This past Wednesday I had a pretty full day caching in two different parts of the state. While visiting my grandparents in Iowa Park I found both of the local caches. Then, after making the four hour drive back to Waco, I met up with Rackin and we polished off the rest of "The Woods." A newly discovered area in Woodway, Texas affectionately known just as "The Woods" by local cachers has been the recent home of a dozen new caches including two of my own. After the day was done I had found 10, performed maintenance visits on 2, and been a part of placing 1 new one.
Showing posts with label Adventures. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Adventures. Show all posts
Friday, December 30, 2005
Tuesday, December 06, 2005
Bastrop State Park
As part of our 5th anniversay, I took my wife to stay at one of the historic C.C.C. cabins in Bastrop State Park. These were created by President Franklin D. Roosevelt's establishment of the Civilian Conservation Corps (C.C.C.), the first New Deal recovery program started after his inauguration on March 4, 1933. While here, we did a little geocaching too.
On the second night of our trip, we drove in to Austin to eat at a fancy restuarant and view the stars through the Painter Hall Observatory on the University of Texas campus.
The 9-inch telescope has a long history with the University. The lens in the telescope is actually older than the tube, mount and dome and was ground a little before the turn of the 20th century by the John A. Brashear company -- one of the finest lens makers of the time. The tube and mount were made by the Warner and Swasey Company of Cleveland and was placed in Painter Hall when the building was constructed in the early 1930s. The dome appears green from the outside because of its high copper content, which oxidizes to a patina similar the color seen on the Statue of Liberty. The inside has been painted but in areas where the paint has chipped, the brilliant original copper can be glimpsed. Unlike most modern telescopes, no electricity is required to operate the clock drive on the telescope. Instead, the drive is wound up to raise a weight which will drop throughout the evening and turn the drive gears.
Saturday, November 26, 2005
Escape from College Station In-Laws
Yesterday, I attended one of the MANY family gatherings in College Station of my wife's family. They are great people and fun to be around, but with 17 people in a house normally occupied by 2, it can be a little overwhelming. They are all big Aggies and a few of them went to the Texas A&M -vs- University of Texas football game. I'm not a big football fan and have no particular connection with either team, so I decided to use some of this time to escape from the in-laws and go geocaching.
When I first started geocaching (even before I had my yellow eTrex) I used a GPS attachment for my Handspring Visor to hunt caches. It normally does really well in open skies and for road navigation, but it is horrible in heavy tree cover. One of the first geocaches I tried to find using this equipment was a cache in Brothers Park in College Station called Siblings Pond. Unfortunately, the tree coverage was so thick that my GPS would direct me to one location and then suddenly say I was 200 feet away and send me to another spot. This cache ended up being one of my first DNFs, so naturally, it had to be first of my list on this trip! With eTrex in hand and a much sharper geosense guiding me, I found this cache with minimal effort in the first place I looked. The hiding spot is SO obvious to me now, that I can't believe I didn't find it originally.
Next, I decided to head off for a quick virtual just .25 miles away, A-maze-ing. This cache is a gravel and limestone maze setup for spiritual reflection behind a local church. Since there is no log book to sign on virtuals, I had to send a description of the cache site to the cache owner via email for verification.
The next one on my list was a micro cache near an old cemetery a little closer to A&M campus, L. L. Foster. This was a nice quick little cache once I FINALLY found a parking spot. The road near this cache site was about a mile away from Kyle Field where the big game was being played, but there were still cars parked bumper to bumper along the entire stretch of this road. I knew I was only going to be here a short while so I double-parked and partially blocked someone's driveway while I searched. It was a quick find.
The last one of my list for this part of the day was one next to the Bush library on the south end of the Texas A&M campus, Under the Trees/Not in the Bush. I sure took the WRONG approach to this cache. On my first approach I made it to a parking lot, but my GPS kept pointing a long way away on the other side of the building. I gave up on that approach and then parked along the edge of the "S" curved driveway just past the main entrance from Bush Dr. (or whatever that main street is). I then proceeded to "bush"-whack my way in a bee line toward the cache site which wasn't TOO bad until I got just past a paved trail next to a little pavilion and there was nowhere to go except down a ravine. At that point, I assumed the cache description MUST have been a joke and turned back to find this another day.
Once I got back to a computer, I pulled this location up on Google Earth and could shoot myself once I saw how easy this cache really was! I didn't realize that there was a back exit from the parking lot I found to ANOTHER parking lot just a few feet from the cache site!!!
Finally, after we ate dinner and played a few games, I remembered reading about another cache across from the local airport that was next to a duck pond. My wife, daughter, and father in-law grabbed some leftover rolls and some old bread and went out after this cache. Emma loved feeding the ducks! Soon, a large Weimaraner came by and decided to go swimming with the ducks. Everybody wanted to stay and watch this dog for a while, so I went off on my own to find Quackers. It too was a very easy find, but was constructed from a 12 inch long piece of metal pipe with screw caps on each end. The entire thing was wrapped in black duct tape. At first, I wasn't sure if I had found the cache or a pipe bomb!
Overall, it was an enjoyable after-Thanksgiving gathering with my in-laws and a good day for caching!
When I first started geocaching (even before I had my yellow eTrex) I used a GPS attachment for my Handspring Visor to hunt caches. It normally does really well in open skies and for road navigation, but it is horrible in heavy tree cover. One of the first geocaches I tried to find using this equipment was a cache in Brothers Park in College Station called Siblings Pond. Unfortunately, the tree coverage was so thick that my GPS would direct me to one location and then suddenly say I was 200 feet away and send me to another spot. This cache ended up being one of my first DNFs, so naturally, it had to be first of my list on this trip! With eTrex in hand and a much sharper geosense guiding me, I found this cache with minimal effort in the first place I looked. The hiding spot is SO obvious to me now, that I can't believe I didn't find it originally.
Next, I decided to head off for a quick virtual just .25 miles away, A-maze-ing. This cache is a gravel and limestone maze setup for spiritual reflection behind a local church. Since there is no log book to sign on virtuals, I had to send a description of the cache site to the cache owner via email for verification.
The next one on my list was a micro cache near an old cemetery a little closer to A&M campus, L. L. Foster. This was a nice quick little cache once I FINALLY found a parking spot. The road near this cache site was about a mile away from Kyle Field where the big game was being played, but there were still cars parked bumper to bumper along the entire stretch of this road. I knew I was only going to be here a short while so I double-parked and partially blocked someone's driveway while I searched. It was a quick find.
The last one of my list for this part of the day was one next to the Bush library on the south end of the Texas A&M campus, Under the Trees/Not in the Bush. I sure took the WRONG approach to this cache. On my first approach I made it to a parking lot, but my GPS kept pointing a long way away on the other side of the building. I gave up on that approach and then parked along the edge of the "S" curved driveway just past the main entrance from Bush Dr. (or whatever that main street is). I then proceeded to "bush"-whack my way in a bee line toward the cache site which wasn't TOO bad until I got just past a paved trail next to a little pavilion and there was nowhere to go except down a ravine. At that point, I assumed the cache description MUST have been a joke and turned back to find this another day.
Once I got back to a computer, I pulled this location up on Google Earth and could shoot myself once I saw how easy this cache really was! I didn't realize that there was a back exit from the parking lot I found to ANOTHER parking lot just a few feet from the cache site!!!
Finally, after we ate dinner and played a few games, I remembered reading about another cache across from the local airport that was next to a duck pond. My wife, daughter, and father in-law grabbed some leftover rolls and some old bread and went out after this cache. Emma loved feeding the ducks! Soon, a large Weimaraner came by and decided to go swimming with the ducks. Everybody wanted to stay and watch this dog for a while, so I went off on my own to find Quackers. It too was a very easy find, but was constructed from a 12 inch long piece of metal pipe with screw caps on each end. The entire thing was wrapped in black duct tape. At first, I wasn't sure if I had found the cache or a pipe bomb!
Overall, it was an enjoyable after-Thanksgiving gathering with my in-laws and a good day for caching!
Wednesday, November 23, 2005
Weekend Run and SkySite
This past weekend, I finally decided to head out past Gatesville, TX and look for the SkySite that I was assigned and do a little caching on the way. If you are not familiar with SkySites (I wasn't until just recently), this is an excerpt from their website.
I had previously picked one up that landed in a guys yard in McGregor, TX a few weeks ago, but this was my first one to hunt down in the wild using GPS coordinates. The SkySite that I was assigned to recover landed in an overgrown field just outside of Gatesville a few weeks ago. Using the GPS coordinates provided to me by Space Data and a printed Google map, I managed to navigate several small farm-to-market roads until I reached the property on which the SkySite had landed. There was a small home on the edge of the property where the land owner lives. She was very nice and allowed me to hike through her fields to recover the fallen SkySite. Some hunters were using her land for the weekend and accompanied me out to the crash site which was in a field full of head-high dry, dead sunflowers. If you've ever seen large sunflowers up close, you know that they are covered in itchy spines all over their stems. It wasn't the most pleasant hike, but the SkySite was right where the coordinates said it would be!
On my way back through Gatesville toward Waco, I saw on my GPS map that there were two caches near the downtown area. The first was a fairly recent regular cache, 1904 Leon River Bridge, hidden in a magnetic key holder on an old iron bridge built in 1904. This cache was pretty easy to find thanks to the good description and hints provided by BikerMike. The second one was a virtual cache, Gatesville Cotton Belt Depot, where you had to find information from historical markers and email the cacher owner instead of actually signing a physical logbook. This one was in an old railroad depot which now sits in the parking lot of the old Walmart and McDonald's.
Finally, between Gatesville and McGregor, there were large patches of cactus all along the roadsides. Seeing this reminded me that I had Zsolt's cactus-cache in my trunk which I got from Sawdust's October geocaching event, "When is a Film Canister NOT Just a Film Canister??." I then pulled off to the side of the road and pulled out this wilderness camo'd container and marked the coordinates. Since this cache is inside a fake cactus hidden in the middle of a field of real cactus, I thought I'd name my newest cache based on someone's first impression as they arrive at the location - Oh No You Didn't!
Space Data launches SkySites (a communication relay device) via helium balloons. They fly up to 100,000 feet and "loiter" for 12 to 24 hours, providing a coverage area of about 400 miles in diameter. Their system cac be used for tracking vehicles, relaying data from remote oil or gas wells, provide text messaging or business communications in remote areas where no "land line" or cell phone service exists.
If the balloon starts to move out of its ground coverage area, Space Data sends commands to the SkySite to detach from the balloon, where it gently falls back to earth via a parachute. Because of the GPS tracking ability, Space Data tracks the SkySite on it's journey back to earth. Then the SkySite radios back to the next SkySite over head, its exact position.
I had previously picked one up that landed in a guys yard in McGregor, TX a few weeks ago, but this was my first one to hunt down in the wild using GPS coordinates. The SkySite that I was assigned to recover landed in an overgrown field just outside of Gatesville a few weeks ago. Using the GPS coordinates provided to me by Space Data and a printed Google map, I managed to navigate several small farm-to-market roads until I reached the property on which the SkySite had landed. There was a small home on the edge of the property where the land owner lives. She was very nice and allowed me to hike through her fields to recover the fallen SkySite. Some hunters were using her land for the weekend and accompanied me out to the crash site which was in a field full of head-high dry, dead sunflowers. If you've ever seen large sunflowers up close, you know that they are covered in itchy spines all over their stems. It wasn't the most pleasant hike, but the SkySite was right where the coordinates said it would be!
On my way back through Gatesville toward Waco, I saw on my GPS map that there were two caches near the downtown area. The first was a fairly recent regular cache, 1904 Leon River Bridge, hidden in a magnetic key holder on an old iron bridge built in 1904. This cache was pretty easy to find thanks to the good description and hints provided by BikerMike. The second one was a virtual cache, Gatesville Cotton Belt Depot, where you had to find information from historical markers and email the cacher owner instead of actually signing a physical logbook. This one was in an old railroad depot which now sits in the parking lot of the old Walmart and McDonald's.
Finally, between Gatesville and McGregor, there were large patches of cactus all along the roadsides. Seeing this reminded me that I had Zsolt's cactus-cache in my trunk which I got from Sawdust's October geocaching event, "When is a Film Canister NOT Just a Film Canister??." I then pulled off to the side of the road and pulled out this wilderness camo'd container and marked the coordinates. Since this cache is inside a fake cactus hidden in the middle of a field of real cactus, I thought I'd name my newest cache based on someone's first impression as they arrive at the location - Oh No You Didn't!
Thursday, October 27, 2005
The Politics of Caching - Part 1
This past weekend and week, I finally got around to hiding several of the caches that I'd been preparing for several weeks.
Unfortunately, not all of these have gone without incident. One of the simple ones in the base of a street light was called Guard Dogs. The name of this cache came from its proximity to the Ramada Inn on Hwy 84 in Woodway, TX. Just to the side of the front driveway of this location, the hotel has placed two small dog statues dressed in seasonal attire. Shortly after I noticed that the dogs had recently been re-dressed in Halloween shirts, I decided that this would be the perfect spot for a geocache and hid a small film canister cache in the base of this lamp post just several feet from the street.
During the first few days that this cache was hidden, several local cachers had a chance to successfully log this find and all made pleasant or humorous comments about the dog statues. That was until I suddenly got this email message from Rodger Fussell.
Well, Mr. Fussell, I'm sorry that you feel this way. Rest assured that I will definitely advise EVERYONE I know including all of those geocachers from out-of-town looking for a place to stay to avoid your hotel. We certainly don't want the general public going on your hotel's property, do we?
Unfortunately, not all of these have gone without incident. One of the simple ones in the base of a street light was called Guard Dogs. The name of this cache came from its proximity to the Ramada Inn on Hwy 84 in Woodway, TX. Just to the side of the front driveway of this location, the hotel has placed two small dog statues dressed in seasonal attire. Shortly after I noticed that the dogs had recently been re-dressed in Halloween shirts, I decided that this would be the perfect spot for a geocache and hid a small film canister cache in the base of this lamp post just several feet from the street.
During the first few days that this cache was hidden, several local cachers had a chance to successfully log this find and all made pleasant or humorous comments about the dog statues. That was until I suddenly got this email message from Rodger Fussell.
"I found a person snooping around my hotel. His excuse was 'he was geocaching'. NO ONE asked to use my property for any reason and that is a shame. If I catch anyone else, they will be given to the local authority along with a complaint. Who do you think you are that you can come on private property without permission. rcfussell"Apparently, this email came as a result of a confrontation with a local cacher attempting to find this cache. "He lifted the skirt, pulled out the cache, and looked like he wanted to choke me and anyone else in the immediate vicinity. I encouraged him to open it up and read what was inside. He then informed me that I was on private property AND that the Texas he grew up in, he would SHOOT me for doing this."
Well, Mr. Fussell, I'm sorry that you feel this way. Rest assured that I will definitely advise EVERYONE I know including all of those geocachers from out-of-town looking for a place to stay to avoid your hotel. We certainly don't want the general public going on your hotel's property, do we?
Sunday, October 23, 2005
The Woodway Witch Project
In the spirit of Halloween, a couple of my co-workers and I have decided to hide a night cache deep in the woods with a little surprise. The plan is to have the geocachers hike down an old trail through the woods until they reach a much smaller path that intersects the main trail. Here, they are required to make their way down this small path until they reach a clearing with large rocks set up to look like a small abandoned cemetery. Once there, the cachers must turn off their lights and allow their eyes to adjust to the darkness in order to see a small glowing light coming from just outside the left edge of the clearing. Finally, once they reach the light, the cache container will be within a few feet. Unfortunately for them, as soon as they find the cache and let their guard down, a creepy skeleton thing will be released and swing out of the trees toward the cachers.
To make the geocaching.com cache page look just as freaky, I've created an animated GIF graphic that will help introduce the cache. This is the small version. Click here to see the final, full-size version.
To make the geocaching.com cache page look just as freaky, I've created an animated GIF graphic that will help introduce the cache. This is the small version. Click here to see the final, full-size version.
Friday, October 14, 2005
Saturday, October 01, 2005
Brazos River Expedition
Against the wind
I’m still runnin’ against the wind
Well I’m older now and still
Against the wind
Bob Seager (Against The Wind)
Once we reached the cache location, it was an amazing experience! After thousands of years of erosion, the water had carved its way deep under one of the embankments. Since the water level was so low, we were able to kayak under this overhang and that was an incredible view! The climb up was a little scary since a fall would have been about 16 feet down into shallow water over rocks and boulders. The cache tower itself might be better renamed "Ivy Tower" since one entire side of the tower is covered in my three-leafed friend. Once the cache was signed by all, we took a break for some snacks before continuing down the river another 5 miles.
The middle portion of our trip was fairly uneventful except for a brief run-in with a couple of locals. This brought back horrid memories of the movie "Deliverance." We all had choruses of "Dueling Banjos" running through our heads and I half expected one of them to holler out "This river don't go to Aquilla. You done taken a wrong turn." Soon, they got back in their airboat adorned with confederate flags and went to another part of the river to continue their business, and we continued down the river with ours.
Those last few lines of "Against the Wind" describe in great detail the last portion of this trip. By this point in the morning, the sun had escaped from the clouds. The wind had also escaped from somewhere and was fleeing right towards us! Luckily, to our great advantage, the river became much narrower and we had a fairly steady current pushing us forward against the wind that was doing everything in its power to push us back. Finally, with the bridge in sight, we pushed forward and managed to complete this remarkable journey in just over 4 hours!
Thursday, June 30, 2005
10 Billion Years Ago...
For the Jeep Photo Contest, one of the assignments for June was to take a photo of a Jeep TB at a point of origin. "Where It All Began - Find a Point of Origin. Go to any point of origin and take a photo with your travel bug."While packing for our trip to the beach, I decided my Jeep's point of origin would have a Darwinian theme. I photographed my Jeep crawling its way out of the ocean onto dry land. The caption reads "10 Billion Years Ago...".
So if you see this in the photo contest at http://jeep.geocaching.com/contest/, please vote for me!
***edit on July 1 to include link***
The direct link to my photo in the photo contest is http://www.geocaching.com/track/log.aspx?LUID=99f5668f-f483-4373-b25c-714965f3ea49.
Friday, June 24, 2005
I found a Jeep!
For those of you who don't know, finding one of the new white Jeep travel bugs in a geocache gives you the opportunity to enter into the drawing for an all-new 2006 Jeep Commander-the first 7 passenger Trail Rated Jeep 4X4!
When you find a white Jeep 4x4 Travel Bug you have the opportunity to sign up for the Jeep 4x4 Geocaching Challenge. Each month you will be provided with three goals for the white Jeep 4x4 Travel Bugs. You can enter the contest by completing one of the three goals each month - by taking a photo with the Jeep 4x4 Travel Bug and the goal in the same photo.I found my Jeep just after bumping into TheGeoGoes near TwinBridges (Nee- CastAway!) in Midway Park in Waco. We chatted for a while and then I found out that they had just dropped off another Jeep TB in the cache. Needless to say, I immediately grabbed the Jeep from the cache even before they had a chance to log onto the GC.com website and say that they left one there!
Monday, June 20, 2005
Homeless Shelter, Bears, and Car Chase
Yes, I know this is the second post of the day for the same caches, but these quick stories seemed to warrant their own post.
While caching on Saturday afternoon, I stopped by Tower of Power which was one of my previous DNFs. This cache is located on the back end of the Richland Mall parking lot near the Sears entrance and next to the abandoned Best Buy. Normally, this is just a clump of trees on the top of a small hill near the high-voltage electrical lines. However, this time when I arrived, I noticed a lawn chair and a half empty bottle of beer sitting near the clump of trees. It looked like someone had recently made themselves at home in the clump of trees. As I climbed the hill and walked further behind the clump of trees, my suspicions were confirmed. There was a make-shift shelter built from two road construction sawhorses and a piece of metal roofing material. Under it were a stack of blankets and a small radio. It was obvious at this point that someone without any other place to live had made this area their temporary home. I quickly found the cache and left the area trying not to disturb anything that might belong to our new neighbor.
Shortly after leaving the Tower of Power, I decided to go find Mikey's Cache! which was originally hidden in honor of a local cacher's birthday. After following the very specific driving directions left by the cache owners, I arrived at the trail head to find something very unusual for this urban area. The trail head was blocked by two orange cones and one of them was labeled "B E A R" in large unmistakable letters. I always knew this was bear country, but had assumed that meant Baylor Bear country. So I still don't know if there really was a bear down this trail or if this was simply meant to discourage people from entering this area for another reason. Either way, the cones were clearly meant to prevent people from entering so I decided to leave the area.
Finally, one of the caches I attempted to find later in the day, Roll with the changes!, was in the parking lot of a local manufacturing business. When I drove into the parking lot, I saw an empty green pickup sitting near the front gate. However, after I found the cache and decided to head on to the next cache, I noticed someone in the truck. The truck then followed me out of the lot, around the underpass U-turn, down the highway, around another underpass U-turn, and down an industrial road. Finally, I decided to do an quick U-turn in the middle of this industrial road where there was light traffic approaching from both directions. As I passed the truck going the opposite direction, it was clear that the driver's intention was to follow me as he watched me drive by. A few moments later when the light traffic had passed, I saw the driver of the truck initiate his own U-turn to continue his pursuit. Luckily, I knew this area very well and quickly turned onto a narrow road with many sharp twists and many adjoining streets. I still don't know if he attempted to follow me down this narrow road, but I did not see him again.
While caching on Saturday afternoon, I stopped by Tower of Power which was one of my previous DNFs. This cache is located on the back end of the Richland Mall parking lot near the Sears entrance and next to the abandoned Best Buy. Normally, this is just a clump of trees on the top of a small hill near the high-voltage electrical lines. However, this time when I arrived, I noticed a lawn chair and a half empty bottle of beer sitting near the clump of trees. It looked like someone had recently made themselves at home in the clump of trees. As I climbed the hill and walked further behind the clump of trees, my suspicions were confirmed. There was a make-shift shelter built from two road construction sawhorses and a piece of metal roofing material. Under it were a stack of blankets and a small radio. It was obvious at this point that someone without any other place to live had made this area their temporary home. I quickly found the cache and left the area trying not to disturb anything that might belong to our new neighbor.
Shortly after leaving the Tower of Power, I decided to go find Mikey's Cache! which was originally hidden in honor of a local cacher's birthday. After following the very specific driving directions left by the cache owners, I arrived at the trail head to find something very unusual for this urban area. The trail head was blocked by two orange cones and one of them was labeled "B E A R" in large unmistakable letters. I always knew this was bear country, but had assumed that meant Baylor Bear country. So I still don't know if there really was a bear down this trail or if this was simply meant to discourage people from entering this area for another reason. Either way, the cones were clearly meant to prevent people from entering so I decided to leave the area.
Finally, one of the caches I attempted to find later in the day, Roll with the changes!, was in the parking lot of a local manufacturing business. When I drove into the parking lot, I saw an empty green pickup sitting near the front gate. However, after I found the cache and decided to head on to the next cache, I noticed someone in the truck. The truck then followed me out of the lot, around the underpass U-turn, down the highway, around another underpass U-turn, and down an industrial road. Finally, I decided to do an quick U-turn in the middle of this industrial road where there was light traffic approaching from both directions. As I passed the truck going the opposite direction, it was clear that the driver's intention was to follow me as he watched me drive by. A few moments later when the light traffic had passed, I saw the driver of the truck initiate his own U-turn to continue his pursuit. Luckily, I knew this area very well and quickly turned onto a narrow road with many sharp twists and many adjoining streets. I still don't know if he attempted to follow me down this narrow road, but I did not see him again.
Big Weekend Run
Father's Day weekend was a full weekend of caching for me! On Saturday, I decided to find many of the quick park-and-grabs around the west/central area of Waco. I ended up finding all 11 caches I went for.
Then on Sunday, we went to eat lunch with my wife's family in Hutto, TX near Austin, TX. On our way back, we found 1 cache in Hutto, 2 caches in Round Rock, and 2 caches in Temple. Overall, I found 16 caches and had zero DNFs on this caching weekend. I'm getting so close to #100 that I can almost taste it! I'm sure it will happen sometime this summer.
6/19/2005 Cottonwood Creek Critter
6/19/2005 Round Rock Rocky
6/19/2005 Dell trail
6/19/2005 In The Bush
6/19/2005 Bellaire North
6/18/2005 Off Target
6/18/2005 "A Horse With No Name"
6/18/2005 The Target of My Affection
6/18/2005 Your a Poet and don't even know it!
6/18/2005 Tower of Power
6/18/2005 "I'm A King Bee, Baby"
6/18/2005 Buckle Up
6/18/2005 Roll with the changes!
6/18/2005 Step Up to the Plate
6/18/2005 I Am Ramachandran The Butler
6/18/2005 Welcome to Wally World
Then on Sunday, we went to eat lunch with my wife's family in Hutto, TX near Austin, TX. On our way back, we found 1 cache in Hutto, 2 caches in Round Rock, and 2 caches in Temple. Overall, I found 16 caches and had zero DNFs on this caching weekend. I'm getting so close to #100 that I can almost taste it! I'm sure it will happen sometime this summer.
6/19/2005 Cottonwood Creek Critter
6/19/2005 Round Rock Rocky
6/19/2005 Dell trail
6/19/2005 In The Bush
6/19/2005 Bellaire North
6/18/2005 Off Target
6/18/2005 "A Horse With No Name"
6/18/2005 The Target of My Affection
6/18/2005 Your a Poet and don't even know it!
6/18/2005 Tower of Power
6/18/2005 "I'm A King Bee, Baby"
6/18/2005 Buckle Up
6/18/2005 Roll with the changes!
6/18/2005 Step Up to the Plate
6/18/2005 I Am Ramachandran The Butler
6/18/2005 Welcome to Wally World
Friday, May 27, 2005
San Antonio Caches
It has been quite a while since I've written about my adventures. The main reason I've been AFK is due to the fact that my adventures haven't been very adventurous lately. Sure, I found a couple of new park-n-grabs near my job to run up my FTF total. That just isn't much to write about.
However, this week, I was sent on a business trip to San Antonio, TX. Of course, while I was there, I had to find a few caches in the area. Shortly before my trip, I posted on the San Antonio Area Geocachers web site about my trip and asked for suggestions for enjoyable caches in the area. The responses were abundant. Some sung the praises of one particular cacher and others said to avoid caches hidden by this same cacher unless I'm really into finding film canisters tossed into shrubs. To each his own!
While searching GC.com's site for San Antonio caches near the area where I would by staying, I found 13 days in 30 seconds, which is San Antonio's only webcam cache in front of the Alamo. Being in San Antonio was all the reason I needed to stop by the Alamo and claim a smiley for this webcam cache. Part of the assignment of this cache was to find the camera, stand in front of it, make the University of Texas Longhorn hand-sign, and then call a friend to visit the webcam page and save the picture. Although, I have no particular objection to UT, I couldn't bring myself to stand there in my green Baylor University shirt and make this particular hand gesture in front of mobs of tourists, the Internet, and everyone in the office building across the street. I hope the cache owner will accept a "Sic'em Bears" hand-sign as a substitution. Luckily, the picture quality is so poor that I'm sure nobody would be able to tell what hand-sign I was making with my arm up in the air.
I also went to a very nice and very large park on the north side of San Antonio called McAllister Park. "For those of you that love nature, this place is one of the best in the San Antonio area. McAllister park is a generous 986 acres, and was originally created in 1968. It was originally called 'Northeast Preserve' for good reason as you will see, but was renamed in 1974 to honor former San Antonio Mayor Walter W. McAllister." Here, I found a couple of caches - The Good Old Days and Where Eagles Walk. There were at least 10 other caches in this very large park, but I decided it was time to move on to another local park that was highly recommended.
Next on my list was Walker Ranch Park which is just on the north west side of the San Antonio Intl. Airport. This was a nice, well-lit park with a paved walking track and numerous hiking trails. The most exciting thing about this park was that it is right along the final approach flight path for the SA airport. Planes would fly so low through here that you could almost throw a rock at them. (Although I'm sure that both the FAA and Homeland Security department frown heavily on throwing objects at passenger planes.) It now makes perfect sense that one of the caches that I found in this park was called Airplane Spot. While in this park, I also picked up the Spring is Great travel bug from Tiger Kitty.
Before it got too dark, I made time to stop by one more cache called Yoga 101. Although this turned out to be one of the film canister caches people had warned me about, the cache would have been very interesting if I had completed the second task associated with finding it. To claim a second find on the cache, you had to stand on the corner of this VERY busy intersection and do Yoga poses. Since I did not bring my camera or have any other way to prove that I stood there and did Yoga (other than a possible arrest record), I decided it would be best to avoid the public humiliation associated with doing this particular activity.
With extreme disappointment, I was unable to visit one of San Antonio's largest caches The Weapons Cache. This was a very large ammo can full of PVC pipe kits. When you assembled the PVC pipes in the kit according to the directions, you created a fully functional marshmallow gun. While reading the details of this cache from my San Antonio hotel room, I read the latest entry on the cache page posted just days before my visit. "May 22 by G4Xplorers - It appears a big mean bulldozer has flattened the largest ammo can we have ever seen. Components of what should be marshmallow guns are smashed to bits.......Stay tuned, this will be up and running again in the near future."
Last, but not least, I had just enough daylight left to stop by one of San Antonio's virtual caches, The Pyramid. Here, in front of a pyramid shaped bank building was a large statue of several intertwined eagles by a local artist. The way to prove that you found this virtual cache is to email the artist's name and how many eagles there were to the cache owner. So, if you want to find out more about this statue, either ask me or just visit the building.
Thank you San Antonio and SA cachers for a great trip and great recommendations!!!
However, this week, I was sent on a business trip to San Antonio, TX. Of course, while I was there, I had to find a few caches in the area. Shortly before my trip, I posted on the San Antonio Area Geocachers web site about my trip and asked for suggestions for enjoyable caches in the area. The responses were abundant. Some sung the praises of one particular cacher and others said to avoid caches hidden by this same cacher unless I'm really into finding film canisters tossed into shrubs. To each his own!
While searching GC.com's site for San Antonio caches near the area where I would by staying, I found 13 days in 30 seconds, which is San Antonio's only webcam cache in front of the Alamo. Being in San Antonio was all the reason I needed to stop by the Alamo and claim a smiley for this webcam cache. Part of the assignment of this cache was to find the camera, stand in front of it, make the University of Texas Longhorn hand-sign, and then call a friend to visit the webcam page and save the picture. Although, I have no particular objection to UT, I couldn't bring myself to stand there in my green Baylor University shirt and make this particular hand gesture in front of mobs of tourists, the Internet, and everyone in the office building across the street. I hope the cache owner will accept a "Sic'em Bears" hand-sign as a substitution. Luckily, the picture quality is so poor that I'm sure nobody would be able to tell what hand-sign I was making with my arm up in the air.
I also went to a very nice and very large park on the north side of San Antonio called McAllister Park. "For those of you that love nature, this place is one of the best in the San Antonio area. McAllister park is a generous 986 acres, and was originally created in 1968. It was originally called 'Northeast Preserve' for good reason as you will see, but was renamed in 1974 to honor former San Antonio Mayor Walter W. McAllister." Here, I found a couple of caches - The Good Old Days and Where Eagles Walk. There were at least 10 other caches in this very large park, but I decided it was time to move on to another local park that was highly recommended.
Next on my list was Walker Ranch Park which is just on the north west side of the San Antonio Intl. Airport. This was a nice, well-lit park with a paved walking track and numerous hiking trails. The most exciting thing about this park was that it is right along the final approach flight path for the SA airport. Planes would fly so low through here that you could almost throw a rock at them. (Although I'm sure that both the FAA and Homeland Security department frown heavily on throwing objects at passenger planes.) It now makes perfect sense that one of the caches that I found in this park was called Airplane Spot. While in this park, I also picked up the Spring is Great travel bug from Tiger Kitty.
Before it got too dark, I made time to stop by one more cache called Yoga 101. Although this turned out to be one of the film canister caches people had warned me about, the cache would have been very interesting if I had completed the second task associated with finding it. To claim a second find on the cache, you had to stand on the corner of this VERY busy intersection and do Yoga poses. Since I did not bring my camera or have any other way to prove that I stood there and did Yoga (other than a possible arrest record), I decided it would be best to avoid the public humiliation associated with doing this particular activity.
With extreme disappointment, I was unable to visit one of San Antonio's largest caches The Weapons Cache. This was a very large ammo can full of PVC pipe kits. When you assembled the PVC pipes in the kit according to the directions, you created a fully functional marshmallow gun. While reading the details of this cache from my San Antonio hotel room, I read the latest entry on the cache page posted just days before my visit. "May 22 by G4Xplorers - It appears a big mean bulldozer has flattened the largest ammo can we have ever seen. Components of what should be marshmallow guns are smashed to bits.......Stay tuned, this will be up and running again in the near future."
Last, but not least, I had just enough daylight left to stop by one of San Antonio's virtual caches, The Pyramid. Here, in front of a pyramid shaped bank building was a large statue of several intertwined eagles by a local artist. The way to prove that you found this virtual cache is to email the artist's name and how many eagles there were to the cache owner. So, if you want to find out more about this statue, either ask me or just visit the building.
Thank you San Antonio and SA cachers for a great trip and great recommendations!!!
Tuesday, May 03, 2005
Gunsight Ghost Town
This weekend, my wife travelled with her family to an old Texas ghost town called Gunsight where a family plot exists in the historic cemetary. In honor of their trip, I packed an ammo can and had them place a cache there called Gunsight Ghost Town.
GUNSIGHT, TEXAS. Gunsight, in southern Stephens County, was named for the nearby Gunsight Mountains. It was settled in the late 1800's and gained a post office in 1880 at J. W. Shepard's store. The community's population was fifty in 1890 and grew to 150 in 1920 because of the oil boom and the town's location near the Wichita Falls and Southern Railway. During the 1920s Gunsight lost its railroad station and post office. Its population was reported as six in 1980 and 1990.
As early as 1858, Gunsight was on a wagon road from Fort Griffin in Shackelford County to Stephenville in Erath County. The road continued through the Gunsight mountains across Colony Creek in Eastland County toward Ranger. Settlers started coming after the Civil War in 1865. The loan Methodist church building was relocated to its present site across the road, north of the cemetery in 1978. Here now are the three remaining vestiges of a once thriving community; the well kept cemetery, the old school building, and the vacant church. The Gunsight Cemetery marks the final resting place for over 450 people. Many graves are unmarked and there are at least 40 graves of war veterans. To date, there are three known Civil War veterans of the Confederate States, two Spanish American War veterans, twelve of World War I, twenty-one veterans of World War II, and two Korean veterans.
GUNSIGHT, TEXAS. Gunsight, in southern Stephens County, was named for the nearby Gunsight Mountains. It was settled in the late 1800's and gained a post office in 1880 at J. W. Shepard's store. The community's population was fifty in 1890 and grew to 150 in 1920 because of the oil boom and the town's location near the Wichita Falls and Southern Railway. During the 1920s Gunsight lost its railroad station and post office. Its population was reported as six in 1980 and 1990.
As early as 1858, Gunsight was on a wagon road from Fort Griffin in Shackelford County to Stephenville in Erath County. The road continued through the Gunsight mountains across Colony Creek in Eastland County toward Ranger. Settlers started coming after the Civil War in 1865. The loan Methodist church building was relocated to its present site across the road, north of the cemetery in 1978. Here now are the three remaining vestiges of a once thriving community; the well kept cemetery, the old school building, and the vacant church. The Gunsight Cemetery marks the final resting place for over 450 people. Many graves are unmarked and there are at least 40 graves of war veterans. To date, there are three known Civil War veterans of the Confederate States, two Spanish American War veterans, twelve of World War I, twenty-one veterans of World War II, and two Korean veterans.
Monday, April 25, 2005
FTF x 2
I haven't done that much caching lately. Most of last week was spent preparing for my annual evaluation at work. However, I have finally been FTF! In fact, I've now been FTF twice.
4/14/2005 Koehne Park Hike
4/21/2005 Bates Motel -- The Sequel
Also, last Tuesday, I attended my first Geocaching Event. This was a lot of fun and I really enjoyed meeting several of the local cachers including DrHogg, Sawdust92, BikerMike, Eagletrek, S1Waco, HOTCrawlDaddy, and others.
4/14/2005 Koehne Park Hike
4/21/2005 Bates Motel -- The Sequel
Also, last Tuesday, I attended my first Geocaching Event. This was a lot of fun and I really enjoyed meeting several of the local cachers including DrHogg, Sawdust92, BikerMike, Eagletrek, S1Waco, HOTCrawlDaddy, and others.
Monday, April 11, 2005
Two-in-one and a solar eclipse!
Last Friday afternoon, a small group of the BUCachers and I got together to log two caches-in-one. The plan was to visit the coordinates for Bridges to Nowhere at exactly 5:06:34 p.m. on April 8, 2005 to claim credit for "Timing" is Everything. In order to claim the find, we had to take a photograph of a digital watch that displayed this exact time and date next to a GPS that displayed these exact coordinates. For the credit, we used the coordinates N 31° 34.062 W 097° 08.170 which corresponded to virtual coordinates of N31° Seconds.Minutes2 W97° Day.Hour(24-hour)0. Oh what we'll do to log a couple of caches!
However, what was really cool was that we did all of this during the 2005 solar eclipse. Although it was fairly overcast and we really couldn't see much of anything for lack of shadows, it was still cool to know that we were out there when all of the action was going on.
Later that afternoon and on Saturday and Sunday afternoon, I drove around town and logged a small collection of other locationless/reverse caches and one physical cache that I've been searching for 3 times already.
However, what was really cool was that we did all of this during the 2005 solar eclipse. Although it was fairly overcast and we really couldn't see much of anything for lack of shadows, it was still cool to know that we were out there when all of the action was going on.
Later that afternoon and on Saturday and Sunday afternoon, I drove around town and logged a small collection of other locationless/reverse caches and one physical cache that I've been searching for 3 times already.
Wednesday, April 06, 2005
Wire scorpions, DNFs, and a cemetery night cache...
Recently, I've had the opportunity to exchange email messages with quite a few geocachers. Many of these messages have been with local cachers providing information about their hides or recent finds such as Sawdust92, Alphatexana, and Aggie99. On other occasions, I've been swapping horror stories about poison ivy with The GeoGoes. But most recently, I've been exchanging emails about how to post images in the Groundspeak forums and creating avatars with losel2. In exchange for my assistance, he is going to send me two scorpions made from wire that he made. One will be for me to keep, and the other to place in a central Texas cache. Overall, I've got to say that I've really enjoyed getting to know these geocachers even if only through email and cache logs.
Secondly, I went 0-for-2 with the last two caches I've searched for and am getting a little frustrated. Although I've had several DNFs while acquiring my geosense and learning the ropes of geocaching, it still frustrates me every time I have to log another DNF. It especially frustrates me when I consider how much time I've spent looking for a cache that either doesn't exist or is WAY off of the posted coordinates. I guess that is just the way the cookie crumbles.
Finally, I want to share my recent experience night caching. Last Friday night, my wife and I had a chance to enjoy a few hours alone without Geo-Baby (although we love caching with her very much!). After a nice dinner for two, we decided to go look for Stanford Chapel Night Cache near Hewitt, TX. This experience was such an emotional roller-coaster for both of us! The cache is located in a little cemetery tucked away in a remote neighborhood. Although I've always known it was out there, I have never had an opportunity or reason to actually stop by and see it. I've never been a big fan of cemeteries at night since they tend to bring up mental images from a slew of 1980's, low-budget, horror films, but this one seemed extra peaceful for some reason and I was pretty comfortable being here for a short while. As we were entering the cemetery, my wife mentioned that she knew two people that were buried here. One was a former teacher and another was a high-school classmate that was killed in a driving accident. (Add my 80's horror imagery to the peaceful nature of this cemetery with the recent knowledge that we actually know people buried here and you already begin seeing the hills, valleys and twists of the roller-coaster beginning to build.)
As we approached the location of the bench mentioned in the coordinates, we noticed a very recent grave site along our path covered in flowers and Easter Lilies. When we stopped to read the small metal marker with our flashlight, we noticed it was for a small infant who apparently had died just days or weeks ago. (By now, our roller-coaster is beginning to hit an all-time emotional low point.) While we continued on to the bench mentioned in the cache description, I began to think about some of the previous log entries and remembered about another nearby bench from a log entry by BikerMike, "If you want to see something else in the cemetery, go to N 31 28.344 W 097 14.162. You'll come to a grave with a small bench there. Under it is a tupperware box. Inside is a picture and a notepad for people to leave thoughts etc...about the 15 year old boy there. Interesting and sad all at once. I read a few of them, and most are quite touching." Shortly after reaching the bench and remembering these entries, I spotted the cache blinking in the direction of the cemetery entrance. Now, the adrenaline is pumping again and the "I Found It" emotions are roaring! After signing the log and replacing the cache back in its hiding spot, my wife and I talked on the way out about how incredibly odd this whole adventure has been. I'll never know if her "roller-coaster" was anything like mine, but it must have been similar. So many intense emotions like fear, remembrance, sadness, excitement, joy and relief were all rolled into this one night cache adventure that I will always remember.
Secondly, I went 0-for-2 with the last two caches I've searched for and am getting a little frustrated. Although I've had several DNFs while acquiring my geosense and learning the ropes of geocaching, it still frustrates me every time I have to log another DNF. It especially frustrates me when I consider how much time I've spent looking for a cache that either doesn't exist or is WAY off of the posted coordinates. I guess that is just the way the cookie crumbles.
Finally, I want to share my recent experience night caching. Last Friday night, my wife and I had a chance to enjoy a few hours alone without Geo-Baby (although we love caching with her very much!). After a nice dinner for two, we decided to go look for Stanford Chapel Night Cache near Hewitt, TX. This experience was such an emotional roller-coaster for both of us! The cache is located in a little cemetery tucked away in a remote neighborhood. Although I've always known it was out there, I have never had an opportunity or reason to actually stop by and see it. I've never been a big fan of cemeteries at night since they tend to bring up mental images from a slew of 1980's, low-budget, horror films, but this one seemed extra peaceful for some reason and I was pretty comfortable being here for a short while. As we were entering the cemetery, my wife mentioned that she knew two people that were buried here. One was a former teacher and another was a high-school classmate that was killed in a driving accident. (Add my 80's horror imagery to the peaceful nature of this cemetery with the recent knowledge that we actually know people buried here and you already begin seeing the hills, valleys and twists of the roller-coaster beginning to build.)
As we approached the location of the bench mentioned in the coordinates, we noticed a very recent grave site along our path covered in flowers and Easter Lilies. When we stopped to read the small metal marker with our flashlight, we noticed it was for a small infant who apparently had died just days or weeks ago. (By now, our roller-coaster is beginning to hit an all-time emotional low point.) While we continued on to the bench mentioned in the cache description, I began to think about some of the previous log entries and remembered about another nearby bench from a log entry by BikerMike, "If you want to see something else in the cemetery, go to N 31 28.344 W 097 14.162. You'll come to a grave with a small bench there. Under it is a tupperware box. Inside is a picture and a notepad for people to leave thoughts etc...about the 15 year old boy there. Interesting and sad all at once. I read a few of them, and most are quite touching." Shortly after reaching the bench and remembering these entries, I spotted the cache blinking in the direction of the cemetery entrance. Now, the adrenaline is pumping again and the "I Found It" emotions are roaring! After signing the log and replacing the cache back in its hiding spot, my wife and I talked on the way out about how incredibly odd this whole adventure has been. I'll never know if her "roller-coaster" was anything like mine, but it must have been similar. So many intense emotions like fear, remembrance, sadness, excitement, joy and relief were all rolled into this one night cache adventure that I will always remember.
Tuesday, March 29, 2005
“The search for truth is more precious than its possession.” - Albert Einstein
Yesterday, Hoby2199 and I spent the afternoon geocaching around the Woodway Park area for several hours. The first cache we hunted was really the only one that could not be found. We spent almost an hour just looking for this one cache called The Hills Are Alive... and finally had to give up. But after that, we found all of them we searched for. Well... almost all of them. It turned out that we spent about 10 minutes looking for a cache before we read the description and learned that it has been disabled and removed a few weeks earlier. So depending on how you view the last situation, we went either 4 for 5 -or- 4 for 6. C’est la vie!
Interestingly, one of the caches called Secret Squirrel-Revenge! was a cache I found last summer as a muggle. While enjoying the park with my wife and daughter, we spotted this cache and wondered why someone would put something like this here. I now wish I had opened it up and learned about Geocaching then instead of waiting until now.
But most importantly, I've now pulled back in the lead over dinkumator!!!!!
Interestingly, one of the caches called Secret Squirrel-Revenge! was a cache I found last summer as a muggle. While enjoying the park with my wife and daughter, we spotted this cache and wondered why someone would put something like this here. I now wish I had opened it up and learned about Geocaching then instead of waiting until now.
But most importantly, I've now pulled back in the lead over dinkumator!!!!!
Wednesday, March 16, 2005
Bates Motel and 23 Kazoo
The co-worker group at Baylor seems to be growing. Even a student worker decided to join us today and hike out to find 23 Kazoo and the Bates Motel - Number 326. While these were both fairly easy to find, they were sufficient to spark the interest of these co-workers to setup their own accounts. I've called the group Team BUcachers.
Tuesday, March 15, 2005
Hooked Some Co-Workers
Yesterday, while trying desperately to locate The Knowledge Cache, I got two of my co-workers hooked on geocaching! Today, they and a third co-worker, joined me finding two other nano caches on the Baylor University campus. All of these caches were placed by a professor at Baylor who goes by DrHogg.
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