Geocaching

Wednesday, December 31, 2008

Reflections on 2008

Let me get the boring statistics out of the way first:

Broke over the 2000 mark
Over 800 for the year
Sixteen consecutive days with a cache find
56 finds in a single day

Other boring statistics can be found on my profile page.
But remember - it’s not about the numbers!

iPhone caching!!!!!

The beginning of weekly geo-coffee hour!

The first memorable outing was in January with my grandson exploring the vast and expansive Cougar Mountain Regional Park near Seattle.  We only found four caches of the many available to us but thoroughly enjoyed the hike - especially fun was busting up the iced-over puddles along the trails!

Unusually nice coastal weather in February lured Pat and I up to Lincoln City with the trailer.  It turned into a good caching weekend for me but only because Pat was sick the whole time and stayed in the trailer!  Poor girl!

This early point in the year also marked the begininng of caches being placed in what has come to be known as the “Forest of Ill Repute”.  So named because of perported “ill-will” between Bad Duck and Family Explorer as they took turns placing caches of increasing difficulty and/or sneakiness!  In reality, all was done in a light-hearted manner but the name stuck.

Returned to the Lincoln City area in May and really enjoyed out hike to Drift Creek Falls.

For the second year in a row, hiked and cached with buddies on Table Rock near Medford while the wives attended a nearby church ladies retreat.  Last year we did Upper Table Rock and this year Lower Table Rock.  Also noteworthy of this trip was a two days of “binge” caching with GBlack.  Dawn to dusk was exhausting but a whole lotta fun - except for the crazy, upset lady yelling “What the ____ are you guys doing with that phone booth?”!!

Pat and I hiked the Rogue River trail to Rainie Falls.  This was one of the most enjoyable and scenic trails we walked this year.

Helped my dad place his first cache on the Barlow District of the Mt. Hood National Forest where he was District Ranger for many years.

Pat and I really enjoyed the Earthcaches around the Bend area while vacationing there in August.

The longest hike of the year?  Oregon Walkabout #3 of course.  This took Rod of familyexplorer and myself two separate days to complete.  The first day out we clocked over 19 miles!  The second day amounted to a mere four miles.  I don’t even want to see a Walkabout #4!

Other memorable outings in the final quarter of the year were; [1] Sauvie Island (portland) with my son-in-law, [2] A WET and wild goose chase with Bad Duck, [3] Creepy Cricket Cave, [4] caching in Portlands 2008 snow storm the morning of my daughters wedding and [5] dune hiking with Bad Duck all the while drooling over his new Garmin Oregon GPSr!!

I should report here on progress made on the many challenge caches in which I’m participating.  Unfortunately only managed to pick up one more County (Columbia) for the Counting Counties in Oregon cache.  Faired better with the Oregon DeLorme challenge picking up five more sections.  Also picked up five qualifying caches for the Oregon Fire Lookout challenge.  Started two new challenges this year - Oregon Fizzy and ABC Challenge caches.

Here’s to a new caching year.......may the log sheets be dry, the micros be few and the scenery gorgeous!

Monday, December 08, 2008

Nice Trails in Corvallis

I was in Corvallis recently and managed to get out on some of the communities trail systems.

Bald Hill Park had a great mix of paved, gravel and dirt paths to choose from.  Lots of cyclists in this community so the paved paths are pretty busy.

Avery Park appears to be one of the more poplular parks in town and therefore has more muggles to deal with but my walks were early morning so the winter cold keeps most of them home.

It seems every community has it’s MLK park and Corvallis was no different.  Very nice area showcasing natural meadow areas with upland prairie and riparian habitats.  There were quite a number of caches to get here and they all seemed to fall in a great pattern for making a circuit to get them all.

A small and much less developed park with dirt paths and a great natural feel was Witham Hill Natural Park.  Three very nice caches on these trails.

The final park I walked and cached in was Willamette Park.  This is the areas largest park and features ball fields, a frisbee golf course, access to the Willamette River and a large “off-leash” area for dogs.  Lots of caches in this park.

I really enjoyed all these area and hope to explore more of them on another trip.

Sunday, November 23, 2008

Creepy Cricket Cave

No long dune hiking today - just wanted to kick back and pick up a few “easy” local caches.

As we’re driving to church in Bandon this morning, we spot Bad Duck parked along 101 with his iPhone to his ear and leaning on his pickup hood with that “ Hey Rod, these coords are putting my in the middle of the highway” look on his face.  I give a friendly little beep on the horn as we blow by - reminding myself to hunt this cache this afternoon.

Well, as we’re leaving Bandon I get a new cache notification.  Cool!  Another one to add to the afternoon’s agenda!  Oh Wow!  Darren put one at the old Coastal Cavern cache site!  That’s going to be cool!

I head out around 2:45 pm with a short side trip to Bi-Mart for some batteries for my light source.  Checked the website real quick - cool, still could get a FTF!

I enter the cave and find the cache container after about 15 minutes - Aaarrgghhh!  kcscottkc was here already!  Oh well, fun hunt anyway.  Took some pics of the monster poisonous spiders all over the cave walls.  Er, I mean, long-legged cave crickets! 

Check out some video

After this cache I swung by and picked up Darren for a ride-along lifeline to go after family explorer’s two new caches between Coos Bay and Bandon.  Got home in the dark - wow, the days are so short!

Saturday, November 22, 2008

Dune Hiking at Honeyman

At one time I had cleared out all the dune caches between Florence and Reedsport.  Of course, in the world of geocaching one thing is constant - change!  Many new caches have popped up in the vicinity of Honeyman State Park and today was the day to make a dent in them.  Some require a water craft and I’ll get to those one day - but today will not be that day!

My day started about 7:30 am leaving Coos Bay.  Chilly and foggy this morning - but NOT raining!  Looks to be a dry day.

Three separate hikes - 8.3 miles - 10 caches found:

Hike number one started at a small parking spot and dunes access along Highway 101 almost 5 miles south of the bridge at Florence where Clear Lake Road takes off.  Headed west into the dunes towards the Quad Mafia Vacation plant cache.  First thing I noticed was how quiet it was - no ATV’s anywhere!  I guess it was too early for them.  Second cache was Sandstorm.  As I’m signing the cache log I hear the first quads of the morning pull up to within 100 feet of my location, shut down the engines, yak a minute or two about where they want to ride then rode off.  I emerged from the trees and continued to the third and final cache of this trek - Get Your Motor Runnin’.  Hike stats:  3.52 miles over an hour and 35 minutes.

Hike number two started from the day use parking lot in Honeyman State Park.  This was the shortest and easiest hike of the three.  Most of the two mile distance was walking through the campground.  First cache was one I couldn’t find on a previous visit when Pat and I camped here back in mid September.  Got it this time after getting some much needed help over the phone from Mackie - thanks Jeff!  I walked south to the end of the campground and then beyond to pick up two other caches - A “H"oney of a Cache and Fun Finder Extreme.

The final hike also started from the day use area but the direction of travel was west past Cleawox Lake into the dunes.  I only intended to complete a new multi-staged cache called Mushroom Walk About.  However, upon finding stage four (of six) I hear it - the faint whisper of another cache (BrikShort) luring me out - out across the treacherous path of machines screaming over the sand.  Find me!  Find Me!  Okay! Okay! I’ll go!  This little side trip added 1.5 miles to the hike.  Finished up the walk about and hobbled back to the pickup as my knees were talking to me as well.  This third hike ended up being 3.8 miles and took two hours (would have been quicker had it not been for a 15 minute pause giving lifeline help to Rod of family explorer).

Made one last stop as I headed for home to look for a third time for Railroad in Woahink.  Thankfully, I spotted it quickly this time.

Where’s the ibuprofen?