July Heat Caching

July was a tough month for geocaching in West Tennessee.  My primary goal this year has been to fill calendar days with one or more caches and July had a lot of days to fill.  Lots of weekdays for spent driving on busy roads to get a single cache before of after work.  I got my last one today on July 31 so I can take a break until mid-September.

I made it to two events this month;
Geocaching 101/FUNdamentals Class and More by Wrath557 and Co | GC5XAKP which was held outdoors in miserable heat, and
Wrath557's 3K Event by godzirra! | GC5Y29F which was held indoors the day after the previous event.  I enjoyed both events, but the second was cool because they lost my food order and gave me a free meal.

Now that I've passed 4700 finds, I can now see myself reaching 5000 sometime in the next year.  But first, I'll let it cool down a bit.

Delta Area Geocachers

Just a little over 8 years ago on May 20, 2007,  the DeltaGeo Meet and Greet was held.  It's not particularly easy to find information regarding the Delta Area Geocachers group now, but it was created and existed briefly during the GOWT geocaching war of 2007.  It was created by two of the remaining members of the GOWT Executive Committee (after most of the others split off to form Jackson Area Geocachers) along with a third local cacher, and if it would have survived, GOWT would probably no longer exist.

It was a fun time with a lot of geocachers from all over and was possibly the most photographed event I've even been to.  Here's to you, Delta Area Geocachers.

May Events in West Tennessee

I haven't been doing much geocaching in the past two months.  What little caching I have done is to fill days on my geocalendar.  That's been a little tough because most of my empty days are during the week so I have to get up early to find a cache before heading into work.

I have been attending geocaching events whenever possible and this month I made it to two.

On May 3, I went to 15 Years of Geocaching! by Team SpiderMonkey | GC5RR65 at Shelby Farms Park to celebrate the 15th anniversary of Geocaching and of course get another meaningless "souvenir" to add to my digital collection.

I got to the park early and headed out to find nearby caches before the event. The first cache  I found was Cache Hiders: A House Made of Bricks by Cache Hiders | GC5N85K. Excellent cache with a field puzzle to get the combination to a lock on the cache.  I got the numbers, but could not read the lock to open it.  I solved this problem by using my camera zoom to read the numbers.  As a side note, there was much speculation at the event on the identity of "Cache Hiders", an alias for a cacher who has put out a half-dozen uniquely challenging caches recently.  Personally, I don't care who he/she is.

After I got home I found a tick on my upper left arm.  Two days later, I had a physical and showed my bite to the doctor who insisted on putting me on antibiotics for a week.  Better safe than sorry, I guess.

My next event was 1K Journey with JoanKV, tuttik, and MorWoods by stemor | GC5THX4 on May 16.  Lots of people came out to celebrate at a Mexican place in Cordova.  It was fun, but crowded.  I should have taken more pictures, but I did see a nice box one of the cachers had to store geocoins in.

GOWT and ABOUT

I don't remember how long ago I stumbled upon the facebook page for "GOWT and ABOUT", a geocaching podcast centered on geocaching in West Tennessee.  I know it took me awhile to get around to listening to any of the podcasts, due to their length.  When I did, however, I found that I enjoyed listening to geocaching stories and news of the area, and there are some pretty good interviews as well.

About a month ago now, I had the opportunity to be interviewed by the hosts of GOWT and ABOUT, itcomagic, godzirra!, and cdhundley.  It wasn't lost on me that I was being interviewed by members of GOWT nearly five years after having been banned from their forums and subsequently their facebook group.

The people of GOWT and ABOUT, as well as most members of GOWT are good people that I enjoy talking to at events, so I was excited to be interviewed by itcomagic and crew.

After a nice seafood dinner, prepared by itcomagic and godzirra!, we embarked on the process of making a podcast.  A lot of work goes into each podcast, and it was amazing how fast the evening went by.  Maybe the blue margaritas we were drinking had something to do with that.

I admit, I haven't listened to much of the interview I did, yet.  I don't really like listening to my own voice that much and I was concerned about what crazy-ass things I might say having drunk enough margaritas.  But I encourage any of you reading this blog to check out the GOWT and ABOUT page on facebook and listen to the podcasts.  I think you will like them.

Here is a link to my interview.  Listen at your own risk. :-)

Pi Day caching - 3/14/(20)15

I admit I haven't been doing much geocaching lately other than to fill in calendar days, but I always try to get to events, especially when souvenirs are involved.  It was an otherwise dreary Saturday, but lots of fun was had at - The Pi's of March - by Team Synchronicity | GC5MBX3.  After enjoying my first shrimp po-boy indoors, I came out and joined a large crowd of geocachers in the parking lot where the event officially was being held.

 [ a nice geocoin door prize that I didn't win ] 

After the event, I went to Overton Park with lostandfound28, joankv, and tuttik to find GGU2GD Means Gotta Get Up To Get Down by cdhundley | GC5MG55.  Nice cache in a nice park.  Afterwards, I went with joankv and tuttik to hunt Tarasque Means Fearsome Legendary Mytho Hybrid by cdhundley | GC5GTNK and get another Pi Day souvenir.

The 2015 Annual GOWT Gathering - 2/22/2015

The 2015 Annual GOWT Gathering   by itcomagic and godzirra! | GC5KZZF marked ten years since the founding meeting was held.  Once again, the event was held at Bozo's in Mason, TN. Lots of people turned out on a very cold and rainy Saturday.

I arrived early and sat at the same spot as I sat ten years ago at the founding meeting.  Unlike the first meeting, I knew most of the people at this event.  Reading the logs afterwards, it looks like only four people from the original event made it to this one (Hoot Owl, bitbrain, pcsenn, and myself).  Maybe it was because of the weather, but I didn't see many of my Jackson-area friends.

The godzirra! 1K Event of Doom!!! - 2/15/2015

On Sunday, February 15, I attended The godzirra! 1K Event of Doom!!! by itcomagic | GC5KVRR at Fox Ridge Pizza in Cordova, TN.  I haven't been to that place since I hosted a 1k event for cgeek way back in 2006.  Lots of folks showed up for this event and a good time was had by all.  This event also filled in a day on my geo-calendar leaving me with 51 days left to fill in.

Office Space Themed Geocaches - 1/18/2015

This weekend, I discovered a small cluster of caches named after characters from the movie "Office Space".  Seven caches in all, in an area of Memphis that doesn't see many caches.  I decided to hunt these caches on Sunday (1/18) because it was an empty day on my geocaching calendar and I'm slowly trying to complete a cache hunt for every day of the year.  With a find on this day, I completed the month of January.

For reference, here is a link to the first cache in this group that I found: Office Space: Joanna
by jdoz22 | GC5K24D.  All caches were nanos that were remarkably easy to find and were in goo shape (because they were new).

There were two other caches in the area I didn't go after.  One was a puzzle and the other had way too many muggles to attempt on this day.

GOWT Lecture Series Event 1 - 1/11/2015

I went over to Cameron Brown Park in Germantown, TN today to attend a discussion on what cachers carry with them on geocaching trips.

 

[event hosts]

The event was hosted by itcomagic and godzirra! and lasted about two hours.  It was interesting to see what they carried in a relatively small pack.  I used to carry more stuff with me, but now am lucky to have my first aid kit handy when I need it.  In the winter, I carry whatever supplies I can round up in the pockets of my jacket.   In warmer weather, I seldom get out to caches where I would need tools to retrieve.

All in all, it was a good time in spite of the chilly temperatures.

Arkansas Hwy 70 Series Completed - 12/21/2014

I had been planning to return to finish the Hwy 70 series of caches between Little Rock and Brinkley, AR for over a year.  This power trail consists of 174 mostly easy finds.

My first attempt was on August 24, 2013.  I drove to Brinkley, AR to get on Hwy 70 and the headed west to end of the string of 20 caches.  I found all of those, got back on the interstate heading west to reenter Hwy 70 at Fredonia(?).  I had many hits and misses on this leg, but still managed at least 40 finds.

My second attempt was on September 7, 2013.  I drove to Carlisle, AR, got off the interstate to hunt caches heading back to the east.  After having so many DNFs on the previous attempt, and reading that the owners encouraged replacement, I brought and used at least 10 replacement caches and still had plenty of hits and misses.  I had to end this trip prematurely when the brakes on my car started to give out.  I managed to make it back to Memphis and a repair shop to get them fixed.

The most recent trip was very different.  I picked a perfect December day to attack this series from the western end of the route.  The last cachers to do the series replaced almost every cache along the route, so when I hit the trail, I had only 2 or 3 DNFs (on the east end) and a surprising number of dry logs. Most of the logs were unbagged, so they were really quick to find, log, and replace. I ended up with 81 finds of the series with 5 additional finds on another series north of Lonoke and ending with 2 more along Hwy 70 before getting back on the interstate for the remainder of the trip home.  After getting home, I had just enough energy to eat dinner before collapsing in bed.

12/13/14 - Events Weekend - 12/13-14/14

{ I will flesh this out a bit more later this week.}

I wasn't sure what I would end up doing this particular weekend, so I marked "Will Attend" on event caches for Saturday and Sunday.  My only plan for Sunday was to log a cache/event to mark the day on my geocaching calendar.

Saturday, I made the drive to Collierville's W.C. Johnson Park to attend Twelve Thirteen Fourteen by bitbrain | GC5H6GD at the Peterson Lake Nature Center.  Not many people had logged they were coming so I think everyone was surprised at the large number of people who showed up.

After the event, I logged a nearby earthcache Peterson Lake Wetlands by cloud_dog_9 | GC5H2E0 and tackled two additional caches along the greenbelt trail that proceeds south from the park.  Both caches were excellent in both hide and camouflage techniques.

Sunday, it was off to an afternoon event in Audubon Park in East Memphis called Hot Dogs -n- Not Dogs II: Patty Duke's Birthday by Team Discord | GC58BWF.  First, I tried for a third time to hunt Eat Yer Vegetables by cdhundley | GC44HMP.  I ran into team hdrider55 leaving that cache (which they had found) so I was disappointed that I still couldn't find it. 

I made it to the event on time and enjoyed a couple of hot dogs while listening to caching stories.  I left early when hdrider55 offered to help me find GC4HMP.  That was another excellent cache as well as evidence that I have spent too much time lately on easy caches.

10 Years of Geocaching - 11/30/2014

Ten years ago, on 11/26/2004 a friend of mine convinced me to get out and try geocaching for the first time.

Ten years later, while I don't have quite the same exuberance I once had, still wanted to get out and hunt some caches this Thanksgiving weekend.

On 11/27, Thanksgiving Day, I hunted two caches, including Bridge over River Dry by hikerRon | GC4RHQ7 in Millington, TN.  I was a cool cache near a Veterans Memorial.  I'd been caching around the Wal-Mart across the street, but had never noticed this monument and "bridge."

On 11/29, I decided to make a geocache run into Arkansas, making stops at Marked Tree, Trumann, and Jonesboro.

Marked Tree was a great place to avenge some earlier DNFs.

This empty cotton field struck me as picture-worthy after hunting a cache in the Arkansas Hwy 463 Series across the road.

 There can never be too many Veterans Memorials.  The cache was nearby.

Stumped? by RememberingTree | GC5D1VW in Jonesboro was my favorite hide of the trip.

Along with a cache, the Jonesboro Farmer's Market had their Christmas trees out.

On 11/30, I visited the western end of the Vollintine/Evergreen Greenline to hunt Blue Man
by shottsy | GC5H0JA in Midtown Memphis.

The last time I was here, the "Blue Men" had been vandalized.  Today all appeared to be in good shape.

Hot Dogs by the River - 11/1/2014

I hated to break my 68 day streak of not geocaching, but the prospect of free hot dogs was too great to pass up.  Saturday's event cache was called Hot Dogs -n- Not Dogs  by Team Synchronicity | GC5F591.  I made it down to Tom Lee Park just as the event was starting.  I was greeted by one of the hosts, shottsy, who it turns out knows my caching buddy jbgreer.

Plenty of people showed up both for the food and the free swag provided by Groundspeak.  It was a fun gathering in spite the chilly temperature.

International Geocaching Day 2014 - 8/16/2014

International Geocaching Day kind of just popped up on me this year.  I didn't really want to get outside in the heat (91 degrees), but I had a couple of nearby easy caches saved to do, so I got out and quickly did them.

I had never been on this particular street before and was surprised to find lots of activity going on at the first cache - located near Wiseacre Brewery.

Ananda means Bliss by cdhundley | GC59B75

Just as I found the cache, a bunch of people walked by and most likely saw me, although they didn't say anything.

The second cache was just a little further down the same road and had nobody around to observe me make the easy find.

Tiny B. means Tiny B.by cdhundley | GC59B8N 

10 minutes for two caches and I was back in my car headed for air conditioning.

7 Souvenirs of August Challenge

Like last year, Groundspeak decided to stimulate caching activity in the hottest month of the year by initiating another geocaching challenge.  Unlike last year's challenge that require cachers to find at least one cache a day for the 31 days in August, this years challenge was relatively simple.

This year's challenge involved finding 6 different types of caches.  You get a souvenir for each type plus a 7th souvenir if you manage to get all 6 cache types.  Some categories only had one type of cache like traditional or multicache, where other categories had more than one qualifying type, allowing you to choose betwee, for instance, letterbox and webcam caches.

I started the challenge on August 1st (Friday), finding a traditional cache and attending an event cache.

7 Souvenirs of August Meet and Greet by txgo4fan | GC58M41 earned me a "Socialzer" souvenir.

Mmm Chicken by moose16285 | GC4XT25 earned me an "Explorer" souvenir.

On Sunday, I set out to get and Earthcache, a Letterbox cache, a Puzzle cache, and possibly a Multicache.  If I had been successful, I would have finished the challenge relatively quickly.  But it was a hot, miserable day with plenty of mishaps.  I struck out on the Letterbox cache in Shelby Farms.  Of course it was there somewhere since it was found a few days later.

Next, I went after a puzzle cache from my list of several I had pre-solved.  I went after three of the "Office Space" caches in Germantown and struck out for various reasons.  Mishaps included dropping my phone at one and having to backtrack to find out.  I did manage to hit paydirt on the fourth puzzle cache I went after.


Nothing Up My Sleeve   by tinksdad01 | GC4N6MH - earned me the "Puzzler" souvenir.

Finally, I attempted to get one of the two earthcaches that were within a twenty mile drive.  I skipped over the one in Chucalissa in South Memphis to get an isolated one in North Mississippi.

The Mississippi Delta by dameetro | GC3NFQA - earned me the "Nature Lover" souvenir.  I had found a traditional cache at this same spot, so I at least knew where I had to go.

Four down, two to go.  I thought about taking off of work on Wednesday to get the final caches needed to complete the challenge because of rain predicted for the weekend (and the next weekend).  I did some research and found a virtual cache, a letterbox cache and several easy looking multicaches in Tupelo, MS that didn't appear to involve going into the woods.  I then took a chance that the weather would be good enough for me to make a trip to Tupelo on Saturday, August 8.

Saturday came and I overslept a bit, but I didn't really need to rush.  It was about 100 miles to Tupelo and I made it there by 10:30am.  I headed to the Elvis Presley birthplace museum and got the letterbox cache on my list as well as a nearby multicache.

Elvis Presley's Birthplace by Gyrocacher | GC48EFY - earned me the "Collector" souvenir.


Elvis Presley: Assembly of God by Gyrocacher | GC59Q4D - earned me the final souvenir I needed - the "Sightseer" souvenir

 On my way out of town, I diverted north to the Natchez Trace Parkway to get a virtual cache event though I no longer needed to.

Twentymile Bottom by Salvo | GC8F1D - was an alternate qualifier for the "Collector" souvenir.

On the way back out I stopped at the Natchez Trace Parkway Visitor's Center and found one more cache - 

Visitors Welcome by Natchez Trace Pkwy | GC3T7CJ 

When I got back to my computer, I saw that I had earned the "Achiever" souvenir, making me the 6,350th person to do so.  Now I can relax. 

Summer Road Trip 2014

I attempted to complete my attempt to find caches in all contiguous counties on my way to and from Oregon (from Tennessee).  I only needed one county (in Oklahoma) on my usual route out west, so I had made tentative plans to cut north into Kansas to make progress on an alternate route.  I was effectively prevented from doing this by strong storms in Kansas predicted for the day I was to arrive so I stayed to the south and found a few random caches on that route.

On the way back east, I only needed caches in Missouri counties.  I found a few caches along the route before hitting Missouri.  Somewhere along the vacation, I lost the list of counties in Missouri I needed to hit, so after I found caches in the northwest corner of Missouri, I simply tried to get as many counties along I-70 as I could.  As you can tell by looking closely at the Missouri map, I only appear to have missed one county (near St. Louis).  Pretty good considering I got there around the morning rush hour.

I added 10 counties to my list:  1 in Oklahoma to close my southern (east to west) route.  1 in Colorado, and 9 in Missouri to almost close my northern (west to east) route.  If I get another chance to make this trip, I'll try to hunt more counties in Kansas, Oklahoma, and Colorado to try and close that route.

Geocaching Maker Madness Event - 3/30/2014

I decided to take some time off from doing nothing to attend an event in Germantown, TN's Cameron Brown Park.  This event, which awarded a souvenir, was designed to honor the people who take the time and effort to place great geocaches.  The host was wrath557 and the guest speakers were magicrock and abiectio.  We learned about camo caches and puzzle caches.  A good time was had by all.

Afterwards, I teamed up with Ham-R-Hed, bitbrain, and bevofan to tackle At The End Of My Rope by tinksdad01 | GC4QA8T.  I almost found the cache by myself, but ended up missing the mark.  This cache earned one of my "coveted" favorite points amd I wish I could describe the experience without spoiling it for others who haven't found it.  As we were about to leave the cache site, another cacher came along so we entertained ourselves by watching here struggle to find it.

On the way out of the park, I got one more find - Where Young Folks Play by ProntoPup | GC4VVQY to end my day.  There was another event nearby, but I'd had enough fun for one day.

W. C. Johnson Park - 12/28/2013

It's hard to believe we are at the end of another year. It's even harder to believe that it has been an entire month since I hunted a geocache.  On this day, I was fortunate to be able to get together with my geocaching buddy jbgreer for a nice hunt in a nice Collierville park.  Almost all of the caches we hunted on this trip were placed this year and I had been waiting for cold weather to hunt them.

After enjoying a nice breakfast, we headed to Collierville, TN and made it to W. C. Johnson Park by 10:30am.  We headed out on the boardwalk into the woods and it started to sprinkle almost immediately.  We had also made the decision not to wear waterproof boots, which on this day turned out to be an excellent decision.

We found ten caches in the woods - nine were by peanutpapa and one was by tiger130.  All were great caches and easily findable.  After leaving the woods we decided to tackle one more cache - Johnson Park Pavilion by rebeldawg | GC47KDY.  This one had evaded me over the summer and on this day as well.  Fortunately, jbgreer did a better job of searching the hiding spot than I did.  We were done by 2pm or so and headed back to Memphis.

[I'll flesh this out a little more - maybe tomorrow.]

9 Years of Geocaching - 11/26/2013

This week was not only Thanksgiving week, but it marked the end of my ninth year of gecaoching.  I 'celebrated" by hunting a couple of caches on my way to Thanksgiving dinner, becuase I mistakenly thought the anniversary date was 11/28.  My bad. 

I had plans to get 4 caches. including a puzzle cache I had solved earlier.  I managed to leave home without my GPSr so my phone had to do for navigation.  I missed the first two caches on my list because I missed a turn and I was running a little behind schedule.  The two caches I did manage to get to were worth the hunt event though I found both fairly quickly.

THE WRATH OF ROCK by magicrock | GC4NYQJ - The puzzle was based on Start Trek II: The Wrath of Khan trivia.  Some answers I knew, others were found on the internet.  Since I didn't have my GPS, I couldn't enter new coordinates on my phona app (as far as I know), so I have to guide myself with the tiny numbers on the app that show current location.  Excellent cache - as anyone who has hunted magicrock caches can attest to.

Rocky Branch by sailemstable | GC2582B  - I used Google Street View to look at the cache area and a spolier pic to identify the cache.  Still, it was a cool cache!  The dog mentioned on the cache page didn't come out, I imagine because he was too busy begging for turkey scraps.

I'm sure I have mentioned this somewhere before, but my first cache find was on 11/26/2004 and was Overton Park Magnetic Wood!? by Spencersb | GCKAX7.  I found it with my caching buddy jbgreer and without the benefit of my own GPS unit.

Caching in Union City, TN - 9/15/2013

Most of my recent excursions have been to Arkansas to the west or Mississippi to the south.  It has been a while since I visited northwest Tennessee.  The first thing I had to do was adjust my pocket query for that area because it has a lot more caches to pick from since my last visit.  The second thing to do was target a specific area.  I have cached in Union City once before along with the surrounding towns and enjoyed my visit.  This time I wanted to focus on Union City itself because it had close to 40 caches in a relatively small area.

{ Beautiful day for geocaching ]

I set out early Sunday morning, just before sunrise.  The weather was nice and cool.  The one thing I did not expect, though, was fog.  It slowed me down a bit and I had to be really careful until after the sun rose and the fog burned off. 

I made a few stops along the way.  Because I took Hwy 51, there is only one rest stop near Henning that I used to organize my maps for the day.  I found ROOTS' --easy micro by lookingUPward | GC4099P in Henning shortly after.  A police car parked by me as I was about to leave the cache site, but he didn't stop me for anything.

I stopped to get an easy cache at a Confederate memorial site in Trimble that had some of the nicest scenery on the trip.  After I signed the log, some dude in a pickup parked near me and sat there while I walked around the area taking pictures.  Creeped me out a bit.

Continuing north, I picked up two caches in Troy before arriving in Union City around 9am - at least an hour later than I had planned.

I hit all of the caches from west to east along Reelfoot Avenue early, which was good because later the traffic was crazy.  I then found most of the caches in the center of town before going after the caches in the Veteran's park at the north end of town.

[ I turned my phone back on for a moment to take this one picture of the Veterans Park. ]

I started running into one technical problem after another as the day progressed.  Because my GPSr maps chip is damaged, I was using my phone for autorouting.  Before I covered a third of the caches, my battery was down to 11 percent and I ended up turning it off.  This also cost me the ability to read cache descriptions and logs.  My GPSr, a Garmin 60csx had no maps, so I had to rely on the compass - like I did as a beginner.  I had paper maps to help me a little, but I didn't have many notes written because I was becoming more reliant on my phone.  I didn't have my camera along because I had started to rely more on my phone to take pictures.  Lessons learned for sure on this trip.  These things slowed me down a little, but I still had a lot of fun.  Most all of the caches were low difficulty/terrain so I didn't get too frustrated.  I also got talk to a woman about geocaching.  She had seen many people visit a particular spot looking for something, and she picked this day to finally ask somebody what was going on.  I dislike encounters like that normally, but we had a nice talk before I had to move on.

I had a late lunch at a Subway before heading back south the same way I came in.  I picked up a few more caches in Dyersburg before ending my day.