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8P – St. Philip, Barbados

Dates: 20 to 28 November 2012

Callsign: 8P9DF

8P – St. Philip, Barbados 2025-01-20T03:46:06-05:00

Staying as Surfsong

Here is the house called Surfsong. It is offered to hams for rent via Amy Beam. As you can see it’s a very big house. Plenty of room for our party of 4.
The location is on the Eastern Side which faces the Atlantic Ocean. It is quiet and far away from all the tourist items. You really need a car to get around. Bring a GPS if you have one, the roads are poorly marked (that is an understatement, they are not marked at all).
The ham shack is very nice and air conditioned (the only room in the house that is). There is always plenty of Ocean breeze to keep the rest of the house tolerable.
8P_House

Arriving

8P_FirstGlimpse
Our First Glimpse at Barbados
8P_FromTheAir
Bridgetown- The Capitol City
8P_Airport_Airplane
Jet Blue Got us here
8P_Airport_ArrivalTerminal
Airport arrival Lounge. A very new and modern airport.
8P_Airport_Relax
Relax, instructions from Republic Bank
8P_Airport_TerminalFront
Out Front. Here’s where we got our rental car and waited for our other party.

Rental House

8P_Coffee_TeresaChris
Coffee on the Ocean. This is my sister Teresa enjoying a relaxing morning java with my XYL on the villa porch.
8P_Groceries_TeresaGayle
Grocery checkout.A very short drive from the rental is this modern and well supplied grocery store.
8P_Antennas_All
House. From left to right: 160m dipole, all band vertical, internet transceiver, tri-bander.
8P_Antennas_BaseOf160Dipole
Base of the 160 dipole. This is the only antenna that worked.
8P_Antennas_BaseOfVertical
Base of the Vertical. Although this antenna turned well on all bands, it didn’t play.
8P_WJ2O_HiJose
Hi Jose! A shout out to Jose, N4BAA.

Beautiful Beaches

8P_Beach
It not hard to find a beach
8P_Beach2
Nice beaches are everywhere
8P_Beach3
Many are private and secluded.

Departure

8P_Departure_Airplane
Darn, and it’s time to go home.
8P_Departure_ChrisDave
Back on the airplane. Here is my wife Chris all smiles as we’re well rested and heading back home.
8P_DrivewaySnow
Sad to come home. Here is the snow in my driveway I drove through to get to my garage.

8P9DF QSL Card

8P_QSL_F
8P_QSL_B

QSL By KB3IFH

Getting a License in Barbados

A U.S. ham who also resides in Barbados made all the arrangement for my license. He is a friend of the owner of the property we rented.
Click here for the full 8-page license
Below is a one page receipt that you are given . . .
8P_License

8P9DF At His Station

8P_Station_WJ2O
Equipment:
Elecraft K3 TransceiverToshiba Satellite Laptop
160 Meter Dipole and the K3’s tuner
We didn’t have very good luck with the antennas. I know how hard it is to maintain antennas especially in the salty Caribbean so I don’t want to be too critical. However, I do want to explain why my score was very mediocre. The tri-bander was totally out of commission. The vertical tuned perfectly on all bands however nobody heard me. I switched to the coax fed 160m dipole which is up about 35 to 40 feet at the center and heard more stations. So, this was my only antenna for the week with the K3 tuning to the coax.
Even though this was not the optimum contesting set-up, I still had plenty of stations to work and had an enjoyable time.
8P_ScoreSummary

Customs:

It was a typical Caribbean airport scene: many planes landing at the same time, immigration was busy, and the baggage handlers were in a big hurry to get to the next passenger. This can work in your favor as the customs people tend to feel sorry for the baggage handlers so they don’t ask a lot of questions about your bags (assuming your bags look “normal”).
6Y5, WJ2O/6Y5, Kingston, Jamaica, Hotel Four Seasons, Morgan’s Harbor, Ham shack,radio dxpedition, qsl card, antenna tower, CW, SSB, Ham radio, dxp, JT65, FT8, RTTY
Nothing like a little Irish whiskey for breakfast while waiting for your flight.
8P_JFK_Airplane
Here’s our aircraft waiting at the Gate on the JFK tarmac.