Ham: without the sandwich
Ham: without the sandwich My wife loves to call me "a bit of a ham" , and I am proud now to say that she is right. Herein lies the story: Somewhere around 1976 I was a boy scout when I attended a Jamboree Of The Air at the home of Lyle Patterson (VK2ALU) in Mt St Thomas in Wollongong. I think that the furthest contact was New Zealand, but most contacts that day were actually around the Illawarra. Nonetheless I was amazed by this concept. I could have my own transmitting station and talk to anyone, anywhere? Sign me up! Turns out that in those days, it was not so simple and the idea of learning Morse Code, even at 5 words per minute scared me off. Yes, I could have gone for the "Z-Call", which did not have this requirement but I wanted to reach the world, and this meant HF. The idea got shelved because school got in the way (and having no money was also something of a concern) but I did get involved in building and restoring plenty o...