There are some rule changes for 2026. Most importantly, the Spud Run has changed from 24 hours straight to 12 hours each on Saturday and Sunday. Starts at 9am PDT on Saturday March 14 and runs for 12 hours until 9pm Pacific. Starts at 7 am on Sunday March 15 and runs for 12 hours, until 7pm PDT. Simply work a station in Idaho, and get their exchange and send yours. Out of state participants send their state, Idaho stations send their three letter County identifier. Check the website for details on log submissions. For more details, see the Spud Run website.

Just a hint: Idaho is close enough to make a road trip and operate. You can help your contesting situation out by working POTA at the same time, being sure to give both exchanges.

There are always a lot of people activating POTA parks for anyone to work them. You can work (hunt) the activated parks from home, portable station, or mobile. This will be an opportunity to work parks on all of the HF bands. If you are a Tech licensee, the Tech segment of the 10m band (28.3-28.5 MHz) is often busy with POTA activators. Check the spotting pages, as some activators also work VHF and UHF Simplex operations. Take the opportunity to work a target rich environment. If you create an account at POTA, you will be able to download a hunter's certificate for the contacts that you make on the weekend. The POTA site also has a spotting function that can allow you to filter the list by band and mode. For more details, see the POTA Website to see how it works.

Support Your Parks Weekends runs once per quarter. Remaining dates for 2025:

• Winter - 3rd Full Weekend of January. January 17-1820, 2026
• Spring - 3rd Full Weekend of April. April 18-19, 2026
• Summer - 3rd Full Weekend of July. July 18-19, 2026
• Autumn - 3rd Full Weekend of October. October 17-18, 2026

For those of you who are interested, the 7QP (7th Call Area QSO Party) will be held May 2, 2026.  It runs from 6am to midnight PDT Saturday May 3, 2026.  It's an opportunity to be the center of attention on a busy contest weekend.  Rare counties are always popular.  There are also 3 or 4 other contests running the same weekend.

Operating modes:  SSB, CW, and some digital modes (Not WSJT).  Bands:  160m, 80m, 40m, 20m, 15m, 10m.  Multiple entry categories: Operate from home, mobile, or county dx-pedition. Single and multiple operators allowed. Self-spotting is allowed.

Exchange is a signal report, and a 5 character code comprised of 2 character state and 3 character county code.  For Kittitas County, the abbreviation is WAKTT.

For more information, rules, logging software, log submission info, etc., see the 7QP website.

Background: The Kittitas County Amateur Radio Club (KCARC) is a participating club in the Lewis and Clark Trail On The Air (LCTOTA) Special Event. We will be able to operate as N7KGS during the 2 week special event operation. You may operate from home, a portable operation, or even mobile. We are looking to set up a group operation, and will make details available as we get them. Hams from all over will contact operating clubs in the hopes of not only working all states on the Trail, but also all clubs. Both activators and hunters are eligible for certificates from LCTOTA's sponsor, the Clark County (WA) Amateur Radio Club.

To participate in the LCTOTA for the club, you'll need to work with Bob, AI7CS, who is the club liaison for the event. Activators are registered with the LCTOTA system, and you will get account credentials allowing you to spot yourself and upload logs. You'll need to put your activation into the LCTOTA so that hunters know where and when to find you. Your logs need to be uploaded, hopefully daily. Logs are submitted only by the activators. As a result, hunters are depending on the log submissions so that they get credit for the certificate awards. If you have questions on logging software, Bob can give a demo of a couple of packages.

One thing to keep in mind is that you can go hunting other clubs, or even N7KGS, under your own callsign, and work towards some of the certificates available to you.

LCTOTA starts 0000 UTC June 6th, 2026 and runs to 2359 UTC June 21st, 2026. Local times are June 5th, 5pm Pacific - June 21st, 5pm Pacific Time. You can try to contact all of the states in the trail, or participate as a trail station. All bands and modes are available. For more details, see the LCTOTA website.

Starts at 11am PDT (1800 UTC) on Saturday June 27 and runs through 159pm PDT (2059 UTC) on June 28. Note: Generally speaking, Field Day runs 24 hours, but you may extend it to 159pm if you set up at the start of the exercise. You may operate individually or as a group. Operation on HF is limited to 80/75m, 40m, 20m, 15m and 10m. All VHF and UHF bands are open for the contest. For more details, see the ARRL Field Day website.