Last year I cross country ski’d into Federation Range VK3/VN-029, 1490 meters above sea level, activated it for 8 points (+3 winter bonus points) and ski’d out again. This is possible because this summit is just off groomed cross country ski tracks at Lake Mountain, ninety minutes north east of Melbourne, a popular sight-seeing, tobogganing and cross country skiing spot. Time to do it again. After picking up skis at Marysville I took Royston Trail from the car park up the long incline, to Panorama, then Hut Trail to Boundary Hut, the remains of a hiking hut, long since burned out, only the stone walls standing to waist height. Distance out is about 4km.
The snow cover was as good as it gets here, although a few warm days since the last fall made it slightly icy. Weather was almost perfect, about 3 degrees Celsius, occasional wind bursts, intermittent sun. It was a picture, as the images here show. This is a great experience, if not physically exhausting, for someone like me who is able bodied but spends more timer soldering than exercising. The activation was also good, 40 meters held up, I made three CW contacts including ZL1TM (received report 539), then a further fourteen SSB QSOs from ZL1, ZL2, VK1, 2, 3, 4 and 5. I’ll let the pictures tell the rest of the story. Hopefully this ski activation will be an annual day for me for many years to come.
Thanks to chasers ZL1TM, VK4FW/P, VK2IO, VK2NP, VK5WG, VK3SQ, VK2UH, VK5LG, VK2VW, VK3PF, VK4TJ, VK1FMGG, VK3GTV (ex VK3LED), VK4FW/P in VKFF1588, VK2MOP, ZL1BYZ.
