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.

Wolf River Wildlife Corridor - 11/27/2010

For the 6th anniversary of jbgreer and I discovering the joys of geocaching, we naturally celebrated by hunting more caches. Because of the cool temperatures and relative dry weather, I suggested that we hunt a few caches in the Wolf River Wildlife Corridor in Collierville, TN. We met up at jbgreer's house around 8:15am.

We have hunted caches in this area at least three different times and under varying seasons and conditions, and knew that this could be a tough area to traverse. Most of the caches were way off of the main trail, and depending on the time of year, many caches could involve wading in swamps.

As we were approaching our destination, I noticed a cache that must be fairly new, because I didn't know it was in the area. We stopped and hunted The Life and History of Toys and Games by ItchyScratchyBumpy (GC2AKGP). It was a nicely-stocked cache and easy to find. I like starting the day with at least one easy cache.

[ nice place for the first cache of the day ]

After a minor routing error caused by old mapping data, we made it to the parking area on the northwest end of the Wildlife Corridor. Hopefully the county will make a better parking area there, but it was fine for our purposes. We had both brought tall rubber boots, but decided at the last moment to no use them. All of the caches we went after in this area were created by peanutpapa.

The first cache we went after was Beaver Falls Cache (GC1WGTW). During our previous trips to the area, this one always got left off of our list. Mostly because we were exhausted from hunting other caches. We took an interesting path to this cache, and at times couldn't see our feet. We found the cache and then spent some time observing the handiwork of the beavers.

[ no beavers in sight today ]

Next on the list was Slough Cache West (GC24H48). It was a short distance to the southeast and we encountered no difficulties reaching it. After finding it, we used a provided waypoint to lead us south to the main trail.

[ the dry sloughs made hiking from cache to cache very easy ]

From the main trail, we used another provided waypoint to lead us to the entry point for Old Logging Road Cache by peanutpapa (GC24CVR). We saw were the logging road started, but it was easy to lose track of where it went on the way to the cache. It was the lowest rated of the caches we found, but on this day it seemed no easier than any of the others. Once back on the main trail, we hiked east until we found an entry point to go for Slough Cache (GC1PP10). This was one we hunted on two other occasions only to be stopped by high water. On this day, it was a simple walk in the park. This cache was maybe 20 feet north of its posted coordinates, which might have been another reason we didn't find it before, but on this day it was easy to spot.

Our final cache of the morning was Cotton Farm Cache (GC1W34K). This area gets deep during the rainy time of the year. This day was definitely a good day to hunt it.

[ most of the caches in this area are obviously subject to flooding ]

After finding the cache, we headed north to the cotton fields and took the trail back to were we had started.

[ north of the cotton fields and an easy hike back to the truck ]

We got back to the truck around 11:30am and since we were going to move the truck to a different area for our next group of caches, we decided to grab lunch in Collierville first. We had many delicious options and finally settled on a fast lunch at Lenny's Sub Shop.

[ In honor of the Thanksgiving holiday - a big turkey sandwich ]

After lunch, we decided we had just enough time to tackle three caches in W.C. Johnson Park. This park is just to the south of the area we hunted in the morning and on the other side of the Wolf River. These were the only three caches we had left in this park to find, and they were deep in the wetlands.

[ W.C. Johnson Park wetlands feature nice boardwalks ]

We took the boardwalk from the parking area all the way north to the Wolf River before cutting west and paralleling the river. All of the caches we went after here were created by peanutpapa.

Our first find was South Beach Cache (GC1PY9F). It wasn't too far off of the boardwalk and was an easy and dry hike.

[ This possum seemed oblivious to our presence ]

Slough Cache South by peanutpapa (GC1Q1VB) was next and was another great cache and hike. The most difficult cache of the afternoon was Weir #3 Cache by peanutpapa (GC1PYBM). The terrain was tough in spots and could have been a nightmare if there had been any water around. From here, it was a 0.83 mile hike back to the boardwalk. Just before reaching the boardwalk, we spotted a trail that we didn't notice on the way into the woods.

[ spotted on the way out of the woods ]

Before leaving the park, I took one more picture from the boardwalk. This picture is more representative of what the area normally looks like.

[ near the entrance of the wetlands - the most water we saw today ]

We were very impressed by the quality of the wetland caches we found on this day. All were in water-tight containers and were tethered to their locations to prevent them from floating away during the times the area is flooded. There were a few that were exposed due to lack of available natural covering. Some could be spotted from a good distance away at this time of the year. I don't know if hunting game is allowed in the area, so I imagine that not too many people wander this far off of the main trail system.

Lucius C. Burch Natural Area - 11/20/2010

[ this web was created by a spider who was afraid of heights ]

I got together with my caching buddy, jbgreer, around 8am to go geocaching in the Lucius C. Birch Natural Area. Most of the caches we went after on this day were to the south and southwest of the Agricenter. We started the morning with two easy caches by drew274. Both were near the newly paved parking area at the southeast corner of the Natural Area. Something Fun, Something Dark (GC2D6TG) , a nice magnetic keyholder was our first find. Something is Rotten in Denmark (GC2D6TW) was our second find. This one was in a little rougher terrain and was nicely stocked and well-hidden.

Our next cache ACME-3025 by giardia_boy (GC2473T), was close by, but we decided to move the truck and come at it and the others from a different location. I had looked for this one once before, and it took some work to find it. The hint was technically inaccurate unless you are a giant. The next cache was an interesting one - The horse eats no cucumber-salad by Abiectio (GC2DV8E). The accompanying puzzle wasn't that difficult, but neither jbgreer nor myself could get evince to confirm our coordinates. We ended up using the coordinates I had come up with - which put us right on it.

We only had one more cache on the list: ACME-Oh Brother Not Another by giardia_boy (GC2DX2E). Since we knew it had a lot of stages, we decided to take a break and get some breakfast at the nearby Chick-Fil-A. Once back at the starting point for the cache, we hunted stage after stage. Most stages were quickly found and all stages used interesting hide techniques. The final had a special surprise! This cache may have been my favorite multicache of the year (for those anxiously awaiting my picks for cache of the year). I met giarda_boy and an event in Collierville last May and have enjoyed the many caches of his I have found.

With this cache done and no more on my list for the area, jbgreer and I drove back to his house and parted ways. Since it was still early in the afternoon, I decided to hunt three more nearby caches that were basically park and grabs before going home.

Bye, Bye, Boneyards???

I noticed the other day that FTF Pirate #1: Boneyards by Chance Encounter (GCYX0Z) has been disabled as mostly likely a prelude to archival. This 3-stage multicache is set in three of Memphis' grittiest cemeteries and hasn't been found in almost three years.

[ from Chance Encounter's geocaching.com profile ]

It would be simple to say that this cache was disabled because some noob filed a "Needs Maintenance" log on a cache he had never visited, but the truth is that this cache along with many others was abandoned by its owner years ago. I, myself, tackled this cache back in March only to get to the final stage and not be able to find it. The coords placed it near a stream of sorts. Maybe it washed away, or maybe it is simply buried under a ton of brush in the area. It would be nice if the cache could be saved, if only because it represents a time before we were flooded by pointless Park and Grabs.

If this cache ends up archived, I will post the pictures I took at the various stages.