First Check-in to CW Net on 7015 kHz!

Though I have heard of CW Net on 7015 kHz, I had not tried checking in so far. Today morning I saw a nice CW signal on the waterfall display at 7015 kHz and thought of listening in. Slowly I could make out that it was VU2TS who was calling for checkins. Tried my luck with my new CW paddles, though I have had only very few CW QSOs, that too with difficulty, with paddles. Though I was a CW DXer long back with homebrew setup, I am out of touch by decades and do not have my old straight key. After an initial error, I could send my callsign correctly and was quite happy to hear the callback from VU2TS and the 5,9,9 report.

The excitement did not stop there, some time later, I received an email from VU2TUM saying that he had seen my new checkin on the CW WhatsApp group. Still later I received an invite from VU2MUD to the WhatsApp group, which I had to politely decline as I am no longer on WhatsApp. One more message reached my phone from VU2ABU, alternate net control of CW Net! CW Net is held on 7015 kHz between 7.30 to 8.15 am IST. Hope to brush up my CW receiving skills and sending skills using the paddles. One advantage what I noted when I worked a couple of DX stations on CW with my ‘100 W and wire’ was that I need not yell at the top of my voice multiple times to establish a contact! If I use headphones as well, it will be least disturbing for those at home. As I am new to CW on a commercial radio, I am yet to learn how to remove unwanted noise which seems to be more when I switch from SSB to CW-L or CW-U modes in FT-710.