Shortwave DX Catches from "Exotic" or Hard to Hear Locations?

[stormy01]

Some places come to mind like Tahiti, Indonesia, Greenland, Seychelles Islands, Sri Lanka, Papua New Guinea, etc...(if you're in North America)
If you listen in to the Hams (Amateur Radio) that counts in my "book" since for example, Radio Tahiti (French Polynesia) is no longer on SW.

Tell us what you have heard recently or over the years...

 

[KeithE4]

Some places come to mind like Tahiti, Indonesia, Greenland, Seychelles Islands, Sri Lanka, Papua New Guinea, etc...(if you're in North America)
If you listen in to the Hams (Amateur Radio) that counts in my "book" since for example, Radio Tahiti (French Polynesia) is no longer on SW.

Tell us what you have heard recently or over the years...

I was able to hear and QSL 35 kW VOA Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) in English to South Asia in 1970. My best as a ham was working 7Q7AA in Malawi from Indiana in 1972, running about 250 watts output SSB on 20 meters, into a trap vertical on the roof of our house.

The sunspots were at their peak then. ;D

 

[radioman148]

Some places come to mind like Tahiti, Indonesia, Greenland, Seychelles Islands, Sri Lanka, Papua New Guinea, etc...(if you're in North America)
If you listen in to the Hams (Amateur Radio) that counts in my "book" since for example, Radio Tahiti (French Polynesia) is no longer on SW.

Tell us what you have heard recently or over the years...

I was able to hear and QSL 35 kW VOA Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) in English to South Asia in 1970. My best as a ham was working 7Q7AA in Malawi from Indiana in 1972, running about 250 watts output SSB on 20 meters, into a trap vertical on the roof of our house.

The sunspots were at their peak then. ;D

Speaking of sunspots when are we going to get out of this low end we've been in for so long?

 

[gr8oldies]

Radio Tahiti comes to mind from the 70s. Sounded pretty exotic too!

 

[KeithE4]

Some places come to mind like Tahiti, Indonesia, Greenland, Seychelles Islands, Sri Lanka, Papua New Guinea, etc...(if you're in North America)
If you listen in to the Hams (Amateur Radio) that counts in my "book" since for example, Radio Tahiti (French Polynesia) is no longer on SW.

Tell us what you have heard recently or over the years...

I was able to hear and QSL 35 kW VOA Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) in English to South Asia in 1970. My best as a ham was working 7Q7AA in Malawi from Indiana in 1972, running about 250 watts output SSB on 20 meters, into a trap vertical on the roof of our house.

The sunspots were at their peak then. ;D

Speaking of sunspots when are we going to get out of this low end we've been in for so long?

Per yesterday's ARRL Letter, the end of Cycle 23 occured in December 2008, which means that Cycle 24 is slowly taking off. It's expected to be a relatively weak one, peaking in May 2013 with 90 sunspots on average.

BTW, my reception of VOA Colombo was on a cheap Japanese-made Hallicrafters S-120A (the last in the junk classic S-38/S-120 line - Northrop/Hallicrafters was phasing out its non-military products by this time) and a 50' wire antenna in our attic. Like I said, the sunspots were very, very good to us in 1970.

 

[radioman148]

Some places come to mind like Tahiti, Indonesia, Greenland, Seychelles Islands, Sri Lanka, Papua New Guinea, etc...(if you're in North America)
If you listen in to the Hams (Amateur Radio) that counts in my "book" since for example, Radio Tahiti (French Polynesia) is no longer on SW.

Tell us what you have heard recently or over the years...

I was able to hear and QSL 35 kW VOA Ceylon (now Sri Lanka) in English to South Asia in 1970. My best as a ham was working 7Q7AA in Malawi from Indiana in 1972, running about 250 watts output SSB on 20 meters, into a trap vertical on the roof of our house.

The sunspots were at their peak then. ;D

Speaking of sunspots when are we going to get out of this low end we've been in for so long?

Per yesterday's ARRL Letter, the end of Cycle 23 occured in December 2008, which means that Cycle 24 is slowly taking off. It's expected to be a relatively weak one, peaking in May 2013 with 90 sunspots on average.

BTW, my reception of VOA Colombo was on a cheap Japanese-made Hallicrafters S-120A (the last in the junk classic S-38/S-120 line - Northrop/Hallicrafters was phasing out its non-military products by this time) and a 50' wire antenna in our attic. Like I said, the sunspots were very, very good to us in 1970.

Thanks for the info on the current cycle. It seems like it will never rally, but I guess I just have to be patient.

 

[gr8oldies]

I knew there were DXers who specialized in getting little regional stations in Indonesia. Mornings while the Vietnam war was still raging you could hear "The Voice of Vietnam" from Hanoi on or near 10040. I liked the African regioanls that would roll in winter afternoons around 4:30pm and if you were up until around 1am some of them would be back. There was a Swazi Music Radio from the tiny repuiblic of Swaziland right near South Afrioca that played pop music, starting with "Popcorn" by Hot Butter. Then there was Radio Luxembourg that would be audible for a couple of hours in the evening.

 

[Icangelp]

Don't do short wave DX these days due to interference around my house, but a new antenna may change that.

Back in the day it was Tahiti and the wonderful female choral groups. Radio New Zealand and of course Radio Australia with their Waltzing Matilda interval signal.

In the 1960's I logged the legendary Lourenco Marques broadcasting to South Africa from Mozambique. LM was a commercial station broadcasting in medium and shortwave to South Africa with disc jockeys playing popular music.

In the early 1960's I heard Radio Andorra on 5995 KHZ one time. Andorra is a postage stamp country in the Pyrenees mountains on the Spain/France border. The main station was on AM 998 KHZ and 400 KW and at the time they were playing rock music on their AM station as France radio stations were entirely government owned and didn't play rock. Radio Andorra was a commercial station.

It was an easy catch, but my short wave listening buddies and I loved to listen to HCJB in Quito, Equador. For us, Equador was a pretty exotic location, plus they had regular DX oriented programs. The station boomed into the US even though they only transmitted with 30 KW. Very cheap place for radio transmission as their electricity was free and came from their hydroelectric plant.

 

[radioman148]

Don't do short wave DX these days due to interference around my house, but a new antenna may change that.

Back in the day it was Tahiti and the wonderful female choral groups. Radio New Zealand and of course Radio Australia with their Waltzing Matilda interval signal.

In the 1960's I logged the legendary Lourenco Marques broadcasting to South Africa from Mozambique. LM was a commercial station broadcasting in medium and shortwave to South Africa with disc jockeys playing popular music.

In the early 1960's I heard Radio Andorra on 5995 KHZ one time. Andorra is a postage stamp country in the Pyrenees mountains on the Spain/France border. The main station was on AM 998 KHZ and 400 KW and at the time they were playing rock music on their AM station as France radio stations were entirely government owned and didn't play rock. Radio Andorra was a commercial station.

It was an easy catch, but my short wave listening buddies and I loved to listen to HCJB in Quito, Equador. For us, Equador was a pretty exotic location, plus they had regular DX oriented programs. The station boomed into the US even though they only transmitted with 30 KW. Very cheap place for radio transmission as their electricity was free and came from their hydroelectric plant.

I remember HCJB very well. They used to boom into the midwest. Thanks for jogging my memory regarding the Waltzing Matilda music on Radio Australia. I had forgotten about that.

 

[crainbebo]

I've picked up way too many stations from Asia at my house in Bothell, WA. China Radio International, Radio Japan, Radio Free Asia, Radio Australia, to name a few.

I've also picked up Brazillian domestics, some as low as 1000 watts!, plus Africans too.

-crainbebo

 

[kenglish]

I think that HCJB was probably the very first SW station I heard on my Hammarland SuperPro, when it was given to me in my high school days.

Funny....I just recently got reacquainted with an old friend, the former TV Chief Engineer from back home. Turns out, after he retired from TV, he went to work for HCJB! Gotta listen to some more of his stories.

HCJB maintains it's offices in Colorado, now. They have construction facilities at the old Crown (tape recorders and audio amps) factory in Elkhart, Indiana. They build stations, and station "kits" for missionary broadcasters all over the world.

 

[kenglish]

Although it's not shortwave, one of my favorite things to do is....
Here at work, we uplink LDS Church satellite programming to NSS-9 satellite, over the Pacific. It's nice to keep a receiver tuned to Wallis et Futuna, or TV Polynesia on a cold winter's day, watching their news reports with swaying palm trees in the background.

 

[radioman148]

I think that HCJB was probably the very first SW station I heard on my Hammarland SuperPro, when it was given to me in my high school days.

Funny....I just recently got reacquainted with an old friend, the former TV Chief Engineer from back home. Turns out, after he retired from TV, he went to work for HCJB! Gotta listen to some more of his stories.

HCJB maintains it's offices in Colorado, now. They have construction facilities at the old Crown (tape recorders and audio amps) factory in Elkhart, Indiana. They build stations, and station "kits" for missionary broadcasters all over the world.

HCJB was one of the first stations I heard in the early 60s when I listened to SW for the first time.