Sunday, May 16, 2010

"Click, Clack, Clatter, Clackety"


This was a cool experience, I may post a bit more detail about it when I can, and I'll post more pictures when I'm up to it. Click, Clack, Clatter, Clackety:

"I've wanted to do this cache for a while, but it's a bit off the beaten tracks and I haven't been able to bike the loop trail anymore like I used to. So I've put it off for a while.

We've been staying in a hotel for over a week, after our recent house fire. I've looked around to see if there was a cache within (reasonable) walking distance for me to go to, and this was the closest one. I finally decided to get out and do it tonight.

I didn't have a gps, so I looked at the maps and hoped they were accurate. I'm fortunate that they were spot on! I was able to make an easy find. :-)

I intended just to get out for a quick walk, but I ended up taking a while, it was such a beautiful evening. There was a storm on the edge of town, that I was worried would curtail my walk (I saw lightening when I was leaving the hotel), but it quickly faded away. The air was warm, despite the storm, although the wind picked up pretty hard towards the end of my walk.

I walked all the way down to the start of the art deco foot bridge across the Wenatchee River, and back. I saw a lot of neat things along the way: two wild kitties, a hawk, red wing blackbirds, lots of people going by on bikes and skateboards - one lady stopped and had a nice little chat with me, (heard) a marmot - who was upset at me for being too close to his area by the Wenatchee River, lots of pretty variations of the color green, flowering dogwoods, wild roses, a sea of grasses waving in the wind like waves of the ocean, beautiful cloud formations, and a gorgeous sunset.

Thank you for dragging me out of my hotel room for a little while. 8-D"

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Late night date/caching adventure

My log for the cache, Kirkland Signature:

My husband and I snuck out of the house for a quick date, after putting the kiddos to bed. We got a couple yummy blizzards (remakes of a past mistake from the Dairy Queen 25 anniversary buy one get one for 25 cents), and wanted to find somewhere close by to park and eat them, with a nice view. All41 drove to this parking lot, because he knew there was a pretty view from there during the day. I laughed a bit, and told him it was nighttime, and that the view might not be as great. We got to the parking lot, and parked in one spot, but there was a bright sign in the way of a view. We moved, parked again, but there was a bush in the way. I will not tell you how many times we moved to try and get an uncluttered view of Wenatchee, but lets just say that there was one other vehicle in the parking lot, with a guy sitting in it watching, and he probably thought we were totally crazy. I just started laughing and laughing, and couldn't stop, which only spurred on my poor husband to try harder to find a good spot. We basically stopped trying after a while, and just sat and enjoyed our lovely dessert. :P

When we were through, I mentioned that there was a cache here that I hadn't been to, and that we had to do it right then. We have an iphone, so we used it to try and get to the correct spot, but unfortunately, it wouldn't narrow down, and showed our accuracy as being 100' or more. I took out the flashlight and fortunately, we found it within minutes. I felt a bit exposed, because there were still people working in the opposite corner of the parking lot, and I felt conspicious with my flashlight. The last time we went to a cache in this spot, years ago, a policeman stopped and questioned us. Fortunately, he knew about caching, so all was well. But since this time was at night as well, I was having flashbacks of having a police car show up. But all was quiet this night. 8D Patudle's police log, My police log.

Thanks for adding to our silly, little, adventurous date. :D

Saturday, May 1, 2010

Geocaching History and Lost & Found Events



Ten years ago, on May 2, 2000, selective availability was turned off. The next day, Dave Ulmer placed the first cache, The Original Stash by the side of a road in the woods near Beavercreek, OR. Then he posted the coordinates for the cache to an usenet group. The cache was found within 2 days. At that time it was called a "stash", a "GPS Stash Hunt", but after a little while, they decided to call it a Geocache because of the possible negative connotations towards the word "stash".

Unfortunately, within a few months, the container was damaged by roadside mowing crews. A cacher found the remains, and wanting to preserve the history, placed another cache within 100', safely up the hill. The Un-Original Stash is still active today.

In 2003, an effort was underway to create a memorial plaque and tribute cache at the site of the original cache. Here is a Geocaching forum thread discussing this: MEMORIAL AT THE ORIGINAL GEOCACHE SITE. The dedication was attended by several geocaching enthusiasts, including Dave Ulmer. The ORIGINAL STASH TRIBUTE PLAQUE © cache is also still active today. It is one of the most sought after cache finds around the world, over 3,000 finds as of this post. I'm sure that number will jump up around Geowoodstock time, when thousands of geocachers will be visiting the NW.

Here is a youtube video with Dave Ulmer showing and discussing his first hide, and then a video of them placing the plaque:





Here is the original Geocaching website, created by Mike Teague.

After becoming interested in Geocaching, Jeremy Irish created a new site in September 2000, with input from Mike Teague. Soon, Jeremy realized that the site would become larger than he could handle all by himself, and so he partnered with two co-workers, Bryan Roth and Elias Alvord. When Groundspeak first started, there were less than 100 caches worldwide. Now, almost 10 years later, there are over 1 million.

Here are some links that have more interesting information:

Geocaching History

A bookmark list of the first 100 caches

Today's Cacher article about Dave Ulmer

Early Gecaching Timeline



This year is full of events celebrating the 10 anniversary of Geocaching. The first Events are occuring around the world this weekend, all with some form of the name, "10 Years! (location)". Each Event celebrating this anniversary will be getting a special cache type icon. Here is my Event, which is being held tomorrow night: 10 Years! Wenatchee Valley, WA.

There are many new items being sold by Shop Groundspeak and other stores. Shop Groundspeak has geocoins, stickers (pictured at the top of this post), t-shirts, etc. with the 10 year logo. I wanted to post pictures of everything, but there's too many things, just go to the link provided.

Here's a pic of the geocoins from Shop Groundspeak:



Here is another version from Geoswag.com:



For the first time, the annual Mega Event, Geowoodstock, will be hosted by Washington State. This is great timing for the 10 year anniversary, so the theme around this event and others that weekend, is this anniversary. Groundspeak has decided to open up the grounds around their building, so that cachers can come and meet the lackeys and sign the Groundspeak Headquarters logbook. This Event will be held the day after Geowoodstock, and is called Lost & Found Celebration. This will help geocachers to complete "The (Geocaching) Trifecta", which is finding the top three desired northwest caches - Groundspeak Headquarters, ORIGINAL STASH TRIBUTE PLAQUE ©, and Mission 9: Tunnel of Light.

There is a link on the Geocaching homepage that discusses all of these "Lost & Found" Events: Lost and Found Tour.

Known Events (at this posting) revolving around Geowoodstock/Lost & Found in the summer:

July 1 –

On the Road to Geowoodstock VIII ~ Waterville Hwy2

On the Road to GeoWoodstock: Everett

July 2 –

COWWS Friday Meet & Greet and Luau

Going APE!

July 3 –

Geowoodstock VIII

C.I.T.O.@ GW VIII

Midnight Geocoin Madness II ~ MGM 2

July 4 -

Lost & Found Celebration

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"I can do all things through Christ who gives me strength."