Priest
Pond 2009
The 2009
DX-pedition to Priest pond continued a long
tradition of Atlantic Canada DXing efforts.
The first trip
to the area was in 2008, when Niel Wolfish, Geoff
Rivett, Chris Black, Phil Rafuse and I set
ourselves up at North Shore Deluxe Cottages.
I scouted out
the whole northeast coast of PEI earlier in the
summer of 2008 from the ground and the air,
looking for a site that was right on the water,
with no "trespass" third party traffic
likely between the antennas and the beach, with
low probability of man-made electrical noise.
This
represented an improvement over the former
DX-pedition site of Miscou Island (NB), at which the cottage location
was separated from a public beach by a high
grassy dune. At Miscou we were plagued by
four-wheeler ATVs and other users getting into
our "antenna space."
Priest Pond is
ideal for radio reception; particularly from the
180-degree swath of coastline extending from due
west to due east. European and Middle Eastern
signals arrive - especially in the final hundreds
of KM - over salt water.
As you can see
from the map above, it's a pretty clear shot over
water in many of the most desired directions.
This is an
advantage over Miscou,
which had land nearby (Gaspé) in the direction
of Asia in particular. We were also on the
western side of the Island, so the last few miles
of Eurasian DX arrived over land.
Miscou, in use
annually from October 2001 to October 2007,
provided many hours of good listening and
fellowship. Niel Wolfish has been the constant
chracter in all of those expeditions, with Ken
Alexander, Jacques D'Avignon, Kevin Carey, Roger
Roussel, Geoff Rivett and me spending time there
over the years.
Miscou was a
good location, and Priest Pond is far superior.
With other East Coast DX locations like Cappahayden (Newfoundland), Cape Cod
(MA), and Camden
(ME), Priest Pond emerges as prime DX real
estate, due partly to the ease of access by car
from the rest of North America. It is within a
day's drive from New England, and only an hour
from Charlottetown Airport with direct links to
New York, Boston, Detroit, Halifax, Montreal and
Toronto.
You can access
the audio files and photos from our Priest Pond
2009 DX-pedition through the links below.
30 Harland View Drive
Stratford, PE
Canada, C1B 1W3
(902)
367-7764
Email: vy2hf@eastlink.ca
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