2005

United Arab Emirates (A6)

In 2005, Mario DJ2MX, QSL manager of A61AJ, received an invitation to visit Ali in the U.A.E. and bring some friends with him. So, Mario put together a nice group of people for the WAE DX Contest CW: Luise DO2MLU and her OM Ben DL6RAI, Tom DL4MCF, Anja DO2WW and her OM Chris DL1MGB. And Mario himself. Unfortunately not. At that time, Interpol was looking for a bad guy, having the exactly the same name as our good guy Mario. Not being sure what U.A.E. border control officials will do with him after arrival, Mario decided to stay at home.

So our group of five travelled to Dubai and had a hot week. With temperatures in the 40's and a humidity well over 60%, life wasn't always easy (outside the shack). Inside the shack, the AC ran without any problems and made life comfortable. But we had to do some antenna repair (80m beam at 50m height was broken). So Ben climbed up the tower at the very first sunlight. Together, we were out in Dubai downtown as well as in the desert several times. And while we guys were running the contest, the girls went out for more sightseeing and museums. Finally, thanks to the tons of steel and aluminium and the fine rigs, we were able to win the Multi-Op category by a 60% margin.

Our sincerest thanks go to Ali A61AJ. We had the great pleasure to be his full board guests! Also many thanks to Mario DJ2MX and Ghis ON5NT.

Link to the picture gallery: Click here

Score: 3,386,472