Amateur Radio Station WD8RIF | POTA Activation Lake Alma State Park, OH

On Wednesday, May 14, 2025, two members of the Southeast Ohio Radio Adventure Team performed successful activations of Lake Alma State Park in Ohio as part of the Parks on the Air (POTA; link) program.

While driving to Four Days in May and Hamvention, Thomas Witherspoon, K4SWL, and Eric McFadden, WD8RIF, stopped at Lake Alma State Park to perform the activations. While Eric had previously activated this park, it was to be a new park for Thomas.

Thomas and Eric arrived at Lake Alma State Park at about 1315 UTC. Because it had well-placed trees, Thomas chose to perform his activation in the picnic shelter across Ohio Route 349 from Lake Alma. Wasting no time, Thomas threw a line into a tree and pulled up a MW0SAW 40m end-fed halfwave antenna. For the transceiver, Thomas chose to use his Penntek TR-45L, which he placed on a conveniently-positioned picnic table inside the shelter.

As they had hoped, Thomas and Eric had usable cell-signal within the park, and they would be able to spot themselves on POTA Spots (link) and to use POTA Spots to identify possible park-to-park (P2P) QSO opportunities.

Thomas operated first, and rather quickly made his ten QSOs, plus a few extras. View Thomas's complete report (with photos and video) here: QRPer.com.

Once Thomas had validated his activation, he surrendered the TR-45L and the antenna to Eric.

This was to be the first time Eric had operated a TR-45L, and he was looking forward to seeing if it was as sweet a transceiver as Thomas made it out to be. Eric began his operation on 40m and his first QSO came at 1355 UTC with KL7NL who was performing a three-fer activation of Singletary Lake State Park (US-2752), Mountains to Sea State Trail (US-8313), and Bladen Lakes State Forest (US-4852).

Finding himself a clear frequency to run on 40m, Eric began calling "CQ POTA". His first QSO in this run came at 1401 UTC with KD3CA in Pennsylvania. QSOs came quickly, with Eric's sixth QSO in this run coming at 1407 UTC with WB3AVD in Pennsylvania. This run included QSOs with operators located in Illinois, North Carolina, Pennsylvania (2), and Tennessee (2).

Pausing to hunt for P2P QSOs, at 1416 UTC Eric made a P2P QSO on 40m with N5BO who was activating Twin Swamps State Nature Preserve (US-4230) in Indiana.

Returning to his previous frequency on 40m, at 1419 UTC Eric worked KA3ICJ in Maryland, and at 1420 UTC he worked KC9HEK in New York.

Eric finished his operation with a P2P QSO on 40m with Thomas, K4SWL, who was standing just a few feet away using Eric's Elecraft KX3 and a dummy load.

In all, Eric made eleven QSOs in just about half an hour of on-air time. All of Eric's QSOs were CW and were made with five watts output.

Eric found that the TR-45L was as sweet a transceiver as Thomas had made it out to be. The radio has superb audio, smooth CW break-in, and excellent analog characteristics.

Because they had miles yet to drive, and a second activation to perform on the way, Thomas and Eric quickly tore down the station and re-packed the car.

Eric also submitted his log to the World Wide Flora and Fauna in Amateur Radio (WWFF; link) program.