Be your own Beacon. I have previously posted about beacons, those radio stations around the world that transmit from various places at various frequencies and let you know how the propagation is working. I have learned that one can be his own beacon. You need to have an Amateur Radio Service license, but that's a small thing. Here's a link to a site by an Ogden Utah ham, Jim Southwick, N7JS, who describes his 10 meter beacon transceiver, which he put together himself. I am inspired. This goes on my project list immediately.

I read about Jim's project in the February 2006 issue of CQ magazine. A copy of the article is available at Jim's website, to which I link above, in PDF format.

Jim's article mentions a website by a British amateur that has "a very good list of beacons worldwide".

You don't need to be a ham to listen to these beacons. You need some sort of Short Wave radio. They are pretty inexpensive at Radio Shack. If you listen to a beacon and send the beacon guy an email telling him where and when you heard his signal, you will get a card from him, called a QSL card, and you will make him very happy.