Steve's and Don's High Road Adventure.

From my home QTH, I wasn't able to hear any T's, so I wasn't able to give meaningful bearings. But based on the fact Glenn was hiding I felt the T's (or a least some of them) would be on the eastern side of the world. I drove over to Steves home in Fontana and on the way I heard T with no audio, T-22 and N6MI T. I was told there would be 5 T's to find. We took some bearings from Steve's home and got a spread between the T's of 100 deg. to 170 deg. So we went south and east. We took the 10 fwy to route 79 and stopped just off the exit. From there all the signals had deteriorated considerably to broad sweeps of bearings except for N6MI's T which was definitely south! We went south down 79 which turns into Sanderson Av. As we went through Hemet, we had signals T-22, no audio T  are left straight down Florida St. (main E – W street through Hemet). T-MI was strong and ahead to the right, so we continued down Sanderson. Sanderson ends at Domenigoni Pkwy the bearing still was in front of us, we chose to go left till we where able to turn right. Now both T-22 and MI T where in front of us, but the road doesn't go through. Back out till we could take the next right which is State St. T-22 a go somewhat right bearing was very strong here and it seemed to be changing quickly as we drove south on State.  Because T-22 was to our right, we took  Diamond Valley Rd. to Palm Av. As we continued south, T MI was ahead, so we focused on finding it first. Up up into the hills, really nice ranches up here. This place is starting to look familiar, I remember we where here trying to find Jippy a couple of years back. We finally decided that the MI T was up above us on Black Mt. Rd. As we were approaching MI T, we heard RJN said he found Glenn, so he must be already at the T. A couple minutes later we saw Glenn's car and Doug's car, stopped and asked if the T was nearby. We moved the car a bit and decided that the T was definitely behind a No Trespassing Sign, so with a little adjustment of said sign (this might disqualify us), we went off and signed into the MI T. While we were at T MI we Steve ,Doug, Don and Glenn got a close up view of a stunt plane doing aerobatics with smoke effects and all, right in front of us, below and of course above for about 10 minutes. It must of been someone who either lived in the lower parts of the valley, or was out showing off to a new girlfriend living there. So now on to our next one, where has T-22 gone? We can hear a T3, and no audio T, but no T-22. Oops! There it is weak and it sounded like T-2. So we are hunting for T-3 and now a weak T-2. I bet MI is changing the Id and power level of the same T! Figures! Well T-3 is up and going, I can see that down the road RJN is still trying to determine what to do next, oh! there he goes, should we follow? We wait a bit go to his spot he spent so much time at and see what we can hear. We only hear MI T, T-3, and the no audio T. So set our sights on T-3, drive .4 mile and see that RJN has parked his vehicle right where we want to be! He said he found T-3 and leaves, we get out and I run to get my sniffer, and determine that it's in back of a bush, I go around and Steve is already signing in! Steve, why do we need a sniffer? You never wait! We leave the T which is on Bit Dr. go out to end and take left on Crown Valley Rd. we drive up to the crest of hill, about .25 miles in and wait for T-22 or T-2 to come on, five minutes later we leave to go back to where we know we heard T-22 strong. Back down the mountain to the area we had last heard T-22 with lots of attenuation, nothing! Is this the T MI was talking about that might have a battery problem? Well thanks Scott! As we were driving around in circles MI calls on cell phone, and tells us T-22 has gone off the air, and also says this is not the T with the battery problem!  So the only place left to go before it gets dark is to no audio T. Back out to Florida St. in the middle of Hemet. Go east, after several bearings Steve professes to know the location of the silent T. It's a mountain called Rouse Hill. To access it one must drive in from route 74 before going up the hill to Idyllwild. Steve, are you sure, can't it be further back like Thomas Mt., wouldn't it be better to go up 74 then south on 74 till we get to Thomas Mt.? No! It is not that far up the road, look! we have several crosses that are far east of Thomas Mt. (yea, but they are all almost parallel). I lose the fight, up to Rouse Hill we go. Initially we go through several citrus farms, then the steep climb starts. The road is surprisingly good since all the rain we have gotten. Well that was a famous last word. As we stopped to get a bearing of a very weak silent T, a vehicle comes up behind me, I gotta get out of the way, hey! It's RJN, why is he up on this road? We let him pull up next to us to explain his unfounded reason to be also on this road. He tells us about the same story Steve told to me. Well does that make me feel any better? Not really, I have a bad feeling about this decision. We let Doug go first, he drives faster than us usually and we can let him find the T first and we can suck off of his efforts. So on we go, we must be up to 10,000 feet by now, and this road has straight down drops offs, sometimes on both sides! And the signal is not getting any better! The worst thing about a signal that has no audio, is that unless you happen to be looking at the s-meter, you have no idea when to check bearing! Also T-MI with lots of audio was as strong as it was when we were on Black Mt. Road, so no turning up the audio or one would get blown out of the car next time MI T came on. Now we are at such a high altitude that I'm having trouble breathing. Oh! And besides the road going on and on, now there are strategically placed mud crossings. Some deep, some rutted,and some both! I'm wondering when we shall be seeing snow and ice, maybe by the time we reach 30,000 feet. Oh yes, there are rocks too! We have caught up with RJN, apparently he has to stop and let his transmission cool! Well if we ever get there we can find the T and RJN can suck off us. Now we have passed the point that the T was suppose to be at and the signal is still ahead of us, but no stronger! I'm beginning to think that the T is over on Rosa Mt. About 150 miles away! Finally we get to a turn off to the right, this trail goes down to Bautista Rd. we keep left, now a large hill right in front of us and the beam is pointing right at it, have we gotten there, lets go on around it, no! the signal is still in front of us. I haven't told you that whenever we couldn't get a signal in front of us, there was always a strong signal coming off of Mt. San Jacinto this told us the T was still on when we couldn't hear it direct. We got to our next choice a left or a right. I told Steve that Thomas Mt. was to our right and we better go that way, but Steve thought a left would be better because we where getting a very strong signal to the left. We decided to go left. As we rounded a corner there was Mt. San Jacinto right in front of us with a strong signal, so no T this way. U turn in mud and ice. Now this road is named Thomas Mt. Rd. Now about 2.5 miles up this road is the turnoff for Thomas Mt. That was our next target, if it's not there, we go home! The signal still was not much to talk about and it was every direction but in front of us. As we came up to the turn off, the signal strength popped up to “you are getting close”, wow we've made it, and there is still light left. So up the rocky hill we went  this is a 4X4 trail, lets stop and see if we need to get out and walk, hold on, the signal is in back of us! Backing down this road is not easy, but back on the main road and 75 feet further on, it's in back of us again! So it's got to be here. Up to the left is a pull out with a short trail, a good place for a T. So after spending 20 minutes there with the sniffer, we come to the conclusion that it wasn't here! RJN has shown up sometime during our search and was last seen trying to go up the 4X4 trail. We get a sniffer bearing further on the main road so off we go. We came to a clearing that looked across a canyon and saw where the T must be. .5 miles further we have theT right in front of us with no more attenuation able to put in (a you are there now signal!). Out to sniff, but before Steve could find it I spotted it between several trees. Wow what is this, the antenna is pointed away from anything, maybe towards Glenn's home, but not anywhere useful. On way back to car, Doug drives up and came to the conclusion that this must be the place the T is at! He had run out of attenuation about 300 feet back, so he was running a bit blind. When he got out of car he found that his sniffer wasn't working properly, so no way to find the silent T. I thought I would help him out a bit and told him if he stood at a particular spot, he could see the T from there. We then promptly left Doug to his devices. Either he signed in way later than he actually found it, or he had a terrible time locating the T, now you must understand it was starting to get dark and where the T was hidden was in the cover of the trees, so maybe it did take him longer than 13 minutes to find it. Doug, I know it's a terrible thing for me to say, but I think you didn't want to win! Doug had told us he was going out the way Glenn would of come in when he was hiding it, so he was going to pick up the 4th T on the way out,  on the way back down. We decided we had had enough of these dirt roads for one day and would go the shortest and fastest way to a paved road! On the way down the continuing mud, ruts, and rocks took it's toll on Steve. Steve was starting to show shades of green around his gills. He didn't complain until after we got back to Hemet. There we stopped and let him recover. Overall if we had been 30 years younger we most likely would have endured the hunt much better, heck I remember a 50+ mile dirt road out in Death Valley that I enjoyed to the utmost, I even thanked the hunter (N6MI) as we found the transmitter late at night. We want to thank AB6PA, Glenn for enduring the task of placing the T's out for us to find, even if one of the T's froze to death at the 40,000 foot altitude!  N6MI who warned us a T might quit before the hunt was over, and sure enough apparently two did! Tnx for the time and effort to place them.

Don KF6GQ & Steve KD6LAJ