After enjoying some very nice fish and chips from one of the local take aways in Golden Beach, I decided to venture out to the Gippsland Lakes Coastal Park VKFF-0747 as it was a Monday night (6th November 2017) and the 7130 DX Net was on.
Our plans were to activate the park on Tuesday morning, but I thought I might be able to sneak in a few contacts to go towards the 44 that are required to qualify the park for the global World Wide Flora Fauna (WWFF) program.
The Gippsland Lakes Coastal Park is just a short drive from Golden Beach.

Above:- Map showing the shot distance from Golden Beach to the Gippsland Lakes Coastal Park. Map courtesy of Plotaroute
On my way to the park I spoke with Mal VK5MJ who was booming in at 5/9 plus. However the static crashes were very loud and it didn’t look too promising for the net.
I found a dirt track off the Longford-Loch Sport Road and operated from the vehicle with the Icom IC-7000 and the Codan 9350 self tuning antenna on the back of the Toyota Hi Lux. But my prediction of the noise getting in the way of a good net came true. I logged just 4 stations, with many others struggling to hear me through the static crashes. So after 30 minutes I ‘pulled stumps’ and headed back into Golden Beach.
I worked the following stations on 40m SSB:-
- VK5MJ
- VK7FRJG
- VK2FOUZ
- VK7VAZ
Hi Paul
Whoops! I missed you. It wasn’t for want of trying but band conditions were terrible. I couldn’t even tell if you were there. Just QRN.
Oh well the next one.
Cheers
John D
VK5BJE/VK5PF