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TO8FH – DXpedition to the Mayotte islands, by F6KOP Radio Club DL3GA's story
The first plan for 2023 was an expedition to Guyana 8R. But the announcement of the 8R7X team triggered a switch to plan B. The new target was Niger 5U. Just a few weeks after booking flights and QTH, the military coup in this country forced us to abandon plan B. Now there was not much time left, so plan C had to be a place with only a small chance for serious problems. Mayotte belongs to the french overseas territories, so there was no need for visa. However, an affordable place for a radio expedition with 12 team members was not easy to find.
___ Monday, October 09, 2023 On the railway platform, an announcement of a canceled train scares me. But luckily for me, this concerns the part after Offenburg. I arrive at Strasbourg on time and after just a few minutes stopover, my TGV leaves with destination Paris. Team members Jean-Luc, Philippe and Damien board the train a little later. After arrival at Charles de Gaulle airport, we meet the F6KOP team, they bring all the radio equipment, too. We clear all check-in stations without problems and board the Air Austral Boeing 787 with service directly to Mayotte.
___ Tuesday, October 10, 2023 After an uneventful flight, we land at Dzaoudzi airport on the Petite Terre island of Mayotte. The entire baggage is here as well, but its quantity attracts the attention of customs. We learn that Mayotte is part of the EU, but not part of the Schengen area. Some paperwork must be completed before we are allowed to proceed. Our host welcomes us and we split up into three cars that take us to the harbor. A ferry takes us to Mayotte's capital Mamoudzou on Grande Terre island in just a few minutes. After another car ride of 40 km, we arrive at the guest house “Pieds dans l'eau” in Boueni. We check the available space for antennas and develop plans while having lunch. The low band antennas will be a challenge, so we concentrate on the three hex beams, the 40m vertical and the shack until it gets dark. I work on the 40m ground plane on the metal roof of our house, it has a perfect SWR. After dinner we hit the bands, but there are serious problems. The CW keyer stalls after a short time, apparently caused by RFI. After a while, a solution is found by adding ground cables to the amplifier housings. My CQ on 7012 kHz (using “my” ground plane) brings few QSOs, apparently I'm hardly heard in Europe. 7018 kHz works much better and starts a small pileup, but noise level and QSB are quite high. After two hours, I go to sleep.
___ Wednesday, October 11, 2023 We run FT8 QSOs on 10m, 12m and 20m this night. There are only two hours without QSOs. I wake up late and take breakfast alone. We decide to remove the 40m vertical from the roof and relocate it to the beach. Here we add verticals for 30m, 80m and 160m with combined forces. A 60m vertical takes the former place of the 40m antenna on the roof. We have to delay the Clublog update until 1200 lost FT8 QSOs are recovered from a backup log. I ask friends at home about my signal on 40m yesterday. I was not strong but had a clear frequency. My next shift begins at 19:00 local time and I work on 40m again. It works better than yesterday, I have a decent pileup. But after one hour a contest starts and I lose my frequency. I change to 30m and run our first QSOs at all on this band. The pileup is much stronger than on 40m and up to 2 kHz wide. However, not much of it is left when I hand over to Eric.	The TO8FH shack with four stations.
___ Thursday, October 12, 2023 At 03:00 I take over from Xavier on 80m. It is very difficult to peel callsigns out of the noise, the surf roar from the beach is louder. After 30 minutes with a handfull of QSOs, I switch to 30m. It takes only few CQs until a big pileup unfolds, up to 3 kHz wide with callers from the Americas. At the end of my shift the sun rises and it gets difficult to separate signals. However, I can work stations from Alaska now. The antenna's SWR is rather bad because the high tide has converted two radials into wire balls. After breakfast, I take some time to untangle them. During my noon shift on 12m, the number of callers is varying. Many callers now, nobody left after just a few minutes, many callers another while later. Patrick reports similar conditions on 10m. This afternoon, the high tide keeps working on the radials of our antennas again. It has torn off two radials from the 80m vertical and one from the 30m vertical. I try hard to attach the 30m radial again, but I can't use a soldering iron out here on the beach... We also have a 6-element beam for 6m with us. But it has to be relocated three times until it no longer causes interference to the other stations. It ends up suspended from the branch of a big tree, only 2.5m above the ground. However, it contributes about 500 QSOs to our log in the end. I have another shift at 19:00, again on 12m. Callers from Europe and North America pile up 2 kHz wide and there seems to be no end. With time, the signals from Europe merge into a uniform pulp, while more and more loud signals from the US west coast stand out. After having dinner with Patrick, it's time to rest.
___ Friday, October 13, 2023 What can happen to a DXpedition on Friday 13 ? Anyway, my morning shift is great. I take over from Xavier on 20m, working a tremendous pileup from North America. I can log a good rate until the signals start getting weaker. I notice that many are still calling although Xavier has already logged them. Then the conditions seem to terminate the show, although Patrick is still making a good rate on 30m CW. I steal 15m that was used by a FT8 station and soon I have many callers from the Pacific. US west coast, New Zealand, Australia, Hawaii, Japan and asian Russia get into our log. Most signals are not strong, but the band is quiet enough to read weak signals, too. Every once in a while, the computer delays the “TU” transmission that would complete a QSO, maybe it needs a reboot. The SSB ops are a little frustrated because they spend a lot of time CQing. During my shift around lunchtime on 15m, there are not many callers either, but I have to call CQ only a few times. After the shift, I join Xavier for a visit of the next food shop. Our hosts provide full board, so we buy mainly drinking water, soft drinks and beer. My evening shift starts at 18:00, still on 15m. It's a wild pileup with many loud signals from Europe, densely packed. I don't listen higher than 4 kHz over my transmit frequency. Single signals from North America are heard, but it's too early to call for that area only. At dinner, Patrick reports exactly the same observations on 17m. Bottom line: No “Murphy” on this Friday 13.
___ Saturday, October 14, 2023 My night shift starts at 03:00. Patrick suggests to test the low bands, so he runs 40m and I try 80m. I can log Iceland and some stations from North America. But that's it, so I go to 30m. Local noise and QSB give me a hard time, but I am making progress. Patrick says that his radio noise is going up and down with the beach surf. 30m doesn't sound like that to me, I'd rather say it sounds like 160m during our past activities in Africa. Olivier arrives by taxi this morning, family affairs forced him to delay his trip to Mayotte. But just arrived, he starts installing his QO-100 station. My next shift starts at 11:00 and I continue on 10m. There is no pileup but I can log a rather constant stream of QSOs. After a while I get the notice that there is contest QRM on my signal, so I move from 28027 to 28047. After a cluster spot by Eric, I get callers here. Then, suddenly the power fails, but only the two CW stations are affected. The integrated fuse of a cable drum has disrupted and this repeats. I reduce transmit power until someone comes with another supply cable. I have to move my transmit frequency again because a loud contest station starts CQing on my split frequency. It seems that callers are now appearing in batches, many from North America. I hand this over to Eric and go for lunch. Just after finishing a pileup of dirty dishes, Xavier asks me to work a CW pileup on QO-100. Like on the Comoros Islands (D60AE last year), CW operation is a little improvised here – no computer keying. And unfortunately, the dot and dash paddles are switched and there's nobody available who knows how to change this. So I simply operate the paddles “backward”. After 67 QSOs, no callers are left and I go to catch up for some sleep.
___ Sunday, October 15, 2023 In my early morning shift, I continue working a vast pileup on 20m with callers from all over the place. Multipath conditions make it really hard to pull out single calls. The best places are the upper and lower end of the 3 kHz split range, here I find stations that stand out. With time, the changing conditions wipe out signals from the Far East and Europe, and the remaining signals from North America are rather thin. I switch to 40m with good results because the callers deliver nice signals. But I also notice significant phase noise from the digimode stations on 17m and even 60m although this one runs only 60W. I see that the station on 17m is no longer making QSOs, so I deactivate it. At the end of this exhausting four hour shift, I work only a few weak signals that I read when the 60m station doesn't transmit. At the same time, Thierry is running a nice rate on 15m SSB. I can't really find sleep before my day shift begins. I continue on 12m, but almost instantly notice that my transmit frequency is flooded by a Swains pileup. I can hear many signals from Japan with some big signals from Europe inbetween. Eric takes over so I can go for lunch, but when I am almost finished he comes to join the lunch group because he had no more callers. Back at the station, Thierry needs a break at the SSB station so I can have the 10m band. There is a decent stream of callers with first signals from North America. But it's the end of my shift, so Xavier shows up soon and continues. My next shift starts at 16:00 for two hours, still on 10m. This time, the ZD9W pileup forces me to move to 28042 kHz. I have no real pileup, but log a rather constant stream of QSOs. This is the time when the sunset glares. Our host installed a kind of curtain but today it flaps around in the breeze. At the end, I have some callers up1, others up2, and a station in between calls CQ PA QSO Party :-) After the delicious dinner, I take over for Eric so he can have dinner too. He has been rather unhappy because of the intense activity on 10m. So I go to 20m and it takes only few CQs to start another vast pileup. Again, multipath conditions make it hard to peel a single call out of the crowd. It works best with a very narrow filter, but it costs time to find signals standing out. Xavier takes over as his shift begins. I'm in the mood for some more CW via QO-100 and log another 35 QSOs, exceeding the 500 QSO line here (SSB and CW). Before the day ends, I have another regular shift and continue struggling with that vast 20m pileup with blurred signals from Europe and North America. First their ratio is rather equal, but with time there are more callers from North America. 160m FT8 operation is tested on the digimode station to my left, but only a few QSOs with reports of no more than -20 dB get into the log. I won't try CW there... Philippe attempts CW on 80m and makes some QSOs, but I hear his transmissions loud on +2 kHz also, so I have to listen at +1.0...+1.8 kHz. This was another exhausting shift and I'm glad when it is over and I can get to sleep.
__ Monday, October 16, 2023 My morning shift starts at 08:00 and our station is still on 20m. I can log some stations from Europe and the Pacific, but then it's all over. Jean-Luc helps me to get the station running in FT8 but even there nobody is coming back. All upper bands are occupied by the other stations, so I take another nap. Just before lunch, Patrick delivers the TO8FH shirts. I skip the afternoon shift because the upper bands are still occupied and the best FT8 signal on 20m gets a -10 dB report. Boueni is a rather small village and there are not many places to visit. I take a walk to the sports stadium and on to the market to purchase some drinks. I meet Damien and Thierry there, and loaded with Cola and beer we return to our guesthouse. I take some nice sunset photos at the beach. My next shift is at 20:00 for four hours, still on 20m. The vast pileup is back and again the signals are blurry. A friend from my radio club gets into the log and just in this moment Wintest freezes - not for a few seconds as so many times before, but permanently. Fortunately, there is a paddle and I can give him a report and finish the QSO. The computer needs a reboot which brings Wintest back to life also. It's time for Eric to take over and continue. For me it's good night...
___ Tuesday, October 17, 2023 I force myself out of bed for my shift at 06:00. The CW1 station is still (or again?) on 20m, but the conditions allow for 150 QSOs in the two hours, nevertheless. Just before the end I go to 17m for daytime operation and add some QSOs there before I hand over to Eric. One of my local DXer friends in DL asks by mail why we didn't respond to his call on 80m. I send a response with some explanation. In fact, the available space is insufficient for low-band receiving antennas. We did install a BOG, but it doesn't perform well. Today the skies are much more cloudy than before but it's not a bit less hot and humid. I take a few photos with the GDXF shirt (thanks for the support, guys). At 18:00 I head back to the station for another shift. We are still on 17m. First the band is very noisy and it is hard to pull a call out. But with time, the noise level goes down and the pileup grows. Unfortunately, the discipline of callers from Europe could be better. After two hours, it's time for dinner, followed by sleep.	DL3GA and one of the three hex beams.
___ Wednesday, October 18, 2023 I get up for another long night shift starting at 03:00. Xavier is still on 17m and it works surprisingly well. I can rapidly log callers from North America until I can't hear anyone. On the CW2 station, Patrick achieves a few 80m QSOs with North America, but after a while he switches to FT8. 30m is available and after a few CQs I have a nice pileup. The signals are not as clear as on 17m before and some thunderstorm static comes on top today. Some early birds from Europe are also calling, but their signals are even more blurred than those from North America. So the QSO rate is not good to set new records, but I keep working on it until the rising sun mutes the band. Before I hand over to Eric, I grab 15m for the day. I check some DX cluster comments about my last shift, looks quite good. It seems that we have more callers since the big expeditions to Swains and Polynesia are now over. But the overall QSO numbers per day are descending. Most of all, the demand for SSB seems to be satisfied after only 10k QSOs. But we are over 50k QSOs, so a final result like last year's D60AE (73k QSOs) is within reach. I keep working on 15m during my noon shift. Frequent phase noise covers many callers, so I call CQ while the noise is strong and try to be listening when it is low. I assumed that this noise came from the FT8 station on 12m until its computer suddenly powers down without action by anyone. Now I notice that the Auto-CQ of the 20m SSB station is causing the noise. I stop it and now I can run QSOs on 15m as usual. It's not long until Eric comes to take over and I can go for lunch. We are out of drinking water and it is sold out at the market, so I return with two big bottles of Cola instead. I spend my afternoon shift still working on 15m and I have plenty of callers. At some point, I notice a flock of callers from Taiwan making it into my log. After the first half of my shift, the sun sets spectacularly at a cloudless horizon. It seems that everyone who is not operating a radio is now taking pictures. After my regular shift, I try one more time for CW on QO-100, but only a few QSOs result. My night shift starts at 22:00 and I work on 30m again. First the callers are mainly from Europe, but more and more from the Americas and Far East join the pileup. It's sunrise time in Japan and the signals from there are rather strong, but heavily blurred by multipath propagation. The sunset line is crossing South America and these signals are quite clean. It's still a while until sunset in North America and the signals are blurry, but most ops listen well and keep the QSOs short.
___ Thursday, October 19, 2023 I wake up at 07:00 and take the opportunity for a breakfast at the “usual time”. My shift starts at 09:00 and I work on 10m. It starts slowly, some phase noise disappears after a few minutes. But then a nice pileup builds, I can't log callers as quickly as new ones join. Most of them are from Europe, Japan and Australia, but today I work also less frequently heard countries like Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines. It's also dupe day, amazingly many calls are already in our log. A cluster spot indicates that this could be related to a missing update on Clublog, but actually it's up to date. Both SSB stations are manned and busy, but with time they are calling CQ more and more. Lunch is fish today, with grilled Manjok, bread fruit and Taro. Snoozing with a comfortably filled stomach, I almost miss my next shift. That would have been a pity because we are still on 10m with plenty of callers. I log QSOs at high rate until the band literally explodes and nobody listens to me anymore. The pileup of ZD9W has rolled over me again and I have to move from 28027 to 28037. Another pileup builds there rapidly and then it's time for Eric to take over. Jean-Luc has discovered a missing log and uploads another update to Clublog. With this bug fixed, the figures confirm my impression – we have over 60k QSOs and our daily QSO numbers are climbing. However, the SSB ops are frustrated because they keep spending a lot of time CQing. There is another beautiful sunset today, this time I watch it swimming in the ocean with some other off-duty ops. Dinner is delicious as usual, but the dessert is fantastic. Small dough bowls filled with vanilla cream and topped with chocolate – wow. My night shift starts on 10m but there are just a few callers from North America left. I go to 20m and have to live with the side-effects of Patricks attempts on 80 and 40m, but he is not very successful with that and gives up soon. It's sunrise in Japan and their signals are strong and rather clear today. Eric continues in his shift.	80m GP at sunset.
___ Friday, October 20, 2023 The alarm wakes me up, this didn't happen so many times here yet. Xavier is on 30m but he says that it's over. So I grab 12m with a hexbeam to Japan, but nobody comes back. So I give it a try in FT8. With the antenna pointing to Japan, there are callers from eastern Europe and asian Russia. The signals would be good for CW, so I try again after a while, supported by a cluster spot by Thierry. Again the callers are almost exclusively from Europe, so I decide to turn the antenna. Funny: Now I hear also callers from Japan... Then it's time for Eric to take over, I hope he will be kept busy enough. Emails from my DXer friends at home confirm that the signals were much less subject to multipath echo blurring last night. At 12:00 we gather for team photos and videos at the beach. But Patrick is not happy with the results, the sun directly over us creates shadows in our faces. We repeat this at 16:30 with good results. I skip my early afternoon shift, because even the demand for CW is very low now. Instead, all stations run FT8 with a rather decent QSO rate. My late shift at 19:00 is still on 12m and I pull many small signals out of the noise, mostly from Europe and North America. Jean-Luc reports that we have already passed the QSO total of D60AE and the weekend is still in front of us.
___ Saturday, October 21, 2023 I force myself out of bed for a shift starting at 04:00. Xavier is on 30m and says it was difficult. Isn't 30m always difficult, I say to myself. But for me it works better than expected, I can maintain a decent rate of 80 QSOs per hour. Signals get weaker after sunrise, so I switch to FT8 and this brings another wave of QSOs from all over the world into our log. Eric appears on time, but he takes breakfast with me and lets FT8 run as long as it brings QSOs. Suddenly the station stops transmitting, apparently a USB connection problem. I help switching to 17m until Eric starts running QSOs. The SSB team has already operated 10m FM and even there nobody is coming back anymore. My next shift starts at 11:00 and I can instantly work a bunch QSOs, but it's over soon. 12m is available but there is not much demand left here either. Stephane takes over so I can go for lunch. Olivier has a successful sked with a school in Luxemburg today, using his QO-100 station. We start taking down the low-band antennas at the beach. The water has buried some radials of the 160m GP in sand and gravel. After pulling them out, I'm bathed in sweat and need a break. Then my next shift starts and I run 15m until the WAG contest begins. I go to 12m where the amplifier quits its service. But the conditions are very good, even with 100W I work a nice rate. The SSB ops are busy again, running 10m FM. Eric comes to continue on 12m, but with few callers now. After dinner, I help him to switch to 30m. Phlippe asks me to handle a bunch of callers on 17m, but I have problems with the function key setup of the CW2 station. So I run the QSOs directly by keyboard and paddle. After some QSOs and a few CQs, I switch to FT8. Two glasses of Sangria get me ready to sleep.	JiMi, F4DLM, operating RTTY.
___ Sunday, October 22, 2023 The entire team meets for breakfast at 06:00 while five stations are still bagging FT8 or FT4 QSOs. The remaining antennas, cables and stations are dismantled and packed into their bags and suitcases. Jean-Luc collects the logs from all computers and uploads a total of nearly 79k QSOs to Clublog. At 10:00 we are ready to hit the road, but the cars are ordered for 12:00 so we can take some rest now. Unfortunately, the extra taxi doesn't show up, so we have to squeeze ten people into the minivan instead of seven. We arrive at the harbor and buy tickets for the ferry that takes us to the other side, and we make it to the airport without problem. The runway here is a little short, so the plane can't fuel up for the entire flight. We land in Nairobi to take fuel for the rest of the trip. Other than that, it's yet another uneventful flight. Monday morning we arrive on time in Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris and all our equipment is here too. Olivier leaves for his connecting flight to Switzerland, the rest of us take a good breakfast before we begin the rest of our trips back home.
Sincere thanks to the F6KOP team for making it possible. Thanks also to the crew of the Pieds dans l'eau guesthouse in Bouéni ! TO8FH operators: Thierry F1DHX, Jean-Luc F1ULQ (co-leader), Patrick F2DX (team leader), Damien F4AZF, Jean-Michel F4DLM, Xavier F5NTZ, Stephane F5UOW, Julien F8AVK, Philippe F8EFU, Olivier HB9GWJ, Eric ON7RN and Andy DL3GA.
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TO8FH – DXpedition to the Mayotte islands, by F6KOP Radio Club
DL3GA's story

The first plan for 2023 was an expedition to Guyana 8R. But the announcement of the 8R7X team triggered a switch to plan B. The new target was Niger 5U. Just a few weeks after booking flights and QTH, the military coup in this country forced us to abandon plan B. Now there was not much time left, so plan C had to be a place with only a small chance for serious problems. Mayotte belongs to the french overseas territories, so there was no need for visa. However, an affordable place for a radio expedition with 12 team members was not easy to find.

___ Monday, October 09, 2023

On the railway platform, an announcement of a canceled train scares me. But luckily for me, this concerns the part after Offenburg. I arrive at Strasbourg on time and after just a few minutes stopover, my TGV leaves with destination Paris. Team members Jean-Luc, Philippe and Damien board the train a little later. After arrival at Charles de Gaulle airport, we meet the F6KOP team, they bring all the radio equipment, too. We clear all check-in stations without problems and board the Air Austral Boeing 787 with service directly to Mayotte.

___ Tuesday, October 10, 2023

After an uneventful flight, we land at Dzaoudzi airport on the Petite Terre island of Mayotte. The entire baggage is here as well, but its quantity attracts the attention of customs. We learn that Mayotte is part of the EU, but not part of the Schengen area. Some paperwork must be completed before we are allowed to proceed. Our host welcomes us and we split up into three cars that take us to the harbor. A ferry takes us to Mayotte's capital Mamoudzou on Grande Terre island in just a few minutes. After another car ride of 40 km, we arrive at the guest house “Pieds dans l'eau” in Boueni. We check the available space for antennas and develop plans while having lunch. The low band antennas will be a challenge, so we concentrate on the three hex beams, the 40m vertical and the shack until it gets dark. I work on the 40m ground plane on the metal roof of our house, it has a perfect SWR. After dinner we hit the bands, but there are serious problems. The CW keyer stalls after a short time, apparently caused by RFI. After a while, a solution is found by adding ground cables to the amplifier housings. My CQ on 7012 kHz (using “my” ground plane) brings few QSOs, apparently I'm hardly heard in Europe. 7018 kHz works much better and starts a small pileup, but noise level and QSB are quite high. After two hours, I go to sleep.

___ Wednesday, October 11, 2023

We run FT8 QSOs on 10m, 12m and 20m this night. There are only two hours without QSOs. I wake up late and take breakfast alone. We decide to remove the 40m vertical from the roof and relocate it to the beach. Here we add verticals for 30m, 80m and 160m with combined forces. A 60m vertical takes the former place of the 40m antenna on the roof. We have to delay the Clublog update until 1200 lost FT8 QSOs are recovered from a backup log. I ask friends at home about my signal on 40m yesterday. I was not strong but had a clear frequency. My next shift begins at 19:00 local time and I work on 40m again. It works better than yesterday, I have a decent pileup. But after one hour a contest starts and I lose my frequency. I change to 30m and run our first QSOs at all on this band. The pileup is much stronger than on 40m and up to 2 kHz wide. However, not much of it is left when I hand over to Eric.

The TO8FH shack with four stations.

___ Thursday, October 12, 2023

At 03:00 I take over from Xavier on 80m. It is very difficult to peel callsigns out of the noise, the surf roar from the beach is louder. After 30 minutes with a handfull of QSOs, I switch to 30m. It takes only few CQs until a big pileup unfolds, up to 3 kHz wide with callers from the Americas. At the end of my shift the sun rises and it gets difficult to separate signals. However, I can work stations from Alaska now. The antenna's SWR is rather bad because the high tide has converted two radials into wire balls. After breakfast, I take some time to untangle them. During my noon shift on 12m, the number of callers is varying. Many callers now, nobody left after just a few minutes, many callers another while later. Patrick reports similar conditions on 10m. This afternoon, the high tide keeps working on the radials of our antennas again. It has torn off two radials from the 80m vertical and one from the 30m vertical. I try hard to attach the 30m radial again, but I can't use a soldering iron out here on the beach... We also have a 6-element beam for 6m with us. But it has to be relocated three times until it no longer causes interference to the other stations. It ends up suspended from the branch of a big tree, only 2.5m above the ground. However, it contributes about 500 QSOs to our log in the end. I have another shift at 19:00, again on 12m. Callers from Europe and North America pile up 2 kHz wide and there seems to be no end. With time, the signals from Europe merge into a uniform pulp, while more and more loud signals from the US west coast stand out. After having dinner with Patrick, it's time to rest.

___ Friday, October 13, 2023

What can happen to a DXpedition on Friday 13 ? Anyway, my morning shift is great. I take over from Xavier on 20m, working a tremendous pileup from North America. I can log a good rate until the signals start getting weaker. I notice that many are still calling although Xavier has already logged them. Then the conditions seem to terminate the show, although Patrick is still making a good rate on 30m CW. I steal 15m that was used by a FT8 station and soon I have many callers from the Pacific. US west coast, New Zealand, Australia, Hawaii, Japan and asian Russia get into our log. Most signals are not strong, but the band is quiet enough to read weak signals, too. Every once in a while, the computer delays the “TU” transmission that would complete a QSO, maybe it needs a reboot. The SSB ops are a little frustrated because they spend a lot of time CQing. During my shift around lunchtime on 15m, there are not many callers either, but I have to call CQ only a few times. After the shift, I join Xavier for a visit of the next food shop. Our hosts provide full board, so we buy mainly drinking water, soft drinks and beer. My evening shift starts at 18:00, still on 15m. It's a wild pileup with many loud signals from Europe, densely packed. I don't listen higher than 4 kHz over my transmit frequency. Single signals from North America are heard, but it's too early to call for that area only. At dinner, Patrick reports exactly the same observations on 17m. Bottom line: No “Murphy” on this Friday 13.

___ Saturday, October 14, 2023

My night shift starts at 03:00. Patrick suggests to test the low bands, so he runs 40m and I try 80m. I can log Iceland and some stations from North America. But that's it, so I go to 30m. Local noise and QSB give me a hard time, but I am making progress. Patrick says that his radio noise is going up and down with the beach surf. 30m doesn't sound like that to me, I'd rather say it sounds like 160m during our past activities in Africa. Olivier arrives by taxi this morning, family affairs forced him to delay his trip to Mayotte. But just arrived, he starts installing his QO-100 station. My next shift starts at 11:00 and I continue on 10m. There is no pileup but I can log a rather constant stream of QSOs. After a while I get the notice that there is contest QRM on my signal, so I move from 28027 to 28047. After a cluster spot by Eric, I get callers here. Then, suddenly the power fails, but only the two CW stations are affected. The integrated fuse of a cable drum has disrupted and this repeats. I reduce transmit power until someone comes with another supply cable. I have to move my transmit frequency again because a loud contest station starts CQing on my split frequency. It seems that callers are now appearing in batches, many from North America. I hand this over to Eric and go for lunch. Just after finishing a pileup of dirty dishes, Xavier asks me to work a CW pileup on QO-100. Like on the Comoros Islands (D60AE last year), CW operation is a little improvised here – no computer keying. And unfortunately, the dot and dash paddles are switched and there's nobody available who knows how to change this. So I simply operate the paddles “backward”. After 67 QSOs, no callers are left and I go to catch up for some sleep.

___ Sunday, October 15, 2023

In my early morning shift, I continue working a vast pileup on 20m with callers from all over the place. Multipath conditions make it really hard to pull out single calls. The best places are the upper and lower end of the 3 kHz split range, here I find stations that stand out. With time, the changing conditions wipe out signals from the Far East and Europe, and the remaining signals from North America are rather thin. I switch to 40m with good results because the callers deliver nice signals. But I also notice significant phase noise from the digimode stations on 17m and even 60m although this one runs only 60W. I see that the station on 17m is no longer making QSOs, so I deactivate it. At the end of this exhausting four hour shift, I work only a few weak signals that I read when the 60m station doesn't transmit. At the same time, Thierry is running a nice rate on 15m SSB. I can't really find sleep before my day shift begins. I continue on 12m, but almost instantly notice that my transmit frequency is flooded by a Swains pileup. I can hear many signals from Japan with some big signals from Europe inbetween. Eric takes over so I can go for lunch, but when I am almost finished he comes to join the lunch group because he had no more callers. Back at the station, Thierry needs a break at the SSB station so I can have the 10m band. There is a decent stream of callers with first signals from North America. But it's the end of my shift, so Xavier shows up soon and continues. My next shift starts at 16:00 for two hours, still on 10m. This time, the ZD9W pileup forces me to move to 28042 kHz. I have no real pileup, but log a rather constant stream of QSOs. This is the time when the sunset glares. Our host installed a kind of curtain but today it flaps around in the breeze. At the end, I have some callers up1, others up2, and a station in between calls CQ PA QSO Party :-) After the delicious dinner, I take over for Eric so he can have dinner too. He has been rather unhappy because of the intense activity on 10m. So I go to 20m and it takes only few CQs to start another vast pileup. Again, multipath conditions make it hard to peel a single call out of the crowd. It works best with a very narrow filter, but it costs time to find signals standing out. Xavier takes over as his shift begins. I'm in the mood for some more CW via QO-100 and log another 35 QSOs, exceeding the 500 QSO line here (SSB and CW). Before the day ends, I have another regular shift and continue struggling with that vast 20m pileup with blurred signals from Europe and North America. First their ratio is rather equal, but with time there are more callers from North America. 160m FT8 operation is tested on the digimode station to my left, but only a few QSOs with reports of no more than -20 dB get into the log. I won't try CW there... Philippe attempts CW on 80m and makes some QSOs, but I hear his transmissions loud on +2 kHz also, so I have to listen at +1.0...+1.8 kHz. This was another exhausting shift and I'm glad when it is over and I can get to sleep.

__ Monday, October 16, 2023

My morning shift starts at 08:00 and our station is still on 20m. I can log some stations from Europe and the Pacific, but then it's all over. Jean-Luc helps me to get the station running in FT8 but even there nobody is coming back. All upper bands are occupied by the other stations, so I take another nap. Just before lunch, Patrick delivers the TO8FH shirts. I skip the afternoon shift because the upper bands are still occupied and the best FT8 signal on 20m gets a -10 dB report. Boueni is a rather small village and there are not many places to visit. I take a walk to the sports stadium and on to the market to purchase some drinks. I meet Damien and Thierry there, and loaded with Cola and beer we return to our guesthouse. I take some nice sunset photos at the beach. My next shift is at 20:00 for four hours, still on 20m. The vast pileup is back and again the signals are blurry. A friend from my radio club gets into the log and just in this moment Wintest freezes - not for a few seconds as so many times before, but permanently. Fortunately, there is a paddle and I can give him a report and finish the QSO. The computer needs a reboot which brings Wintest back to life also. It's time for Eric to take over and continue. For me it's good night...

___ Tuesday, October 17, 2023

I force myself out of bed for my shift at 06:00. The CW1 station is still (or again?) on 20m, but the conditions allow for 150 QSOs in the two hours, nevertheless. Just before the end I go to 17m for daytime operation and add some QSOs there before I hand over to Eric. One of my local DXer friends in DL asks by mail why we didn't respond to his call on 80m. I send a response with some explanation. In fact, the available space is insufficient for low-band receiving antennas. We did install a BOG, but it doesn't perform well. Today the skies are much more cloudy than before but it's not a bit less hot and humid. I take a few photos with the GDXF shirt (thanks for the support, guys). At 18:00 I head back to the station for another shift. We are still on 17m. First the band is very noisy and it is hard to pull a call out. But with time, the noise level goes down and the pileup grows. Unfortunately, the discipline of callers from Europe could be better. After two hours, it's time for dinner, followed by sleep.

DL3GA and one of the three hex beams.

___ Wednesday, October 18, 2023

I get up for another long night shift starting at 03:00. Xavier is still on 17m and it works surprisingly well. I can rapidly log callers from North America until I can't hear anyone. On the CW2 station, Patrick achieves a few 80m QSOs with North America, but after a while he switches to FT8. 30m is available and after a few CQs I have a nice pileup. The signals are not as clear as on 17m before and some thunderstorm static comes on top today. Some early birds from Europe are also calling, but their signals are even more blurred than those from North America. So the QSO rate is not good to set new records, but I keep working on it until the rising sun mutes the band. Before I hand over to Eric, I grab 15m for the day. I check some DX cluster comments about my last shift, looks quite good. It seems that we have more callers since the big expeditions to Swains and Polynesia are now over. But the overall QSO numbers per day are descending. Most of all, the demand for SSB seems to be satisfied after only 10k QSOs. But we are over 50k QSOs, so a final result like last year's D60AE (73k QSOs) is within reach. I keep working on 15m during my noon shift. Frequent phase noise covers many callers, so I call CQ while the noise is strong and try to be listening when it is low. I assumed that this noise came from the FT8 station on 12m until its computer suddenly powers down without action by anyone. Now I notice that the Auto-CQ of the 20m SSB station is causing the noise. I stop it and now I can run QSOs on 15m as usual. It's not long until Eric comes to take over and I can go for lunch. We are out of drinking water and it is sold out at the market, so I return with two big bottles of Cola instead. I spend my afternoon shift still working on 15m and I have plenty of callers. At some point, I notice a flock of callers from Taiwan making it into my log. After the first half of my shift, the sun sets spectacularly at a cloudless horizon. It seems that everyone who is not operating a radio is now taking pictures. After my regular shift, I try one more time for CW on QO-100, but only a few QSOs result. My night shift starts at 22:00 and I work on 30m again. First the callers are mainly from Europe, but more and more from the Americas and Far East join the pileup. It's sunrise time in Japan and the signals from there are rather strong, but heavily blurred by multipath propagation. The sunset line is crossing South America and these signals are quite clean. It's still a while until sunset in North America and the signals are blurry, but most ops listen well and keep the QSOs short.

___ Thursday, October 19, 2023

I wake up at 07:00 and take the opportunity for a breakfast at the “usual time”. My shift starts at 09:00 and I work on 10m. It starts slowly, some phase noise disappears after a few minutes. But then a nice pileup builds, I can't log callers as quickly as new ones join. Most of them are from Europe, Japan and Australia, but today I work also less frequently heard countries like Thailand, Indonesia and the Philippines. It's also dupe day, amazingly many calls are already in our log. A cluster spot indicates that this could be related to a missing update on Clublog, but actually it's up to date. Both SSB stations are manned and busy, but with time they are calling CQ more and more. Lunch is fish today, with grilled Manjok, bread fruit and Taro. Snoozing with a comfortably filled stomach, I almost miss my next shift. That would have been a pity because we are still on 10m with plenty of callers. I log QSOs at high rate until the band literally explodes and nobody listens to me anymore. The pileup of ZD9W has rolled over me again and I have to move from 28027 to 28037. Another pileup builds there rapidly and then it's time for Eric to take over. Jean-Luc has discovered a missing log and uploads another update to Clublog. With this bug fixed, the figures confirm my impression – we have over 60k QSOs and our daily QSO numbers are climbing. However, the SSB ops are frustrated because they keep spending a lot of time CQing. There is another beautiful sunset today, this time I watch it swimming in the ocean with some other off-duty ops. Dinner is delicious as usual, but the dessert is fantastic. Small dough bowls filled with vanilla cream and topped with chocolate – wow. My night shift starts on 10m but there are just a few callers from North America left. I go to 20m and have to live with the side-effects of Patricks attempts on 80 and 40m, but he is not very successful with that and gives up soon. It's sunrise in Japan and their signals are strong and rather clear today. Eric continues in his shift.

80m GP at sunset.

___ Friday, October 20, 2023

The alarm wakes me up, this didn't happen so many times here yet. Xavier is on 30m but he says that it's over. So I grab 12m with a hexbeam to Japan, but nobody comes back. So I give it a try in FT8. With the antenna pointing to Japan, there are callers from eastern Europe and asian Russia. The signals would be good for CW, so I try again after a while, supported by a cluster spot by Thierry. Again the callers are almost exclusively from Europe, so I decide to turn the antenna. Funny: Now I hear also callers from Japan... Then it's time for Eric to take over, I hope he will be kept busy enough. Emails from my DXer friends at home confirm that the signals were much less subject to multipath echo blurring last night. At 12:00 we gather for team photos and videos at the beach. But Patrick is not happy with the results, the sun directly over us creates shadows in our faces. We repeat this at 16:30 with good results. I skip my early afternoon shift, because even the demand for CW is very low now. Instead, all stations run FT8 with a rather decent QSO rate. My late shift at 19:00 is still on 12m and I pull many small signals out of the noise, mostly from Europe and North America. Jean-Luc reports that we have already passed the QSO total of D60AE and the weekend is still in front of us.

___ Saturday, October 21, 2023

I force myself out of bed for a shift starting at 04:00. Xavier is on 30m and says it was difficult. Isn't 30m always difficult, I say to myself. But for me it works better than expected, I can maintain a decent rate of 80 QSOs per hour. Signals get weaker after sunrise, so I switch to FT8 and this brings another wave of QSOs from all over the world into our log. Eric appears on time, but he takes breakfast with me and lets FT8 run as long as it brings QSOs. Suddenly the station stops transmitting, apparently a USB connection problem. I help switching to 17m until Eric starts running QSOs. The SSB team has already operated 10m FM and even there nobody is coming back anymore. My next shift starts at 11:00 and I can instantly work a bunch QSOs, but it's over soon. 12m is available but there is not much demand left here either. Stephane takes over so I can go for lunch. Olivier has a successful sked with a school in Luxemburg today, using his QO-100 station. We start taking down the low-band antennas at the beach. The water has buried some radials of the 160m GP in sand and gravel. After pulling them out, I'm bathed in sweat and need a break. Then my next shift starts and I run 15m until the WAG contest begins. I go to 12m where the amplifier quits its service. But the conditions are very good, even with 100W I work a nice rate. The SSB ops are busy again, running 10m FM. Eric comes to continue on 12m, but with few callers now. After dinner, I help him to switch to 30m. Phlippe asks me to handle a bunch of callers on 17m, but I have problems with the function key setup of the CW2 station. So I run the QSOs directly by keyboard and paddle. After some QSOs and a few CQs, I switch to FT8. Two glasses of Sangria get me ready to sleep.

JiMi, F4DLM, operating RTTY.

___ Sunday, October 22, 2023

The entire team meets for breakfast at 06:00 while five stations are still bagging FT8 or FT4 QSOs. The remaining antennas, cables and stations are dismantled and packed into their bags and suitcases. Jean-Luc collects the logs from all computers and uploads a total of nearly 79k QSOs to Clublog. At 10:00 we are ready to hit the road, but the cars are ordered for 12:00 so we can take some rest now. Unfortunately, the extra taxi doesn't show up, so we have to squeeze ten people into the minivan instead of seven. We arrive at the harbor and buy tickets for the ferry that takes us to the other side, and we make it to the airport without problem. The runway here is a little short, so the plane can't fuel up for the entire flight. We land in Nairobi to take fuel for the rest of the trip. Other than that, it's yet another uneventful flight. Monday morning we arrive on time in Charles de Gaulle airport in Paris and all our equipment is here too. Olivier leaves for his connecting flight to Switzerland, the rest of us take a good breakfast before we begin the rest of our trips back home.

Sincere thanks to the F6KOP team for making it possible. Thanks also to the crew of the Pieds dans l'eau guesthouse in Bouéni !

TO8FH operators: Thierry F1DHX, Jean-Luc F1ULQ (co-leader), Patrick F2DX (team leader), Damien F4AZF, Jean-Michel F4DLM, Xavier F5NTZ, Stephane F5UOW, Julien F8AVK, Philippe F8EFU, Olivier HB9GWJ, Eric ON7RN and Andy DL3GA.

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