Operating in France

[NToombes]

Hi

Driving down to the south of France (Toulouse area) mid May and wonderedif anyone had any advice atall regarding operating in F land.

I have an FT-8900 in the car with a 2m and 70cms antenna. I will probably take my additional 6m/2m/70cms antenna with me and maybe, if conditions are on my side try some 6m FM work.
We are staying in an upstairs apartment so I dont think I will bother taking the HF gear (FT-897D, PSU and Buddipole) as space will be tight in the car (3 adults going).

So, whats 2m like in France? Is there much activity on the repeaters? Maybe I need to look for an Echolink node that I can connect to and then connect to my local GB3BN repeater :-)

Just wondered if anyone had any suggestions / thoughts.

Neil
M0CJM

[M0HJO]

Hello,

I went on holiday there two years ago and found not much going on/happening on 2M FM or repeaters. But did find more ops on 2M SSB. HF was very active. I used my IC-7000 in the car and a 10M in size pro-whip for HF and the antenna on the car for 2M.

I was camping and no problem using my big antenna.

John.

[NToombes]

Hi John

Thanks for the message! Tempted to take the 897D and the ATAS120 with me but I al so then would need to take my secondary battery (dont want to flatten car battery) so it gets all a bit silly again.
Will see how I feel nearer the time !

Thanks

Neil

[Captain Lockheed]

Operating in France on HF, don't they still require a morse pass ticket?

[g4ilo]

Yes it does, apparently, according to this document. You learn something new every day. Whether anyone is likely to check whether you are proficient in Morse is another matter. I took my CEPT license document but no-one ever asked to see it.

I have never tried 2m in France since I presume they would all be speaking French which I can't. If I was going to take a radio to France at that time of the year I'd take a 10m multimode. There should be loads of short skip and it should be easy to work back to the UK with a modest sized antenna and not too much power.

[M0HJO]

Operating in France on HF, don't they still require a morse pass ticket?

Yes that is the question I asked. I was emailed back within a day and asked if I had a CEPT FULL Licence. I emailed back saying yes. The reply was “Bring a copy of your licence with you" which I did and was never asked to show it. The only question I was asked was by a "French Police Man" who was a "Ham", who asked what I thought of the IC-7000!

He was very impressed with it!!

John.

[NToombes]

Hi Guys

Thanks for all your comments. Maybe I will take my Full licence with me and my morse pass certificate and that should cover me from all angles.

I thought that 2m and 70cms maybe pretty useless to me (Dont speak french either) but hey, its all installed in the car so may aswell switch it on.
I am just a bit screwed for power taking the HF set unless I clip onto the car battery and keep an eye on things so I dont drain it to much to start the car! If it had ben down to me i would have booked more of a house with a garden so I could have sat in the garden, drinking beer and using full HF setup!

Regards

Neil. M0CJM

[g0slq]

If it had ben down to me i would have booked more of a house with a garden so I could have sat in the garden, drinking beer and using full HF setup!

Fail to prepare, prepare to fail monsieur

Road Trip!!!

Try QRP with the ATAS matey - I'm sure that will not hurt the battery - 10w out

[2E0JFS]

Lucky b)gger. :-)

My parents live there and they have enough huge trees to stick up some pretty amazing wires. Very high up too...both the trees and their garden a top a massive hill...sigh....

[Adriano9966]

operating ham radio from france is my dream and the driving force behind me chasing the full ticket so unfortunately I cant give you any advice regarding however it seems to me that radio is a big hobby in france driving along the coast towards St Malo and Cancale I noted that many operators appeared to be using cobweb style antennas for hf ham radio
why worry about speaking french perfectly? just give it a go even just a few phrases
many people do speak english but its so much more fun speaking to people every year now I have become gradually more proficient in the language and I now have no problem shopping or talking to people
I took cb with me to france the last two years and I can confirm that on 11 metres
at least its very easy to talk back into the uk especially the north of Scotland and beyond so I'd imagine that 6 would be similar in many respects