It Started With Some Puzzles - 11/26/2011

Saturday didn't look like it would be a good day for caching because of rain, but when my buddy jbgreer asked if I was interested, I immediately put together a list of caches to hunt.

We met up as usual for a nice breakfast and discussion of the day's plans. I picked out a couple of puzzle caches to start with - ones that we had both solved months ago. Depending on how much time we had, I selected a few in Shelby Farms to finish out the morning. The first two caches turned out to be in different locations in the same park. Since these were puzzle caches, I'll leave it to the curious reader to deduce which park that might be. After finding suitable parking, we flipped a coin and decided to go after Phillip Duffy Tolerates A Crazy Transient adopted by Tinksdad ( GC19QK3) first. The hike started out easy and before too long, we were fighting our way through some interesting terrain that included some brush and thorny vines. The hide spot was perfect and didn't take long to find once we were in the area. We were surprised to find two cache containers in the same spot, both with logbooks. We signed the one that everyone else signed and packed everything back up.

[ An early test of coordination ]

[ The fields are beautiful this time of year. ]

Next up was Say What? by mndvs737 (GC1RJ9). It was in an area more likely to be damp, so we were very fortunate not to run into much water on the route we chose. It wasn't until we got to the cache itself, that the ground was damp. The container, however, was a nice, dry ammo can. After signing the log, we made our way back to where we parked with little difficulty.

[ A break from bushwhacking ]

With two good puzzle caches off of our list, we decided to drive to Shelby Farms to pick up a few easier caches to end the morning. Shelby Farms has a lot of activity going on around this time of the years with their Starry Nights exhibit and a Thanksgiving Day 4 mile race. We decided to park near the Woodland Discovery Center to start our hunt.

First on the list was Water and Electricity Don't Mix! by BrunoFam3 (GC2ZNV1). This area could at times be very popular with park visitors, but this morning, we swooped in and jbgreer made the find quickly. After we both had signed the log, a gust of wind came up and jbgreer got a little exercise chasing down the log.

Next was Yeti's Path by thefamilybush (GC2WWQ2). I had done this one during the heat of the summer, but thought it would be a fun one for jbgreer to find. The trails in this area are really nice, and I hadn't known about them until I hunted the caches in the area.



He found the cache quickly enough, and I kept an eye out for people while he signed the log. The area is popular with bikers.

The next two caches we wanted to hunt were I'd rather be fishing! by Balls2thefloorgeocacher ( GC37YEN) and Quit Horsing Around by ProudMother06 (GC37YEM). Both caches were near a lake and the first spot (near a pier) had two people standing around so we decided to get the other one (GC37YEM) first. As we were walking towards the area, we saw a man in front of us wearing camo clothes. When he stopped at the area we wanted to search, jbgreer started to ask him if he was a geocacher. I recognized at that point that we had run into jaybirder. We decided to search together and after some effort, found the cache.

[ jbgreer and jaybirder ]

We decided to hunt (GC37YEN) together and by the time we got to the pier, we people had left. It was a pretty good hide with lots of potential spots, but eventually I spotted it. We all signed the log and were lucky that wind the wind that we didn't lose anything in the water.

At this point, we parted ways with jaybirder to hunt a few more caches. On the way back to the truck, we stopped at a pavilion to get rid of some trash and found a log smoldering in a concrete firepit. It could have easily gotten more serious, but fortunately, someone had left a water bottle nearby with enough left in it to put out the log.

[ a little tough to see the top end of the log is still burning ]

We headed to the east end of the park to hunt Kidz Kache by polikkronos (GC2MENF). I had hunted this one before without reading the note that said it was moved away from the place described in the hint. Since I had later realized where it was moved to, it was an easy find today. It was in a cool container that was covered with small ants. Nice!

After leaving Shelby Farms, we picked up two more caches to end the day. Lapizero
by thefamilybush (GC2VAFX) was a good find marred only by the fact I lost (or realized I lost) my reading glasses. I've lost a total of four pairs of reading glasses over the years, but had had this pair for a while. Oh, well.

The final cache we found was Sotobosque by thefamilybush (GC2VWDD). It was in an interesting area complete with honey locust thorns. I got poked reaching in a hole for the cache. I signed the log and left a little blood mark on the page. All-in-all, it was a pretty good morning with 8 caches found and no DNFs.

Blytheville, AR - 11/24/2011

I had a 4-day weekend to do whatever I wanted, so I planned out a few possible geocaching trips. I was invited to have Thanksgiving dinner of Thursday and when I found out it wasn't until 3pm. I selected from my list a trip up I-55 to Blytheville, AR. I figured that if I got up early enough (a hard thing to do these days), I could hit Blytheville, AR and head north into Missouri before coming back down into Tennessee and to my family's house via Hwy 51.

I've been through Blytheville at least twice before, so there were only about a dozen caches for me to go after.

By a miracle, my alarm got me out of bed on time Thursday morning. The weather was cool and a little damp, but I wasn't expecting any rain so all was good. I was on the road by 7 am and traffic was very light. I had a few caches on my list to pick up on the way north to Blytheville but made a last minute decision to skip them for times sake.

My first find of the morning was Ring....Ring....Ring by Lancent | GC266F5 at the southern end of Blytheville near the point that I got off of the interstate. This place was the former site of a convenience store and I really wished it had been open as I needed some gas.

[ Ring...Ring... ]

Gas would have to wait until I got into town. I found Champion Trees of AR: MS County: Willow Oak by zcoach (GC2MPVR) without paying any attention to the tree (I think it was across the road). The cache was near a car lot that was thankfully closed on this day.

One cache I found near the center of town was Fountain in the park by flame897 (GC2FMJQ). The little park had some interesting monuments including one to the founder of Blytheville. This park was also near the town's Greyhound bus terminal.

[ Rev Henry Thomas Blythe ]

[ Go Greyhound! ]

Just good clean fun! by flame897 (GC2FNRV) was an interesting cache at an appropriate place. I had figured it would be at a car wash, but instead it was outside of a community center for young people called "Clean Fun Club". I made one more stop before heading west out of town. P&G Special by flame897 (GC2FNT6) was outside of a church. I stayed in the lot for a bit updating my paper map with my finds so far.


Next, I picked up four caches at the old Eaker AFB. I had been here before and am pretty sure that the first cache I found was near a spot I had found another cache two visits ago. It is an interesting area as some of it has been repurposed and still has activity.

Cold War Relic-The Terminal by zcoach (GC2HNWE) was an interesting spot with a hide that suprised me given what I had been finding most of the morning.


Cold War Relic-The Memorial by zcoach | (GC2HNW4) was near a memorial to the crew of a B-52 shot down over Hanoi in 1972.


Heading northeast towards the interstate I decided to skip Grandpa's Challenge by Doug&Di (GC1ARRA) and hit Leonarda 3 by LeonardaDaArtsi (GC2EAZQ) before leaving town. I had to cross a muddy area to get to the cache, but the mud was just dry enough that I didn't sink in it.



After leaving town, I headed north into Missouri for more caching fun!

Night Caching in Nesbit Park - 11/14/2011

I don't get many opportunities to go night caching with a group, so when I heard about a plan to hunt Night Time Squirrel Hunt by Tuck Sackett, Hoot Owl, Gibbenator (GCR91D) organized by jeffbouldin, I immediately signed on to go. Even though I've been on this hunt twice before, I figured it would be a fun way to spend an evening. After signing up, I checked the weather forecast for Monday - 70% chance of rain.

I checked the weather forecast at several points on Monday and each time I checked, the rain had been pushed off until later in the evening. By the end of the work day, I knew we'd be clear of rain chances, so I went home and packed my gear and relaxed before heading out to Nesbit Park.

I arrived at the parking area around 8pm, about 30 minutes early. I paced around in the dark until nelms3 pulled up. The others (jeffbouldin, giardia_boy, and shandrum) all arrrived just before 8:30pm. My understanding for our late start was that we were waiting for bitbrain to get off of work, but it turned out that he couldn't make it, so just after 8:30pm, we set off into the woods.

[ heading into the unknown ]

I figured that since I have found the cache before, I'd hang out in the back and watch the others spot the tacks. I was prepared though, with Gatorade, a hand-held flashlight, a headlamp, and a small LED flashlight. It had been a few years since my last visit and it seemed like there were a few more ditches and gulleys than I remembered. The temperature was moderate - around 68 degrees, and there were few bugs out (other than spiders).

[ nelms3 lights up one of the many spiders we came across ]

Since there had been no rain, the terrain challenges were minimized. Still, stumbling around in the dark has its risks. I had no memory of how many sets of tacks we passed or how many trails we crossed - only a rough time estimate of how long it should take.

[ some of the gulleys were deep ]

Finally after about 50 minutes of hiking, I heard the sound of an ammo can being opened. I looked over and saw the jeffbouldin had discovered the cache. He signed the log, replaced it, and stood back to let the others eventually find it. It took some a bit longer, but eventually everyone found the cache and signed the log.

[ nelms3, jeffbouldin, giardia_boy, and shandrum find the cache ]

Invigorated by success, the group decided to hunt a few other caches before leaving the park. We found CWL003 - Bartlett Stash by CWL (GCG409), Just Off The Yellow Trail
by cgeek (GC1AJ9F), Tango Base Three by ttowery (GCN5R8), and Stanky Creek
by itsmebigd (GC16NMB) - not in that order. It was a good selection of caches, and two of the four caches were among the oldest in the park.

Because it was getting late, we deviated from the Yellow Trail when we got fairly close to the parking area and ended up leaving the park just after 11pm.

Hdrider55 Rides Their Way to 1K - 11/12/2011

When I arrived home from a morning of caching with my friend jbgreer, I noted that I had just enough time to make it to the hdrider55 Rides Their Way to 1K event by nelms3 (GC34GFP) at 2pm. It was about a 30 mile drive to Oakland, TN and I had to be careful not to speed since the area around Oakland enforces the speed laws pretty vigilantly.

[ An object found earlier that reminded me that I had an event to go to. ]

I arrived at the designated place around 1:55pm, right behind brunofam3. There was already a good-sized crowd checking out the various travel bugs and coins that people brought along. I wrote down the tracking number of all of the coins that I could read. One of these days, I will learn to bring a magnifying glass.

[ Some early discussions before mealtime ]

I decided to hurry up and get a seat and let others fill in around me. We seemed to have just enough room for everyone to get a good seat. I had Chicken Parmesan to eat and enjoyed swapping stories with the geocachers around me. There were a lot of newer geocachers around me and I enjoyed their enthusiasm about geocaching.

There was a door prize drawing that had enough items that everyone ended up winning something. I actually ended up winning two items, because they had extra items. I won some reflective tacks (for night caches) and a small geocoin along with a nano cache. I will have a place a cache soon, since over the years I have won just about every size cache container there is.

After the event, I decided to hunt three relatively easy caches in Oakland. I actually ended up following brunofam3 around - which was great, because they did a better job of finding the caches than I did. Caches found, I decided to head back into Memphis and catch a movie before going home.

Horn Lake, MS - 11/12/2011

I met up with my caching buddy, jbgreer at our usual time and had breakfast while discussing the plans for the day's cache hunt. I had chosen Horn Lake, MS as our destination because it looked like there were some interesting caches to find. I also wanted to log a cache for my "Mississippi Blues Trail Challenge" list.

We took Hwy 51 south and made a couple of finds in South Memphis (Whitehaven). The first was The Long Pink Caddies by supersally76 (GC31384) just outside of a restaurant near Graceland. The cache was secured to a sign in the landscaping with a lock. The combination for the lock was near the big pig's nose.

[ The pig van at Marlowe's ]

It was obvious after opening the cache, that it was placed with the owner's approval and was a great cache for our first find of the day. As we were leaving, we saw a pink cadillac parked nearby.

The second cache of the morning was near an interesting sign just north of the stateline. Rock-N-Roll Ghost Town by Scooby-Doo Crew (GC2TVNP) should have been a quick find, but we were led off by possibly faulty coordinates to a wooded area nearby.

[ An odd place to run into other cachers ]

While poking around in the bushes, I looked up and suddenly saw two vehicles parked nearby. It was a virtual horde of cachers. The geocachers among them, I later found out were gfors and vanlaanfamily. While I eventually looked where the cache was hidden, jbgreer actually made the find.

[ Everyone looking where the cache is not located ]

We met up with these cachers at one of the first caches we found once we got into Mississippi: Rent A Constitution Class Starship by Scooby-Doo Crew (GC2V57M). We found Mississippi Blues Trail: Big Walter Horton by dameetro (GC34KQ3) which I added to my qualifying list for the Mississippi Blues Trail Challenge.

We then headed to a nice park for another cache (and a restroom). Python Loose at the Park
by wilbur8869 (GC2RRF8) was in a nice patch of woods with a disc golf course nearby. The hide spot was definitely worthy of the name.

[ no bushwhacking required ]

The next cache Soccer Ball by DavidandAbby (GC2PV8E) was nearby, but we actually had to leave the park and enter a schools athetic fields. Appropriately, there was a soccer game in progress. I wanted to leave, but jbgreer convinced me that we could just walk around everyone and make to the cache. Turns out he was right and the cache was in an area hidden from the spectators.

The final cache we found in Mississippi was The Zombie Wasteland by wilbur8869 (GC36F9R). I had selected this cache because of the cool picture I had seen of the container. It was in a wooded area near an apartment complex that used to have a paved walking trail.

[ Nice! ]

The last cache of the morning was Pyradoptics by dameetro (GC2Z9G7) at the northbound I-55 rest stop in Memphis. I had seen this structure many times in passing. It's name is "Pyradoptics" and apparently lights up at night. The cache, itself, was located not far from the "artwork". All-in-all, it was a successful day. 13 caches found, with no DNFs. Several were interesting hides. It was fun to meet cachers from other states as well.

[ "Pyradoptics" ]