Every year radio amateurs from all over the nation converge on Dayton, Ohio. It is the annual “Hamvention,” a gathering of the clan. Anywhere from 25,000 to as many as 55,000 spend a few days at the worlds largest ham radio gathering.
The gathering is so large that there are subsets of gatherings, which of themselves are substantially large. I spent most of my time at one such event, the FOUR DAYS IN MAY, or FDIM as it is known. This is a collection of radio amateurs that are sincerely interested in conservation: they insist on communicating with radio transmitters that use 5 watts or less of power. This is significant because the legal power limit is as much as 1500 watts.
Why do they do it? Simple, they’ve found that, in most cases, the additional power is just wasted. It is the same as using a 475 horsepower automobile for transportation when a golf cart will suffice. Another practical reason to do so is the equipment is portable, small and will run on batteries. This is why I chose low-power, or in ham radio jargon: QRP, operation. QRP is an abbreviation used by ham radio operators (one of many “Q” abbreviations) on Morse code to indicate their power level. It is much easier, on Morse code, to send the three letters “Q,” “R,” “P,” than it is to send out a character string such as, ” I am running low power here, 5 watts to be exact.” Low power, battery operated equipment suits my hiking environment.
On the Appalachian Trail I carried a radio that fits inside an Altoids mint tin and managed to communicate with radio amateurs all over the country.
This year, at the Hamvention, I had the good fortune of addressing an audience in a Forum about my hike. It was on Sunday morning and I feared a small turnout since many of the long distance travelers to the event leave Sunday morning to return to the far reaches of the globe, and the east and west coast. I was thrilled to see the room nearly full. The room holds several hundred!
The audience was engaged, fun, and lively. It was a fantastic session. I presented a bunch of video slides about the hike and took questions afterwards. It was practically a mob scene and did my heart good to see so much enthusiasm. It is always thrilling for a public speaker to have such a great audience.
I closed the discussion with a slide that summed it all up. I announced that on my next hike on the Camino de Santiago, in Spain, I was going to use QRO power. (QRO translates as high power, at least hundreds of watts). I showed this ridiculous slide that shows me pulling a very large wagon, with a 5 kilowatt power generator, video terminal, ancient high-powered radios and tuners on my back and an automobile battery. Those that use QRP had good chuckle on that one…
