My Ambitious POTA Goal: Activate 25 Parks in Two Days (THIS WEEKEND!)

Since earning my General License in September 2024, I’ve completely fallen in love with Parks On The Air (POTA).

One of the goals I set for myself early on was to activate every park in my home state of Kentucky, which has 183 recognized eligible POTA parks.

To track my progress, I exported the full Kentucky park database and created a custom Google My Maps visualization that updates as I go. You can view the live version of my map here:

👉 https://www.google.com/maps/d/viewer?mid=1VYmkWvF20huEIWebIo5fn7g8pJleOJQ&usp=sharing

Red pins = Parks I’ve already activated

Blue pins = Parks I still have left to activate

Yellow pins = The parks I’m planning to activate this weekend

Purple pins = Two bonus parks just across the border in West Virginia

Over the past year, I’ve already activated 33 of Kentucky’s 183 parks. This hobby has taken me to so many beautiful and historic places that I may never have visited otherwise. It’s been one of the most rewarding experiences of my amateur radio journey so far.

This weekend, Saturday, October 25th, and Sunday, October 26th, I’m attempting something ambitious:

Activate 26 parks in two days.

To accomplish this, I’ve mapped the entire route, calculated travel times between each location, and planned for roughly 20 minutes per successful activation before moving on to the next park.

👉 CLICK HERE TO SEE MY SPREADSHEET

I’ll be operating with my Yaesu FT-891 at 100 watts, paired with my ATAS-120a mobile HF antenna mounted on the car. My plan is to log at least 15 QSOs per park before packing up and heading to the next one.

If you’d like to follow along or help make this happen, add my call sign KQ4UUR to your HamAlert so you’ll know when I’m spotted in a new park. Quick contacts will help me reach all 25 parks before the weekend is over.

Now for the part I’m most excited about…

Up to this point, my POTA travels have been a solo adventure. But this time, my wife Stephanie and our dog Leo are joining me! We’ll be “road tripping” through scenic parts of Kentucky right as the autumn colors start to show and staying overnight in West Virginia on Saturday.

Stephanie has always been incredibly supportive of my amateur radio hobby, even though she’s never been personally interested in operating. But the idea of a fall road trip together (with Leo, of course) turned this challenge into what will be a fun and memorable shared adventure.

And who knows, you might even hear Stephanie on the air! I told her that if I get stuck making contacts, a female voice calling CQ would almost certainly help. Since I’ll be right there with her at the radio, she can legally operate as a third-party operator using my call sign KQ4UUR. So if you hear her calling “CQ Parks On The Air,” be sure to say hello!

If you notice us spotted in a park and then gone ten minutes later, just know it means we hit our 15 QSOs and had to move on quickly to stay on schedule.

I’d love your help in making this marathon activation weekend a success. Please share this with anyone who might enjoy following along or making contact with us.

See you on the air!

Cliff (KQ4UUR)