Greetings Field Day Enthusiast (flier) (map)
Are you Ready?
ARRL Field day 2026 is quickly approaching. MARCA has reserved the Woods Canyon Group Campground. Field Day starts Saturday June 27th and Sunday June 28th. Per field day rules, we will begin our site setup early afternoon, 1pm-ish, on Friday June 26th. The official start of "on the air" operating period is 11:00 am Saturday morning and the ending time is 10:59 am Sunday morning.
If you are planning on attending, please contact Paul Bennett, kd7kdo or Norm Johnson, aa7oo, to confirm your attendance. All are welcome to participate in the planning, help with setup, or to just follow along. Sign up with Paul or Norm.
See more details as they are known or changed ... navigate via menu .. to Field Day.
Family, Friends, Visitors, & Guests interested in amateur radio, or curious about what Field Day is all about, or just looking for an adventure are welcome to attend, we'll bring you right into the activities with no worries.
WARNING! & ALERT! Be Advised! Google Thinks Hates Knows No Not Where Woods Canyon Campground and Group Site is located..... SO SEARCH for "Woods Canyon Lake Store and Marina". Which is very close. Woods Canyon Campground is located about 30 miles EAST of Payson (87 & 260). Leaving Payson its a quick drive on RT-260 to the top of the RIM. As you crest the RIM look for "THE RIM" road and turn LEFT onto this nicely paved road. Drive about 2 miles, turn LEFT onto FS-105 and a short distance to the Group Site on the RIGHT. The Woods Canyon Lake Store and Marina is about 300 yard past the group site.... Set GPS coordinates to Woods Canyon Group Site... which is very very close to these coordinates: 34°19'43.74"N 110°56'24.94"W (34.32881667, -110.94026111). Note this is at an elevation of 7610ft. Grid square DM44mh.
MARCA will be operating 2 stations as class 2A. Class 2A allows 2 regular stations plus a GOTA station, a vhf station, and a satellite packet station. Antenna & Station Equipment setup will start on Friday afternoon finishing on Saturday morning. The actual FD contest operation begins at 11:00 am Saturday and continues for 24-hour ending Sunday at 11:00 am. After the operating period ends, we will tear down and be ready to hit the road back to the “cool” valley mid Sunday afternoon. We will operate phone, CW, FT8, SSB Voice and others. This is an "Operator" Choice as to which mode..
Stations may operate for 24 hours. Optional, there is typically someone Operating and another Logging, thats 2 people for an operating shift. We will be using N1MM software for logging and maybe try something new, Networking N1MM between all the operating stations to produce ONE Log.
A MARCA sponsored BBQ is planned for Saturday night. (BBQ, hot-dogs with the “fixins”, beans, chips and soda). We also are planning on coffee, eggs, sausage, bacon, a stack of banana pancakes on both Saturday and Sunday mornings. You should provide all of your other meals, snacks, drinks, water, etc. There is lots of camping space in the trees, so bring tent or motor home, sleeping bags and your normal “camping” equipment. If roughing it isn't your style, there is a small motel at Forest Lakes, which is close by (30 minutes). Also, a large group of the FD participants typically visit a local restaurant on Friday night.
All hams, family, friends, and neighbors are welcome. If you would like to participate, please email us with the number of people in your party, the number of hams and your approximate arrival time. Also let us know if you can bring a rig or other equipment. Other equipment might be headphones, your favorite key or paddle, coax with PL259s etc. You are welcome to bring your batteries for your personal operations.
Join us for the entire field day event, Friday, Saturday and Sunday, for just come up for Saturday operations and Saturday evening BBQ.
Here is the ARRL website announcement http://www.arrl.org/field-day to brush up on the official rules.
Paul Bennett
KD7KDO