Lingmell & Scafell Pike

Activation Reports
1

After four years of operating radio on hills I finally made it to the highest peak in the Lakes, Scafell Pike which is both a WOTA summit LDW-001 and SOTA summit G/LD-001.

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Routes up Scafell vary, including the Corridor route from Sty Head, the main path up from Wasdale End and the path I chose based on the start of Phil’s route via Lingmell.

After dropping my daughter off at school in Kendal I took the coast road from Kendal South via Greenod eventually arriving at Santon Bridge where the run into the Wasdale valley starts.

I knew the forecast was for a dry day but the cloud base was clearly sitting around 300m based on the initial view up the valley.

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I parked at the National Trust car park which is currently £7 per day.

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I took note of Phil’s blog point about missing the initial path onto Lingmell so made sure to check the OS map on my phone to get on the right track. The path up Lingmell is fairly punishing but you definitely ascend quicker than the main path to Scafell via Lingmell Gill. I hit the cloud line within around 45 mins and I wasn’t then to see any views until the descent from Scafell Pike. I did a bit of zig-zagging as I approached the summit of Lingmell to avoid the steep scree slopes to the East. The path takes you around to the North.

Lingmell

WOTA ID: LDW-035 Height: 800 m (2625 ft)
SOTA ID: n/a Grid ref: NY209081
HuMP ID: n/a QTH Locator: IO84JL
Book: The Southern Fells Lat: 54.461973 Long: -3.220419

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Take-off to the South is clearly limited by Scafell Pike and this panned out with the range of contacts I got here. I was using the FT1XD with a copy RH-7700 telescopic whip.

I was listening to Chris M0KPW working several stations from his location on Whitfell and it was good to get a S2S with him from Lingmell. He said he’d try and hang around to get the chaser points from Scarfell Pike.

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Summit of Lingmell

Time Call Band Freq Mode Grid Country Operator Name Comments
11:16 G4FBC 2M 145.525 FM IO84en England Ron
11:15 2E0XUP 2M 145.525 FM IO91vl England Steve
11:13 GW4ZPL 2M 145.525 FM IO73wd Wales Colin John Barwell
11:13 2E0LDF 2M 145.525 FM England
11:12 G1OAE 2M 145.525 FM IO84fp England TONY STEEL
11:11 GM4WHA 2M 145.525 FM IO84ix Scotland GEOFF HARPER
11:07 M0KPW/P 2M 145.550 FM England Chris SOTA: G/LD-032

The traverse to pick up the corridor route path to Scafell via Lingmell Coll was straightforward (even in the mist). At this point you’re into a scree/rock path which gets progressively more boulder ridden, until you hit the summit which is an extraordinary boulder field, I commented to one fellow walker ‘how does this happen’ - his one word reply summed it all up: ice. Still no views, surrounded by mist!

Scafell Pike

WOTA ID: LDW-001 Height: 978 m (3209 ft)
SOTA ID: G/LD-001 Grid ref: NY215072
HuMP ID: n/a QTH Locator: IO84JK
Book: The Southern Fells Lat: 54.453978 Long: -3.210926

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Summit Selfie

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OS Benchmark

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HF Setup

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Snow in a horseshoe

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Not a pretty summit, but it is big!

I wasn’t sure about the size of the summit, so ruled out taking the 80m dipole, and actually skip distance on 40m the day before was very short, so didn’t feel like I was necessarily ruling out chases but missing that band. By taking the Super Antenna MP1 I also guaranteed the ability of working the higher frequency HF bands, and as it happens but the end of the activation I had contacts on 40m, 20m, 17m, 12m, 10m, 6m and 2m!

First off I worked Chris and Nick who were still on Whitfell but getting cold.

10m especially was wall-to-wall with operators making the most of the band opening, with many SSB and FM stations to be heard. My compromised setup of low-profile tripod and 5w meant I wasn’t able to work many that I had heard. Mike 2E0YYY on the HEMA summit Overmoor G/HSB-021 was taking full advantage of the opening with his Antron 11 CB antenna which also works well on 20m, and I managed an SSB QSO with him although it was hard work at his end. Also of note was getting two separate S2S from Matthew M0MZB/P who started on Fairfield and had arrived at Red Screes before I’d finished. I also worked G5ZX/P on Stony Cove Pike and great to get a short-skip 40m QSO with Allan GW4VPX/P on a mid-wales summit.

In the end I started to get cold, even though it wasn’t wet and the wind was light and I had two jackets and a puffer over the top. It gets you in the end!

Time Call Band Freq Mode Grid Country Operator Name Comments
14:42 M0MZB/P 2m 145.475 FM IO84ML England Matthew SOTA: G/LD-017
14:36 G5ZX/P 2m 145.525 FM IO84nl England SOTA: G/LD-018
14:02 S52WW 10M 28.437 SSB JN75cx Slovenia Damjan Kenk
14:00 2E0YYY/P 10m 29.445 FM IO83xa England Mike HEMA: G/HSP-021
13:55 2E0YYY/P 10m 29.220 SSB IO83xa England Mike HEMA: G/HSP-021
13:35 G0TDM 6M 50.157 SSB IO84oq England John Sutton
13:18 F5JKK 10M 28.420 SSB JN23mx France ERIC JAUCH
13:17 HB9AGH 10M 28.420 SSB JN47gj Switzerland Flütsch
13:14 EA7GV 12M 24.955 SSB IM87ec Spain JOSE L. MENJIBAR
13:12 OE6END 12M 24.955 SSB JN77pc Austria Andreas (endi) Gruebler
13:11 G0TDM 12M 24.955 SSB IO84oq England John Sutton
13:10 SP9AMH 12M 24.955 SSB JO90lc Poland Mariusz Mroczkowski
13:05 IK2LEY 17M 18.140 SSB JN45nn Italy FABIO PELLIZZONI
12:58 DL1CR/P 20m 14.325 SSB JO52ab Germany SOTA: DM/NS-163
12:56 ON7LO 20M 14.325 SSB JO20IB Belgium Louis Wyns
12:54 ON8PHD 20M 14.325 SSB JO11hc Belgium Phil
12:52 SM5LNE 20M 14.325 SSB JO89bk Sweden Jan Skoldin
12:51 EA1DHB 20M 14.325 SSB IN82fw Spain Ricardo Pena
12:51 F5JKK 20M 14.325 SSB JN23mx France ERIC JAUCH
12:48 OH3GZ 20M 14.320 SSB KP11oq Finland JUKKA Jack KOVANEN
12:47 SA4BLM 20M 14.320 SSB JP70lt Sweden Lars Markus
12:44 GW4VPX/P 40m 7.194 SSB IO82km Wales Allan SOTA: GW/MW-031
12:43 G4WSB 40M 7.194 SSB IO91vl England Bill Bowditch
12:42 G0RQL 40M 7.194 SSB IO70uv England DON ROOMES
12:40 F4WBN 40M 7.194 SSB IN93hl France Christian SAINT-ARROMAN
12:40 2E0FEH 40M 7.194 SSB IO70VJ England Karl Kruger
12:39 G0FEX 40M 7.194 SSB IO92jp England KEN PORTER
12:39 EA2DT 40M 7.194 SSB IN92et Spain Manuel
12:38 GM6ZAK 40M 7.194 SSB IO86lh Scotland Andrew Sutton
12:26 G1OAE 2M 145.425 FM IO84fp England Tony
12:25 G4YTD 2M 145.425 FM IO94ta England Tim
12:25 G0MHF 2M 145.425 FM IO83lj England John
12:23 G1PIE 2M 145.425 FM IO83qr England MARK PROCTER
12:22 G8CPZ 2M 145.425 FM IO84of England AJ Barth
12:21 M7AYH/M 2m 145.425 FM IO84pg England
12:21 G3PSB/P 2M 145.425 FM England Phil
12:20 G7WKX 2M 145.425 FM IO83ni England Simon Davis-Crane
12:19 G7WAW 2M 145.425 FM IO83vw England David Thompson
12:17 G0LWU 2M 145.425 FM IO84na England Andrew Charles Scarr
12:16 GW4ZPL 2M 145.425 FM IO73wd Wales Colin John Barwell
12:16 M1DYU 2M 145.425 FM IO83pm England GM Rogers
12:15 2E0LDF 2M 145.425 FM England
12:13 GM4WHA 2M 145.425 FM IO84ix Scotland GEOFF HARPER
12:13 M0SSD 2M 145.425 FM IO84jd England George
12:13 G0TDM 2M 145.425 FM IO84oq England John Sutton
12:12 G1OHH 2M 145.425 FM IO84ob England Susan Griffin
12:11 G7CDA 2M 145.425 FM IO83qt England Douggie G7CDA
12:10 M0MZB/P 2m 145.425 FM IO84ml England Matthew SOTA: G/LD-007
12:09 2E0LBI 2M 145.425 FM IO84jc England Leslie Bell
12:07 G0HIK/P 2M 145.425 FM England Nick SOTA: G/LD-032
12:06 M0KPW/P 2M 145.425 FM England Chris SOTA: G/LD-032

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On the descent I was only around 50m below the summit when the cloud was clearly opening up and by 100m below I was getting increasingly good views, a blessing as it would have been pretty miserable to get nothing!

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View to the East

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I decided to return via Hard Knott and Wrynose - I definitely would not want to tackle those in the wet. As it was you have to really judge a few of the worse corners well, and trust in the machinery!

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View of Wrynose from Hard Knott

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Many thanks to the chasers, and those operating from the fells for S2S.

Regards, Mark.

3 Likes
2

Hi Mark,

It was good tor track you on APRS on your way to the summit of Lingmell. Great pictures to. It is alot of years since i have been on Scafell Pike so it is still to do for SOTS/WOTA.

Thanks for both summits and look forward to working you soon.

73’s Geoff GM4WHA

3

I noticed on the FT1XD that I had a direct APRS ping from you Geoff. I will have to take a look on the handset to see who I got from that lofty walk.

Legs are aching today, but will be back out tomorrow.

Regards. Mark.

4

This is the station list as recorded in my handset, transposed from the APRS screens:

STATION LIST

NO IND CALL SUFFIX DATE TIME TYPE DIST MI SPEED MPH COURSE DEG ALT M ICON
01 E MD0MAN- 9 05/14 16:09 FTM-350 66.9 20 348 75 :red_car:
02 E GM4WHA- 9 05/14 15:22 YAESU 44.4 0 252 20 :house:
03 E M0NOM - 7 05/14 15:16 FT1D 13.7 0 254 816 :walking_man:
04 E 2E0IKM-10 05/14 15:05 FTM-400D 26.8 0 116 65 :house:
05 E 2E0LDF-10 05/14 15:03 YAESU 26.8 0 300 64 :house:
06 E MW0NLG- 9 05/14 14:52 FTM-400D 103.7 0 0 248 :red_car:
07 E G4HCC - 4 05/14 14:37 FTM-100D 49.2 3 236 101 :red_car:
08 S MB7UL 05/14 14:35
09 P 2E0XLG-10 05/14 14:31 FIXED 35.2 ★
10 I EL-425621 05/14 14:24 ITEM 59.5 SE ③
11 O EL-257033 05/14 14:21 MB7UL OBJECT 58.3 SE ③
12 I GB3XL 05/14 14:13 MB7UL ITEM 59.5 SE :satellite:
13 P GB3CR 05/14 12:11 FIXED 87.0 S 98 :satellite:
14 P 2E0UVA-N 05/014 12:11 FIXED 232.7 SSE DⒼ
15 E G7OMN -7 05/14 12:07 TH-D7 5 1 158 229 :walking_man:
1 Like
5

Some more info from aprs.fi:

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It would appear most of the tracking was via MD0MAN-10 in Douglas on the Isle of Man, which makes sense based on the good propagation in that direction.

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I have to confess I know only the basics about APRS! Presumably stations which aren’t internet enabled wouldn’t make this list?

1 Like
6

Hi Mark nice activation and good you did get some views…I listened on 2m and searched for you on the hf bands but nothing. Then looked on aprs.fi and you were coming down off the summit and I was too late for the party. :+1:

1 Like
7

Thanks for listening Mike. I had that situation at the end where I’d gotten too cold playing on HF and ended up having to move off when I would have liked to do a final run on VHF. You sometimes just don’t realise how cold you’ve got before it’s too late!

I’m out tomorrow somewhere, not quite the same level but would like to get a few more points before the holiday is over and I’m back to work.

Regards, Mark.