Jump to content

COINTEST: Help me plan my cross country road trip!


ThirstyMick

Recommended Posts

Were you able to figure out where you'll be going :sad: ?

 

I believe she left on the 31st. Guess we'll know where she went when she comes back :(

 

After an intense day of wrapping things up at work, we did infact take off westward on the evening of the 31st B) and what a trip it was!

 

We went so many places and saw so many incredible things, I'm so sad to be back (although my bed is so comfy after a month of camping) Thank you everyone for your suggestions B)

 

I'm going to keep the suspense for one more day :laughing: I think I know who the grand prize is going to, but I'm at work right now and need to refer to my notes to figure out the rest :laughing: Also, my pictures are somewhere between my camera and my PC (PolskiKrol has an organization system, so I'm letting him deal with it) and I'd like to provide photos to support my decisions, haha. But since I've already posted elsewhere I figured I should give an update

 

So one more cointest before I give you any trip details B) For a surprise coin of my choosing (which means I haven't decided yet) :laughing:

 

Our first real (more than a few hours) stop was in Badlands National Park, and our last real stop was in Rocky Mountain National Park. We didn't make it to North Dakota (I'm not sure if it's considered the midwest or west) what (other) midwestern state did we somehow manage to miss? It should have been right along our route.

 

edit to add: one guess every 5 minutes, no editing posts :anicute:

Edited by ThirstyMick
Link to comment

Nebraska

 

We have a winner :anicute: email me your address and I'll pick out something shiny to send to you :laughing:

 

We somehow managed to miss Nebraska! We decided to take I-70 home through Kansas and Missouri. Wow Kansas is a BIG state :laughing: We passed by a sunflower farm which was without a doubt the coolest looking farm I've ever seen, and found the oldest active cache (Mingo) while in Kansas. I'm sad that we didn't see Carhenge, but we were advised that the truck traffic on 80 could be heavy* and PK wanted to see the St. Louis Arch :laughing:

 

*and when we got to I-80 in Pennsylvania, oh was it heavy....and scary. Pretty stressful driving, until traffic came to a screeeeching halt. We got lucky, being 5 minutes behind (and not zero or 30) the worst accident I've ever seen. We crawled past on the shoulder before they decided to close the interstate...... for 12 hours!

Link to comment

I'm glad you're back home safe. I love road trips and stopping at those rest stops :laughing: .

 

All the Ohio rest stops had two caches per :laughing: and some rest areas actually had wooded parts behind them with ammo cans! woohoo!

 

...we only did the rest area caches in states were weren't going to a park in, gotta color in that map :laughing:

Edited by ThirstyMick
Link to comment

WooHoo, Welcome home...Now just don't quit your job and jump into a Big Truck like I did after my long trip.

 

You mean that you weren't born a truck driver :laughing:

I WAS, but I didn't do anything about it until I had to go back to work posting Real Estate Signs after my 16 day trip for my 35th B-day. I came back and worked for 4 days, then quit and got my Truck license.

Link to comment

WooHoo, Welcome home...Now just don't quit your job and jump into a Big Truck like I did after my long trip.

 

You mean that you weren't born a truck driver :laughing:

I WAS, but I didn't do anything about it until I had to go back to work posting Real Estate Signs after my 16 day trip for my 35th B-day. I came back and worked for 4 days, then quit and got my Truck license.

 

Oh Wow! Haha, actually, I've been thinking that becoming an NPS Park Ranger might make for a good career change :laughing: It'd be a lot less money, but that's not what life is about, is it?

 

Sounds like a fun trip Thanks for the cointest. Will there be pictures coming?

 

Hopefully tomorrow when I announce the (other) winners :laughing:

Link to comment

Sorry for the long delay! Some things came up when we got home, and I was a bit distracted.

 

Part of it, was that I was fevorishly designing and carving a little gift for everyone :lol: so everyone is a runner up :D I wish I got the idea before we left, so I could have dropped some along our travels, but I thought of it while we were travelling..

 

If you have made a post to this thread prior to this post, even if you didn't enter the cointest, just saying have a nice trip, send your mailing address to thirstymick@gmail.com this isn't the address my profile emails, because that one if kind of... flooded right now (sorry if I've missed an email from you!)

 

cb800ac4-5910-423c-b501-5972b0c53249.jpg

29873311-81d1-45c0-b651-943404a29ab5.jpg

 

I'm proud of the carving, but as you can see my stamping-into-fimo-ability could use some improvement :rolleyes: I'll be getting some more colors too :o

 

I'll be making them and mailing them out over the course of the next week.. I seem to be improving so far <_<

 

Now for the cointest winners... drumroll.....

 

Bronze (Nerd) : Multonomah Falls: ThePetersTrio

 

It was rainy when we were through Portland, but I'm so glad you posted this! We almost missed what maybe should have been an obvious stop, but for some reason I completely forgot about, Thank you, thank you!

 

Bronze (Nerd) : Badlands National Park (Badlands Cache): GPX Navigators

 

c4f498dc-0665-4ce7-bc82-cb41765f0586.jpg

 

Need I say more? The terrain in Badlands National Park was like nothing I've ever seen. Our first glimpse from the highway of the rolling plains abruptly ending at the crumbly beautifully layered rockiness was... well it was something, and we had a bunch of Travel Bugs that wanted to be in the area, so Badlands Cache was just perfect :)

 

Silver (I-80) : Limestone Hoodoos in Banff: SuperNewbiePro

 

328a349f-5e75-4eaa-b204-a90bfe039b8d.jpg

 

It wasn't what we came to Banff expecting to see, and that made it awesome. We saw the rocky mountains and the beautiful glaciers, the bright blue lakes, of course :unsure: but the hoodoos were different and totally unexpected. Thanks for the recommendation. We did miss a bunch of caches in the park, I'm glad we didn't skip this one :)

 

It was also a good short walk on easy terrain. When we got to Banff I was in a lot of pain. I destroyed my hiking shoes in Grand Teton. Both soles had a big hole from end to end (they were cheap, but the most comfortable shoes I've ever owned) I got new shoes in Montana, and promptly destoyed my feet in Glacier :anibad:

 

Silver (I-80) : The Continental Divide: cache_in_hand

We crossed it a few times... Two or three times in Yellowstone alone

a7bb8f23-8867-4448-910b-ecfeed82c44e.jpg

Wow was it cold up where we crossed it in Glacier!

cdc09f64-c310-4ee7-9d84-ef6ad1cc4d64.jpg

But I think this is the crossing you meant :ph34r: and it was quite pretty at that spot :)

b96d9439-7883-41b7-9c5c-ae57300f0e57.jpg

 

Gold (Earth Turtle) : Valley of the Ten Peaks: gardengorilla

 

There are no words.

 

We pulled into the parking lot and okay... ten peaks, yeah kinda nice, a lake, okay... I guess let us see where the coordinates take us.. up that pile of rocks, ooh I don't know if my feet can handle that... ooh a trail... climb, climb, climb peer over the edge of the rocks and... oh. my. god.

 

82cf65d1-f080-4117-845d-0719d88f8b1d.jpg

b2ee426c-5f5b-4d2f-8159-72252ea4f10a.jpg

 

I don't think my eyes were prepared for what was in front of them, and I can't imagine they'll ever see anything remotely comparable again. just, wow. Thanks for making sure we got there, and thanks for placing the earthcache (that I still need to send you answers for and log :lol: haha, I'm sooo behind)

 

To all the winners: please send you mailing info to thirstymick@gmail.com, I'll get the prizes out as soon as I can :)

Link to comment

We missed a lot that I would have loved to have seen. We didn't make it to California (or Crater Lake in Oregon) but we stopped at a ghost town called Cisco in Utah and were chatting with a couple of bikers from San Francisco who told us about a really cool ghost town near Yosemite called Bodie (it was on the list), and from the sounds of it, we defintely need to get there when we're out that way! I'm sure there were other amazing suggestions from you guys that we just didn't get to! Man 3 weeks flew by!

 

Some other highlights from the trip (I hope all the photos are okay with the mods)...

 

17ea4ae3-b433-4330-9eac-c3fff7e44db4.jpg

Grand Teton was really something... we did a 20-something mile loop and destroyed my shoes completely, traveling through the Cascade Canyon and Paintbrush Canyon, and wow. Lake Solitude was really pretty, and all the flowers.....

6599c54e-e623-4af0-ab37-c4a506694a48.jpg

PIKA!!! I became obsessed with these adorable little guys :rolleyes:

66fbaf78-d0cd-407e-bd93-e5f5a0f4ff8c.jpg

The pools in Yellowstone were really cool

2c424c30-a429-45eb-8a4d-bd9f9eb0c8d8.jpg

And the wildlife in Glacier

1bae3025-3d8d-418f-8e3a-52eb1e5b5c13.jpg

That was a family of Mountain Goats (babies!!!) and a couple of Bighorn Sheep

Why'd they call it Glacier again? (the tiny thing in the left center is me)

d51b81a8-8b6b-47e4-8f7c-63868f52662d.jpg

We climbed a mountain in Banff (feet were half healed) called Fairview (and what a Fair view it was!!)

840fdf14-75ba-4a27-a6f0-35d75ac95717.jpg

and explored a canyon in Jasper carved out by a river

0a80f0e4-e039-4840-ad56-dc7c93acf11a.jpg

The Athabasca Glacier was impressive!

1538fd91-03bf-4e28-b063-f73d6f99314a.jpg

I didn't expect one of my favorite stops to be in Idaho, but Craters of the Moon was really neat!

1a6fd376-9d79-4763-800b-ddbb30ae1d56.jpg

Edited by ThirstyMick
Link to comment

Awesome! Awesome! Awesome! What a great trip you guys had! And thank you for the win!

 

We just returned on Sunday from Glacier, Hell's Canyon, Craters of the Moon and Devil's Tower. Did you go into the caves in Craters? That was fantastic.

 

Wow, we so have to compare pictures. Our Logan Pass sign - well we were hot!! LOL! Did you get all the virtuals in the park? If you do them in order #7 really is the pinnacle!

 

We drove by the Badlands on the way home. No time to stop this trip but we love it out there and will go again for sure! At least we could see them from I-90.

 

Welcome back. Great stuff indeed! :rolleyes:

Edited by GPX Navigators
Link to comment

Awesome! Awesome! Awesome! What a great trip you guys had! And thank you for the win!

 

We just returned on Sunday from Glacier, Hell's Canyon, Craters of the Moon and Devil's Tower. Did you go into the caves in Craters? That was fantastic.

 

Wow, we so have to compare pictures. Our Logan Pass sign - well we were hot!! LOL! Did you get all the virtuals in the park? If you do them in order #7 really is the pinnacle!

 

We drove by the Badlands on the way home. No time to stop this trip but we love it out there and will go again for sure! At least we could see them from I-90.

 

Welcome back. Great stuff indeed! :ph34r:

The caves at Craters of the Moon were so cool! All the photos I posted were PolskiKrols actually :rolleyes: he's not done organizing mine (he say's I was just shy of 5000 pictures) but I'm sure I have some photos that do Craters *slightly* more justice <_< How was Hell's Canyon? we didn't get there..

 

Devil's Tower was pretty neat too! And to think I wouldn't have known about it if not for a geocoin :unsure:

 

We did maybe half of the Glacier Virtuals (of course I've yet to log a single thing), we started from 7 and worked our way down until we got to the trailhead we planned to start a hike from... we got back down after dark... we're always racing the sun :anibad:

#7 was awesome though! Windy, but beautiful!

Edited by ThirstyMick
Link to comment

One last bump and update, because I'm slow... But I'm giving stuff away so no complaining :huh::rolleyes:

 

I'm just gonna say, I have an immense amount of both admiration and gratitude for all of you who have the energy to run stores, mint coins, ship promptly... :o I couldn't handle all that work!

 

These tokens have taken forever to get made, but I'm kinda proud of how they turned out :)

After I baked the clay, I noticed that the ink was smudging so I needed to put a clear coat on all of them, It took a few coats and a whole lot of drying, but now they're nice and shiiiiiiny (this was a big part of the delay)

 

297c9b13-ffb4-430c-9c97-10905498ec7c.jpg

 

The front is probably self explanatory, that's North America :P

Around the edge of the back are the Postal Abbreviations for all of the States and Provinces we passed through while on the trip, In the center are the four symbols we probably saw the most of :) I-80, the interstate we departed from and the Trans-Canada Highway (Canada Rt. 1) The parks symbol for a trailhead and the symbol for camping :P These tokens are a thank you for everyone who posted to the thread with a suggestion or just to say have a nice trip!

 

If you sent me your address before last week, you hopefully already got a package :D If you replied to my email, like last week or so, I haven't packaged up your prize & token yet, but I will soon.

 

If you're in the address book, you're covered :D I've got a bag of packages that I'm bringing to the post office next week.

 

I believe about 5 people are left... I have a list stored with the tokens, if you don't email me (thirstymick at gmail dot com), I'll send an email probably some time next week asking for your address...

 

Packages that haven't been packed yet will probably be sent next week or the following week.. Things are a bit chaotic right now...

 

The day after we got back from vacation our landlord dropped a bomb on us, he told us that he decided to sell the house (he's probably moving to Montana, I'm soooo jealous) and last Monday we found out that the time has come. After a frantic week, we did find a place to go....and by the first alllllll this clutter we surround ourselves in needs to be moved. So I may need some time to get things sent, or, if you're not in the address book (b/c if you are your package is already waiting by the door) you can let me know by email if I should just bring your token to GCF, we're still planning on attending :)

 

Okay, that was a lot of updating for just a cointest... I guess since the cointest is well over, Eartha &/or FSM may close the thread at your discretion...

 

Thank you again to everybody for your wonderful suggestions and well wishes!!!!

Link to comment
Sorry for the long delay! Some things came up when we got home, and I was a bit distracted.

 

Gold (Earth Turtle) : Valley of the Ten Peaks: gardengorilla

 

There are no words.

 

We pulled into the parking lot and okay... ten peaks, yeah kinda nice, a lake, okay... I guess let us see where the coordinates take us.. up that pile of rocks, ooh I don't know if my feet can handle that... ooh a trail... climb, climb, climb peer over the edge of the rocks and... oh. my. god.

 

82cf65d1-f080-4117-845d-0719d88f8b1d.jpg

b2ee426c-5f5b-4d2f-8159-72252ea4f10a.jpg

 

I don't think my eyes were prepared for what was in front of them, and I can't imagine they'll ever see anything remotely comparable again. just, wow. Thanks for making sure we got there, and thanks for placing the earthcache (that I still need to send you answers for and log :D haha, I'm sooo behind)

 

To all the winners: please send you mailing info to thirstymick@gmail.com, I'll get the prizes out as soon as I can :D

 

oh, I just saw this now.

Wow, great pictures ThirstyMick! I'm so glad you had such a clear day and I think you were one of the last people to be able to get to the coordinates as there is now construction going on there. I have to say that I have been rewarded handsomely for publishing this cache just by the sheer amount of pictures and logs that I get from people all over the world who have enjoyed this cache. THANK -YOU!

Link to comment

Make sure you start at the George Washington Bridge! :cute: (next time around)

 

(did you come back? or just leaving across country now?)

 

Haha, thanks for the tip.... hmm I think I've been there :)

0d6895a2-7a8b-4e84-b006-dc15eb5f12e5.jpg

 

Yeah we went on the trip in August -_- Think I'd be afraid to visit some of those places now, brrrrrrrrr... George loves it, but I don't do well in the cold!

 

Glad the tokens are starting to arrive :) Sorry it took me so long to get them all out!

 

Gardengorilla: I can't thank you enough for bringing us there (I'm sad to hear the spot isn't accessible now, GZ really was the best view, from ground level it was nice, from GZ, it was breathtaking) we probably wouldn't have gone there, or even known about it, if not for the cache... One of these days months I'll send you the info and actually log it!! My notebook of answers is on my desk, but the task of logging 100's of earthcaches and virtuals is daunting.

 

Guess it's time to close this thread since the trip and cointest are done :lol: Thank you everybody for the fantastic tips!!!

Link to comment
Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...