Hi there,
this is my small personal page and it’s about my hobby: radio and DX!
I started with radio back in 1993, having local QSOs with friends from school. Then – one day the whole CB band was full of QRM and foreign people and I was impressed. Airing as “13PUM” I had my first “DX” QSO with 13PA31 from Bavaria and later that day with 35AR Albert from Austria. The first ALFA TANGO in my log was 1AT978 Paolo, located in the province of Pavia in north Italy. The fire was ignited!
I ran hundreds of QSOs all over Europe and became 13CT358. In 1998 I joined the “Gruppo Radio Italia” ALFA TANGO and aired as 13AT213 since that.
A big experience was to join the “big brothers” of Franconia, 13AT289 Jakob and 13AT401 Jan on an IOTA trip in late summer 1998 to the archipelago of Maddalena, a group of islands located at the north coast of Sardinia. Three weeks on a camping site and excursions to some lonely spots around Maddalena island were an exciting experience. I was working pile ups and enjoying the propagation, which was so much different to the one I knew from my home QTH. Unfortunately I just realised years later, that none of the activations appeared in the ATs super committee list, as (ex) #289 Jakob – leader of this trip missed to send proofs to the HQ. I went through all my stuff and found some proofs, like ferry tickets, camping site passes, photos, etc. I sent a big letter to the HQ explaining the situation, but they had no mercy.
Later in summer 2002 I did a short trip to Ibiza island to air as 49AT/E023. I carefully collected proofs and payed much attention on doing it right this time.
After moving to a new QTH from a silent spot in the federal state of Brandenburg to noisy Berlin, doing DX became more and more difficult. There was no way to build a good antenna, some homemade wire was my only chance to be on air. Additionally solar cycle 23 had already passed its peak and having 250+ DXCC worked and most of them confirmed, this hobby got a touch of hard work.
A last highlight was to air as 13AT/BE, participating in the German Federal States Award, which was initiated by the german supervisors.
Moving again, this time within Berlin, resulted in going QRT for some unpredictable time, as other things in life came into focus and again the situation to build a proper antenna wasn’t given.
In 2010 I was back on air – just sporadic and portable in a way, as I was able to raise a Bamby antenna only temporary and in an unoptimised location – surrounded by buildings and having no way to put it on top of one of them. Germanys supervisor Mike #012 contacted me and asked, if I would like to obtain a 0-digit. I became 13AT031 and was engaged into building the german divisions webpage. The general interest in radio subsided and there was nobody contributing information and news to the webpage – a good idea born dead.
- 2014 then, by random my YL and me bought a house. Of course I had seen light to get back on air and 1st time ever with a chance to setup a proper antenna. Well, I forgot about the YL-factor and it was bit of a struggle ending up with still a permanent portable setup, which however works quite well.
Vy 73s de
Martin #031
13AT031, Martins Blog 