Have Any Great Caching Experiences This Weekend?

[+MamaKatS]

Happy Tuesday, y'all! Back to the real world for me... I had yesterday off work for Presidents' Day (US), but the kids were all in school for a make-up day from our recent snowstorm. It was 70 degrees and mostly sunny (or mostly cloudy, depending...it varied thru the day) so I spent the whole day geocaching SOLO and had a blast!

 

If you are in Georgia, or are coming thru Georgia for any reason, I HIGHLY RECOMMEND visiting the town of Madison, GA. There are a BUNCH of caches hidden there (easy, family-friendly...will have to bring my kids back) and it's a gorgeous, historical town...like a page right out of Gone With The Wind. Seriously. It's like stepping back into another century... I positively adored the place! I spent most of the day geocaching there, then eating lunch and taking tours of some of the historic homes.

 

After that, I hopped on over to Stone Mountain (totally in the opposite direction, closer to Atlanta) and did some caching/hiking there...I found one, & had one DNF. I definitely recommend Stone Mountain caches, too... but be ready for a workout on some of them, LOL!

 

Feel free to check out my pics HERE.

Anyone else have any fun caching adventures this weekend? Do tell!

Edited February 22, 2011 by MamaKatO

[+What Trail?]

Thank you for sharing your pictures! What a wonderful town & so much history! Will definitely have to stop there on our next trip South!

[+JL_HSTRE]

Yes, I did. I took a 90 minute drive north for a minor event 3 counties away. After the event, I found 13 caches (out of 15 searched for). The highlights were a great scenic view, an excellent veterans memorial park & museum, a great downtown walking tour, and an awesome use of Wherigo (although I sadly DNF'd the container on that one). Trip was well worth it.

[+MamaKatS]

Fun!!!! It's great when you have time to tour the place you are visiting and enjoy the location. I'm usually so time crunched, I don't get to do that often.

[+GeoGeeBee]

I'll play!

 

We made a trip to Georgia this weekend. Our primary focus was not on caching, but we did manage to sneak a few in and in the process I managed a couple of "personal bests."

 

1) I found my first Wherigo, "Puppymonster's Playground," whose CO is our forum moderator Mtn-Man.

 

2) I achieved a new "most cache types in a day" with a traditional (several, actually), a Wherigo, and a Mystery.

 

3) I achieved a new "most states in a day" on the trip home, with caches in Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina.

 

4) Also a new "most counties in a day" with four counties in that same drive.

[+CanadianRockies]

Ms. CR and I enjoyed the balmy -2C (28F) temperatures with an 8-km (5-mile) stroll through the Rocky Mountain foothills. I strapped on snowshoes, and she did the cross-country ski thing. She would zip ahead of me on the downhill slopes. I caught and passed her on the uphill sections. We found six caches along the way.

[+Chief301]

We had a somewhat frustrating start on Sunday...1st cache we stopped at had too much muggle activity so we gave it a miss. The second one, the coordinates seemed really screwed up and just didn't jibe with the cache description, so we DNF'd that one too. Third one, the cache owners showed up as we were hunting and told us it had been muggled. Next one was another DNF after about 30 minutes of searching. We were really getting frustrated...we usually do better than this! However, things started looking up after that and we found the rest of our targets for the day. Very nice day for caching, springlike conditions, and the ones we did find were nice boxes in the woods as opposed to P&G micros that we get so often around here, so overall a good day!

[+Kameharem]

On Monday I took the whole family, myself, wife, son, and daughter to Pt. Defiance park in Tacoma Washingtion for a day of geocaching. downloaded 17 caches in the park which is known as the bremuda triangle because of jumpy gps readings. we teamed up Mom and son vs Dad and daughter for who could find the most caches. we would hike the trails and then when we were within 30 feet of GZ I would read the hint and point in the direction the GPS was indicating and we would all search for the cache. end of the day results Dad and daughter with 9 finds and Mom and son with 4 finds. Lossers treated at starbucks; it was a good day.

[+hzoi]

We took advantage of warmer temps to get out of town. We'd completed one challenge based in Birmingham and another in Huntsville, and we're still working on the Alabama Delorme and county challenges, so we drove up to Huntsville, did a bunch of hiking and caching around town, then swung out west to get some counties and Delorme pages before driving back down. Had a great time, did a lot of hiking, found some great caches, and rolled over to 3300. A good time was had by all.

[+MontyFam]

Visiting with family we decided to jump on snowmobiles for a couple caches. One DNF and one find. Got to see my brother jump a few puddles (Open water on the lake) that was pretty cool! The lake was almost pure ice with little to no snow on top. Mrs MoFryFam inadvertantly did a complete 360 after gently tapping the brakes on her sled. That was pretty cool to see too!

[hoosier guy]

Had a beautiful weekend in SW Indiana. Picked up 4 earth caches which was a blast. Not a big numbers weekend but hanging out with my girls and being outside was great.

[+geodarts]

We found ourselves 90 miles from home with a lot of unexpected time due to some scheduling problems with another event. My noncaching wife asked me what we could do in the area, and to me the answer was obvious. She was gracious as we cached out way past alien airstreams

 

 

to Rief's Gas Station

 

 

It turned out to be fun for both of us. Several good virtuals. One very nice Wherigo. Some wine tasting in Sacramento delta. A great meal. The next day I took the dog for a relatively short hike over to a new cache, past several small waterfalls, right after a rare snowfall on our mountain, even getting a chance to run into a friend along the way. But mostly, it was a weekend for the family.

Edited February 22, 2011 by mulvaney

[+Harry Dolphin]

Last summer, we took the coastal route through Georgia, and enjoyed Savannah, Brunswick and Saint Simons Island. Had a great time!!

Last weekend we found some caches that we'd DNFed before because of the snow. Then looked at a 5/5 cache we'd looked at six years ago. I guess seven years ago, you probably needed to hike the seven miles to find the seven waypoints. I'm pretty sure I've figure out the final location using Google maps, and can go for the final with a quarter mile walk...

[+MamaKatS]

Last summer, we took the coastal route through Georgia, and enjoyed Savannah, Brunswick and Saint Simons Island. Had a great time!!

 

 

I absolutely ADORE Savannah. If I won the lottery tomorrow, I'd move down there next week, LOL! Any city that is old and historical is right up my alley, but Savannah is, so far, my favorite.

[+NicknPapa]

We found THIS PLACE less than 30 miles from where I've lived for my entire life. Finds like this are why we go.....

[knowschad]

I tried to get an FTF on a micro in a blizzard. I took Monday off (no President's Day holidays for most of us) because we had received about 18" of snow. A notification came in of a cache about a 1/2 mile from my house, and I had already cleared the drive, so I figured, "why not?". Got my winter clothing back on, drove very carefully to the cache, climbed a pretty good hill through the deep snow, and spent about 20 minutes looking. By the time I walked back to the car, I could barely see my footprints from the trip in.

 

The cache hasn't been found yet, but I have since learned that it (a micro) was hidden on the ground.

[+jmw61]

I hit a few up on the north end of town on Friday. One that really stood out for me was an old lime kiln. Pretty cool and a shame it is "hidden" in overgrowth and not many folks get to see it. Glad the CO put one there and I got to see it.

[+MamaKatS]

We found THIS PLACE less than 30 miles from where I've lived for my entire life. Finds like this are why we go.....

 

Wow, that is GORGEOUS!

[+lamoracke]

I was with a group of 20 cachers doing arguably the best puzzle cache I have ever seen, period.

 

I am not alone in that opinion as you can see by the favorite point ratio.

 

http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?guid=50fff323-2659-4e06-bd04-41ad9abf230c

 

The Di Gital Code GC2MP3A.

 

Artwork was fantastic. Creativity and use of different ideas was awesome. Cache location was nice too.

[+tango501]

What ^ said

this was an awesome experience and one that not be forgotten

[+briansnat]

My caching was interrupted by a thief. We chose a remote (by NJ standards) place to cache. A sign in the parking lot advised users not to leave valuables in their cars due to break ins, but that stuff happens to other people so my wife's purse, wallet, GPS, iPod and other valuables were still in the car. She asked me if I thought they'd be OK and I said there was nothing to worry about because thieves don't come out in the cold. Famous last words.

 

We parked the car and stepped into the woods and walked about 200 feet. We stopped and I was checking my GPS for the nearest cache when we saw a car pull into the parking lot. We could see the driver get out and start looking into our car. Hmmmm. He obviously couldn't see us so we crept closer. When a car passed by he would stand up and innocently look around, and when the car passed he would go back to looking in our car.

 

Then he went back to his car and returned with an object, a pipe or crowbar, in his hand and he was heading right toward our car (it was the only car in the lot). At that point I figured that he was about to smash our window so I headed back to the lot double time. The snow was very crunchy so the guy heard me coming and retreated back to his car. When I reached the lot he was leaning against his car nonchalantly pretending to be taking pictures with his cell phone.

 

We had a brief conversation where he asked me directions to a certain hiking trail and he got in his car and left. We grabbed all of the valuables from the car and continued our hike, but after about 5 minutes we turned around because we realized we couldn't have fun if we were worried about the guy coming back.

 

That was the end of our geocaching adventure for the weekend. I did have the presence of mind to turn my video camera on and got him, his car and license plate on film but it was very shaky. Reported it to the police, but being that no crime was actually committed there wasn't much they could do.

[+geodarts]

My caching was interrupted by a thief

 

I am glad that because of the timing, your alertness, and quick action that nothing was taken. But considering how quickly he pulled out the "taking pictures with the cell phone routine," he could have made a natural cacher if he had chosen to use his talents for good rather than evil. All in all, it is a reminder to me that not everything happens to other people. I suspect that a lot of us need to be more cautious about what we leave behind when we set out on a hike.

Edited February 23, 2011 by mulvaney

[+CanadaKate]

The best adventure of our geocaching weekend was attending a local event. Who other than geocachers would pull into a school parking lot, jump out of their cars, play broomball [with many people they'd never even met before], drink hot chocolate, eat homemade cookies, chat, discover geocoins and then head off in a convoy to watch the braver ones in the group climb a 30 foot tree to find a cache?

[+GRANPA ALEX]

Went out on a windy Saturday to get 10 kayak caches on Jordan Lake & Robeson Creek (near Raleigh NC), about 6 miles of paddling . . . windy, where you paddle two feet forward and get blown back a foot. After a storm had elevated the lake some 11 fett, was prepared to replace some caches and did. All of this followed five mile of hiking for caches on Friday. You bet, sleep came easily and lasted the night.

[+Flintstone5611]

Went down to PA for a little shopping and ended up caching there and back. We picked up an EC in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New York (which was, by far, the craziest phenomenon we have ever witnessed) and a bunch of other caches in between. Great weekened for us!!

[nobody137]

Had a nice over night trip to Helen, GA, which passed us through Gainesville, GA. Wanted to specifically do the Bamboo Forest cache there, where I happened upon a baby copperhead while looking through a pile of debris. Luckily (well unluckily for the snake) it was dead, but still scared the crap out of me. Found the cache, had a great lunch, and then made it to Helen. It was a nice little trip.