8Q7YY - Rakeedhoo island - Maldives
Or how to celebrates one's wife's birthday properly 🙂
Wise men say that if you occasionally bring your wife to a warm, blue ocean, it pacifies them. Not for long, of course, but still … So, it was planned as a pacific trip to the Indian Ocean…
But what is the point of traveling anywhere if you are without a Moxon, VDA, a few 1/4-wave verticals, and a small Icom, even if it is your wife’s birthday trip … 🙂
Location
As before, the final destination must meet a few criteria to be selected:
- Blue ocean with warm waters … For some reason, XYL doesn’t appreciate DXing in R1F and on her birthday, particularly 🙂 … I don’t mind R1F (but FSB minds ;-). However, we are firmly on the same page with my XYL that a lot of salty water in the vicinity of the antenna is excellent for a low-angle antenna intake… I am not sure my XYL operates in exactly the same terms, but she clearly agrees that a lot of warm salty water near the equator is good for the destination 🙂
- The location must be high enough in the DXCC most wanted list, at least, in some categories, for example, #83 in SSB or #37 in SSB on 6m, to spark sufficient interest
- At the same time, it must be within reach of a solo DXer to obtain the permits between Zoom calls or other working activities. Thanks to Parker (8Q7PR) for the great help. I have the license in a few quick days
- Hotels and planes must be reasonably priced
- Practical possibility to have QTH outside of cities for antennas, and hopefully not disastrous local QRN
The Maldives sounded like a nice option, meeting many of these criteria for a duo-expedition. We had traveled there years before for a diving safari, and it was perfect. This time – DXing …
Hm… well… I must not forget that it is a birthday trip – not a DXpedition … I mustn’t forget. I mustn’t forget … But it looks like 55 kg out of 30+30 kg luggage allowance will not be bikinis or anything even close to that 🙂
Choosing a country is 1/2 work done. But within a country, a reasonable QTH must be found as well:
- Hotel owners must not be scared of 10-meter carbon masts with rope guys and a Moxon on top (and a few VDAs along the shore) and a 40-meter LMR400 feeder from our room
- There must be a place for the antennas and, hopefully, within 10-20 meters for the salty water to play with VDA antennas, for example
- And… – there must be low local QRN. It is hard to predict QRN, of course, but since the majority of my potential working directions will be north, if there are any local sources of QRN, they must be on the back of my Moxon or VDA, i.e., on the south. This means that the hotel must be on the north of the island, and the beam would be facing the ocean – not LED lamps and solar panels
- The smaller the island, the fewer sources of QRN … at least, in theory. However, a single nasty one in the vicinity can easily ruin all plans and calculations. I struggled but successfully overcame such local QRMs in Tuvalu, Vanuatu, and Fiji. Let’s see how lucky we will be in the Maldives
Rakeedhoo – “in 2003, the island was described as the smallest of the inhabited islands in the atoll,” – looked like a nice spot to meet expectations. Is it so or not, we will know the future – not today – June 21, 2025
All estimates can be ruined was incorrect input data. For example, many owners show their property on the map quite lausily… So, you thought it was truly beachfront and on the north, but it may be 50 meters behind other buildings in a densely packed street with no space for antennas and terrible QRN. Let’s believe in good luck 😉