[HCDX] Rowley revisited, 1620 mystery, etc.

[Mark Connelly <MarkWA1ION@xxxxxxxxxx>]

On the early evening of 12 JUL 2000, I decided to revisit
a local DXpedition site in a national wildlife reservation
that has not been used for awhile because of instances of
park rangers chasing people out after the posted sunset
closing time.  The site - the parking area at the eastern
end of Stackyard Road near Nelson Island in Rowley, MA -
is in the middle of a huge coastal salt-marsh behind Plum
Island, a narrow barrier beach.

This location (GC= 70.829 W / 42.745 N) has been used for
some legendary receptions over the years by members of the
Boston Area DXers.  Loggings include India-1566 and numerous
rare Middle East stations, Greeks, etc.  For a map of the
site, go to "http://www.geocities.com/wa1ion_mark/rowley.gif";.

Though the site has room for near-Beverage length antennas,
I stuck to the active whip / broadband loop cardioid array
clamped to the car's roof-racks, as I figured I might have
to leave the site in a hurry if law officers or a car load
of beer-blasted carousing teenagers suddenly appeared.
I arrived on site at 7.35 p.m. local (2345 UTC) with a plan
of staying no more than 2 hours.  Sunset time was about
8.20 p.m. (0020 UTC).

Not too many others showed up at the site: basically bird
watchers in a few cars and on one motorcycle.  Luckily,
neither law enforcers nor hell-raisers were encountered
right up to 9.30 p.m. EDT / 0130 UTC when I left for
home.  The biggest problem I encountered during the
outing: insects.  "Greenheads" (large biting flies common
in salt-marshes) and "no-see-'ems" (irritating little
gnats) dive-bombed me any time I was out of the car for
more than a few seconds.  After all, it's mid-July.

Now on to the interesting stuff: the DX.  Right at the
start, 45 minutes pre-sunset, Trans-Atlantic heterodynes
were noted across the medium-wave dial.  Ceuta on 1583.6
got the award for first readable audio, easily beating
up the synchro SER Spaniards on 1584.  I was surprised
to find that low-banders like Algeria-549 were punching
in big signals well before sunset.  Often, especially in
summer, the band tends to open from the top of the dial
downward.  It didn't take long for things to really get
rocking.  By 0020 sunset, the "doors flew open" and
Trans-Atlantic signals were boiling in.  Spain ruled
supreme and just about every low-band frequency from that
country was pushing big audio across.  The "surpriser"
was SER on 810 beating back WGY; there was almost nothing
from co-channel CJVA and Latin Americans.  Northern Europe
didn't offer much: indeed 567 had Spain solidly atop with
not much evidence of Ireland at all.  Morocco on 612
was local-like and if Ireland was under them on that
channel, it would be hard to prove it.  693 was all
Spain // 684: no UK there.  Aside from Spain and Morocco,
I heard Madeira-531, Azores-836, Egypt-819 (over Morocco),
Italy-846 (fair: back on at what power level ??), and
several from Canary Islands, Portugal, and Algeria among
others.  More northerly European reception was pretty
much limited to a relatively weak Swiss signal on 765
and sporadic appearances of Croatia-1134 and Slovakia-1098
popping through generally bigger Spaniards.  I didn't note
anything from southern Africa (1197 had Spain, not Lesotho).
Conditions across the band slowly deteriorated after
0100 UTC with the higher band Trans-Atlantics weakening
before the low band signals did.

Latin American DX, though not especially abundant, did
yield a nice signal from Brazil on 700 (all by itself
for awhile before Venezuela mixed in).  On 720 I had
a pipeline to Radio Oriente in Venezuela: it totally
crushed normal dominant CHTN.  I checked for Bruce
Conti's possible Suriname on 600, but the channel was
just a "stew pot" containing (apparently) CKCL, WICC,
YVQB, ZYK278, and CBNA.

Another thing I checked was the Haitian-French Creole
station on 1620.  It wasn't there at 2335 UTC (so no
groundwave), but by 2350 UTC it was booming in.
Coincidentally, on 1650, the Logan Airport (Boston)
TIS was dominant at 2335 via groundwave, but a few
minutes later it got buried by skip from the coastal
VA station.  This would seem to indicate the likelihood
of the 1620 station being in the northeastern USA
somewhere farther away than Boston (unless, if in
Boston, it's using a horizontal antenna giving poor
groundwave but good short skip).

The Rowley outing was a good midsummer DX success.  The
location has less southern / southwestern exposure than
Cape Cod QTH's and static was almost non-existent.  Also,
not ONE signal from Cuba was audible ... hurrah!  Another
advantage over the Cape is the greater ease with which
New York City stations can be nulled with the cardioid
phased array.  Even pesky WQEW-1560 can be nulled more
than 20 dB with co-located loop/whip and maybe more than
that with two broadband loops spaced 50 m on a NE/SW axis.
Such null depth on 1560 would be unheard-of on Cape Cod on
an average night.  It would be great if the Rowley site can
be used for DX activities on a regular basis once again.

Last week, I and the rest of my family were down at West
Yarmouth, MA.  Plenty of Cuban signals there ... too many
I'd say.  I did some encouraging experiments there with
a Pennant antenna, recently written up in QST magazine
by Earl Cunningham (K6SE).  My version uses a remotely-
controllable (Vactrol) termination resistor.  I'll have
more about this later after a battery of further tests.  

For anyone in the Caribbean and Latin America, here's a
brief list of unidentified off-channel signals heard from
Cape Cod: 540.3, 859.57, 939, 1050.3, 1060.3, and 1139.6.
Also off-channel are Colombia on 759.92 (only slightly off)
and Radio Carabobo in Venezuela on 1039.6 with a big messy
het against the 1040 group.

Loggings from late June / early July will be assembled
into a "Summer 2000 Roadtrip Report #1".  In a week or so
this will be sent as text to a number of DXers and newsgroups
and posted as HTML to a Web site (with links to DXpedition-
site maps).

73 / good DX to all ... Mark


=====

Mark Connelly - WA1ION - Billerica, MA, USA
e-mail: MarkWA1ION@xxxxxxxxxx
homepage: http://members.aol.com/MarkWA1ION/weblink.htm

=====








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