In addition to the splendor and beauty, he states that he is “so glad to be working guys on 80M, for the first time in 20 years!” and “The DX Flagpole is 2-3 S-units louder on first tests versus the loop on 20/17M.”

"XR0ZRC ... one-called him.  Not bad for a 20’ OCF Vertical Dipole and 100 watts."

Update 03-13-2019: "Interestingly, one of the big DX deals going on right now is Juan Fernandez Island (Robinson Crusoe), XR0ZRC. The pile-ups have been enormous. I caught him on 20 CW the other morning at 13:11Z just as 20M was opening up here. He evidently had just moved to 20 as the pile was small, I caught the previous station working split and one-called him.  Not bad for a 20’ OCF and 100 watts."

"Far more competitive than I expected." 

Update from Bill after ARRL SSB 2019 (weekend of March 2-3). If you were on the air at all during this contest you know even some of the fiercest of competitors pulled the plug about halfway through! It was lousy radio propagation conditions, even for the 200' tower guys. Here's more from Bill...

“So glad to be working guys on 80M, for the first time in 20 years!”

"By the way, I ran about 100 contacts in the ARRL Phone DX Contest over the weekend.  I could hear a ton of stuff in Europe and Asia. Also was on 20, 15, and 10. As you would expect with lousy propagation, 20 was a zoo. I still managed to put some European and Oceana stations in the log. In the pile-ups, I got a surprising number of 1 to 3 call contacts, far more competitive than I expected. Same thing on 15. Only half a dozen on 10M as it was only open for a couple of hours on Saturday afternoon, and that was mostly to South America and the Caribbean."

Let's be like Bill and make ham radio even more fun, again...

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