Having gone west for a few years we decided to go east this year and take our holiday on Mauritius, timed of course to overlap the second weekend of March and the Commonwealth Contest. A search of the web and an exchange of e mails and faxes with Jacky, 3B8CF, revealed that I could rent his shack for the contest weekend and that I would have no difficulty getting a 3B8 licence if I applied in good time. I could also operate from a hotel if I wanted and to be sure to take a 2m HH for their repeater.
The hotel we stayed at was the Sugar Beach on the west side of Mauritius. This is a large resort hotel that I liken to an upmarket (and hotter ) Butlins even down to a hotel song! The management were pretty unhelpful with regard to radio even though I had exchanged faxes well before our stay, and cleared their concerns. However one phone call from Jacky sorted them out for me. The swimming pool and water sports were first class. However the in pool aerobic exercises left me feeling quite exhausted, just watching. There are plenty of other hotels to choose from, Ian, G4LJF, operated from Villas Caroline, Flic and Flac, DJ7MI operated from Beach Village (Tros Biches) and others have used Paradise Cove in the north.
As you will read, out of a 14 day trip I ended up with about 4 days when I did some operating. Despite having applied for a licence the middle of last year, I had licence problems for the first week , which were successfully resolved by Jacky, 3B8CF, and Mr Beeharee at the Telecommunication Authority. Due to the approval procedure this can take sometime. I believe however that next time it will be much better. But Jacky's help was essential. Actually the delay was compounded by the weather.
After the first weekend of wonderful sunshine, the weather turned into a nasty cyclone, 110 mph winds which left the entire island on emergency power. Cyclone Davina, by 2200 Tuesday, was gusting at 170 kph and passing 20km SE and moving south west. The palm trees were getting a thrashing and water was being pushed through the door joints and seals. I used our beach towels to prevent it flooding the floor. During the cyclone we were confined to our hotel room with picnic rations and the government offices were closed. It took 5 days for electicity supplies to be restored in the south.The hotel had its own generator so that's one reason for staying there.
I operated the contest from Jacky's QTH in Quatre Bornes. This is on the western-central side of the island, about 1 hour from the airport and ½ hour from Port Louis the capital. Jacky's home is on rising ground with a clear take off to EU/USA/Africa and is significantly higher than sea level. I rented the apartment/station for the contest weekend. The first floor apartment includes patio, 2 double bedrooms, kitchenette, fridge, shower room and separate toilet, etc. It is naturally ventilated and spotlessly clean. It has its own entrance and direct access to the radio room.
Jacky's station comprises a TS440 and a Alpha amplifier. The amplifier is only used on 80 and 40 due to TVI problems on HF. The antennas are an A4S for HF, an A3WS for WARC, a 40/30 rotary dipole and an inverted vee for 80. All of these are fitted onto a flat roof about 50' square and all can be lowered and secured very quickly in the event of cyclonic weather. I also took with me an IC706 Mk2, some wire for dipoles etc. and a laptop to logging and keying. SD was used for BERU and for casual DXing.
A few hours casual DXing on the Friday before the contest and on Saturday morning soon convinced me that operating from 3B8 this year was going to be very different for 8P9IF and the Caribbean. For a start the contest starts at 4pm and sunset is at about 6.30pm. So there is an incentive to get as many Gs/VEs in the log as possible on 20, 15 and 10 before the band closes. On the other hand, the HF bands stay open longer into the evening so more band changing would be needed. Certainly conditions were a great deal better than in previous years
Overall my result was poorer than I might have expected. But 80 and 40 were very affected by absorption effects such that as soon as the sun came up 80 and 40 died completely to be followed shortly after by 20. Static noise was bad on 80, possibly due to the cyclone earlier in the week. There were some very quiet periods, and this made the contest into an HF bash. 20 was open for very long periods, through into VE when EU propagation died away. And there were some very strange effects, for example, when Dave, G4BUO, was working a VU on 10, the VU was completely inaudible in 3B8 despite being a lot closer. It is also difficult to crack the transatlantic pileups and get through the wall of G stations. And even the African stations who were on had their beams north most of the time and were difficult to catch.
Analysis of my score shows that it was 80 and 40 where I missed out. I was about 4 hours ahead of UTC and therefore the night was shorter. Next time I will go quicker to 40 at sunset and band hop more often to all bands in the period immediately after sunset. I didn't even make 3 Gs on 80, only G3TMA and G0IVZ made it, though there was a lot of static. The lack of overlap with VE darkness also cut down that path. Jacky had already shown me when the band would open but pointed out that the day to day variation was large and that I might not make any VE Qs at all. In the end I managed 13 Qs on 80. All of this led to some very quiet periods, only 3 Qs in the 2 hour between 0600 and 0800.
Despite all this 7 stations made it on all 5 bands, namely 9J2BO, G0IVZ, G3TMA, VE2ZP, VE3VHB, VK2BJ, VK8HA. Many thanks to them for the bonuses.
This was also the only time a 3B8 has ever called me in BERU, and it was just the year when it didn't count !
3B8/G3PJT is a complicated call at the best of times. It produced a fair number of ..--.. s when I called people! It doesn't help matters much if you make a mistake and send 3B9/G3PJT from time to time !!! Some folk even ignored the 3B8 altogether, still that's their problem.
I have never had so much problem with unwanted callers as I had in 3B8. Probably it was because I was not active very much in the week before BERU. What is the matter with these people ? Deliberate jamming seems to be the response when these people don't get their way. Particularly bad was an HB9 and an IT9, etc. It makes the pile-up more of a challenge when only about a ¼ of those calling count for points.
After about 21 hours of the contest the TS440 started to chirp and I had to swop over to the 706, which did a very fine job. My reservations about its large signal handling on 40 really didn't show up on HF and the sensitivity was very good. The DSP board I had fitted was very effective on 10. The 440 had a slight tx/rx offset which was not obvious when running but was more tricky when I was in 'search and pounce' mode.
When SD failed to spot a dupe I thought I must be seeing things but SDC, the BERU version, has a bug which misses dupes and bonuses too. Its been designed to level the competition a bit. SD never used to do this.
All in all another very interesting contest, a good way to combine a bit of radio with a holiday and a wonderful way to meet some of the local people and understand their society, culture and economy.
Interestingly Jacky had the plaque awarded to Gaston Koenig, VQ8AC, in the 1930s for one of the first W.B.E. awards. (see photograph).
And Rosemary did a good deal of clothes shopping too. 3B8 is where most of the world's leading brands have their garments and knitware made and there are some great bargins in the factory shops.
And finally a big thank you to Jacky and Shakila for their hospitality and good company. They were the highlight of our holiday on their lovely island.
