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You know you're a benchmarker when...


Harry Dolphin

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I don't take the train to and from the city very often anymore. Yesterday, I had to take the train home. It's about an hour and a half ride on the Morris abd Essex line of NJ Transit. I should have brought along Friday's crossword puzzle to finish...

I've hunted for most of the benchmarks on this line, at least as far as Newark. So I looked out the window to see if I could see any of them. :anibad: I actually saw one!! (Most of the bridges are covered with ballast.) And I decided that we were wise not to try to climb the bridge in Millburn. Even stranger, I recognized several stretches of track, and bridges, that we had searched.

Hmm... I need a hobby. Oh, wait! This is a hobby. :o

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I gets worse! I could find either of the benchmarks I looked for yesterday. One due to the ground being frozen (and possiby due to a pipeline.) Didn't have much time today. New refrigerator was supposed to be delivered between 2 and 4 (It didn't fit through the door. :( ) So I used scardeycat to look for some 2002 benchmarks (not on GC). (I needed my fix!) Walked right up to them. Interestingly, they are scaled, with degrees, minutes, seconds, and the coords were 9' off by my GPS for the first one. Interesting coincidence. Don't know what to make of these new-fangled DF PIDs! I usually hunt for KV, KU and LY PIDs.

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You know you are a benchmarker when... you are thinking the whole time that you are archiving a cache, "It sure is a good thing you can't 'own' any benchmarks. It makes them so much more fun knowing if they are destroyed, all you do is make a report and not mourn too much." (Unless it was a real "old one").

 

Which also goes along with thinking that it is a real shame when a surveyor "messes" with a really old mark - say an old 18-- drill hole by placing a benchmark disk in the original drill hole say in 1945. It tends to put a damper on the hunt and find a bit.

 

Shirley~

Edited by 2oldfarts (the rockhounders)
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Interestingly, they are scaled, with degrees, minutes, seconds, and the coords were 9' off by my GPS for the first one. Interesting coincidence. Don't know what to make of these new-fangled DF PIDs!

 

I'm curious......Are you saying that the "DF" PIDs in your area have SCALED coordinates? In North Carolina, DF's are set by NCGS or by private contractors working for NCGS, and the coordinates have Seconds to several decimal places.

 

-Paul-

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You know you've been bitten bad when you can spot witness posts along the highway at 70 MPH in a torrential downpour and you still look for a place to make a U-turn to go back and check for the benchmark.

 

Then there's the benchmark hunter who faces being buried in a fast approaching sand storm and perseveres to recover the benchmark!

 

fdd49779-44f8-4957-9cb2-ede47c79c6ee.jpg

 

Keep smiling (and you may get a mouthful of sand!).

 

John

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You know you've been bitten bad when you can spot witness posts along the highway at 70 MPH in a torrential downpour and you still look for a place to make a U-turn to go back and check for the benchmark.

Hey wait I resemble that remark.

:o

 

I wasn't going 70, but that's exactly how I found NZ0042 near Crater Lake.

 

Patty

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You know you're a benchmarker when you persuade your snowmobile-riding buddies that benchmark recovery attempts are FUN - any weather - any altitude! We were mapping a ride plan that would take us within a half-mile of UW7527 "FANCH 29TH ENG 1942" (a survey disk located about 9 miles SW of Portage AK, set by the US Army's 29th Engineers in the early days of WWII). I asked what the group thought about riding up onto 'this little shelf right here on the topo map so I could, uh, dig around looking for a benchmark...' They shook their head at my wierd 'need' to find these brass caps littering the countryside, then dug in to figure out how we could do it (without becoming avalanche victims - the slopes one drainage north of this point have claimed 2 lives already this year).

 

We didn't make it all the way to the mark, but my five riding partners agreed the 'target' put a sharper focus on our effort to go just as far out and up as we felt safe doing under adverse conditions. I logged a 'note' for FANCH (with some spooky gray photos and a map), and hope on one of our return trips this spring the riding conditions will allow us a better shot at climbing just a few hundred feet more up the slope... safely... to find that little disk set in a rock outcrop.

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You know you're a benchmarker when you persuade your snowmobile-riding buddies that benchmark recovery attempts are FUN - any weather - any altitude! We were mapping a ride plan that would take us within a half-mile of UW7527 "FANCH 29TH ENG 1942" (a survey disk located about 9 miles SW of Portage AK, set by the US Army's 29th Engineers in the early days of WWII). I asked what the group thought about riding up onto 'this little shelf right here on the topo map so I could, uh, dig around looking for a benchmark...' They shook their head at my wierd 'need' to find these brass caps littering the countryside, then dug in to figure out how we could do it (without becoming avalanche victims - the slopes one drainage north of this point have claimed 2 lives already this year).

 

We didn't make it all the way to the mark, but my five riding partners agreed the 'target' put a sharper focus on our effort to go just as far out and up as we felt safe doing under adverse conditions. I logged a 'note' for FANCH (with some spooky gray photos and a map), and hope on one of our return trips this spring the riding conditions will allow us a better shot at climbing just a few hundred feet more up the slope... safely... to find that little disk set in a rock outcrop.

 

Man-O-Man! Now I understand the terminology of "Extreme Benchmarking"!

 

Snow and freezing cold versus being out in over 100 Degree temps in the middle of a big old sandstorm being scoured by sand, with gritty teeth and hard to get a breath). Which would you choose if you had to choose? Adicted!

 

Shirley~

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You know you're a benchmarker when your wife smacks you as you're driving along because every mile or so you point and call out, 'There's a benchmark right over there!'.

 

Been there. Done that. Got the bruises to prove it. :lol: Only I don't stop at benchmarks; all survey marks are included. PLSS sections corners, property corners, street monuments, aerial targets, etc.

 

It's an occupational hazard... and a curse. :)

Edited by Kewaneh & Shark
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You know you're a benchmarker when your wife smacks you as you're driving along because every mile or so you point and call out, 'There's a benchmark right over there!'.

 

Ha! I'm gonna remember this quote when I move to Arizona (PV area - one day soon - Lord willing...)

 

Anyhow, with the rate you've been knocking down the finds in AZ, I'm gonna say

"Look honey - there's another benchmark - I've got AZcachemeister's coords - it should only take a second!"

and then I'll get smacked... and I'm gonna laugh every time!

 

Carol (my wife's name too) has learned that benchmark hunting means a great chance to finish that book she'd brought along... she enjoys caches, but thinks I'm slightly wobbly in the head over benchmarks! Too funny...

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You've driven 2189 miles in the last seven days and have been working or driving for 12-14 hour days and you drive a couple hundred miles out of your way, on your own time, to log the lowest mark in the U.S. just because it is ALMOST on your route and is the only gravity station non-round disk that you know of.

 

532590ce-be71-4a29-9d48-a5497dbeffb6.jpg

 

DAYTON-HARRIS Gravity Station

 

And you make sure you log at least one mark in the six states that you are driving through. Wait a minute, 2189 miles and only six states, that hardly seems fair, BDT, Seventhings, PFF and others could drive through 15 or 20 states in that mileage!

 

CallawayMT

Edited by CallawayMT
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I run fire rescue and was out on an auto accident call one day when I realized that a mark I had wanted to look for was nearby. The mark should have been in the median strip, an area that is normally inaccessible due to the heavy traffic in the area. When it was determined that no EMS was required I took a quick stroll a little farther down the median before the engine crew finished their clean-up duties. No mark, but I have to say that taking advantage of a fire truck while it's blocking a lane for safety at an accident, may mean you're addicted.

 

HV3489

Edited by ProudVirginian
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How about when you're reading a "You know you're a benchmarker when..." forum and read in someone's post :

DAYTON-HARRIS Gravity Station
and think that sounds familiar.....

 

Sure enough. I found it two years ago, the last one to find it before CallawayMT found it recently. :huh:

 

And I do the "There's a benchmark there" routine with my teenage daughters. They just roll their eyes. I try to tell them to be grateful they have a mom with an interesting hobby. :huh:

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... You check sidewalk curbs and culverts for the paintd "BM" and look for possible WP's and concrete Monuments and look at all Carsonite sticks for "Survey Marker" sticker even when you aren't hunting and just driving to and from work or whatever. I gotta stop this I might rear-end someone someday. BTW does anyone else try and read ALL Carsonite sticks, no matter what color they are, even though most Survey Marker sticks are Orange? I have finally learned to give up on anything colored Blue which means water line or meter.

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You know your a benchmarker when you drive 226 miles one way to find two benchmarks ( PF1173 and PF1171) and do the climb up Caribow Mt. when there is lightning to the north, and it's coming south. It was a 3 mile climb up the mountain and it rained most of the way up.

At least I didn't go up Speckled Mt. to find that one. The storm really came along with high winds, thunder and lightning. I did go back at a later date and got PF1171.

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Yeah...my friends always give me the same reaction when I try and take (drag apparently) them along...I get the typical...

 

"You wanna what, where?!!"

 

Have yet to convince anyone, but my Border Collie to get out there with me!

 

I laughed when I read this, I've only just started, but already my little sheltie is the only one who will go out with me. I feel like she really likes it though, maybe she knows we are "hunting". ;)

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Since your new to Benchmark Hunting, I think it is fair to warn you that there is a risk of becoming 'hooked' on this hobby - you could succumb to what is clinically described as OCBD (Obsessive Compulsive Benchmarking Disorder). I did a treatise on this malady in 2006 - be on the watch for symptoms as listed here.

 

Welcome ! :drama:

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