Uncle Mack's Geocaching Blog: Jaybirder's Roost

I've been on a run of numbers hunts recently so I appreciate it when I can hunt a single good cache that involves a long hike in the woods. I especially like it when I get to hunt caches with my good friend jbgreer.

Jaybirder's Roost by Jaybirder (GC209W3) is a multi-stage cache that takes you all over the "Wolf River Environmental Restoration Greenway Trail System just north of Collierville, Tennessee. This area is approximately 2200+ acres of bottomland hardwood forest with old cotton fields to the north.

Hunting the cache first requires that you hunt six addtional caches, each with a letter-number pair that aids in the creation of the start coordinates for Jaybirder's Roost. We had hunted five of the six preliminary caches a month before and for stopped cold around 160 feet away from Noisey Crows Cache by Jaybirder (GC20Y8J) by high waters typical of this time of year.

On this day we met at casa de jbgreer at 8am and made it to the park around 8:45am. It was a short and uneventful walk to Noisey Crows Cache. The water we had encountered earlier was all gone. I left a "When Pigs Fly" geocoin at this cache and we pieced together the coordinates for the start of Jaybirder's Roost and began what would end up being a long day of hiking.

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We encountered tall grass and spots of iced-over water while hunting the first few stages of the cache and I was glad I had worn my high-rubber boots. We passed by the truck after 4 stages and stopped for a quick drink. If I had taken off my boots at this point and put my tennis shoes back on, I would have had a perfect rest of the day. There was, however, no way we could have anticipated the conditions for the rest of the hike. Besides, I initially had plans to hunt a few other caches I knew would be in water if time permitted.

I can't go into great detail of the rest of the hunt at this point because it is a relatively new hide and I'd prefer not to spoil it for the few people who might stumble across this blog. I can say that on this day the sky was clear with a few snow flakes early. I don't believe the temperature ever got above freezing, although I was warm enough that it wasn't a problem. We didn't carry food or water, so the only place we rested was at the truck after stage four. I had a big breakfast, so I wasn't overly hungry and the cool temps didn't cause me to get overly thirsty. In summary, it was a great day to hunt this cache!

One big topic of conversation we had was how many stages could this cache have without ruining the experience. Did too many stages dampen too potential hiding spots for more caches? At one point, I correctly guessed the number of stages this cache had. Definitely some luck involved in the guess.

Upon arrival at the final stage, I dropped off two coins and took the time to write a legible entry in the logbook. The hike back to the truck was long! It took approximately 5 hours to hunt all of the stages. In the GOWT forums recently, I had posted something to the effect that it would take a great deal of motivation to get me to hunt a cache with more than four (known) stages. I am glad I was sufficiently motivated to hunt this cache at this time, because in the summer it would be AWFUL!