Holiday time

It has been holiday time during the last few days. It was my birthday on March 27 and during the weekend we had a few days away by the seaside on the south-west coast of England. With lots of family time, a little drinking and even weather good enough for relaxing the beach, there was not so much radio listening. However, I managed a little MW dxing on the portable Sony receiver with small indoor loop.

A little holiday drinking

Propagation conditions seemed to be pretty good over the weekend. On Friday evening, Vrolijke Mijnwerker could be received with no extra antenna - the ferrite rod inside the radio was enough for reception that was perfectly listenable. And on Saturday there were some fine signals. Barcelona, for example, was coming in very well as usual, as you can see from the video:

On Saturday evening I received a message to tell me Desperado was testing on 1620 with just a few watts of power. He was interested to know if reception was possible in England. And, even with just the portable set-up I was able to identify the music he was playing. The signal was mixing was another station and there was a lot of fading and interference, but I could distinctly make out the trumpets on the record being played. Nice to hear low power Dutch pirates making it across the water to England without the need for a big antenna at this side.

Today we arrived home and I booked tickets for the ferry to the Netherlands. So, come the first week of August, we will be crossing the water to have plenty of fun and plenty of pirate visits! Right now I'm tuned in to Vrolijke Mijnwerker on 1646, one of the people I look forward to meeting in a few months from now.