Mylor Conservation Park

My 2nd activation on Sunday 29th September, 2013, was the Mylor Conservation Park, which was just a short 10 minute drive from Scott Creek.

Mylor Conservation Park is situated in the Southern Mount Lofty Ranges ‘Adelaide Hills’, about 15 km south east of Adelaide.  The park consists of 49 hectares of remnant bushland.  Much of the region surrounding Mylor Conservation Park has been largely cleared for residential and agricultural purposes.  The park forms part of a mosaic of remnant bushland areas in the district which are linked by vegetation corridors on both public and private land.

The park is covered by open forest with a canopy dominated by Messmate Stringybark and Brown Stringybark, associated with a shrubby under storey.  The park has abundant wildflowers in spring and many of the native plants were also out in flower.  The Onkaparinga River flows just to the east of the park boundary.

     

The park is used for a number of outdoor recreational activities, such as bushwalking or horse riding through the open woodland.  A section of the Heysen Trail runs through the park.

Numerous bird species inhabit the area, including the endangered Yellow tailed Black Cockatoo, Purple-crowned Lorikeet, Superb Fairy-wren, and Red-browned finch.  A large number of native animals call the park home including Western Grey kangaroos, echidnas, and the deadly Eastern brown snake.  Because it was such a warm day, I was ever vigilant of snakes.  Fortunately none were encountered !

I accessed the park via Whitehead Road, just off Strathalbyn Road (the main street of the quaint little town of Mylor).  The town was proclaimed in 1891 by Acting Governor of South Australia, Sir James Boucaut, who named it after his Cornish birthplace.  Towards the end of the Whitehead Road there is a small parking area.  From here I walked into the park and set up my gear, using the north western park boundary fence to secure my squid pole with some octopus straps.  The chickenwire fence also made a nice back rest.  Fortunately the track heading north at this point made a good clearing for me to string out the legs of the dipole so the antenna was radiating east-west.  I found a comfy spot up against the fence, in the shade from the hot sun (it was about 28 deg C).

      

After turning the radio on I was pleasantly surprised to hear that the noise floor was nice and low.  A lot better than Scott Creek Conservation Park.  However there was a lot of RTTY QRM due to the RTTY contest.  Again I tuned to 7.100 and again there was Brian VK5FMID, patiently waiting for me.  This was followed by Peter VK3PF, Dale VK5FSCK, and John VK5FTCT.  And to my pleasure, what followed was a steady flow of callers from VK2, VK3, & VK5.  All with great signals.  I worked a few QRP stations including Andy VK5LA on 5 watts, Ben VK3FTRV on 5 watts, Shaun VK3VLY on 5 watts, Simon VK5TE on 5 watts, and Andrew VK2UH also using 5 watts.

     

When things slowed down a little, I tuned down to 7.095 and worked Ian VK1DI/2 who was on top of Mt Gillamatong, VK2/ ST-034 in the Southern Tabelands of NSW (5/5 both ways).

I then tuned around the bands and on 7.105 I heard Steve VK2FISN just finishing up a QSO with another VK2.  Steve had tried calling me numerous times on 7.100 but unfortunately he just couldn’t quite hear me well enough.  I called Steve and we were finally able to make a contact.  Perseverance counts !

In a little over an hour, I had 31 stations on 40m SSB in the log.  Time to head home & ‘beer o’clock’ !

The following stations were worked on 40m SSB:-

Brian VK5FMID; Peter VK3PF; Dale VK5FSCK; John VK5FTCT; Allen VK3HRA; Colin VK3UBY; Mal VK3AZZ; Greg VK3HBM; Sandra VK3LSC; ANdy VK5LA/qrp; Tim VK5AV; Nick VK3ANL; Ron VK3AFW; Peter VK2NEO; Ian VK5CZ; Ben VK3FTRV; Bernard VK3AMB; Fred VK3JM; Shaun VK3VLY/qrp; Graham VK5KGP; Shaun VK5FAKV; Rick VK5FGFK; Colin VK5HT; Simon VK5TE; Roy VK5NRG; David VK5KC; Ian VK1DI/2 (SOTA); Steve VK2FISN; Jim VK3AIX; Nev VK5WG; and Andrew VK2UH/qrp.

Thanks everyone.  A fun afternoon in the sun.