Shelby Farms - 1/15/2011

I got a call from jbgreer asking me if I wanted to geocache on Saturday. Our primary goal would be to hunt Flip Dizzy - Flip Out by Abiectio (GC1CW22). This cache is the final of a seven cache adventure series that involves a lot of puzzle-solving and hiking in really cool areas within Memphis and Shelby County, TN. We had started this series in September of 2008 with Flip Dizzy by Abiectio (GC18M8X). Because we were trying to complete this series with little to no assistance from others, it took us a while. Both of us had to solve the individual puzzles before we would go after the respective caches.

After having a delicious breakfast at one of my favorite eating spots, we made the drive to Shelby Farms.

Once we entered the woods, we began our quest. Even though you can get some spoiler information about this hunt by reading others' online logs, I will try to minimize my contribution to the spoilers. I will say that we hiked - a lot. We spent a lot of time on nice trails. There was still a little snow out, and some spots were slippery. We saw lots of runners and bikers while on our journey. I spent a lot of time taking pictures of things. We found the cache itself in good shape.

[ a beautiful spot ]

[ the trails were relatively snow-free ]

[ one of two armadillos we spotted ]

[ remnants of an old railroad bridge ? ]

The Greenline Experience

One of the caches we went after while in the area was Greenline - #1 by giardia_boy (GC2EQ10). It was in the vicinity of the old railroad bridge that crosses the Wolf River.

I knew that the trail we were on would lead us under the greenline and was not sure how we were going to get up on the bridge. There used to be a makeshift ladder formed from railroad spikes hammered into the bridge pilings, but I knew that these were gone.

After crossing under the bridge, we simply walked along the side trail a good distance until we found an entry point.

Once we got up to the paved trail, made our way back to where the cache was located. There were lots of people biking, walking, and running along the greenline. Fortunately there were occasional gaps of time where we could do what was needed to get our hands on the cache.

While in the general area of the greenline, we also hunted BLUE TRAIL??? by Hoot Owl (GC24VA8). The name of the cache also denotes the name of the trail we took to get to it. Amazingly, the last 200 feet of that hunt was the most difficult terrain we passed through all day. The container for this cache was an ammo can that was once part of spencersb's Dark Tower Series.

When we got back to the truck, we observed that we had hiked a total of 8.35 miles. We had a little bit of time left, so we took a shot at finding I Spy - Shelby Farms by giardia_boy (GC2C7Y1). This cache involved figuring out the coordinates of objects in two photographs taken amongst the 3500 acres of Shelby Farms, and using some distance information linked to each picture to compute a third location. This location was stage 1 of a 2 stage hunt. The sign at stage 1 had the coordinates on it for the final stage. I had done all of the calculations the night before and it turned out that I had correctly figured out where stage 1 was. After that, it was simply a matter of traveling to stage 2 and making the find. This was a creative design and if I hadn't known the relative locations of both objects, it would have been tough to work out the coordinates for stage 1.

We did some recon on a couple of other caches in the area before leaving for the day.

My Favorite Cache Finds of 2010

Even though I found a relatively low number of geocaches this past year, it was still tough to pick favorites. I did, however, and here is my list.

Micro - Tucked Away Downtown by Jeff60523 (GC1NXXG)
This is just outside and across the street from Union Station in Chicago. Muggles aplenty and my GPSr was almost useless because of all of the tall buildings.

Regular - Caching is a Virtue by cache-n-dash (GC1BX3E)
After hunting a few caches in Baker City, OR, my Dad and I decided to hunt a cluster of caches in nearby Virtue Flats. This cache and the nearby ones required lots of hill-climbing in a desert-like environment. Rattlesnakes were a distinct possibility.

Multi - Jaybirder's Roost by Jaybirder (GC209W3)
First hunt of the New Year. A comfortable 27 degrees and sunshine provided near-perfect conditions for what would turn out to be the longest single-day cache hunt for me and my caching buddy, jbgreer. It also required hunting six additional caches to get start coordinates.

Event - Geocaching FUNdamentals by Geocachers of West Tennessee (GC2440D)
I don't really require a fundamental course in geocaching, but I really enjoy the park that it was held in. Prontopup does a really good job at hosting these types of events, and it appears that he gets a lot of practice.

CITO Event - CITO in Germantown by Geocachers of West Tennessee (GC253F5)
Held shortly after the Geocaching FUNDamentals event, this has to be the best-organized CITO of the 5 I have been to. It was spread across multiple Germantown Parks.

Mystery - The Original Buster Brown by Bulldog Duo (GC1P047)
After caching in Paragould, AR all day, I made a stop in Hornersville, MO on my way home. The history behind the man this cache honors was the most fascinating thing about the hunt.

Favorite Earthcache - Earthquake Lake by Paper_Doll and Girl Scout troops 1629 & 1632 (GC112BZ)
The only earthcache I did on my tour of Reelfoot Lake caches. I picked it because it only had 3 questions to answer.

Favorite Power Trail: Delta Trail SP#1GPT by BackpacknJack (GC2712K)
I spent 2 days hiking the length and back of this neat trail and found 75 of the 112 caches along it. I picked the wrong time of year and the heat and mosquitoes definitely affected my hunt - especially on the second day. I'm going to try to get back there early this Spring to finish up the caches.

Favorite Virtual: So many Storeys, So Little Time by bspeng (GC47A4)
- technically, I didn't hunt any virtual caches in 2010, but I revisited this one during a train trip to Oregon in June. On my previous visit, I saw the view from the 99th floor of the Sears Tower, because there was construction taking place on the 103rd floor. This June, I got to stand in one of the skydeck ledges on the 103rd floor. These ledges extend over four feet outside of the 103rd floor - 1353 feet over Wacker Drive and the Chicago River.

Favorite Cache of the Year - Treasure Hidden in a Field by Worldtraveler (GCF1D5)
This was an incredible cache hunt that I had been wanting to do since I started geocaching more than six years ago. Part of the fun was in remembering what geocaching was like when I began. It was sad to read about what has happened to it in the months after my visit.

This list is subject to change as my memory gets refreshed regarding the caches I enjoyed.

Final Finds of 2010 - 12/31/2010

I had the entire week off, but spent the early part of the week doing cache maintenance. The latter part of the week had off-and-on rain, so I didn't plan on any big cache runs. On Thursday, jbgreer and I hunted Flip Dizzy - Monkey Comes In by Abiectio (GC1AVN2), one of two remaining caches in the Flip Dizzy series we needed to hunt before going after the penultimate cache in the series. If you are a cacher local to the Memphis area, you really should do the entire series. It's probably the best (that I know of) in the area.

On Friday, the rain held off long enough for jbgreer and I to hunt Flip Dizzy Loves Jelly Beans by Abiectio (GC194XF). This hunt turned out to be relatively easy compared to some we have done in the area, especially considering the terrain rating. I took a lot of pictures, but can't post many of them because they are spoilers. We got back to the car just before darkness set in, and headed back into Memphis where jbgreer dropped me off.

When I got back to my computer, I began work on the puzzle for Flip Dizzy - Flip Out by Abiectio (GC1CW22), taking only a short break for dinner. After many wrong turns, I finally hit upon the solution.

I was pretty excited about solving the puzzle, and because I knew only about a half-dozen finds had been made in the two years since the cache was published, I wanted to post a note on the cache page that basically said that I had solved the puzzle and that as soon as my caching partner solved it, we would be hunting it. When I went to post the note, I saw that on 12/20, a couple of "cache jackals" had posted notes saying that they had found the cache and would log it online after they "met the requirements".

[ Do you take the path less traveled? ]

I look forward to hunting Flip Dizzy - Flip Out by Abiectio (GC1CW22), which according to spoilers in the cache logs, is a multi-stage cache.

Anyways, it's a New Year and time for me to get to work creating my list of favorite finds of 2010.

Update 1/1: My caching partner, jbgreer called me this morning to let me know he has solved the puzzle for "Flip Out".

Overton Park - 12/30/2010

I met up with my caching buddy jbgreer at 8am. Our plans were to have breakfast and then hunt a few caches, mostly in Overton Park. Puzzle caches were pretty much the order of the day. I had one to find in Overton Park and jbgreer had two with another one in another park. Overton Park has a lot of great trails winding through old-growth forest and is a lot of fun to explore.

[ these woods look a lot creepier in the wintertime ]

Our first cache to hunt was Colors by cgeek (GCY9RB). I had found the cache a little over four years ago, so I was certain we would be able to find it on this day. I stood off to the side and watched jbgreer search around for the cache. After a while, I decided to sidle over to where I had found the cache earlier and could not find it. After some more futile searching, we decided to move on.

The second cache we went after was Flip Dizzy - Monkey Comes In by Abiectio (GC1AVN2). We had both been working on the puzzle for this cache for a long time. For my part, I had discovered all of the pieces to solve the puzzle along time ago, but couldn't get a verifiable solution. I ended up having to use another tool to get correct coordinates. My original solution had me 50 feet off of what proved to be the actual coordinates. The cache area, itself, was fairly easy to get to. It was hidden well, though, so once at ground zero, we searched every possible spot before jbgreer made the find.

Confidence restored, we returned to the spot where "Colors" was supposed to be. Even though it was logged as found the day before, we found no trace of it. Time to move on...

[ interesting debris ]

While in the park, we also checked on Overton Park Mystery Cache by Spencersb (GCPKGJ). I adopted this excellent cache a few years ago and had done some much-needed maintenance on it two days earlier. It had been found between the time I cleaned it up and this day and was still in good shape even after rain the day before.

Next cache on the list for jbgreer was No Ducks Here by lkvids (GCTPK4). I was FTF on this cache back in March of 2006 and it hadn't had many visitors since. I stood off and waited for jbgreer to make the find.

It was about noon and since jbgreer had some more time, we went after two more caches in north Raleigh. I had found these before (crownjewel classic's #3 (GC2392E) and crownjewel classic's #4 by crownjewel (GC2392Q)), so I waited in the car while jbgreer hunted them.

I enjoyed the hunt, even though I only logged one find.

Downtown Memphis - 12/26/2010

It was a bitterly cold day today. That made it a perfect time to go down to the Riverfront to do some maintenance on a cache I have at Martyr's Park. It was about a 30 minute hike from where I work to downtown and there were few people out today. I figured I'd also take the opportunity to scout out the Pyramid area for an upcoming visit.

Once at the Pyramid, I saw some construction equipment parked at the south end of the parking lot near Memphis's Great Pyramid of Cheops by kingmedic (GC20ZHX). I walked over and quickly found the cache and took a quick picture of the Pyramid.


It was also a perfect time to check out the condition of another nearby puzzle cache: Ramesses' Tomb by Sprout (GCTN3Y) that had been recently archived because of a missing graphic on the cache page - a hieroglyphic description of the coordinates. The cache container is still in its spot, undisturbed since its last visitor in October. While in the area, I also scouted out some good spots to photograph the Egyptian Explorer travel bug I should be receiving soon.

After leaving Pyramid Plaza, I headed south along the riverwalk towards Martyr's Park. On the way, I hunted Last Call by Rizzlefoshizzle (GC2BHC3). I finally arrived at the park and was pleased to find no one around. I replaced the log in my cache - Memphis Martyrs by Tuck Sackett (adopted by Mackheath) (GCN59Y) and spent a little time looking for an alternate hide spot. I will be coming back here soon with a better container.

With all of my geocaching work done, I headed back into downtown to get a bite to eat before returning to work.

Secret Egypt

On December 8th, I was contacted by the Herbert Art Gallery & Museum in Coventry, England and was invited to host a Travel Bug whose primary goal was to visit Egyptian-themed sites in Memphis before making its way back to Coventry. If possible, part of the wish for the TB is for it to make it back in time to be part of the Secret Egypt exhibit that will run from February to June 2011.

This particular Travel Bug is one of 40 released with the goal of visiting specific Egyptian-themed sites or museums in different parts of the world. I have been monitoring the logs of the others, and some are doing better than others in accomplishing their goals.

I am expecting the Travel Bug to arrive any day now and will post details on its journey while with me as well as links to allow tracking it as it moves on. While it is unlikely that I will run across any geocachers while I am in possession of the TB, any I do come across are more than welcome to "discover" it.

Update: 12/27/2010: It looks like bad weather may have delayed the travel bug's arrival. I didn't receive it today, and tomorrow is the last sunny day we are forecasted to have until Saturday or Sunday. The good news is that I took lots of good test pictures at the Pyramid (yesterday) and the Memphis Zoo (today).

Update: 1/5/2011: Will today be the day I receive the TB? I hope so, because we have a string of good weather days coming up.

Update: 1/7/2011: Sigh. No travel bug this week.

Update: 1/22/2011: Nothing yet...

Update: 2/7/2011: Finally, the TB arrives after being somewhere in transit for seven weeks. I will create a future blog entry tracking its progress with me and beyond.

Groundspeak Souvenirs are Rolling Out

I'm still trying to figure out what these souvenirs are all about. I received my first one earlier in the year. I "earned" it by logging a cache find on 10-10-10 and it was in honor of the 10th anniversary of geocaching. There was an attempt to set a record for the most cachers logging a find in a single day.

In recent weeks, Groundspeak has been rolling out souvenirs for each of the 50 U.S. states as well as a few international ones, and ones for special events. The state ones are being awarded retroactively, and I have been "awarded" souvenirs for caches found in Kentucky and Tennessee. Based on my caching history, I should be getting about 20 more state souvenirs soon.