Catchup and Travel

Good morning, Evening and or whatever time it is XD.

It has been about a month since my last entry which is quiet crazy to me, as it feels as if i wrote it a week ago!

So to fill in my cyberspacer's and h3ck3rs. I for the first time in my life left the United States which for context anywhere between 48%-50% of Americans have a passport. And at least for where i live in rural Indiana there is seldom anybody i hear leaving the country for holiday.
So minus the drive which i will spare the details (i was up 26 hours straight) myself and a close friend went up to a island in Quebec Canada. AND MAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAN CANADA IS BIG! lots and lots of trees and mountains. Now this is the more interesting bit, some of the audience will assume by me saying "I vacationed to Quebec" will have to 2 pretexts.

#1 EWWWW FRENCH?!?!

#2 What hotel?

To address point #1, yes everything was in french but luckily majority of people of people there spoke english. (sadly i never learned to bi-lingual) and #2 i did in fact not spend the week in a fancy hotel room with caviar. Although i did have some sardines from the local IGA, so close enough!

My close friend rented an very remote island for a week. It felt like camping with a cabin basically. I ACTUALLY really enjoyed it, there was no phone service, and every hour on the radio there would be a 5 minute segment about the weather and news.
And im not gonna lie, it was SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO nice to not have ADS blasted in your eye holes and news articles saying the next disastrous thing that happened in the world.

It was a week on a lake, with my friend and his family. We played cards and i ended up bring a QRP HF radio SPECIFICALLY FOR THIS TRIP. It was a Xiegu g106, and a 66ft end-fed half wave, and i ended up making 22 contacts.

Many people were confused by my callsign, because it rarely happens that a U.S AMATEUR activates in Canada.

ALWAYS READ ABOUT OPERATING RULES IN DIFFERENT COUNTRY'S before considering operating your radio.

Now the U.S and Canada have a agreement in 1952, that allows for U.S Citizens that are visiting the great north to operate with a few stipulations. Please read the full page by the Canadian goverment. But the SPARK NOTES are

23cm band is restricted at U.S Canadian Border for border operations.
don't use more than 1,000 watts (i know your sad you cant bring your 2,000watt amp on vacation SMH)
Add your operating zone for where your staying, So an example is KA9STK/VE2. The VE2 means your operating in QUEBEC.

I made some really good contacts while up in Quebec!

I made 2 contacts with Indiana
Washington, Tennessee, Texas, Florida

And a contact that to put it as my friend would put it "he would not shut up about it"

I made contact with California, which is the first time i ever have. But that's not the fun part!

I made contact with a VE3 station from Quebec whom was visiting the U.S. The contact was less than 4 minutes long, but it was so much fun!

I threw my call out expecting to be stepped on because i was running 5watt QRP the whole time i was up there, and running purely off a small solar setup. The nice Canadian man picked me and the conversation, was roughly

"your 5-4, here in Quebec you have a very beautiful country!"
"your 5-4, here in Charlie Alpha very pretty here aswell!"
exchanged 73's!

Something about riding that QRP adrenaline rush just made it so much more exciting!!!!
Towards the end of my stay in Quebec i made a contact with a nice man in slyvania on 5watts aswell.

Then on the way home once we made it back to America i heard a net happing for 60miles?????

At the time i was questioning what power they were running, but the following day i realized the Canadian wildfire smoke opened VHF propagation WIIIIIIIIIIDE OPEN. people from pen were making contacts will Illinois on VHF via skip. Which is mind boggling to say the lease!

all in all my trip to Canada was SOOOOO MUCH FUN, great food, great and very kind people and REALLY great food! (THERE BACON AND SWEETS ARE SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO GOOD, ALSO OLD DUTCH SALT AND VINEGAR CHIPs).

It was nice to get away for a week and the noise floor on an island in the middle of knowhere was super nice for hearing other stations!
I was hearing QRP from flordia it was that low!

But i digress, hope everybody is doing well and if not i hope your situation improves.

73's!