How about someone in Wrightwood and the "Grey Ghost" chatting on Simplex?
This afternoon I heard station W6RO on Wrightwood Simplex #2 - 145.520 so I decided I'd find out where W6RO was located. After a few minutes of trying, as there were other stations doubling one another, I made contact with W6RO. It turns out that the control operator was W7FTT (Jim) from Wrightwood and volunteers monthly aboard the Queen Mary in Long Beach.
The signal was a little scratchy but very clear! We talked for about 10 minutes and were both surprised on how well the simplex connection worked. Jim believed he was at 35 watts with a yagi antenna on the Queen Mary. I was using 50 watts on a Yaesu FT8800 using a Diamond dual band X510M antenna (8.3db on 2 meter).
