By Stan Horzepa, WA1LOU
Contributing Editor

This week, Surfin’ visits a Web site where you can get your feet wet operating at 5 W -- or fewer.

I never operated QRP intentionally. Forty two years in ham radio and I always cranked the transmitter to maximum output.

Inspired by the New Year and old videos of hikers operating QRP from remote -- and not so remote -- mountaintops, I thought I would try something new.

Having followed the advice of friends and family (“Take a hike, Stan”), I was already familiar with that part of the modus operandi, but the QRP part was a mystery.

I searched the Internet and found many QRP-related web pages and sites. One that I found very interesting was QRP Is! on Dale Holloway’s Amateur Radio K4EQ website. Not TMI (too much information), but just enough to encourage a ham of the QRO ilk to consider QRP.

At QRP Is!, Dale recounts his introduction into QRP, his QRP DXpedition on Honduras’ Roatan Island, and the various QRP radios he built and used during his low-powered hamming career.

(Thank you Rem Donnelley, K6BBQ, for an e-mail that sparking this installment of Surfin’.)

Until next time, keep on surfin’!

Editor’s note: Stan Horzepa, WA1LOU, sees two feet of snow stacked in his front yard and thinks QRP mountain-topping in the spring. To contact Stan, send an e-mail or add comments to the WA1LOU blog.