Activated on October 8th, 2025
Waiting for eighteen months made my activation much sweeter. The southern end of the park was closed for renovation since July of last year. I waited for fifteen months, and after a non-grand opening non-celebration, I made my first activation in the renovated area. This area of the park is beautiful to look at, with its two new soccer fields, one covered in synthetic turf and the other in natural turf.
The newly built bathrooms talk to you, yes you read that correctly, they talk to you in two languages. There is automation to the point that it is self-cleaning. Music! They play music while you are doing your bio-business. In speaking to one of the contractors, I was told that other parks already have them installed for over a year. I asked how they were holding up, and his response was that “they’re getting the crap beat out of them.”
However, back to the spot. The entirety of road and round-about is now paved with well-marked parking spaces. Seventy meters to the south is the cabana under which I made my first CW activation. My intention was to activate there, but the trees, shade, and new benches (I don’t recall seeing them before the renovation) beckoned me. This worked out fine as my intention was to use my AX3 antenna and the cabana has a corrugated metal roof on it.
I walked around some to explore new activation spots, so it took a bit for me to settle down. By the time I did that and settled down I was there for an hour. Setting up the radio and antenna was a breeze, especially since I was running the radio on internal batteries. The antenna required me to put together the antenna base, screw on the antenna, and connect the feed line. Badda bing, badda boom. I was calling CQ POTA by 1500, an hour after I got there.
Normally after I start calling CQ, it takes a while for folks to get around to me. Not this time! Within a minute I got three calls in a row. Then, nothing. Several minutes passed with the radio beaconing with no takers. Impatient to get Qs prior to 1700L (0000Z), I started hunting. I hunted three parks in 20 minutes (US-1239, US-3180, and US-4408). I continued trying all the bands between 10 and 40 meters with no added Qs. Back to calling CQ POTA!
My life was going well when around thirty minutes after I started two school busses showed up and disgorged some high-school students. I thought I was having a nice weekday activation until they were setting up all their practice gear right in front of me. The guys had all their personal gear against the fence, and the girls (I don’t know what sport they practice) were to my left on the other side of the bleachers. Soon the boys moved to the natural field and a relative quiet returned to my activation. I never heard the girls.
Once again, I started calling CQ POTA and was rewarded with hunters! The furthest hunter was from Alaska, William AL7KC, although at the time I was not sure I had the callsign correctly copied. In using HAMRS, I have it set up to automatically get and fill in information from QRZ. With this contact no information came up. I was reasonably sure it was an Alaskan contact; however, I had concerns since this was my 10th contact. Yeah, I activated but was unsure. Technology certainly helps here. Had I been paper logging, I would have gone for thirteen contacts. As it turns out, he was a righteous contact, so all is well. With one more Q in the log, I sent QRT a couple of times and at once turned off the radio.
The last five Qs took me a total of fourteen minutes. Still, that’s an average of about three minutes per Q. That rate does not a pileup make, but I was grateful, nonetheless. I was done. And I broke out my celebratory cigar after the fat lady sang. I recorded my closing comments and packed up my gear all while puffing away. As of this writing, I cannot recall any Stupid Human Tricks I performed at the park. It’s been a while since I could say that.
Progress.
Activation Statistics
| Location | DM04vc13, 34.09716, -118.23382 |
| Activation Attempt | 102 |
| Date | October 8, 2025 |
| Park | US-3548 Rio de Los Angeles State Park |
| Park Activated? | Yes, #84 |
| First Activation | June 11, 2022 |
| Previous Attempts | 27 |
| Park to Park Contacts | 10: US-1239, US-3180, and US-4408 |
| Number of Contacts | 11: CW |
| DX Contacts | 1: Alaska |
| Historical Contacts | 334 |
| Mode | CW |
| Radio | Elecraft KX3 |
| Antenna | Elecraft AX3 |
| Tuner | Internal |
| Power | Internal |
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