Huntington, OR - 7/4/2010

My Dad and I decided to drive down to Huntington, OR to spend the day with my brother and family. They had a rented a small house with some friends for a three-day fishing weekend along the Snake River.

I planned to pick up a few caches along the way, but found out while on the road that I didn't have any caches for the area around Huntington loaded. My only find of the day was BUB # 1 Durkee and Greenbean Casserail by Team Storm_Runner (GC1E1N4). It was a guard rail cache near the Durkee exit.

It was a beautiful weekend and the extra time spent with family was definitely worth skipping Geowoodstock for.

Union, OR - 6/24/2010

Most of this day's caches were in or around the town of Union, OR. Union is roughly 9 miles south of Cove and is a pretty neat little town.

Our first find was at Union City Park - Creek side park cache by Buck Snort-Clearwater Explorers-Globaltreckers (GC1NA0B). This was nicely tucked away near a rushing creek. Before leaving the park, I decided to take a few pictures. We were spotted by a teenage girl who figured we must be tourists since she has never seen anyone taking pictures there before. She tried to talk our ears off, and it was tough getting away.

Water Works by Jabez Gang (GC1YKBD) was in an area I had cached in before. It was one of those deals where you have a choice to walk along one side of a creek or the other. As usual, I initially chose the wrong side and walked nearly a quarter of a mile before realizing I needed to be on the other side.

Craig Mountain Junction by Person named after the mountain placed this cache. (GC1PEKV) was along the road to Hot Lake Springs. The cache was in a cookie tin and was wet on the inside. At some point I cut my right wrist on something - probably barbed wire.

After finding three caches, I told my Dad that we were done for the day. I think he was disappointed. I was too - it was a great day for caching, but I had no more caches mapped for the area.

On the way back to Cove, we decided to try A Little Bit of Heaven by wallowadave (GC1QT4R). My Mom and I hunted it a couple of days before with no luck. Many previous logs showed that the coordinates were off and I thought I had gone over the area pretty thoroughly before. On this day, I had climbed down a small embankment and when I turned around to tell my Dad something, I spotted the cache.

History Repeats

Seen on a local geocaching forum:

"GOWT is one big, happy clique!"
- tinksdad01, GOWT Advisory Committee 7/19/2010

History repeats itself. This same group was referred to as a clique (actually "click") in a derogatory fashion by a mouthbreather named dalls (now on the GOWT Advisory Committee) three years ago in this same forum.

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For my liberal readers out there - a gift: Yogi's Gun Blog. Written by a West Tennessee geocacher and volunteer cache reviewer and grade-A nutjob. You're welcome.

Pasco, WA - 6/18/2010

After 2 days and 3 nights on the train, I finally arrived in Pasco, WA. I got off of the train at 5:35am ready to do some caching! My dad was going to meet me at the station and since I didn't know if I would be late, I figured I'd have at least an hour to cache before he showed up. After looking around the station to see if anyone was waiting for me, I set out for the first cache of the morning - The Wrong Side Of The Tracks Cache by ISPYU168 (GC112PW). Nice cache in a little park about a half a mile from the station. After finding the cache, I got a call from my Dad saying that he and my brother were at the station. I gave them directions to where I was and they picked me up.

My brother wanted to do some shopping in nearby Kennewick, so we headed south across the river and to the shopping center where he had wanted to go. It was still early so we decided to have breakfast (I don't remember where - maybe IHOP). After a nice breakfast, it was still early so we hunted for nearby caches. Pasco and Kennewick are both cache-rich environments so it didn't take long to find 8 caches. By this time, the stores were opening, so we took care of the business we needed to do in town before heading back to Cove, Oregon. We didn't hunt anymore caches on that drive, in part because my family had to leave home at 3:30am to come and get me.

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Since I didn't take any pictures in Pasco or Kennewick, here are two pictures (of many) I took the day before while passing by Glacier National Park in Montana.

[ Not a very nice day outside. ]

[ We got to hear about how the glaciers are disappearing due to global warming. ]

Chicago, IL - 6/16/2010

I went to visit family in Oregon in June and because of some uncertainties with my car, I decided to take the train. I had a layover in Chicago, so I had mapped out some nearby caches to go after. I did the same thing 2 years ago and was thwarted then by hot and muggy conditions which limited me to only one find near the train station. This trip proved to be much more successful. I arrived in Chicago around 9:30am. Because of my two previous visits, I was much better able to handle getting around. It is amazing how easy it is to get disoriented in downtown Chicago. My GPSr proved to be limited in accuracy, due to the many tall buildings (including the Sears Tower), so I relied largely on a detailed paper map and the cache hints. It was also relatively cool on this morning, which allowed me to get around an area of just over 1/2 sq miles.

My first three stops were southeast of the train station. After finding What'chu talkin' 'bout, Willis? by ShazamMan (GC268AW) on my second attempt at it, I decided to cool off by going in the Willis (Sears) Tower. On my last visit, 15 months or so ago, there were short lines and we were only allowed to go to the 99th floor. This time it was packed and we got to go the the newly renovated 103rd floor with its new viewing platforms. I tried to take my own picture but had little luck getting the shot I wanted. Fortunately, one of the platforms has a camera set up where they will take a picture (for a price) of you.

I thought I'd be nervous, but from that height the ground looks fake. It actually looks scarier standing on the ground and looking up at the platforms. After my visit to the tower, I had lunch at Jimmy John's nearby and found one more cache before it got too warm.

For those wondering: The heat was an issue because I had to spend two more days on the train in the clothes I was wearing.

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On my trip back, I didn't think I'd get to find anything but I did manage to get Tucked Away Downtown by Jeff60523 (GC1NXXG) in a packed area just north of the station (across the street).

Midtown Memphis - 6/12/2010

It is getting to be the time of the year where I take a break from hunting area caches and do other things. I was surprised however, when I looked for local (to me) caches and found that a bunch have been published recently. Three of these new caches were within a mile or so of my residence.

I decided to tackle them after work on Friday and because they didn't get on my most recent PQ, I had to print out the cache pages. Around 5pm, I picked up my GPSr and cache information and set out on a little hike. It was blistering hot (like most of this weekend is supposed to be).

My first stop was The Golden Arches by dguyusnavy (GC29W6B). The immediate area of the cache was guarded by muggles parked in the two adjacent handicap spaces. Not to be too judgemental, but I think their primary handicap was eating at McDonald's. I had to skip this one for now and move on to Buc Lap Series - #2 by dguyusnavy (GC2A0TB)

I pass by this place all of the time when I am out on a run, so it was cool to find a cache there. I was also surprised to be the "FTF" on this cache. I'm not an FTF hound, so this was probably my first in three or four years.

Not far to the south was walk in the park by crownjewel (GC29Y59). I took Hollywood Street south to this one because there was less traffic. First, I passed by the local BSA building just to the north.

Approaching the park, I spotted where I thought the cache was and headed straight for it. It was where I expected, but nicely hidden. I also noticed my GPSr coords were off because I had entered an 8 where I should have had a 3. This is an interesting stretch of land to the west of Tobey Park. It is park-like, but it only apparent purpose is as "extra" parking for events.

["Tailgate" Park]

Many times, the more interesting spots are actually across the street from a cache. In this case, the more interesting spot is the Children's Museum of Memphis.

[ CMOM]

Now, back to The Golden Arches... It was an easy PnG that had personal relevance to the cache owner, but there are many more interesting cache-free spots nearby. Below is an example.

[ Barksdale Mounted Police Station ]

Barksdale Mounted Police Station has an interesting history associated with it. It was where George "Machine Gun" Kelly was temporarily housed after being captured by Memphis Police Officers on September 26, 1933. Kelly was actually born in Memphis.

When I first discovered this place, I wanted to create a "virtual" cache. I even had a detailed description of the history of the building. "Virtual" caches were disallowed before I could get around to it... I thought about submitting this place as a "Waymark", but decided to let someone else interested do it instead. If you were lame, you could do a lightpole cache at the Walgreens next door.

Shelby Farms Greenline

Here is one of the first pictures taken of the near-completed 7 mile stretch of the Shelby Farms Greenline that runs between Shelby Farms Park and Midtown Memphis.

This picture was taken from Waring and faces east towards Shelby Farms. They currently have paved a 1.8 mile strip. After visiting the Delta Heritage Trail, I'm not sure I like this trail being paved, but I imagine it is better for strollers and rollerblades.

The paved section goes from Waring (west) to Podesta Street (east). Podesta Street is where geocachers typically entered the trail/tracks to approach to wooded part of NW Shelby Farms.