vk5pas

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Greenhill Recreation Park VKFF-1712

Posted: 26 Feb 2017 06:00 PM PST
https://vk5pas.org/2017/02/27/greenh...ark-vkff-1712/


Yesterday (Sunday 26th February 2017) I had a very enjoyable lunch with my
wife Marija, our daughter Olivia, our son Jake and his girlfriend Samara,
and my Dad and step mum. Â*Marija served up her very well received, home
made lasagne, and we sat underneath the pergola enjoying the sunny warm
day. Â*It was a bit of a celebration for Olivia, who is about to turn 18 and
who has just started university where she is studying nursing.






When everyone left just after 3.00 p.m. local time I decided to head out to
activate a park. Â*It was too beautiful a day to be sitting around at
home. Â*I jumped on to the computer and checked out the KML file on Google
Earth and decided to head to the Greenhill Recreation Park VKFF-1712. Â*This
was to be a unique park for me, and in fact, the first time the park had
been activated for the World Wide Flora Fauna (WWFF) program. Â*Greenhill is
about 7 km east of the city centre of Adelaide, and is located in the
foothills of the Mount Lofty Ranges Adelaide Hills.


Above:- Map showing the location of the Greenhill Recreation Park, east of
Adelaide. Â*Map courtesy of Location SA Map Viewer.

Greenhill Â*Recreation Park was declared on the 1st January 1952 and is 24
hectares in size. Â*The parks vegetation consists primarily of Eucalyptus
open woodland over an understorey of grasses, herbs and forbs. Â*Greenhills
terrain is quite steep. Â*A number of walking trails pass through the park.


Above:- Aerial shot showing the location of the park in the Adelaide
foothills, just above the eastern suburbs of Adelaide. Â*Image courtesy of
google maps.

The area of Greenhill dates back to the mid 1800s. Â*Once a road had been
constructed in the 1850s, a number of market gardens, an orchard and
dairies were established in the area. Â*A vineyard was planted by William
BREWER, who with his wife Eliza, erected a stone home on Greenhill Road in
1857.

The parks southern boundary borders Greenhill Road, which today is a busy
bitumised road leading from Adelaides eastern suburbs up into the Adelaide
Hills. Â*Greenhill Road was originally a rough bullock track leading to the
wheat cops and market gardens of Greenhill, Carey Gully, Uraidla and
Summertown in the Adelaide Hills. Â*In 1860, one settler wrote:

Many families to my certain knowledge are suffering great privations, being
unable to bring their commodities to market.

Another wrote:

A horse belonging to one of our settlers was thrown down into one of the
deep mud-holes upon this roadPersons returning from town are compelled to
travel in company,, for it is positively unsafe to travel on this road
alone.

The park is located just down the road from Yarrabee Road Greenhill, which
was heavily impacted during the 1983 Ash Wednesday bushfires. Â*Over 3,700
homes and buildings were destroyed and 75 people lost their lives in South
Australia and Victoria. Â*Of those, five people died at Yarrabee Road,
Greenhill. Â*Nearly 4,200km2 Â*of land was burnt in one day. Â*To put that
into perspective, that is almost twice the size of Luxembourg in
Europe. Â*The Ash Wednesday bushfires were the deadliest on record until
February 2009 when 173 people perished on Black Saturday.

Murray Nicoll, a journalist provided reports on Adelaide radio station 5DN,
from the fire in the Adelaide Hills. Â*This included live broadcast of him
watching his own house burning to the ground at Greenhill.Â*Â*

The sky is red and then white, its going crazy, the fires jumped 150 feet
high straight over the top of Greenhill Road. Â*Im watching my house burn
down, the roof is falling in, its in flames and theres nothing I can do
about it.

Below is some audio of Murray Nicoll reporting from Greenhill (listen in
for some very powerful broadcasting from 1.15 4.00)



If you wish to activate this park, there are three options. Â*The first is
to park your car in Thorpe Road Greenhill and then walk a short distance
uphill to reach the park via Gate three (3). Â*This was the first point
which I checked out. Â*I decided not to operate from this location as there
are houses which back onto this northern section of the park. Â*There were
also power lines. Â*There is a track which leads uphill, but this meant
placing all the gear in a back pack and hiking uphill. Â*It was a warm day
so I decided against that.


Above:- Gate three at the top of Thorpe Road.

I then drove back up Greenhill Road to gate two (2) which is located on a
sharp bend. Â*There is a small area in front of the date off Greenhill Road
which can be quite busy. Â*But the sign on the gate says to keep the gate
clear, no doubt due to access for firefighters in the event of a
bushfire. Â*There are no other parking options there, so this was not going
to be an option for me to access the park.



I continued on Greenhill Road to gate one (1) which is located near the bus
stop. Â*There was an area here for me to park the vehicle off Greenhill Road.



I walked a short distance up the track which overlooked Greenhill Road and
Chambers Gully. Â*I made as much noise as possible to scare aware any
snakes, as it was a warm and sunny day. Â*I made a couple of trips back to
the vehicle to collect gear. Â*For this activation I ran the Yaesu FT-857d,
30 watts output, and the 80/40/20m linked dipole, supported on the 7 metre
heavy duty telescopic squid pole.


Above:- Aerial shot of the Greenhill Recreation Park, showing my operating
spot in the south eastern corner. Â*Image courtesy of Location SA Map Viewer.

After finishing setting up I headed to 7.144 on 40m and started calling
CQ. Â*It took around 5 minutes of CQ calls for my first station to be
logged. Â*It was Brian VK3BBB who was a good 5/8, but gave me a 5/2. Â*Oh no,
this was not a good sign. Â*Next up was Mark VK3PI who was 5/9 plus and
reciprocated with a 5/9 for me. Â*That was better. Â*I had intially thought
that the band conditions were going to be quite poor.

It was very slow going for the first part of this activation. Â*Contact
number ten, qualifying the park for me for VKFF, was Rhett VK3WE. Â*This was
after 20 minutes of being on air. Â*I was also experiencing S7 static
crashes and quite a bit of QRM from European stations, who sadly were
unable to hear my signal. Â*I went on to work a total of 24 stations on 40m
from VK1, VK2, VK3, VK4, VK5, and VK7. Â*It was looking as though it was
going to be hard work reaching the 44 QSOs required to qualify the park for
the WWFF global program.

I then lowered the squid pole and removed the links and headed off to
14.310 on 20m. Â*My first taker there was John VK6NU, whose signal was down
very low, but we managed to make a good contact (5/3 sent and 5/1
received). Â*Next was Fran OK7WA in the Czech Republic with a good 5/5
signal (4/4 received). Â*This was followed by Fuji JA8DCR in Japan (5/9 sent
and 5/7 received), Max IK1GPG in Italy (5/7 sent and 5/5 received), and
Hinko S52KM in Slovenia (5/7 sent and 3/3 received). Â*I then logged Hans
VK6XN in Western Australia, Danny ON4VT In Belgium, and finally Joe VK5WU.



I had received a test message from Adrian VK5FANA, advising that he was
patiently waiting for me on 80m and that he was unable to hear me on
40m. Â*So I inserted the links in the dipole and headed to 3.610 on the 80m
band. Â*Adrian VK5FANA was the first in the log on 80m (5/7 sent and 5/8
received). Â*I went on to log a further 6 stations on 80m, from VK1, VK3,
and VK5. Â*This included Les VK5KLV at Port Augusta. Â*It was a real struggle
with Les, who was hearing me better that I was hearing him. Â*But we made it
in the end due to the tenacity and persistence of Les (3/3 sent and 5/3
received).

I now had a total of 39 contacts in the log, with just 5 more to go for me
to qualify the park. Â*I headed back to 7.144 and started calling CQ, but
within a minute or so, the WIA broadcast commenced on 7.146, so I QSYd to
7.135. Â*There I logged Howard VK3QA and Brett VK2WWV, but I was again
forced to QSY, as a JA station came onto the frequency calling CQ. Â*He was
5/9 and I was unable to compete with his very strong signal.

I then moved up the band to 7.160 where I worked a further 17 stations from
VK2, VK3, VK4, VK6, VK7 and New Zealand. Â*At 0900 UTC, another WIA
broadcast kicked off on 7.158, just below me. Â*I now had 58 contacts in the
log, and had qualified the park, so I decided to have a quick look around
the band before going QRT and heading home.








I found Jarrad VK3BL and Jim VK2QA chatting on 7.115, so I popped in to say
a quick hello. Â*As I was signing with Jarrad and Jim, Roy VK7ROY came up to
say hi, and we QSYd a bit further up the band to 7.130. Â*I also worked Roys
friend Mark VK7FAAZ who has just become a licenced amateur. Â*It was a
pleasure to be Marks first contact. Â*I worked a further 9 stations on 7.130
from VK2, VK3, VK6, and VK7, before hitting the switch and calling it an
evening. Â*It was now almost dark and I wanted to pack the gear away before
it was completely pitch black. Â*There was a lovely sunset to be enjoyed and
some great views of Adelaide from the park.





I ended up with a total of 70 contacts in the log on 80, 40, and 20m from
VK1, VK2, VK3, VK4, VK5, VK6, VK7, New Zealand, Slovak Republic, Japan,
Italy, Slovenia, and Belgium.

I worked the following stations on 40m SSB:-

VK3BBB
VK3PI
VK3CBP
VK1AT
VK3PAT/p
VK4FW
VK3GGG
VK3PMG
VK7JON
VK3WE
VK2NSS
VK3FCMC
VK3FSPG
VK3MPR
VK3ANL
VK3TJK
VK2DI
VK2NNN
VK5SFA/m
VK3VIN
VK3FSLG
VK3FPSR
VK3OHM
VK3BQ/m
VK3QA
VK2WWV
VK6OP
VK3VLA
VK3QD
VK7BC
VK4HNS/p
VK3FMDC
VK3GK/2
ZL1AAW
VK4NH
VK4SJ
VK3HSB
VK2GPT
VK2LDN
VK4SMA
VK3ELH
VK7PSJ
VK2HPN
VK3BL
VK2QA
VK7ROY
VK7FAAZ
VK2FOUZ
VK6WE
VK3ALA
VK2QK
VK7FPRN
VK7FRJG
VK3DPG
VK7VZ
VK6FCAO


I worked the following stations on 20m SSB:-

VK6NU
OK7WA
JA8DCR
IK1GPG
S52KM
VK6XN
ON4VT


I worked the following stations on 80m SSB:-

VK5FANA
VK3BSG
VK3GGG
VK3PMG
VK5WU
VK1DI
VK5KLV


References.

Nicol, S, 1997, RAA touring, Adelaide Region

Wikipedia, 2017,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenh...eation_Parkgt;, viewed 27th
February 2017