Unless you were asleep at the dial you probably heard a lot of yelling, begging, and contacts being made on the HF bands yesterday.  From 1200Z yesterday to 1200Z today stations were on the air doing what contest stations do - making contacts.  Ahh, yes, it was the weekend for the IARU HF Championship.

I hadn't planned on participating until I started seeing some islands starting to be advertised on the spotting networks.  Since I'm still chasing the islands I immediately seized the opportunity and started making contacts.  80m was also open to Europe in the overnight hours (particularly after 0400Z) so I was able to pick up a few countries there as well.

Here's some of the places I put in the log during the contest:

• Aland Islands, 20m CW
• Fernando de Noronha Archipelago, 15m SSB
• Isle of Man, 20m CW and 40m CW
• Faeroe Islands, 40m CW
• Aruba, 80m CW and 40m CW
• Germany, 80m CW
• Canada, 15m CW and 80m CW
• South Cook Islands, 20m CW
• Portugal, 80m CW

Most, if not all, of these contacts were either new countries, new bands, or new modes.  That brings my current DXCC count to:

• SSB - 118
• CW - 65
• Data - 106
• Overall - 165

Looks like I will be competing in the upcoming Maryland QSO Party and helping out with the ARRL Rookie Roundup - RTTY, both as K3CAL.  Those contests should be a lot of fun!

Oh, and a checklog has been submitted to the ARRL.