Update April 27, 2025: VP2VI went QRT as planned at 0500Z today, with almost 175,000 QSOs in the log.

Update April 26, 2025: 168000 QSOs after 16.6 days with almost 37000 unique callsigns.

The last 16 hours of our operation are running. Remember: QRT on Sunday, 27-April, around 0600z.

Last night it was raining intensely and it is still raining right now.
Hopefully there is no rain tomorrow when taking down the antennas and packing stuff.

Signals on the high bands are quite low today, so we do mostly CW right now. If the signals improve later, we'll switch over to SSB and hope to put some more completely new callsigns in the log.

It's quite frustrating sometimes when you pull out a very weak callsign, only to find out that it is a "Dupe" (worked on this band+mode before)...
But we don't complain, we are very happy for all the contacts that you made with us! Hope to see you again on our next DXpedition (October?!) :-)

Update April 25, 2025:  160000 QSOs after 15.6 days with 35200 unique callsigns. And 1.7 days to go. Yesterday, electricity went down for the first time. It took 20 seconds for the local Diesel generator to start automatically and jump in. We only had to switch on the radios and amplifiers again. The return of public power went completely unnoticed.

Also yesterday, ClubLog Livestream gateway went in a fault state claiming some buffers were full (after two weeks...) :-) Closing and restarting the software restored the stream right away.

Meanwhile we have outnumbered our 2024 activities 3G0YA (140k QSOs) and PX0FF (159k QSOs).

 Now trying the 165351 QSOs that we made with a much bigger team as 4W8X in 2023.

We can probably beat that number, but not much more because there are not so many callers anymore...

We have also set the QRT schedule: End of operation will be on Sunday (27-Apr), around 0600z - after Europe is in full daylight and the lowband propagation is gone. This gives us four a few really needed hours of sleep before all the dismantling, cleaning and packing work. 

We'll continue operating especially 160m, 80m, 60m and 40m after 0000z in both last nights.

Update April 24, 2025: 148400 QSOs after 14 days with 32900 unique callsigns. And 3.5 days to go.
Propagation was better today. Not yet the same like in the beginning, but we were able to produce quite some good rates on the high bands at the  peak times. There was a decent 50 MHz opening between North America and South America today, but we were sitting in the middle (=being left off).
Local weather has improved, too, and the waves are down to normal bath tub moves. Yesterday we met Walker, K5ARP, who lives on the island, too.
He has a drone and made a few still pictures from the air. If I find some time tomorrow, I will work on them and provide it here... In a few hours, from 0900z thru 1000z we will try 160m towards VK/ZL. It will be the last try for this area. With 1400+ CW contacts in the log on 160m (plus 1600+ FT8  contacts) we seem to have given a fair chance to all 160m enthusiasts. In the coming days we will use the 160m radio setup on different bands after 0600z when Europe is in full daylight.

Update April 21, 2025: 129500 QSOs after 11.5 days with 28100 unique callsigns. And 5.5 days to go. If propagation sucked yesterday, it does even more today. However, last night we added quite some contacts to the four band slots mentioned yesterday, and we plan to repeat it in the coming days. Our neighbour Jonathan, VP2V/W5GI, who owns a house nearby, came in and said hello. And we met DY3WYK who works for our host as a carpenter (he wore a T-Shirt with his callsign 🙂

From time to time other people come walking in from the beach and wonder what we are doing here…It’s been a bit windy in the last days and the waves in the big bath tub outside are a bit higher. Shack temperature varies between 36°C in the day and 29°C in the night. We keep all doors and windows open. At night it’s interesting to see which kind of fauna (insects, geckos, scorpios…) are passing by. We placed another food order in Tortola and will pick up things from the evening ferry. (All this gossip tells you that we are in a good and relaxed mood, smoothly living through the days… 🙂

Update April 20, 2025: 123500 QSOs after 10.5 days with 26800 unique callsigns. And 6.5 days to go. Today propagation sucks. Signals on all bands are weak and we cannot run at good rates. Even FT8 doesn’t produce any pile-ups. Comparing numbers SSB+CW vs. FT8 shows that us four humans were catching up with the computers which could play their multi-stream advantage only over the first few days. 🙂 Currently we are almost equal in numbers… 🙂

For the remaining days, we will concentrate on a few white spots which need to be filled up. Of course, 160m/CW stays on top of the list, with 60m/CW, 80m/SSB and 40m/SSB as the runner-ups. 50 MHz didn’t offer good openings yet. It all seems to be TEP between South America and Europe/ North America, with us being left off – too close to the Equator… Cluster messages like “Please 160m SSB” or “Please more CW” won’t help. We are actively managing our timeframes per band/mode OURSELVES, thank you. It’s our standard to deliver the best available compromise for everybody’s demand. But, as always, we can’t satisfy the very last 0.1%.

Update April 12, 2025: 43000 QSOs at 1515Z. We were not lying in the beach yesterday as some stupid hawk commented. Instead, we set up the 80/160m transmit antennas, 60m Inverted-V and the fifth radio setup. Please note that we are already operating on 80m and 160m, but we still have to listen on the transmit antenna, because the RX antennas will be set up only on Saturday. A brief visit to 50MHz yielded another 40 QSOs. We caught an opening to ZL and worked about ten ZL’s, mostly ZL3.

Update April 10, 2025: After 13 hours and 49 minutes of operating we have the first 10000 QSOs in the log (an average of 724 contacts per hour, with four signals). From 06:46z thru 07:42z there was an Internet outage and a few hundred contacts seem to be missing from ClubLog. We’ll fix that some time. Team is in good shape. Our host Ann is marvellous and the QTH is perfect. Weather is nice at 26°C day and night. Inside the shack temperature goes up to 32°C when operating. The Caribbean waters are very refreshing. It has been raining for 15 minutes only once. Now back to the radio.

Update March 16, 2025: QRV starting either 09-Apr-2025 00:00z or 10-Apr-2025 00:00z. This depends on our final decision how to reach our QTH upon arrival: by public ferry boats with an over-night stay on Tortola Island – or (faster) by private airplane charter which can bring us there in just under 30 minutes and let us get “on the air” one full day earlier..

QRT on Sunday, 27-Apr-2025 12:00z. We’ll need the rest of the day to take down all antennas and prepare for our departure on 28-Apr-2025 in the early morning.

The total weight of our equipment is around 560 kg. We have sent out two oversize parcels by UPS (2x 30kg = 60kg), which contain all aluminum and fiberglass masts, as well as the (two) Spiderbeam fiberglass tubings, the DX Commander and the 6m antenna and two supportive 14m long fishing rods. The rest (500 kg) is transported as (paid) excess baggage on the aircraft: 17 checked-in hardcase suitcases (75x50x32cm), 4 cabin trolleys and 4 back-packs, which count as the “personal item” according to the airline’s regulations.

Ben/DA1DX, Win/DK9IP, Lutz/DM6EE and Andree/DL8LAS will be active as VP2VI from Anegada Island, British Virgin Islands (BVI) on April 10-27, 2025. All operators are active members of Bavarian Contest Club.

Activity will be on 160-10m using CW, SSB and FT8 (MSHV). The team will use ClubLog's Live stream.

On ClubLog, the British Virgin Islands are currently ranking as #114 Most Wanted country worldwide; #96 from Europe; #38 from Asia and #173 from North America.

The team plans to have 5 radio setups with a variety of antennas. See QRZ.com for the list. The total weight of their equipment is >400 kg. It is transported as (paid) excess baggage on the aircraft.

QSL via DJ4MX, LoTW or ClubLog's OQRS. For QSL cards/LoTW, PLEASE use the ClubLog OQRS system.

Watch QRZ.com for updates/news, pictures and the VP2VI Guestbook.