We had a bit of propagation here (US south coast), where I made a contact at about 120 miles from my attic J-pole. It totally changed my thinking about the 2m band. When I'm driving somewhere, I sometimes call CQ on the calling frequency (146.52 here). I haven't scored a hit on it, but now that I know it's possible, I try. It's better than being bored, anyway. I wish we had mountains here, but alas, it's the Mississippi flood plain, and doesn't get much more topographically uninteresting than that.
Since I got my 9700 I've been trying to call CQ on 146.52 and I've actually talked to a few folks here in central FL. Even one person on 446! I work from the house a couple days of week and leave it on the calling frequency and it's dead. I wish more folks would call CQ - I'd answer!
