Monday morning I spent tackling the hedge that runs the length of our property. It is a mammoth creature that I have not so affectionately nicknamed “The Beast”. After, 2 years of cutting and trimming I have it down to about 12-14 ft. tall and 8 ft. wide. The goal this spring is to get it completely cut down on the neighbors side back to the property line and down to about 8 ft. tall. I accomplished that task on the first 15 feet or so by Monday afternoon, just in time to enjoy the late day sun streaming into the yard space that hadn’t seen sunlight for years. Man that felt good.

What could make my day any better you ask?

Well, my sadistic side got a bit of a workout that afternoon. I fired up that Chipper/Shredder for the first time this spring and cut that “Beast” to bits!! The grinding, whirring, whooshing sound of the shredder in high gear was the most beautiful music I have heard in a very long time! It was transcendent! I just kept grinning and shredding, grinning and shredding, grinning and shredding! What a glorious day!

During my transcendent experience, the City of Lakewood published the next clue for their Treasure Hunt. PJ is hooked on this treasure hunt. If you have followed the link above and read the clues, you may notice the they are obtuse to say the least. It’s like looking for a needle in a haystack. This City is full of possibilities and with this latest clue, PJ rushed out to track some of those possibilites down. Me I was to busy grinning and shredding grinning and shredding… You get the picture. As night fell, PJ rolled in and we both started looking at the clues again. Trying as many different perspectives as we could find to come up with possible search locations. We looked all afternoon and into the evening. No Luck.

We decided to regroup and get dinner at Red Robin. To be honest up until this portion of the day I was leaning toward blowing off geocaching (and thereby this post) to keep looking for the medallion that is the treasure in the Treasure Hunt. But, sitting down to dinner I happened to check facebook and there I saw a very saddening message from a friend and fellow geocacher. His father passed away yesterday. I knew this would have hit him hard. So I decided to go a grab the tribute geocache, Screw You Sean! (GC29MF5) placed lovingly in his honor by Polarbz. It was just our way of showing a fellow geocacher some support. Our best to you and your family Sean.

The next geocache was a quick grab while stocking up on puzzle solving, up all night brainstorming food-like substances and Diet Coke. We found JAM (GC26Y12) by krklnmn. I haven’t met this cacher, but I would like to thank him for being an astute student of the obvious. Ya see, we live in Washington State. It rains here. It rains here a lot. I am constantly stunned by the number of micros that use regular paper as logs here. Regular paper turns to mush when wet. Heck just pulling a log out to sign it on a misty day is enough to get it wet enough to make signing for the next guy a real pain. BUT! krklnmn Didn’t use regular a regular old piece of paper smushed up in a tiny ziplock bag. NO!! Krklnmn is BRILLANT!! He used “Rite in the Rain” or iGage Weatherproof Paper. No need for a irritating little plastic baggie, just a Sharpie or a “Rite in the Rain” Weatherproof Tactical Clicker Pento be able to leave your mark with. I carry a very Fine Sharpie and a Fisher Stowaway Space Pen. If you are going to be a geocacher in Washington, these pens need to be considered “standard equipment”. If you are coming to Geowoodstock VIII in July, you may want to pick up a couple. After all, it is the middle of June and it is still raining here!

Well, here is hoping that tomorrow dawns bright and clear. Part of all that green that is springing up all over are weeds that need pulling. More yard work and mind bending clue deciphering are on the agenda for tomorrow. Until then, sweet dreams out there in geo-land!

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Tupperware Tuesday

So, tell me .. How was your “Tupperware Tuesday”? To find out more and how to participate, follow this link: “Tupperware Tuesday”. If you love geocaching, we’d love to hear from you! Chime in with your comments or your weeks caching highlights. Can’t wait to read what you found today!

Found this YouTube Video on “Jon’s Adventure Vlog: Geocaching For Buried Treasure!”

So, Tupperware Tuesday geocaching adventure reports will begin again after this long break. If you would like to participate, you can learn how here. Today’s geocaching had a couple of new twists: A real Treasure Hunt and my first full day of geocaching without using my DeLorme PN40 GPS.

Geocaching with my iPhone has its advantages. In a crowded park no one seems to pay any attention to me walking around holding it right in front of me and paying so much attention to the device. People have become so used to seeing people outside and yet ‘plugged in” that once the identify the device, they ignore you. This greatly enhances the stealth factor in my geocaching arsenal! I love that! Not that I really needed the increase at the 340 acre Ft. Steilacoom Park, but watching people’s reactions certainly gives me more confidence that the iPhone purchase was worth the price. I just wish the accuracy and signal lock were better. I’m sure with the 4G coming out those things can be improved. 

The geocache that I went to find is  Ft. Steilacoom Monument – GC25NZB by StealthBountyhunters. With one hide and one find, I’m pretty sure this is a “sock puppet” account, but a nice hide none the less. The cache has been there since March and there is a geo-trail forming. As spring progresses lets see if we can’t let that heal a bit by just walking over as much green as possible instead of stepping on it. I’d like this one to last for a while, since it would be very conveient for the trading of TB’s. The size and the hide are good for a trading spot if the geocache is not compromised. Just remember to keep an eye on the trail and you should be able to see anyone before they see you.

The other geocache search took me to the American Lake Park on the other end of town. I had never been to this park and it’s nice, but there seems to be a lot of people just parked in their cars sitting there. I don’t get that. If you go to a park why stay in the car? Are the afraid of too much fresh air? Sunshine? What? I’m so baffled by it. The geocache there is American Lake Park  – GC1792X by Spookdawg13. A park and grab, but not quite that easy with everyone sitting in their cars. 

Did you know that the City of Lakewood Parks and Recreation Department has a Treasure Hunt going on? Yep. This is week three of ten. I spent the rest of the daylight hours driveing around the city looking at things and comparing what I saw to the 3 clues. No luck though. You can find the clues and links to all the great stuff they have going on this spring at www.lakewoodparksandrec.com. You’d think that as geocachers we’d have the best chance to find this. Well, after today, I’m just not so sure of that. Anyone else out there following this Treasure Hunt? Having any luck? Got any ideas? I’m stumped so far.

Well, that was my Tuesday. Tomorrow is another day and I have an empty fridge, so you know what that means. Costco. My checkbook is trembling already!

Geocachers never cease to amaze me with their creativity. I have found geocaching containers so cleverly hidden in plain site, that as a muggle, walking that same path daily, I never noticed their existance. I even photographed one once and didn’t realize that the shot contained a geocahe until many moons later.

Geocaching containers are not the only way to be creative with your geocache. The cache coordinates can be skillfully hidden in an image on a geocaching.com listing page or woven into the fabric of a story written to disguise clues to the cache. Some caches are theme based with elaborately decorated geocache containers, filled with ornately decorated geocaching log books and geoswag all reflecting it’s theme. These are some of those extra steps taken by many geocachers to engage our imaginations and uplift our spirits while geocaching.

I have found micros in the woods hidden in hollowed out sticks. I have found ammo cans hidden behind a garden fence in an urban alley. But until today, I had never found a geocache online.

ErikaJean, a geocacher from Arizona, has introduced me to a new kind of creative geocache. She has put together an interactive introduction to geocaching on YouTube. Using a series of short videos hyperlinked to hot spots on the main video, she takes us on a tour of her backyard during our hunt for a geocache. It’s as close to geocaching as I’ve ever seen on a screen and a great way to introduce geocaching to your muggle friends when they won’t leave the computer to go outside and play. (I used to resemble that remark!) I may not be able to log a smiley on geocaching.com for this one, but the smile it brought to my face was well worth it.

Thank you ErikaJean for your splendid version of a creative geocache!

(And yes, I did giggle )