Well, we made it home tonight after two days of driving from
Florida, only to find 657 incoming emails (and that after deleting
about 200 during two short periods of internet access while on the
trip). So it will be a while before the inbox is back to normal.

I was never able to get the station working while in Florida, so that
portion of APE never made it on the air. I've confirmed the radio is
working fine, so my suspicion is that there may be a cable broken
in the radio-computer interface. But I didn't have the equpment
there to work on it during my short stay at my mother-in-law's, so I
took down the station and gave up on Tuesday morning.

That didn't dampen the satisfaction of the succussful operation
from our first week on the road. Here are the final statistics on the
W3HF/4 portable operation from Bogue Banks Island (NA-112) in
North Carolina.

First of all, Bogue Banks is NOT a little island, for those of you who
havnen't looked it up on a map. It varies between about one-half
and one mile in width, and is about 20 or so miles long. It contains
many thousand houses, quite a few supermarkets, dozens of other
businesses, a national historic site (Fort Macon), and the
permanent QTHs of at least half a dozen hams. And we weren't
exactly roughing it, either. The beach house that we rented had full
utilities, real beds, and a full kitchen. The only real sacrifice was
the lack of internet access. Even AOL doesn't have a dial-up
number there, so I couldn't take advantage of their introductory
offers. I'm sure there are local ISPs, but we didn't find them.

W3HF/4 went operational from the island at about 2330z on 10
August and went QRT at 2335z on 16 August. (As Erika had
stated in an email I saw, most of both Saturdays were spent
driving.) My son Matthew helped me with the station set up, and
monitored progress during the week, but never participated in any
QSOs. (He was too busy with beach activities and playing with
cousins.) There were 107 QSOs made, 106 on PSK31. (The 107th
was on SSB, with FG/IK2JYT on NA-114.) There were 100 different
stations worked on PSK, including 20 070ers (based on still
preliminary counts). Four statons made multiband contacts:
KF4FHS on 20 and 30, VE9DX on 30 and 40, and both K8Ij and
KC8LJN on 20 and 40.

My apologies to all those who were looking for me and couldn't find
my signal. I tried to work any 070 member I heard, often trying to
break into QSOs when I could. As I had stated earlier, I didn't have
any internet access while on the island, so I couldn't announce
operating times myself, or make skeds with anyone once there.
My thanks to all of you who spotted me, posted where I was, and
relayed operating plans in one way or another.

For those interested in callsign details, stations were worked with
suffixes starting with every letter of the alphabet, so the W3HF/4
operation qualifies for the ARRL Friendship Award. There were 79
unique prefixes worked (using the PODXS DPX rules), including a
few that I hadn't worked before.

For those numerically inclined, the split was almost exactly 50-50
in terms of DX and US stations: 51 US, 49 non-US. (non-US
included one KP2.) Italy was the country with the most DX
contacts (7), followed by Germany (with 4).

24 US states, 3 VE provinces, and 24 DXCC entities (not including
W or VE) are in the log. There were no new DXCC entities for me,
but a few new band-entities. (Another disappointment was missing
both TY6FB and 9G1UW, both of which would have been new
ones.) Four of the six continents were worked--Africa and Oceania
were missed.

Band splits are as follows: 5 QSOs on 15m, 85 on 20m, 6 on 30m,
and 10 on 40m. No contacts were made on 12m or 10m.

Finally, here are the QSL details. I will be creating a special QSL
with a few pictures of the operation, so this may take a few extra
days, so please be patient. I think the following set of rules covers
all possibilities. Please read down the list to find the first rule that
applies to you.

1. Please do not feel obliged to send me a QSL unless I
specifically request it (e.g., for DPX reasons).

2. All 070 members (US and DX) will receive an unsolicited QSL
direct.

3. All other DX stations will receive an unsolicited QSL via bureau.

4. Any other US station that specifically requested a QSL during
the QSO (for IOTA or "first QSO" reasons) will receive a QSL direct.

5. Any other QSLs received direct will be responded to in the same
manner.

6. SWL requests may be submitted via email.

7. As a minimum, eQSLs received will be responded to in the
same manner. (Please note that I have not yet activated the
W3HF/4 account, but I will. So please do not send eQSLs to either
my W3HF or W3HF/6 accounts, as these will not count for North
Carolina.) I may yet submit the whole log to eQSL--I haven't
decided yet.

If I have missed anything, please ask.

I had a great time operating from the island, if that wasn't obvious
to all involved.

73,
Steve
W3HF