Short SOTA tour and DIRAGE ham rally (part 2)

The day after my short SOTA tour was the DIRAGE ham rally in Diest.

Not so much to tell about the rally itself, I guess you know the picture ... a hall filled with mainly middle aged to "old" men (with some exceptions) ... and row after row of tables filled with "stuff" a ham may or may not need.

After buying a couple of items I really DID need, I went to look for the SOTA booth which was on the first floor of the building. Peter ON4UP had set up a nice exhibit of SOTA related items, with a backpack, boots,equipment, pictures, videos etc..

ON7PX - ON9CBQ - ON4UP (picture by ON4UP)

This was of course also the celebration of 10 YEARS SOTA in BELGIUM, so all the flags and balloons made it a SOTA Party !

[NOTE : left in the above picture is Walter, ON7PX. Sadly enough, he went SK in 2018]

I had brought my SOTA "umbrella with integrated operating table" , and some homebrew battery packs, which drew a lot of interest from the others.

(picture by ON4UP)

And I could finally meet and see to whom  some familiar voices really belonged.
Some of the top guns were there : Karel ON4FI , Belgians number one chaser ,
ON5SWA, ON6UU, OT6V, all three also very active in activating ONFF.
And of course Peters' eternal companion in crime, and Belgians TOP ACTIVATOR ... Franz, ON9CBQ/DL3RBF was there too !
I can't name them all, but in total we were with 18 Belgian SOTA activators.

Here a group picture of some of these fine gentlemen ...

(picture by ON4UP)

After a most enjoyable day, I went back to Ostend ... and that's the end of a short SOTA weekend !
See you next time !

73,

Luc ON7DQ