Category Archives: Guest Posts

Mysteries about the weather

A big hello to all the SWLing community. Imaginary Stations have a couple of great programmes going out on air this week. The first is on Saturday 29th March 2025 at 1100 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and also on Sunday 30th March 2025 at 0900/1300 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and at 2000 UTC on 3975 kHz and 6160 kHz. It’s WMMR – Mystery Mix Radio and it’s one of those “Guess what the theme is?’ specials. Once the show’s over, you send us what you think the theme of the show was and the nearest to the correct answer wins a special eQSL. Tune in and enjoy!

On Wednesday 2nd April 2025 at the new time of 0200 UTC via WRMI  we bring you a meteorology special with The Weather Channel. Expect some areas of low and high pressure on the show, all sorts of weather related tunes and the odd isobar thrown in for good measure. Also if goes well they’ll be a live set from the “weather-rock” pioneers Cirrocumulus. So get that barometer and thermometer at the ready and keep an umbrella at hand just in case and tune in for some forecasting fun.

For more information on all our shows, please write to imaginarystations@gmail.com and check out our old shows at our Mixcloud page here.

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More keeping on from Radio Skybird and Radio Ace

Greetings to all the SWLing community, hope things are well, wherever you are. This week coming, Imaginary Stations hoist the sails on the pirate ship Skybird again and brings you another audio voyage in the Free Radio Skybird series and it’s the third and final planned broadcast of the station this year.

Tune in on Saturday 22nd March 2025 at 1200 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and also on Sunday 23rd March 2025 at 1000/1400 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and at 2100 UTC on 3975 kHz. As with last week’s show, expect some great tunes, onshore and offshore classics and lots of interesting bits and pieces as usual.

On Wednesday 26th March 2025 at the new time of 0200 UTC via WRMI  we bring you possibly what could be the finale of Radio Ace. Tune in for what may be the last time we hear from the great DJ Flash Frisbone. It may have a sad or a happy ending but Flash will be missed, tune in and find out what actually happens.

For more information on all our shows, please write to imaginarystations@gmail.com and check out our old shows at our Mixcloud page here.

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Don Moore’s Photo Album:  Guatemala (Part Four) – To the Western Highlands

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Don Moore–noted author, traveler, and DXer–for the latest installment of his Photo Album guest post series:


Lago de Atitlán con el pueblo de Panajachel de fondo (Photo by Larissa Gomez via Wikimedia Commons)

Don Moore’s Photo Album:
Guatemala (Part Four) – To the Western Highlands

More of Don’s traveling DX stories can be found in his book Tales of a Vagabond DXer [SWLing Post affiliate link]. If you’ve already read his book and enjoyed it, do Don a favor and leave a review on Amazon.

If anyone deserves recognition as the first tourists to visit western Guatemala it would be the American John Lloyd Stephens and Englishman Frederick Catherwood. In the 1820s and 1830s, Stephens traveled extensively in Europe and the Middle East and published several books about his journeys. On one of those trips he met Catherwood, an accomplished artist who traveled around the Mediterranean making drawings of archaeological sites.

The pair decided to visit Central America after coming across accounts of ruins in the region by the Honduran explorer Juan Galindo. Their trip received official support when U.S. President Martin van Buren appointed Stephens as a special ambassador to Central America.  The two men wandered the region for several months in 1839-40 visiting known Mayan sites and rediscovering many others. Stephens wrote two books about their travels, Incidents of Travel in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatán and Incidents of Travel in Yucatán while Catherwood published a book of his drawings, Views of Ancient Monuments in Central America, Chiapas and Yucatan. All three books became immediate bestsellers.

Frederick Catherwood’s 1840 lithograph of the central plaza in Quetzaltenango, Guatemala. 

The three books introduced the Mayan civilization to the rest of the world for the first time, bringing new visitors to the region. Some came to do serious research. Others were just curious adventurers. But the numbers that came were small as only a few wealthy people had the time and money to journey to exotic places.

Then the 1960s brought a new kind of tourist – the hippie. Many young people in Europe and North America saw flaws in the materialism of their own societies and became interested in experiencing non-western cultures. The Mayan region of Guatemala was a perfect destination. It was exotic, relatively easy to get to, and cheap.

That qualification of cheap was especially important. The hippies weren’t big spenders staying in classy hotels and eating at pricey restaurants. They found rooms in basic hospedajes and ate everyday local food cooked by indigenous women at roadside comedores. In many ways that was better. The money went directly to local working people instead of to the wealthy owners of fancy establishments.

The 1960s and 1970s became the era of hippie tourism in Guatemala. Most of visitors went to the area around Lake Atitlán, drawn by the lake’s natural beauty and the region’s year-round springlike climate. The epicenter of it all was the little lakeshore village of Panajachel.

Clouds of War

To anyone wandering the shoreline of Lake Atitlán in the mid-1970s, Guatemala seemed to be a peaceful place. In reality, a guerilla war was raging just a hundred kilometers away. In 1954, a CIA-sponsored coup overthrew Guatemala’s elected government and ushered in a long period of repressive military regimes. With the military showing no signs of relinquishing power, around 1965 a few leftist activists went into the remote mountains of northern Huehuetenango and Quiché departments with hopes of repeating Fidel Castro’s success in Cuba.

By all appearances, this should have been a minor footnote in Guatemala’s history. The would-be revolutionaries, after all, were city people without the skills to survive in the remote mountain highlands. But they recruited a few Mayans to their movement and then a few more until the Mayans dominated the guerilla movement. Yet the Mayans were never guided by ideology. The guerilla movement was a way of fighting back against centuries of repression, discrimination, and poverty. As one observer put it, “They’re Communists because of their stomachs, not because of their heads.”

As the guerilla movement grew the combat zone gradually moved south and into other regions. And the war became less a political revolution than an ethnic conflict. The military was dominated by Spanish-speaking ladinos who knew nothing of Mayan culture or the Mayan languages. All Mayans were seen as potential enemies, as was anyone who attempted to improve the Mayans’ lives. That lead to the formation of military-run death squads which targeted small town mayors, teachers, social workers, church leaders, and anyone else who dared to speak up. By 1981 over two hundred non-combatants were being kidnapped, killed, and dumped by the side of the road every month.

In 1976 the Lake Atitlán region had been seen as a peaceful place. A few years later the combination of active military death squads in the villages along the lake and a widening guerilla war elsewhere had put an end to that image. The era of hippie tourism in Guatemala was over. Continue reading

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Onshore and offshore, Radio Skybird keeps on keeping on

Greetings to all SWLing community. This week in the world of shortwave entertainment, Imaginary Stations bring you more eclectic programming. As part of the 15th year anniversary series we have a transmission of Free Radio Skybird 2. Tune in on Saturday 15th March 2025 at 1200 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and also on Sunday 16th March 2025 at 1000/1400 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and at 2100 UTC on 3975 kHz.

As with last week’s show, expect more tunes from the onshore and offshore genre, a mini-feature on the musician Jim Sullivan and lots more interesting stuff during the hour that’s beamed to Europe via Shortwave Gold. Turn on (the shortwave radio) and tune in.

On Wednesday 19th March 2025 at the new time of 0200 UTC via WRMI we bring you another episode of the excellent Shortwave Music Library by DJ Frederick. A show well worth tuning into if you the like all sorts musicwise.

For more information on all our shows, please write to imaginarystations@gmail.com and check out our old shows at our Mixcloud page here.

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Onshore and offshore sounds are all around us

Good day all SWLing community, we’re letting you know what we’ll be sending out across those airwaves this week. The first is a return of all things esoteric when it come to your listening  pleasure with Free Radio Skybird. Tune in on Saturday 8th March 2025 at 1200 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and also on Sunday 9th March 2025 at 1000/1400 hrs UTC on 6160 kHz and at 2100 UTC on 3975 kHz brought to you via the transmitters of Shortwave Gold

Expect some onshore, offshore and all sorts of sounds from the sky (bird). Tune in for your audio treat.

On Wednesday 12th March 2025 at the new time of  0200 UTC via WRMI we bring you more of Radio Ace. Expect more of that DJ Flash Frisbone fellow and all things radio. Enjoy!

For more information on all our shows, please write to imaginarystations@gmail.com and check out our old shows at our Mixcloud page here.

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Don Moore’s Photo Album:  Guatemala (Part Three)- Guatemala City Continued

Many thanks to SWLing Post contributor Don Moore–noted author, traveler, and DXer–for the latest installment of his Photo Album guest post series:


Photo Source: Dennis Sylvester Hurd via Wikimedia Commons

Don Moore’s Photo Album:
Guatemala (Part Three) – Guatemala City continued

by Don Moore

More of Don’s traveling DX stories can be found in his book Tales of a Vagabond DXer [SWLing Post affiliate link]. If you’ve already read his book and enjoyed it, do Don a favor and leave a review on Amazon.

When I started DXing in 1971, and for several decades afterwards, the most widely logged Guatemalan shortwave station by DXers was Radio Cultural on 3300 kHz. It was also known as TGNA, the call letters of that 90-meter-band frequency. The medium wave outlet on 730 kHz was TGN. The station also used 5955 kHz and 9505 kHz, but those frequencies were always harder to hear because of interference from more powerful international broadcasters.

Back then this Evangelical broadcaster was owned and operated by the Central American Mission of Dallas, Texas, but only received a portion of its funding from the CAM. Additional funding came from local donations in Guatemala and another important source was selling time to American Evangelical preachers to air their prerecorded English language religious programs. These programs were broadcast late at night, when propagation into North America and Europe was best, and were always preceded by an English station identification. That made it an easier log for DXers who didn’t understand Spanish.

TGNA was the station I most wanted to visit when I arrived in Guatemala City in June 1983. But Guatemala DX Club members informed me that the station had been temporarily closed down because of “philosophical disagreements” with the government. They were off the air and would remain so for several weeks. I made four more visits to Guatemala City over the next year but somehow never found the time to visit the station. It wasn’t until my visit in December 1987 that I finally stepped inside their front door. That visit became the subject of the first article I wrote for Monitoring Times magazine in June 1988.

Wayne Berger, station manager and chief engineer, and missionary Bob Rice gave us a very long tour of the station. Wayne and Bob had built or rebuilt most of the station’s technical equipment and even some of the infrastructure. On the day we arrived they were welding a broken door back on its hinges. Wayne had built the 3300 kHz transmitter, shown in the next picture, out of spare parts.

Main studio control room at TGNA in 1987.

At the time of my visit, TGNA had two pennants. The larger one was mostly reserved for local listeners. The smaller one was sometimes included with QSLs to lucky DXers.

But neither of those compared with these traditional handmade weavings given by listeners for the station’s 37th anniversary in August, 1987. (I just wish my color photos had survived.)

English ID from Radio Cultural, 3300 kHz, as heard in Pennsylvania 23 November 1979 at 0427 UTC:

Audio Player

Radio Cultural, 3300 kHz, as heard in Michigan 23 March 1989 at 1101 UTC:

Audio Player

Easter in Guatemala

Of all the things I’ve seen in my travels, the Easter processions of Guatemala certainly rank near the top. I am fortunate to have been in Guatemala twice for the holiday, in 1982 and 1984, and I plan a return trip in the next few years. Processions take place all over Guatemala during Easter week, but the most elaborate take place on Easter Thursday and Good Friday in Guatemala City and, especially, in Antigua, the old capital twenty kilometers to the west. There are several processions both days in each city and each procession takes several hours. Continue reading

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Carlos Visits the Studios of UFRGS Radio

Visiting the studios of the University Radio of Rio Grande do Sul, Porto Alegre, Brazil

by Carlos Latuff

On the morning of Thursday, February 27, 2025, I visited the studios of the radio station of the Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul (UFRGS in Portuguese) in Porto Alegre, Brazil. Founded in 1950, it’s the first broadcaster in Brazil operated by a university, which currently broadcasts on medium wave (AM) and over the Internet (streaming): https://www.ufrgs.br/radio/ao-vivo/

Headquarters of the UFRGS radio studios in Porto Alegre, Brazil.

The programming focuses mainly on classical music, but it also has programs of other musical styles. Despite the technical, bureaucratic and financial difficulties (a typical scenario of state radio stations in Brazil), the UFRGS Radio has been operating thanks to the efforts of its team. One of the things that catches my attention at this station is the news bulletin, broadcast on weekdays at 12:00 p.m. local time, presented by Mrs. Claudia Rocca.

News bulletin from UFRGS Radio, voiced by Mrs. Cláudia Rocca.

The bulletin is 10 minutes long and brings local, national and international news, some of which are suitable for my already traditional illustrated radio listening.

According to the station’s director, Mr. Claudio Roberto Dornelles Remião, the UFRGS radio station, like most AM radio stations in Brazil, will migrate to FM, but there’s still no set deadline.

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