YOTA Hungary 2023 – Day 3

What did you get up to on Day 3?

“We started the day with some interesting lectures about different areas of amateur radio. The first was on the IARU, where we learnt that they were all volunteers. Some of the statistics on average ages of radio operators were very concerning, which led to some interesting conversation on the things we can do in order to bring more youth into amateur radio.

Our second lecture was on WRTC, where we heard about the history of world radio team championships, and how it is relevant to contesting today. We learnt about each year of contesting, and how it’s important to work with other operators to improve our performance in bigger contests. This lecture was inspiring to those of us into contesting, as WRTC is the most prestigious contest in radio.

The final lecture was on contest logging software and the Cabrillo file format for contests. This was an extremely useful lecture for members of the team who want to get into contesting, as well as improve our efficiency for general logging.

Due to the lovely weather, we decided to go swimming in the Danube River with our friends from different countries. This was followed up with another kit building workshop, where we used a new kit and an ex-Soviet relay to make a CW paddle. We were able to use this to practise CW, which is very useful for the members of the team learning Morse code.

After dinner, we finished the day with ARDF in the dark. We used our headlamps, maps and the receiver to successfully navigate the course. We did much better than the first time and had a lot more fun!”

Category: YOTA 2023