NorthWes

At last was able to find both time to go searching and ground clear of snow... AND Mrs NorthWes officially sanctioned this 'first recovery effort' of mine for this contest by agreeing to accompany me despite the cold wind and sleet. It was a grand view of Turnagain Arm and upper Cook Inlet from the station... After a search of the rules, I believe 'DARK RESET' (UW7682) qualifies as a 1912 mark (drill hole) even though it had a disk cemented into the drill hole in 1964 as part of the 'monumental' resurveying effort in the wake of the Good Friday Earthquake that 'relocated' much of southcentral Alaska . Therefore (pending John's review and approval of course!) here's my first entry: UW7862 / 1912 / N / N

If it hadn't been for an email from Artman to me in June 2005 about my photo and log at UW5498 (the Salty Dawg Saloon on Homer Spit, in Homer Alaska), I wouldn't have known about the benchmark gallery. Now Artman does it again with a pleasantly-worded instruction set on what should've been obvious to me all along... doh! Thanks once more for helping me learn how to get more out of this game, Artman!

*sigh* Alaska's the only state without a 'county map.' Even Louisiana with its parishes gets a map... what's up? I guess the 'borough' system here confuses folks too much... understandable, since most states back east are smaller than our largest boroughs! And lets not even talk about a DeLorme challenge here!

Good job on finding that article, headybrew! My favorite cache container up here in Alaska is the ammo can. Here's an ammo-can cache that was recovered after a forest fire... great story, great photos... and the ammo can preserved the original log despite being toasted. Visit this log by the Ladybug Kids for the Taiga Cascade cache , located northeast of Fairbanks, on the Chatanika River.

I earned my Eagle award in 1971 as a member of Troop 251, Pioneer District, Miami Council at Wright-Patterson AFB (outside Dayton OH). Senator John Glenn was the keynote speaker at the council's Eagle Award recognition dinner - his brief and concise recounting of the Scout Law and its application in our lives was riveting. The teamwork, hard work, friendships, and fun I had along the way to earning that award convinced me I can do about anything I set my mind to. I was blessed to be in a troop guided by men who purposed to build character and competence. They were my friends' dads, my own dad... I was fortunate to be the recipient of the care and instruction of my elders, in detail, of what it means to be trustworthy, loyal, brave... and all the other values that combine to produce young men who go out to build up their communities, rather than tear them down. Sure there's some things that seem unpalatable about the standards Scouting holds as basic tenets today... especially if they weren't values you were raised with. For me, they're as right today as they were when they were written. And, when there's a tough job to be done and I have to choose those who will stand with me to get it done, all other things being equal I'll choose the Eagle Scout. They've been through one crucible already... and modern history shows they've got the stuff to be successful over and over again.

You can see all the Federal Stock Numbers for ammo cans you'd ever want here: Bway Corporation's PDF listing of Ammo Cans made for US Army & others. Just be careful - you'll get into a real case of 'ammo can envy' when you see some of the big boys they make! Some of the tests listed subject cans to 72 continuous hours of salt spray under 'high pressure' to ensure the can doesn't leak or rust... I'll hunt at home tonight for the cache page from the Fairbanks area with photos showing a can recovered after the huge forest fires of 2005.

Sorry to say that the Matanuska Colony land sale survey marks weren't all recorded in the database we use on geocaching.com... In fact, most of the original railroad land surveys (versus the later right of way surveys) aren't in the database either. Still, they're pretty cool to find, as they document the history of land transfer from the federal government into state and federal hands. Good luck with the BLM lands office and hunting the records - I'm due to look for Talkeetna-area records from the 1913-1943 period there myself.

Thanks for the update, Will - I missed this notice while out 'recreating' in Alaska's snow country. I got one coin ordered & paid for tonite.

Is there a map version showing a PID overlay on Alaska?

Cyclometh, here in Alaska almost all tidewater areas are 'public lands' with 'reasonable access' (meaning, access 'in transit' - not access to camp out or such) allowed on beaches below the mean high tide line. The exceptions are those few areas with titles patented from the federal government well before statehood in 1959. Some federal property transfers into private hands in the 1950s did not include tidewater ownership. I would think this applies in Washington state as well - so access below the mean high tide mark would be permitted unless the beach is posted. Of course, what folks' perceptions are regarding 'their' beach can lead to differences about what's 'legal' access! Asking the property owner is the golden standard, of course - if you can access the property owner. Perhaps your enthusiasm for the benchmark recovery will infect them with a desire to know more about the area's history.

I'm working on one of these introductory seminars for the Anchorage Parks & Rec Dept, to be presented just before our CITO event at Kincaid Park on April 22nd. I've looked at (and borrowed shamelessly from) the many excellent presentations out there, and have begun to build ours for a one-hour inside presentation to be followed with a one-hour 'jungle walk' out in front of the building across a large field bounded by brush and spruce trees. Much like emb021's plan for the VentureScouts, I'll have the class navigate across several mini-caches on their way to a final cache (which will be an 'official' on-line geocaching.com hide). Four additional follow-on classes on Thursday evenings will take advantage of the long daylight to lead classes in small groups afield in the rest of Kincaid Park to hunt down various caches of increasing difficulty. Training development literature emphasizes repeating main points a minimum of three times to ensure the student retains the presented information. I wasn't sure I could stretch an 'Intro to Geocaching' across a full hour (and my Alaskan buddies better be quiet here! ), but with that mandate to repeat major emphasis points three times I'm finding myself doing a re-summation of the process about every five minutes throughout the presentation. It's to be hoped that important points such as the CITO, Trade Up or Trade Even and Tread Lightly ethics will be engraved in the students' memories, as well as aquisition of useful habits such as 'marking' the car location, bringing along cache repair materials, and packing spare batteries. After I read the requirement to repeat major points three times, I stumbled across the author's assertion that for every minute spent actually presenting there should be an hour of development time. I nearly threw up my hands and went geocaching.... then realized I had a new excuse for going afield! Yeah... that's it... 'Honey, I need to do some field research to test assertions I'm making in the Parks & Rec presentation.' With just 44 days left to prepare, I'm thinking at least an hour a day afield will be necessary to ensure the class goes well. The presentation will be posted to our organization's website at GeocacheAlaska.org for future use.

Sign me up! I'm hoping to travel western Prince William Sound this summer searching for some of the marks along the rocky shoreline - if the weather allows. Otherwise, I'll be hunting marks along the Alaska Railroad to find ones old enough to qualify... should be fun!

Sooo.... just where was this 'mountain in Alaska'? If it's on my travel route I'd love to climb up and log that USCG marker! I'm based in Anchorage, but get to travel from time to time... sure would like to know... The Coasties are tremendously respected up here - between those guys (with their unofficial motto of 'You have to go out - You don't have to come back) and the Rescue squadron aircrews of Kulis ANGB's 176th Operations Group, Alaskans are well-served for Search and Rescue when the chips are down.

This topic pops up every now & then, doesn't it? criminal's link to the thread on Treadwell provides a must-read for folks who want to 'anthropomorphise' bears - they're animals, not humans. Most Alaskans resent folks like Treadwell whose ongoing idiotic behavior at some point or another ends up putting someone else at risk. I encountered bears inside the city limits (well inside!) here in Anchorage twice last year while caching - once at thirty yards, and once at thirty feet. I described those encounters here on a thread about 'Firearms and caching'... Lots of rhetoric about bears out there... meet them up close and you'll suddenly wonder if all the excellent advice you read in places like the Alaska Dept of Fish & Game Bear Info page or the Alaska State Parks bear info page are going to apply in your now very lonely and scary moment! I've met quite a few bears hunting or hiking in my nearly thirty years of Alaskan residency - almost all of them fit the profiles described by the biologists. The several who didn't were black bears that displayed intense curiousity - and made me very very nervous. As for their strength - yeah, brown bears have been known to kill cattle on Kodiak Island with a big swat to the head (breaking their neck), but look at the musculature of a black bear when he's skinned out, and you realize he's nothing to go hand to hand with either. Remember, as with mountain lions, it's not necessarily the bear you see that's going to be the problem... As you're far more likely to encounter moose or especially loose (and impolite) dogs here in Alaska while geocaching, it's good to be alert (not locked on the GPSr) and to have a plan for those animal encounters. Me - I carry a walking stick for the dogs, and a discreetly hidden firearm in a fanny pack holster for the others. In some areas (such as when I check on my cache at 'Three Forks of the Montana', where lots of folks crack up at the hand-lettered sign warning about 'hiking bears' - not realizing the trail is used heavily in late fall by bears foraging along the salmon stream...) I may upgrade to a rifle or shotgun in the summer. Others are comfortable just armed with knowledge and perhaps pepper spray... Whatever you do, don't think 'Grizzly Man' Treadwell had the right answer for the long run - the law of averages caught up with him in the form of an animal whose prey-hunting behavior finally kicked in and 'tested' if Treadwell was prey - or a predator nasty enough to be left alone.

Our tourism folks say 'Alaska - Beyond your reach - within your dreams'... with over 750 caches awaiting city visitors and remote bush travelers alike there's plenty of adventure here for the geocaching enthusiast! Keep an eye on our organization's website... there's lots more to come... www.geocachealaska.org

We'd love to meet the 'geocaching doula' of Interior Alaska! As your plans firm up, let me know - might be an opportunity to 'team-up' with some of our folks down here for a fun-filled cache hunt...

Nifty concept... ordered a set for my collection...

Trade made - thanks to fellow scouters!

Missed this one... As an Eagle Scout ('73) I never pass up any chance to support Scouting... and it's a cool coin! I'd like to acquire 3 of these (one for myself and two for close caching friends who're Eagles). Any takers? If interested, e-mail me regarding upcoming Alaskan geocollectibles soon to be available for trade...

Signed up, membership now pending. Thanks!

Quarterly at most (coin production's a lot of work!) Produce a thousand or more - sample via preorder system. It would be nice to see the announcement for the coin made to benchmark-oriented folks first... Several coin sites out there appear to smooth out some of the 'bumps' in coin production for the developer. Well, what's the series going to feature? Historic points, obviously... what else? This is too exciting!

Thanks for the update, Holograph! I love 'benchmarking' - possibly more than geocache hunting - and your stats/info links help keep me motivated to do more than just find the mark... I appreciate your work very much. Looking forward to more exploring this summer season here in Alaska, as well as some opportunities to 'hunt' in Michigan and Arizona this spring.

Got my four coins in yesterday's mail... makes me want to go out and buy myself another CJ5 to replace the one I sold two years ago... beautiful coin, well-packaged too! Thanks for the effort you put into this one...

Awesome design on the 2006 USA coin - and I like the 'all-metal' reasoning too. I just noticed my USA coin icon has updated to a variation on the American Flag w/USA across it - it rocks! (Of course, being an English-born American, I was thrilled to see my UK coin's new icon as well!). Job well-done, Stressmaster...

OH my! New York, Connecticut, Pennsylvania, and Aerohound coins rec'd today! My those Aerohound coins are cute! (I suppose ya gotta be a hound lover to really appreciate them...) Love the detail on the state coins I'd traded for...