Ham Radio QSO Parties

GPS would seem to be the obvious answer. However the GPS units I have seen seem to tell you which town or city you are close to, not necessarily in. I invite comments from folks who have more positive experiences with GPS systems with regards to knowing precisely which county or city you are actually in.

Question:
Which logging program should I consider?

Answer:
Just for the record printable log sheets are available on the www.w4va.org web site if you are only going to make a few QSOs.

Question:
Last question — I read your post regarding the use of phonetic callsigns . . . do most VHF’ers use those or not? Again, I’ll prep my son as needed either way.

Question:
The rules give suggested frequencies for use — during a contest is it normal for all (or most) contacts to be made on these frequencies (at least in the VHF/UHF part of the spectrum), or do folks jump around? If there is a range of frequencies that are used, I’ll pre-program the radios to be able to quickly scan those sections of the bands.

Question:
Would it be considered bad form for each of us to contact one another from opposite sides of county or city boundaries? On each band we have available to us? And then switch locations?

Question:
As for ’station category,’ we hope to spend most of the time mobile, but the rules imply that multiple operators would need to work under a single call sign. I would think that we’d better off working under our own call signs, but am unsure if that is allowed. Is it?

In the ‘operator categories’ section of the rules, I don’t know if we’d be better off trying to each fit in the “Single Operator” category, or in the “Multi-Operator/Single Transmitter” category. Do you have any guidance, or does it really matter at this point?