For me, Parks on the Air is a wonderful program that tracks your activations at federal and state parks. The idea is that you take your radio equipment and set up everything you need for on-air operations within the boundaries of the park you choose. You “activate” the park personally on the day you make your outing by making 10 contacts, or QSOs, with other operators by radio.

Ham radio operators usually keep a log of their contacts, and it is the log for the current contact that is submitted to the POTA site to get credit for your activations. At the same time the activator is giving credit to all those with whom contact was made, the hunters.

The hunters looking to contact the activators at the parks can be found on the POTA spotting page to see who is activating at the moment. Who knows, you may even be able to hunt a DX park outside the country!

You can check out how I’ve been doing by checking out my POTA profile page.