Hello - I know nothing about ham radios but it was recommended to get a Tegret UV5R. Would this be sufficient for only needing to communicate with my buddies around 300 yards apart, in deep deep woods in the mountains?

Any help would be appreciated. We tried hunting walkie talkies but due to the dense woods they wouldn't work.

Health issues got me back in the hobby again. Just trying to figure out where I am in the solar cycle. Seems like if you hear something on 10 m we're doing okay

I passed my Technician today, and I’m pretty happy about it. Although, I’m a little nervous about forgetting things and doing something wrong… I’m still excited though

OK, this is super niche, but couldn't figure where else to write about it.

If you're a member of any ARES or RACES organization, there's a chance you have a copy of a fillable PDF file of the ICS 309 form. But if you actually try to use it, you'll find that anything entered in the second line gets auto-copied all the way down the form. I've found copies of this form in multiple ARES/RACES organizations, so I'm guessing it's pretty widely used, but I guess nobody is actually filling it in electronically.

A little searching found a good form at https://w0eca.org/ics-forms/ if you're looking to update.

Passed my General exam today and pretty excited about it. Passed Technician in August and have been casually studying via the HamStudy app - can’t say enough good things about that. Over the last 72 hours I watched the entirety of the W4EEY General Class series on YouTube. Passed with a 33/35. I took a swing on the Extra exam too - didn’t pass, but realized how much Dave and Gary (in the videos) dropped some Extra info in the General series. Shout out to W4EEY and KE4EA for their knowledge and presentation (I gelled more with Dave’s style but appreciated the 2 different formats), and to the folks at HamStudy for such an easy to use learning tool.

Anyway - Catch ya on 20m!

PS - Do you prefer ‘Stroke’ AG, ‘Slant’ AG, or ‘Slash’ AG?