Geocaching

Memorable Kids Cooper Cache (Sticker TradingCache)

We spent a long time looking for this one. We decoded the hint and read all the logs. Maybe it's buried somewhere? We found yellow caution tape which seemed to be where the cache should be, but not sure if that's part of the cache. There were people playing tennis nearby, but they didn't seem to be paying attention to us.

CalTrain-San Antonio

This one wasn't as buried as we expected once we looked in the right place, though we didn't expect the color of the container. Took marwasgalot whistle (for another cache later in the day) and a pink bouncy ball. Left floating keychain and snoopy.

Northern CA Solar System Model: Planet Jupiter

Found this one pretty easily. We have been to this park many times, but we weren't aware of this mini-path. TNLN. Thanks.

Circular Reasoning

Spent a lot of time working on this one. It appears that most of my high school education has faded into the ether. Tried a couple of methods, then finally got one that looked pretty good on paper. I even wrote a little code to do the last calculation for me. Got to the location and discovered my math was off somewhere, but we were clearly close. Watching our GPS we were able to zero in on the location and have a nice walk at the same time. Left some Disney dwarfs pogs, and took a cool blue ball and the WTC Rivet travel bug. Challenging cache (if you're not in high school!) but very rewarding. Thanks!

Our Lady of the River

Ended up here while doing another cache. We remembered that there was another cache in this park and looked it up. Neat place - we would have never known it was here. While we were looking for it two other couples saw us in there and came to see what was there. While waiting for them to leave, I spotted it. Saw the ranger's log entry. TNLNSL.

Haunted Toys

Much easier the second time here. Some employees were hanging out closeby, so we waited for them to leave. I was a little concerned about attracting attention while accessing the cache - it was pretty noisy - but I don't think anyone saw us. TNLN. Thanks!

Put your lips together and blow

Very original cache. We grabbed a margwagsalot whistle earlier in the day, specifically for this cache. We felt pretty ridiculous, good thing no one was really around. Signed the log book and we were off for a well deserved Slurpee down the street after a full day of caching.

Cards are us

We did a lot more digging than we needed to at this one. Lots of people around, but not at the cache. Did another cache very nearby. Didn't have any cards, so TNLN.

Don't mess with the Army

We were a little worred that this cache would be too well hidden, but as we approached the location, we saw it very clearly. We just had to wait for an opening to grab it. TNLNSL. Thanks.

Border Patrol #1

Found this one between yard sale shopping. I had to get some perspective to notice where this one was. Thanks.

Northern CA Solar System Model: Shoemaker-Levy

Took a guess at the coodinates and found it easily with the hint. Looking forward to the rest of the series! TNLN.

RESERVOIR CACHE

our last cache on our Idaho trip. We sure had a lot of fun. This was another quickie. TNLNSL. Thanks.

Welcome To Mtn. Home

Found this one after a few minutes of looking. TNLN. Stopped by McDonalds on the way out and got a very refreshing milkshake.

Niagara West

All kinds of confusion on this one. We wanted to visit Niagara Springs, but we didn't have any good maps, so it's a good thing we had this cache location in the GPSr. We had some difficulty figuring out which side of the river it was on. First we went north, but the GPSr looked like it was on the south side of the river. So back down we went, all the way to the fish hatchery only to realize that it was definitely on the other side. On the way back we could see the road coming down, so we marked where that was and headed for it on the other side of the river. Once we got close enough we were able to follow the signs down to it. Very nice falls and extremely clear water. The park was pretty nice too.

The cache was full of ants, both on and in the cache. We had some miscommunication about what we were leaving and taking from this cache and we ended up taking an Idaho pin and geocaching sticker and leaving an Outback coaster. We traded up on a cache later that day hopefully to make up for it!

HOT CREEK CACHE

Where's the creek? We wanted to get out of here quickly as some people in a jeep stopped up the road and were shooting at something. We left a White Sox hat we found earlier in the day and left a Coke antenna ball.

Its there

This cache was complicated by the fact that there were two huge RVs parked directly in front of the cache. We had to wait for one of the owners to leave to walk her dog. TNLN. Thanks.

Travelers Blues II

A nice distraction on our drive from Twin Falls to Boise. Took a golf ball and left something we wrote illegably on our printout.

Snake River

There was lots of thunder overhead, so we had to do this one fast. At least the day had cooled off.

We took a happy face guy and left a quarter.

Some people nearby were using a metal detector near the cache site. If only they knew the real treasure was 200 ft away!

We stopped by the Oregon Trail ruts on the way back. As soon as we got out of the car, it began to pour. Then a minute later it completely stoped. Strange weather here!

Porcupine Path

1:30 pm

No porcupines today - it was too hot. They were smarter than us for staying somewhere cool!

We parked on the wrong side of the river on our first try, but found the nice new park and cache soon after.

TNLN. Thanks!

Let's Make a Deal

This one was nuts! We took the low road and quickly got pretty tired. During the second scramble, we got a little concerned that we would injure ourselves and not make it back. So we went up to the top and things got much easier.

We ran into a nasty plant with thorns and it made our skin swell up. Ouch.

We found the cache using the hint though we never did find the arrow. Is it really necessary to hide the cache that well? Geez, I don't think there's much traffic here!

The cache was really well stocked. We took they smokey the bear baseball and left $1.

The way back from the rim was much easier. We're still sore from this one! Great views though!

Travelers Blues III

When we arrived at this cache, there was no one around. Suddently 3 cars arrived. We felt pretty suspicous looking around in the grass and there was thunder and lightning about, so we decided it probably wasn't a good idea to be hanging out next to a metal fence. So while we waited for the people to leave we decoded the clue. Once we did that, it was obvious where it was. Now were going to have to suspect caches hidden like this all over the place!

Twin Falls

Quick cache. Nice park. We were parched and decided to go into the restroom to fill up on water. BIG SIGNS - non-potable water - do not drink! The vending machine was happy to take my dollar though.

Shoshone Falls

We didn't feel like injuring ourselves while on vacation looking for this one, so we gave up. Too many places to hide on an unstable hill. Our feet were pretty dirty after this (sandals are not the recommended attire for this cache), but we washed them off at the lake afterwards. Lots of people swimming and hanging out on Memorial Day weekend.

Shoshone View

Nice view from here. The cache was very well covered, but we managed to find it OK. TNLN. Thanks for the quick cache.

Perrine Bridge

We were just trying to get in the general area of this cache and took a random left turn and parked. Turned on the gps and discovered we were 27 feet from the cache. Unfortunately, so were about 50 other people, all watching people parachute off the bridge. So instead we took a walk to explore the area. Then we realized that we hadn't gotten a map of where our hotel was for the night. We looked up, and there it was about a half mile away along with a large selection of dining options... very strange.

As we passed by the cache site again we tried to find the cache. While there were still a lot of people, they were looking at the bridge and people falling off it, not us. Got right on top of it, but I hadn't read the details properly (at all?) and I thought it was a regular sized cache. So, we didn't find it. But we vowed to return after dark when hopefully everyone would be gone and we had some food in us.

That's what we did and we found it after a few minutes of groping around in the dark. We just love that whenever we go to a new place, geocaches take us right to the coolest spots. Thanks!

Pillar Falls Lite

Drove to this one between tries of another nearby cache only to realize that we didn't have to drive at all. Then again, everything seems that way in this part of Twin Falls - everything is really close but you've got all these big stores and malls and restaurants which you think you would normally drive to, so you do.

Anyway, after a really short drive and a quick walk, we zeroed in on the cache site. I randomly stuck my hand in a place I thought it could be and found it instantly. That never happens.

The falls were waning at this time of the year, but we enjoyed the drive ... err ... walk!

Emberton View Point

Our first cache in Idaho. Nice view. Found after a few minutes of looking. No snakes, but lots of lizards. TNLN. Thanks.

John W. Christian Greenbelt

I went to check on this cache this morning to make sure it was still there. Someone rehid it in a slightly different place and I had a hard time finding it! I thought it had gone missing for the 3rd time. But it is still there. I did up the difficulty rating a bit and added a hint.

Getting to know yahoo

With the help of the super-nice Groundspeak folks, I've modified some the cache details to better meet the guidelines. The cache hasn't moved, it just has different questions. Cache on!

Whisman Station

Nice park. Drove here from home for #3 in the series. We stopped and relaxed for a bit at the cache site.

Evelyn Station

GPS wasn't liking it here, but managed to find it anyway. Drove here from Whisman in a few minutes. 12 more to go...

crabbels CASE

This little bugger ended up on our first page, so I started to attack it. I had thought about doing a cache based on this recently, so luckily I got the concept pretty quickly. A buddy on my web site helped me narrow down the words. I was lucky enough to catch the last hint when it had a little more formatting and that helped me confirm 3 words. Then it was just a matter of figuring out what was logical for the rest of the words. Thankfully the second part was much easier - pretty much trial and error. Thanks for challenging cache!

Tube It!

Why is it that only one AAA in the Bay Area (Walnut Creek) is open on Saturdays? Who has time between 8:30 and 5:30 to get their fill of maps? Well, the AAA served one good purpose - there was plenty of free parking in their lot just across the street from this cache. And we got to snicker as several people walked up to the door only to realize it was closed.

Anyway, this cache followed the typical arc of emotions - anticipation, curiosity, frustration, destitude then finally eureka and exhileration! There were lots of people around, so we made like we were waiting for someone several times, then darted in and out of the ivy to play with that strange tube.

When I put it back, I accidentally put it in backwards and realized that others would have a hard time getting it out. Luckily we were able to fix it and we were on our way.

Mountain View Station

We've never driven so close to a cache and then spent so much time looking for it. It was a quick drive over from Evelyn and we nearly drove into the cache. So many places to hide! There weren't too many people around on a Saturday afternoon, but enough that we had to look up and whistle more than a few times. The hint was helpful, but not quite specific enough to narrow it down to one place. Very tricky location. 11 more to go!

Moffett Park

2nd cache on our walk today. Looked a bit longer for this one and felt a bit suspiciuos, but there was no one around. 14 to go!

Lockheed Martin Station

Decided to walk to this one since it was so close to our house. Nice day for a walk. Found the cache pretty easily. Nice station; maybe we should use it. :-)

S.C. Stairway View Cache

This was our last cache of the day which was a good thing because it was almost dark and the mosquitos were out. Had some trouble taking a left turn an ended up parking on the other side of the hill across from some kind of hall where a prom or something was taking place. Walked through a really cool 200-year old cemetary though, complete with a small chinese burial ground. Found the cache pretty much by feeling around. Took a sun and left a quarter. Nice view up here. I'll add it to the list of places where someone can buy me a house. :-)

S.C. Birdwalk Cache

#2, so close to a FTF on this one! I think we parked in the right place, but we didn't look at the park map and we ended up going all the way around the park. That was ok, it's a really cool park. We liked the floating pathways and the animal footprints at the playground. Found the cache easily. We were a little confused as to why there was a microcache inside this cache? Took a Save the Whales pin and left a spider. Thanks!

Ocean View

We were looking for this cache with hitsman and chris when another cacher, 4wheeler, came by. Found it pretty quickly (nice spot) and took a koosh ball and left a spider. Then we walked up to the park to enjoy the view and watch 4wheeler grab the cache. Almost tried to walk here from the SC boardwalk. Good thing we didn't!

Under the Boardwalk

Nicely hidden. Some people on the boardwalk above saw us and were making jokes. Oh well. TNLN.

Marine Center

Looking at the map, I was really hoping this was on the pier, otherwise we were in for quite a swim! Thankfully it wasn't. This one was in a nice spot and we had to be stealthy. Took us a while to figure out how to open the cache! Tried to log from my Treo that we had just used the last two lines in the log sheet, but couldn't get it to work. Stopped and watched the sea lions for a bit and we were on our way.

Schwan Lake

Drove around a while before we finally read the parking hint. Then we took the wrong path and headed back down a gulley and over to the cache. Hitsman and chris didn't follow us and we got separated and confused. We both had cell phone though and we were able to contact each other though neither of us could really describe where we were. They ran into a cacher and his dog and hung out by the cache while we closed in on the cache with our GPSR. Lots of trampled grass around the cache gave it away a bit. Left a spider and took a free limo ride token.

Lighthouse Field

Nice location for a cache. We walked by the lighthouse first, watched the surfers and the seals and then headed to the cache. Lots of people out walking their dogs. Took a marble and left an airplane (I think).

Elementary Nervousness

We had a friend visiting from out of town. Introduced him to Geocaching and showed him this cache that had been annoying me for a few weeks that I couldn't figure out. He sat down and stared at it for a few hours and came up with an answer. He really wanted to go out and find it immediately, so we did. We wandered out the streets a bit, trying to find a way to get to the cache and finally found the spot. This was our first cache found at night. Good thing it was in a fairly obvious spot. I think my friend is addicted now. :-)

John W. Christian Greenbelt

Finally got around to getting a micro together and placing it here. The biggest challenge there was finding a film canister since I switched to digital photography years ago. I stopped by my local drug store and not finding any empty canisters I could buy, asked the person behind the photo counter if they had any. They had a whole wastebasket full of them!

Anyway, went to place the micro and some local hoodlums were hanging out right next to where the cache would be. They seemed to be looking for something in the bushes. Probably not a good idea to place it there again.

So I moved the cache to a new location about 50 feet away. Hopefully it will last longer. Please be discreet!