Find #2000!!

WooHoo!! I made it to 2000 cache finds. It took me 2 years and 9 months to get to this point - with tons of fun along the way. I've gotten out into parks and places I've never been to before. I've met some really friendly people. I've found some great caches in very memorable spots. Thanks to everyone who helped me get this far.....those that hid caches, those that put up with the "newbee" questions, and those that came up with some fun puzzles (after all, it was those puzzles - and the thrill of the hunt - that got me hooked on this). Thanks everyone!

I happen to be traveling today so I wasn't able to really do much planning for my 2000th find. I had to pick something close but that would be memorable. So I picked Wagon Wheel Park Petting Zoo Bonus Cache (GC1C48Q). On the surface this seems like a simple puzzle but there are 6 other caches that you have to complete before you can do the final puzzle.

There were other caches in the park so I thought it would be a good place to start my caching in Dallas. So off I went....

(In the order I found them...)

Wagon Wheel Park Petting Zoo #5 - Boy I made this hard, but at least I understand what I'm looking for now.

Wagon Wheel Park Petting Zoo #6 - Humm, a DNF - am I going to be able to finish this with a DNF on one of the stages. Oh well, I'm still going to ge tthem all.

Wagon Wheel Park Petting Zoo #3 - Getting used to the way the hider hides them by this point.

Wagon Wheel Park Petting Zoo #2 - No problem - routine micro.

Wagon Wheel Park Petting Zoo #4 - Routine micro.

Wagon Wheel Park Petting Zoo #1 - Tennis balls galore if anyone needs one you can get them here.

Now solving the puzzle...

Missing one of the number might make this hard but it turns out I got lucky. #6 is the least significant digit of the north coordinate. So this just might work. Theres only 5 possible number it could be and since it's the least significant digit I decided to mark them all and look at each one.

I headed out to the first guess. Not easy to get to and I might be on private property. As I get closer I see where the private property ends and the public park begins (there's probably a way to reach this area from the park but I went a different way). Back into the trees about 100' or so and.....

Bingo!! First guess was right. I love it when I get lucky! Fun find and well worth the 2000th find.

Now I'm off for the next 1000....

Tough FTF Hunt

Yesterday (9-8-08) at about 4:45 a new cache popped up.  Roseville PNG (GC1G3BK) is only about 4 miles (as the crow flies) from where I work.  I decided it was time for me to pack up and head out - maybe I would be able to get the FTF!

I arrived at ground zero at about 5:15 or 5:20 and started the search.  I of course scoured the traditional locations very quickly and came up empty (BTW, future finders, don't play with the electrical box taped to the light pole.  The cache is NOT in there and the electrical box is live).

The area is definitely muggle heaven.  Tons of people around everywhere... but I can't give up now.  I widened the search radius and continued on.

After a short while I noticed three people walking toward me so I started walking back toward ground zero.  Soon one of them gave a little "hello" wave and smiled.  Of course I waved back and could tell they were cachers as well.  Turned out to be Lasreaine, Magicite, and Moonpies who were also hoping for the FTF.

We all continued looking throughout the area.  Some widening the search area and others keeping around ground zero.  Finally I heard the sweet sound of "found it" from right behind me (5:35PM).  Yes, behind me because I just searched that area.  It was Lasreaine who came up with the find - and it was a tough find at that!!

You can read my cache log for some more insights.  Lasreaine's log is there too.

Thanks for the fun hide, Joukkusisu.  It was great to meet three new cachers today and I hope to see them again sometime.

NOTE: Turns out this cache has been a thorn in others sides.  Lots of DNF's in the first 24 hours.

27 Mile Bike Ride

It's been a long time since I've written anything here. There is so much to write about - lots of caches, vacation caching, etc, etc - and the more I think about it the more it seems like an argues task. So to compensate, I've just put off writing anything. Well, that has to stop - now. So I'm going to have to just skip the fun, exciting stuff I haven't written about and move on.....

This weekend EagleEyeMN (my oldest son) and I went for a bike ride around Forest Lake (both the town and the lake). Our goal was to make it a 25 mile ride - it ended up being a little over 27 miles in the end. Of course I planned a series of caches to do along the way, too. Finally tally was 19 finds, 0 DNF's, 1 we decided we couldn't get to, and 2 that we skipped because they haven't been found for so long (and we had to keep moving).

We parked the car at Tolzmann Park at the north end of the lake, got the bikes and the packs ready and headed out counter-clockwise around the lake. Our first cache was about 400 feet away - whew, that's was a tough ride :-)

Our second stop was disappointing - and gave us thoughts of not being able to complete both tasks - 25 miles AND all the caches we have on our list. The cache just didn't seem to be accessible from where we were and if we wanted to go around to get it we'd spend too much time. So we decided to skip it and keep going.

The next part of the ride was filled with caches. Of course some of them were very quick - either EagleEyeMN or I would spot them and be picking up the cache before the other one even got off their bike. Those type of caches helped us stay on time (although the only time commitment was that we had to be done in 8 hours - not too difficult).

At about the 7 mile mark we started looking for The Treasure Hunt (GC1FV3J). This was a fun multi stage cache. The cache hider, Plumcitykitties, did an outstanding job with both stages of this cache. They spent time in ensuring that both containers were unique and fun. Thanks for all the work, guys! You'll have to go find the cache yourself to see what I'm talking about.

Next we headed back toward the lake and decided to stop for lunch at Beltz Park and X-Ray (GC1CXG0). Another excellent cache hide by Plumbcitykitties! The park was hopping with kids and a couple of adults so the fact that we were stopping for lunch made it a little easier to grab the cache. Luckily, EagleEyeMN put is eagle eyes to work and found the cache right away. However, it took some time before we could actually retrieve it. When the time was right we made the grab and got it back quickly. Thanks for another great hide, guys!!

After eating and grabbing the cache it was time to move on. We skipped one on the way to Hardwood Creek WMA (GC59A2) because it hadn't been found in a long time - and the fact there there were two cars and a handful of muggles at ground zero when we passed by. We did, however, stop and take a quick 2 minute break there anyway.

Hardwood Creek WMA was interesting. You can read the log to get some more information. Needless to say we were lucky to get out of there without getting poison ivy.

By this time in the ride we were both tired but still feeling pretty good. We made it about 16 miles and were at the south end of the lake. Only 5 caches left to go on our list.

We headed up the east side of the lake and took another break at the next cache - North Shore Trail (GC1709T). Fun hide - mostly because of the muggle traffic. We were lucky today, though. The muggles were already out on the lake and not coming back in yet.

Status check.... EagleEyeMN is doing just fine and I'm starting to get tired. I'm not hurting yet but that last couple of miles were a lot more difficult for me than for him. Finding the cache - and grabbing a candy bar - gave me a few minutes to recover before heading on.

As we continued to head up the east side of the lake, we decided to skip the next cache because it hadn't been found in a while and we needed to keep pressing on. Thinking back on it now I should have stopped and taken another break - but we didn't.

Last stop for the day was Kulenkamp Memorial Park with 4 caches in the park. Although mostly uneventful in this park there was one multi cache - Sudsy (GC16ZPJ) - that needed some help. Checkout the log for more details. The other interesting cache in this park was Kavanaugh Red (GC1CMJH). Seems some soon-to-be hunters wanted a deer stand in the park. I don't know if hunting is legal in that park but there's a deer stand at ground zero now (see my log).

We now have all of our caches done and it's about a 3 1/2 mile bike ride back to Tolzmann Park and the car. We're both tired but getting the caches in this park gave us time to recuperate. So off we went.

We finally arrived back at the car. EagleEyeMN was tired but still feeling "ok." I, on the other had, was about to DIE!! The last two miles of the ride really did me in. We didn't stop since leaving Kulenkamp park. It was only 3 1/2 miles but it really did me in. My quads were about to explode! I did all I could do to get off my bike and walk over to a bench to sit down for a rest. EagleEyeMN graciously took the time to pack up the bikes while I just watched from a distance (thanks, dude!).

Overall it was a fun day. EagleEyeMN and I were able to spend some good time together and he was able to prove his young legs were much better than my old legs. That's ok, though, I can still do more push ups than he can :-)

Holiday Caching and an FTF

My sister-in-law and her family are here visiting for the holiday. We just got cleaned up from a morning of paintball fun (but that's a different story all together) and I sat down to check email. While I'm sitting there two new caches pop up. One puzzle and one regular. Our visitors have only been caching once before - when they visited last time - and they've never done a puzzle cache before.

I printed the cache page out and handed it to my brother-in-law. After a few minutes he had it solved. Then I explained that these two caches had just popped up and that if we left now we might be able to get the coveted "first to find" honors (I explained what that was, too).

After a few minutes we had a group of six of us who wanted to go and a list of 10 caches that we might be able to grab - including the two FTF's. Of course each kid that came wanted to have a GPS so I had to load 4 other GPS's with waypoints (and charge the batteries that were dead). Loading only takes a few seconds with GSAK but charging took 15 minutes - and every minute counts when hunting FTF's in this area.

We headed straight for the first FTF attempt. ROCKIN' by KC0TWB. By the time we made it to the cache site the listing had been published for around an hour. The group was hopeful that the FTF might still be possible but I wasn't so sure. An hour is a long time in these parts.

After some hunting the kids finally found it (only a couple of small hints to get them going in the right direction). They were impressed by the container and the work put into it. I think they're beginning to like this game!! We opened the log and, yep, we were too late. We were 3rd to find. The kids wanted to trade all the SWAG so I pulled out the SWAG Bag and added a bunch of trinkets to the cache.

That one didn't result in an FTF but we had one more chance - the puzzle that my brother-in-law solved. We all piled back into the car and headed straight to that one (passing some other caches along the way in hopes of an FTF).

The next one was TXT4FUN by meralgia. When we pulled up I thought to myself another one of these (no, not an LPC but another popular hide in parks). As we approached I thought, yep it should be over there. The kids thought so, too, and started searching the area. I stood there watching the other five search and noticed something just a little different. Humm, that looks interesting. I meandered over and took a look - trying not to get the attention of the other five. Yep that's it - very cool! My sister-in-law saw me look at it and now we're playing the waiting game - giving hints every so often to get the group in the right spot. One of them even said, "What's a _____ doing there?" (sorry can't give too much away) But he didn't go check it out. We finally gave enough hints so the kids all found it.

We opened the container hoping that the log book might be blank. Slowly we opened the log book and VIOLA! A blank log book. WooHoo! We were first to find!

That was a fun find and now they're hooked. We continued the day finding more caches in the area, including the ones we passed on our way to the FTF. In all we nabbed 7 before heading home for dinner.

That night my brother-in-law ordered a Garmin Colorado 400t from Amazon. It will be here on Tuesday so we can play with it.

Note: the pictures are not from the caches mentioned in this posting so they are not spoilers for those caches. They are other caches we found today.

Trifecta Caching

WooHoo! A trifecta all in one cache!! I've had a trifecta day, or a trifecta week, but I don't think I've had a trifecta cache before!

Trifecta: The situation of having three major accomplishments or achievements in a sport, profession, or pastime.

Pastime: That which amuses, and serves to make time pass agreeably; sport; amusement; diversion; games.

Game: A pursuit or activity with rules performed either alone or with others, for the purpose of entertainment.

"Would you like to play a game? How about Global Thermal Nuclear War?" (10 bonus points of you know what move that quote is from)

Since Geocaching is a game, and a game is a pastime, and a trifecta is an accomplishment in a pastime I think the name qualifies: Trifecta Caching.

June has been a slow caching month for me for many reasons. Now that it's July I can get back on the bandwagon again - and there's no better way to do that than to start with a trifecta cache!

X=GZ (GC1DQGK) by Topgear was that cache.

The cache popped up last night as a new puzzle cache. I thought I might have a chance so I quickly solved the puzzle the old fassioned way (printed a map of the area with the coords on it then used a compass to disect some lines, drew a couple more lines and viola - ground zero was found). I was pretty sure Rebelex wouldn't be going after this since it was a puzzle, so my odds of being "first to find" where even higher. So I added X=GZ to my list of caches to go after on the way to work in the morning.

On the way to work I arrived at a parking lot near the cache. Another car was ahead of me and parked in the same end of the parking lot - where no other cars were.

"Humm", I thought, "Looks like I might have to share this find with another cacher."

I quickly got out of the car and so did the other person. We kinda glanced at each other and moved on. He grabbed a very large bag out of his trunk and headed toward a door.

"Whew, I think I'm back on my own for the hunt."

Approaching the cache I waded through tons of poison ivy, mosquitoes who wanted to drain my body of blood, and even a tic or two. After a short search I finally made the find, traded a travel bug, and signed the log.

Ok, now here's where the trifecta comes in. My three achievements are:

1. Marked off another day for "Bakers Dozen." This will be a puzzle for Day 5. My bookmark for the Bakers Dozen caches can be found here.
2. I needed an X for "Alphabet Soup" - X is the last one I need to finish that puzzle. My bookmark for the Alphabet Soup caches can be found here.
3. WOOHOO!! First to Find at 8:05AM. I really didn't think this one would last until 8AM but it did. I haven't had an FTF for quite a while - April 17 - so that makes it 2 1/2 months. SWEET!!

I finished the caching day by completing Day 5 of Bakers Dozen at lunch.

I wonder if there's such a thing as a quadfecta for next time....

KB Challenge - Minnesota Bakers Dozen

Last week I spent all of my caching time working on the King Boreas Minnesota Baker's Dozen challenge cache. I've written about this challenge before so you've probably heard about it, but the essence of the challenge is to find 1 cache on day 1, 2 caches on day 2, 3 caches on day 3, all the way to 13 caches on day 13. Now the day's don't have to be consecutive days or that would be impossible for me to complete - I don't cache 13 day's in a row. The other major rule is that at least one of the caches found on a particular day must be either a multi-cache or a puzzle cache. That throws an interesting twist into the whole thing. Visit the cache page for more details.

So last week I found myself ignoring the coveted FTF's just because I've either already hit my number for the day, or the FTF might be a multi or a puzzle and I can't go get it because I already have my multi or puzzle for the day. So I passed on a couple of FTF hunts.

However, last week I was able to complete some of the bigger number day's. Here's my cache bookmark which shows my progress so far. I focused on the bigger number days on the weekends because it's almost impossible to get 12 or 13 caches at lunch. I used to be able to do it but now I have to drive too far because I've cleared out the area close to work. Now just getting 3 or 4 caches takes up the lunch time (and sometimes I'm only able to get 1 or 2).

The progress last week looks something like this:

• Sat June 14 - Day 13 - Tbone and I did this. Another post talked about our adventures on our bikes.
• Mon June 16 - Day 4
• Tue June 17 - Day 7 - This required a longer lunch, though.
• Wed June 18 - Day 2 - The multi I did here was a killer. Took way too long - but fun!!
• Fri June 20 - Day 12 - I was at a baseball tourney and was able to get enough caching in between games to get the full 12 done.
• Sat June 21 - none - I had high hopes of getting day 11 out of the way - but there was no time between baseball games today.

So overall it was a successful week - getting Day 12 and 13 out of the way. Only 4 days left, 5, 9, 10, and 11. I'm afraid it will take a couple of weekends to get 9, 10, and 11 out of the way, though.

Back in the Saddle

Wow, it's been a while since I've been able to get out and do some geocaching. I've been dealing with pneumonia for the past couple of weeks and am finally well enough to get out there. So TBone and I decided to take our bikes and go ride some trails. Of course the trails we picked were loaded with caches, too. We ended up grabbing 13 today - just enough for day 13 of King Boreas' Minnesota Bakers Dozen Challenge. I still have a few more day's to fill in but I'm getting there.

Tbone and I had a great day. We found some pretty tough caches, Tbone found some fun SWAG, and we traded a few Travel Bug's and Geocoins. We scared up 5 or 6 deer - got to within about 30 -40 feet of a couple of them before they ran off. The mosquitoes were out in full force! I think they almost carried us away a few times. The worst part is when you're stopped to sign the log - the mosquitoes are relentless when your not moving!!

Then of course there were the tics. Ton's of them. As you can see from the pics we were in grassy areas so I went first to try and break the path for Tbone. That also meant that I got most of the tics. I think we pulled 15-18 tics off of my clothes. Tbone had about 4 or 5 during the day. None of them bit us, though, so it looks like we found them all.

All in all, we had a great day finding 13 caches, 5 or 6 deer, a few ducks, and lots of dragon flys - and doing it all from our bikes. Thanks for going with me today, Tbone. I had a great time!!

Sokratz Lab

I was able to do some lunch caching today. Only had time for three quick grabs but the fun part was solving a puzzle last night. Lost in Minnesota was a fun puzzle cache that took me some time to figure out. I wasn't sure if the cache really was in Minnesota or not but after I solved it I found that it really was in Minnesota - even though a Utah cacher hid it (with help from someone around here). All you puzzle hiders out there, check this one out.

I've spent some time in the Sokratz Lab lately. Now my lab is nothing like the Posen lab, I'm sure, but it still creates some pretty fun containers.

Many of these containers have already been hidden in the last month but there's sill plenty more to be hidden this summer. Of course I can't show you all of them or it would give them away. The picture here shows some of the more "traditional" ones you may find next time you hunt a Sokratz cache.

San Francisco Caching

I spent last week in San Francisco on business and of course had to get some caching in. I was able to find 29 unique caches in the downtown area - all within walking distance from Mascone Center. According to the track log I walked 9.5 miles on Tuesday, 4 miles on Wed, and 4.5 miles on Friday. And don't forget the San Francisco terrain. This isn't Minnesota anymore. There are more steep hills than I imagined. Many of them had stairs instead of sidewalks because they were so steep. I sure had a good time, though, walking through the streets and seeing things I would have never seen. Here are some that I thought were interesting....

Franciscan Complex - Alcatraz Terrane - My first cache on the trip and my first Earth Cache. This was a pretty cool place. I learned something about Graywacke, too. Not at all what I expected.

Parrot's Perch - Wild parrot's, how cool is that. Boy they were loud, too. This as an interesting place. There wasn't a road but a set of stairs that did a "switch back" to get up the hill. Everywhere along the stairway there were walkways to the houses. It's hard to describe without actually being there.

Watermelon Hill - This is evidently a place where David Letterman rolled a bunch of watermelons down the hill. Boy it was steep!!

Lombard Street - Yes, this is the famous curvy road hill. This was a fun cache. I met a cacher from Tennessee here. Lots of great views from this vantage point. And of course tons of muggles in the area!

At the Pier - This is a Web Cam cache at Pier 39 (the tourist area). You'll have to checkout the log to see the pictures of Sokratz playing at the pier. I'm on the phone with my wife so she could take the picture from the web cam.

Bamboo Alley and Chinatown Tour - These were a couple of puzzle caches that took you on a sight seeing tour. Saw things I probably wouldn't have seen otherwise.

S.F. Cable Car Barn - This was a fun place. It's at the heart of the cable cars. This working museum is where all the cables that power the cable cars run from. It was pretty interesting to see how it all works.


Of course there a couple of DNF's (did not find) in there too. One of them really bugged me. At one point there were 4 of us there looking for it.

Union Square - We couldn't find this one at all. I came here on two different days and at one time even had one of the street vendors selling art work helping me look for it. It was maddning. After leaving I sent an email to the cacher I met at Lombard Street because she had found this one, too. Boy did I feel stupid when she told me where she had found it. Yikes - sometimes you feel like a nut, and this was that time!

Of course there were many other fun caches there too. Overall it was a great caching adventure for a couple of days in San Francisco.

I took some pictures along the way and used GPicSync to sync the pictures up with my GPS tracks. The result in .KMZ file can be viewed in Google Earth (don't confuse that with Google Maps, they're two different things). You can download the 3.6MB file from here.

Free Maps for Garmin units

I haven't had much time for caching the past week. Work has me hopping right now. It will slow back down in a week or two - then they'll be more time for caching again.

I have spent some time looking at maps for my Garmin units that I don't have maps for. I found some excellent maps (most are works in progress).

First Topo Maps from http://www.miscjunk.org/mj/mp_main.html.
They cover Wyoming, Utah, Montana, and Colorado and they are great! I took an older eTrex Legend (old blue - with only 8meg for maps) and loaded some of the Wyoming maps. I choose Wyoming because I grew up there and thought I would know if the maps were accurate or not. Well, the they are exceptional! The contours are excellent, plus you get street maps for cities and towns!! Next time we go out there I'll definitely load the older GPS's with these maps. The kids will love it compared to not having any maps at all.

They also have some off road maps for Minnesota. You Minnesotans might want to check them out.

My second great find was http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/.
Although the map choices are sparse, they have "How To's" to teach you how to create your own maps. I thought this was pretty good, and if I find the time, I might just try it myself.

Next it was off to http://openstreetmap.org/.
A very interesting community based project. These guy's are mapping the world one saved track at a time. Take a look at your area and I bet you'll be impressed. What I found most useful about this site was the European maps that can be generated. If you're planning a trip over seas, take a look here and learn how to make your maps before you go.

Lastly, follow this topic in the GroundSpeak Forums http://forums.groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?showtopic=189762.
These are the best street maps I could find (for free!!). ibycus is doing an outstanding job creating a complete USA map set. If you haven't seen this yet, it's a "must see." The only issue that I could find is the speed of the GPS. I tried loading a set of maps on the old eTrex Legend. They load just fine. However, the blue eTrex Legend just isn't powerful enough to draw the maps quick enough. It took forever because of all of the detail ibycus is providing. However, on the newer color eTrex line it worked great.

So, if you're looking for maps and don't want to pay a bundle, the resources above are a great start. And if you can't find what you like, you can always make your own and contribute them to the cause.