Tropical Bands and Radio Nacional in Brazil

Well, I have spent the last few evening and mornings monitoring the tropical bands and now that we are at the peak of the sunspot cycle and I finally have an outdoor antenna, I heard the Northern Territory Shortwave Service VL8A from Alice Springs in Australia on 4835khz at 2131UTC on July 01st. I remember seeing this station years ago as a teenager and wondering how anyone ever heard it when all I could get was noise! So this was a nice catch for the logbook.

Also, after an especially memorable trip to Brazil years ago, I have had a special interest in any SW stations from that country. This morning I heard Radio Nacional on 6180 at 0546UTC. The signal was really good with some nice Brazillian music and a full station ID on the hour.

Also from Brazil this morning was the Christian station Super Radio Deus e Amor from Curitiba, but I don't like this one so much as it's a bit fanatical-sounding with no nice music for the early hours to listen to as I drink my cup of tea! That's not to say I dislike religious stations. To the contrary I enjoy WWCR, Vatican Radio and especially Dr McGhee's morning "Thru The Bible" talks on TWR Europe. As someone very interested in life's spiritual journey I find many of these programmes offer inspiration for the path, though I prefer to take the seeds and essence of truths from the world's great spiritual traditions than get too involved in only one. I also find as I get older I am drawn back more and more to the Christian religion, and some of St Paul's writings blow me away with their depth of vision and love.