 Watts into the 160 Meter inverted vee or the R-7 vertical.  Also I made 35 contacts with my new KX1.
My wife and I went to Bermuda in December to celebrate our 50th wedding anniversary, so the last 17 contacts during 2007 were made from there - K4UK / VP9

Conditions during 2007 were not as good as 2006, but I did make a total of 446 QSO’s.   I worked 58 countries on 30 Meters on five continents and I worked 50 countries on five continents on 17 Meters.  I never was able to work any one in Asia.  I had the highest score of the QRP entrants and Rob sent me a certificate.  I continued operating in the Challenge through 2008 and until June 30, 2009 when it was discontinued.

My operations through the years on 30 Meters enabled me to earn WAS with all 50 QSL cards coming from members of FISTS.

During the last two weeks of June in 2002 we visited Alaska.  We began the trip in Vancouver, BC on the Carnival "Spirit" cruise ship.  The ship stopped at Ketchikan, Juneau, Skagway and Sitka.  The final port of call was Seward from where we were bussed to Anchorage.  We rented a car there and visited some of the interior of Alaska.  We spent nights at Talkeetna, Fairbanks, Valdez, Palmer and Anchorage.  The trip was awesome!

Even though I took my K2 along, my operating was quite limited as we were mainly just tourists enjoying our visit.  I did operate K4UK / KL7 during Field Day from the porch of our cabin while the Cruise Ship was docked at Juneau.  I used a Hustler mobile antenna mag-mounted on a trash can and made 16 QSO's.