Walton Hill, G/CE-002 - 315m ASL - SO 942 798 - OS Explorer 219 - 1 SOTA point        

A SOTA region completion inside 31 hours?  Well, OK, 30 hours and 59 minutes to be exact.

The annual mid-summer get-together of the British DX Club - http://www.bdxc.org.uk  - provided an opportunity for Jimmy and myself to activate the entire Central England (G/CE) SOTA region in a weekend.

We left Macclesfield at 6.30am BST on the morning of Saturday 14th July 2007, and made straight for the M6. Progress was unimpeded and we were onto the M5 in no time, after a chat with Steve GW7AAV on GB3VT (Stoke-on-Trent repeater). After leaving the M5 onto the A456, we took a spot of breakfast at McDonalds in Halesowen, then continued the short distance to the parking spot for Walton Hill G/CE-002. This is easy to locate. From the A456, turn off at the signpost for "Clent Hills", then turn again following the convenient signpost for "Walton Hill". There is a National Trust car park on the flanks of the hill.

                           

The pull up to the summit is an easy five minute walk. The area is popular with dog walkers. We set up the SOTA Beam on the fishing pole, and pointed it at Connahs Quay, knowing that DSP and AAV needed it as a unique. However, all replies were from local stations in the West Midlands, so we happily worked through these. 14 minutes into the activation, Mike GW0DSP/P called in from Hope Mountain GW/NW-062 for the summit-to-summit and to claim 50% of his remaining CE summits chased. Barry was also looking for us, but couldn't get us on FM, so we went horizontal SSB and made contact that way. Jimmy M3EYP/P rounded off the activation with a local 2m FM contact for his 4th, and we made the quick descent to the car, ready to move onto Bredon Hill G/CE-003.  Thanks to the following stations, all worked on 2m FM with 5 watts, with the exception of M3PXW where 2m SSB was used to make the trip: