FT8 in the quiet years

It seems odd to be talking about the "quiet years" when solar conditions are so good. 

However, in about 5 years' time there will be few sunspots and many will (wrongly) assume the higher HF bands are dead.

In many cases this is not the case and a casual listen around 27MHz will prove this is due to a lack of activity and not poor conditions. 

Hopefully FT8 users will stick around on bands like 10m, 12m and 15m and prove the bands are open far more often than is assumed. I well remember working a surprised LU when I was running 10m SSB QRP when there were no sunspots at all at sunspot minimum some years ago. 

FT8 is well monitored and works with very weak signals. Who knows by then we may have an even better mode!

In my experience, N-S paths remain open for DX at all points in the solar cycle. I agree you have to be more patient, but that is half the fun.