Ham Radio Youth Insights—My Experience at Austria 2026 YOTA Camp

This past summer (July 25-Aug. 1, 2026), I had the opportunity to attend the YOTA (Youngsters On The Air) camp held in Wagrain, Austria. I’ve attended YOTA camps in IARU Region 2 for a few years now and even joined committees that helped plan and execute these gatherings, so I was interested in learning about YOTA in IARU Region 1.

This was the third year that “exchange” students had traveled from Region 2 to Region 1 for the camp. The first time was in Austria (2016) and the second was in France (2025), so we were particularly excited to attend the YOTA camp in Austria since it marked the ten-year anniversary. Both the 2016 and 2026 events were held at the same place in the mountains of Salzburg.

Camp started on Saturday evening, so most of Saturday was a travel day for me. I flew into Munich where my German host family picked me up to take me to the camp. We got to catch up after a few weeks apart and spend the afternoon together before they dropped me off at the camp.

After checking in and putting my things in my room, I met my roommates—one from the US and one from Bosnia. Then we all headed to the opening ceremony. There we learned which countries were represented, went over the rules, and got to see the schedule for the week. Afterward, most of us headed to the shack excited to start working toward our QSO goal for the week. I stayed out of the shack for the first few hours to avoid the pileup of people and to catch up with some friends I hadn’t seen in a while. I headed to the shack a little later, once most of the campers had already gone to bed.

We started out the week’s activities strong with some VHF and UHF antenna building on Sunday morning and HF antenna building in the afternoon. Both of these builds contributed to one of the main goals of the camp: Making sure that every camper could take home a full station at the end of the week. This is one of the biggest barriers for young hams when they get started with the hobby. Through all of the builds that we did at the camp, this barrier was almost entirely removed for those who attended. By the end of the week, we each had a portable power supply, an HF radio, an HF antenna, and more.

That night we had the annual Intercultural Evening, one of everyone’s favorite camp activities. While Intercultural Evenings are starting to become a bigger part of the YOTA camps hosted in Region 2, it’s a longtime tradition for Region 1 camps. It’s always a challenge to make it a success in Region 2 since far fewer countries are represented, but we do our best to host one when we have campers from more than one or two countries in attendance.

With over 30 different countries represented by campers at the Austrian camp, though, we learned about lots of other cultures while sharing foods from our home countries with each other. This was a little bit of a challenge for the other Region 2 exchange camper and me. Neither of us had been in the US for the few weeks preceding the camp, so we had to make do with what we could find in the “American” aisles of nearby grocery stores.

The next day we all got started building the main component of our stations—the QRP Labs QMX+ Transceiver. Many campers had never soldered before, but even those with previous experience had their work cut out for them. I had done some soldering, but not much. Luckily, the camp hosts had organized plenty of pros to be there to provide support and guidance, ensuring that we all left with a working radio and antenna. We spent most of the day on the QMX kits before finishing up with a few different presentations and spending some time in the shack.

On Tuesday we got up bright and early because we would be leaving the hostel to explore Salzburg. My group started off the morning with a visit to a nearby castle, “Schloss Hohenwerfen.” We took a tour and then did a little bit of Castles On The Air before heading to the next stop—an ice cave. We took a guided tour of the ice cave and, of course, tried some VHF and UHF operations to see how being in a cave would affect it. After we finished the cave tour, we all headed back to the hostel. Some of us operated for a few hours before heading to bed.

On Wednesday we all woke up full of energy and ready for the day. One of the most anticipated events of the camp was scheduled for that afternoon—the ARISS contact! For those unfamiliar with ARISS, it stands for Amateur Radio on the International Space Station. It’s a program that helps schools and groups reach astronauts on the ISS to ask them questions about what life is like aboard the space station. We did some prep for the ARISS contact and then a run-through before waiting patiently to hear the breathtaking, “Welcome aboard the International Space Station!”

Once we made contact, around 20 campers asked questions before the ISS traveled too far for us to hear. After the contact, we had dinner together and then took some group photos before holding a testing session so that interested campers could take the U.S. licensing exam and try to get their U.S. callsign. Many of those who tested ended up passing their exams, and we all went to bed on a high note.

The next morning we woke up bright and early again because it was time for our SOTA (Summits on the Air) day. We packed our lunches and got ready to do some hiking and SOTA activating. This was my favorite part of the week. The views were amazing and we had the chance to test our newly built QMX radios as well.

We finished out the week on Friday with a fox hunting session in the morning and then had our closing ceremony. Afterward, we spent the rest of the evening together playing games and getting on the air.

All in all, it was a great week. We all had the opportunity to experience other cultures, learn more about amateur radio (of course), and, m…