US-3625

Gamble Plantation State Park

The Judah P. Benjamin Confederate Memorial at Gamble Plantation, in Ellenton just off US-301. Open lawn, mature oaks, room to park and set up out of the way, and an antebellum mansion to walk around between decode cycles. The gate is the thing to plan around.

At a glance

Entry: Free
Hours: The park is open 8:00 a.m. until sunset, 365 days a year...
Operating position: Drive-up
Tables: Yes
Shade: Partial
Restrooms: See park page →
Water: See park page →
Grid: EL87rm

Official park page Florida State Parks → Trail maps, closures, facilities and current alerts, kept current by the agency. Activation history POTA.app — US-3625 → Every activation, activator and hunter log for this park. This guide covers conditions on the ground, not the logbook.

Getting in

Parking

Room to park and set up on the property without being in anyone's way once you are inside.

Hours

The park is open 8:00 a.m. until sunset, 365 days a year — the gate is real and does not open early. The visitor center and museum open 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. Thursday through Monday, closed for lunch 11:45 a.m. to 12:45 p.m., and closed entirely Tuesday, Wednesday, Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year's Day.

Access

Reached from US-301 in Ellenton.

Setting up

Where to operate

Operating was done from inside the vehicle with a hatch-mounted vertical, both in the adjacent lot before opening and on the property afterward. The park also has picnic tables behind the mansion and open lawn under mature oaks, neither of which has been tried.

Noise floor

Measured on site: S5 with the antenna connected against S1 disconnected, roughly 24 dB arriving through the antenna system rather than generated in the radio. With a vehicle engine and a satellite terminal both shut down, the floor settles to about S4 against S1, which is normal external band noise on 20 m in daylight. Those two sources together account for roughly 6 dB — worth knowing if you operate from a running vehicle here.

Antennas

A Harvest OUTB2000 HF/6M on a hatch mount read 1.32 SWR at 14.070, 37.84 ohms resistive with essentially no reactance.

Cell coverage

general: Starlink was used. Note it costs about half an S unit of noise when running.