When All Else Fails

I took my family on a ten mile hike in the Blue Ridge Mountains about a week ago. My wife took her cell phone to test coverage . . . no towers near . . . no phone calls. When she couldn't get a tower she asked me what we would do if we had an emergency (she worries about my heart).  That's a great question.  What would you do if you were 30 miles away from the nearest town, on a mountain trail about five miles away from the nearest road and something went wrong?

I pulled out my 2 meter/ 70 cm hand held ham radio with all of five watts of output (a lot more power than a cell phone by the way), announced, "AJ4AL monitoring" and quickly made a couple of contacts through one of the Lynchburg repeaters about 40 miles away and then for fun made contacts with ham radio operators in Bedford, Lexingon and Roanoke through other repeaters.  Then I tried contacting Lynchburg again on simplex (without a repeater) and got a call back. When all else fails . . . ham radio. Nice to know the help was only a CQ away.  That’s -.-.   --.-

This is my 2m/70cm hiking companion

By the way, you don’t need to learn Morse code to earn a ham radio license.  That requirement was eliminated several years ago.  Lucky for me I didn't have to take the 20 word per minute Morse Code exam when I advanced to an extra class license.  However, I did take the old 5 wpm years ago when I took the Novice exam.  The license classes have also been simplified.  Only three amateur radio licenses are granted today, the technician, general and extra class licenses. 

The tech class license will authorize you to use the VHF/UHF radio that I took up to the Blue Ridge.  It is great for local communication and emergency work.  The general class and extra class licenses provide voice as well as data frequency allocations on HF bands . . . the frequencies where you can contact amateur radio operators on the other side of the planet when conditions are good.

The Tech class license exam is 35 multiple choice questions and the question pool and answers are published.  Don't you wish the exams that you took in college were like that?  Elementary school students frequently pass the exam and I expect that my 10 year old son will pass it before he turns 11 in two months.

If you want to learn more about amateur radio go to the ARRL website.  You will find more information about licensing, as well as contact information for your local amateur radio club.  Chances are good there is a club near you that may offer licensing classes as well as exams.

Strange thing for a wellness coach to write about?  Not really.  Part of being well is being prepared.