by William Eric McFadden
From the Strouds Run State Park website:
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Located outside of the city of Athens and within easy driving distance of Ohio University, Strouds Run State Park surrounds Dow Lake and draws a mix of trail and lake users. Miles of hiking, mountain biking, and horseback riding provide scenic views from rugged trails. The lake offers boating, paddling, swimming and a shaded campground.
Pictures
Description
On Friday, January 9, 2026, one member of the Southeast Ohio Radio Adventure Team performed a successful bicycle-portable activation of Strouds Run State Park (US-1994) as part of the Parks on the Air (POTA; link) program.
Taking advantage of a second unseasonably warm (68°!) January afternoon in a row, Eric McFadden, WD8RIF, did both a bicycle ride and a POTA activation of Strouds Run State park, bicycling from his work-office's parking lot to Bulldog Shelter within the state park.
"Welcome to Strouds Run State Park".
Eric arrived on his bicycle at the Bulldog Shelter at 1850 UTC and began setting up his Elecraft KH1 station in the unoccupied picnic shelter. Because the afternoon was really quite blustery, and the ground around the picnic shelter was saturated from rains earlier in the day, Eric didn't want to trust his bicycle to support his mast, so he deployed his ad hoc 35' EFRW antenna supported as a sloper on his Goture Red Fox Super Hard 720 carbon-fiber mast leaned into a handy tree, with the single 13' counterpoise wire placed directly on the concrete floor of the shelterhouse. Eric was on the air at 1859 UTC.
Eric's KH1 station.
Eric's mast and antenna.
Continuing the test he had begun the day before, Eric used his small powered speaker instead of his usual earbuds.
The KH1 with the external speaker.
As has become the norm at this location, Eric had cell-signal at Bulldog Shelter, and would be able to access POTA Spots to spot himself and to find Park-to-Park (P2P) QSO opportunities.
Eric started his operation on 20m. After finding himself a clear frequency to run, Eric began calling "CQ POTA" and, at 1900 UTC, after his very first call, worked KA3INH in New York. Eric continued to call "CQ POTA" and was auto-spotted on POTA Spots. His first QSO after being spotted came at 1905 UTC with K0SN in Montana. QSOs came quickly, with Eric's eleventh QSO coming at 1919 UTC with KD2ZQZ in New York. The run included QSOs with operators located in Arkansas, Florida (2), Iowa, Montana, New York (2), Texas (2), Washington, and Wisconson.
Eric finished his activation by hunting for P2P QSOs, and at 1922 UTC he succeeded in making a P2P QSO on 20m with VE3SRF at Surrey Lake Park (CA-4166) in British Columbia.
In all, Eric made twelve QSOs, including one P2P QSO, in twenty-three minutes of on-air time. All of Eric's QSOs were CW and were made at five watts output.
Following his final QSO, Eric took some more photos, tore down his station, and began the ride back to his car.
Dow Lake, looking south...
... looking north.
As at the previous day's activation, the little speaker produced very pleasant audio.
Eric also submitted his log to the World Wide Flora and Fauna in Amateur Radio (WWFF; link) program for an operation at Strouds Run State Park, KFF-1994.
(return)