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Gig Harbor/port Orchard Cache Machine

travisl

By travisl
in Northwest

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travisl

+travisl

Posted
Posted

I haven't created the cache page or the route for the Gig Harbor/Port Orchard Cache Machine yet, but a few folks have asked, so watch this space. I expect to have the route and page posted in the next week or so.

 

I just got my first pocket query, and great oogly moogly there's a lot of caches out there. Counting just the Gig Harbor/Rosedale peninsula, and then all caches west of SR-16 (between SR-16 and Colvos Passage) up to Gorst, I'm counting 139 of them (all types, all ratings, except locationless and caches with coordinates in Puget Sound).

 

This will take a bit of pruning. I may end up saving some of the northern end for the Bremerton II cache machine later in 2005.

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travisl

+travisl

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Making my plans to be there already. Trav, want to navigate again?

Sure! I've still not figured out if I like navigating more (because I actually know what caches we're going to and can remember them to log them later) or driving (because I can see the sights instead of running with my nose in a map).

 

I'm looking forward to it!

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The Jester

+The Jester

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Travis!!!! Didn't you learn last January??? Are you really ready to inflict that weather on the Gig Harbor area? :mad:

 

What the heck, I'm a sucker for pain/cold/epics, I think I'll come. :mad:

 

Bull Moose, if you really want to meet everybody, just set up a coffee/hot chocolate station at one of the cache parking lots...

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Riddlers

+Riddlers

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Posted (edited)

Travis has set aside Jan. 8, 2005 for the cache machine in Gig Harbor.

 

January 8, 2005: Gig Harbor/Port Orchard

March 26, 2005: Wenatchee (may swap with Bremerton)

July 9, 2005: Bremerton II (may swap with Wenatchee)

September 24, 2005: Port Townsend/Port Angeles

 

Taken from Travis's own page and in the title of this topic.

Edited by Riddlers
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travisl

+travisl

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...and then go to Red Robin in Taoma or Silverdale or where ever you decide to go.

There's my first quandry -- there's no Red Robin in Port Orchard or Gig Harbor. I e-mailed the Port Orchard chamber of commerce asking for suggestions on Tuesday, and they said they'd get back to me "tomorrow", but nothing yet.

 

From what little I know of the area, The Harvester in Gig Harbor may work, although that's kind of a quiet restaurant.

 

Heck, here's the e-mail I sent to them. If any of you have an idea, chime in.

 

I'm in the early planning stages of a quarterly scavenger-hunt like event, scheduled for Saturday, January 8 in Port Orchard and Gig Harbor.  This geocaching "cache machine" will be the ninth such event I've organized. Prior events were held in Bremerton, Yakima, Victoria, Spokane, Olympia, Vancouver, Portland, and the Tri-Cities.)  We typically start before dawn, and finish with dinner after sunset.

 

We usually get about 25 people attending dinner afterwards, although it may certainly be more, in part depending on the weather.

 

I'm looking for suggestions for a fun, family oriented restaurant that would be welcoming to a group our size and serves good beers.  We've frequently eaten at Red Robin, so I guess I'm looking for a restaurant of that atmosphere and price range.

 

It would need to be located somewhere between Gorst and the Narrows, but off the beaten track wouldn't be a bad thing.  Any ideas?

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travisl

+travisl

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I just got my first pocket query, and great oogly moogly there's a lot of caches out there.

Um.. yeah. There's like, a lot of caches out there. It's like Portland, only more compact.

 

This is officially no longer the Gig Harbor/Port Orchard Cache Machine. It's just Gig Harbor. I'll tack Port Orchard into Bremerton II this summer, if that's not so packed.

 

I'll close this thread once I have the route and page up later this week, and I'll open a new "Gig Harbor Cache Machine" thread at that time.

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JavaDuck

+JavaDuck

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Hi Travis,

 

I work in Gig Harbor, but live in Federal Way. Give me a day or two and I will think of some possilbe locations for dinner. Criminal may have some ideas as well since he lives in that area. One suggestion that comes right to mind is Godfather's pizza in Gig Harbor. I attended a birthday party for Nana Bear there.

 

I'm going to have to start finding something else to do during my lunch break, so I have some caches to hunt for the cache machine now.

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CurmudgeonlyGal

+CurmudgeonlyGal

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Posted (edited)

Two downtown Tacoma restaurants capable of large groups:

 

The Old Spaghetti Factory at 1735 Jefferson St 253.383.2214

 

Harmon Pub & Breweryy at 1938 Pacific Avenue 253.383.BREW

 

The Old Spaghetti Factory is probably most like the Dead Robin experience and seems to have a good bang-for-the-buck value (dinner prices include bread, salad/soup, dessert (which is spumoni or ice cream). I don't know that they will reserve for large groups on the weekend as we just tried to get seating for 50 w/o actually being at the door. In the end we ended up sending in a couple of people just prior to 5pm to secure the seats. It worked out perfectly.

 

Harmon might work, but it's also pretty small. I don't know how they'd handle seating for as many people as will want to go.

 

The Red Robin in Tacoma is pretty small, no? Will they let 'us' make reservations?

 

Godfathers? For a cache machine? Surely you jest. <_< Four types of beer (three low-carb or lite) and nuthin' else. Gots to have the drinkies after a long day caching!

 

The Harvester? That's like old people stuff, isn't it? The one in Gig Harbor is pretty tiny, and would be overwhelmed by the masses.

 

-=-

michelle

Edited by CurmudgeonlyGal
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Stump

+Stump

Posted
Posted
The Red Robin in Tacoma is pretty small, no? Will they let 'us' make reservations?

I don't think it's any smaller than the one in Olympia.

 

I do like the idea of Godfather's though. It's right across the bridge from Gig Harbor and the room Happy Gilmore used for GeoDiver's party earlier this month was pretty cool. It was nice having our own room completely separate from the rest of the restaurant.

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Criminal

+Criminal

Posted
Posted
But do they serve beer?

Yes. No idea what kinds.

PLEASE!!! NO GODFATHER'S PIZZA!

 

They have four or five kinds of beer, all domestic standards like bud, bud light, some low carb, and similar crap. It seriously lacks in the "atmosphere" department as well. (Someone used the word "filthy" to describe that particular Godfather's)

 

I second the Harmon, a really nice place with great beers. There are too many good places to go for this, leave the pizza joint for some kid's birthday party.

 

JMHO! :D

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JavaDuck

+JavaDuck

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Well, I never realized my suggestion of Godfather's would cause such a stir. :D Sounds like there are fellow geocaching beer drinkers out there.

 

If there is a better place for beer, I am all for that. What is the restaurant that is near the Park N Ride. I know you can see it from 16. Something cafe, I've had lunch from there and it was pretty good food. I'm not sure about price or if they serve beer. Just another suggestion to throw out.

 

Now, if we are opening suggestions to Tacoma as well. There is the Rock (a pizza place)near the UW Tacoma campus. I was there this past weekend and it was pretty good pizza and good beer too.

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Riddlers

+Riddlers

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If Harmon's is local and not all the way into Tacoma, and has real beer and good pizza and can handle all of us, than I am will Criminal. Lets just go there. As an out of stater who plans to be there, after a day of caching I really don't want to have to tackle driving through a new area like Tacoma.

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GeoDiver/GeoGrammy

+GeoDiver/GeoGrammy

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The Harmon is "downtown" Tacoma...as "downtown" as you can get. But it is easy to find... right on Pacific Ave...the main drag thru town. And well worth the effort. The pizza place in GH that Java Duck mentioned earlier was Round Table and not Godfathers.

 

Another suggestion might be Anthony's (the old Shorline) in GH. They have a lower floor below the main restaurant that has been used for several group events that I have attended. One event was even a small gathering of old schoolmates for an impromtu get-together. Anthony's has a pretty good selection of brews. Not sure about the menu/prices.

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pdxmarathonman

+pdxmarathonman

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Posted

I am not from the area, but I noticed that GH and Tacoma seem to be less than 10 miles apart. If Harmon's were to be the chosen destination it seems that Travis wouldn't have too much trouble putting together a route that leads us in the right direction. I wonder how far, and it what direction the cache-concentration is for The GHCM route now that Port O is out of the loop.

 

Oh wait, I replied to this thread. I must be thinking it's time for another CM....

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travisl

+travisl

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Posted (edited)

Anthony's is a bit higher price range than some of the cachers would probably like. If we want the banquet room, we'd have to guarantee them $1400. Yow.

 

I'd LOVE to have it at Rock Pasta (easily the best pizza in the city of Tacoma), but only if we can't come up with somewhere in the Gig Harbor area. One of these days, I really need to go to Harmons, too. However, I'd really prefer to keep the dinner spot close to the route.

 

Yes, Harvester is definitely an old-folks kind of place -- the kind of place that Aunt Mabel and her friend Olga from her bridge club stop by for dinner after getting their hair done. I'd want to warn them far, far in advance that we'd be coming.

 

I haven't been out there in years, but what about Rotors, the restaurant at the Narrows Airport. Is that still open? They always seemed fairly dead, and they're fairly small, so we'd pretty much pack the place.

 

The Tides was the first place I considered, but the silly state liquor laws would prevent the under-21 crowd from eating there with us. Bah.

 

Or, we could have mexican like we did after the Poker Run in Olympia last year. There's a Montezuma's or Puerto Vallarta.

 

I'm also seeing an italian place called Villa Nova, a place called the Harbor Rock Café, the Sunset Grill, or (sounding more expensive) the Harbor Inn or Poseidon's. Anybody know about these?

Edited by travisl
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Criminal

+Criminal

Posted
Posted (edited)

Sunset Grill: The same as Harvester, only it's Aunt Mabel's Grandma who'll be there after her hair appointment.

 

Harbor Rock: Great place, but out of the question if the group will be larger than 10.

 

Monty-Z's: Great food, but I doubt the group will be able to sit together here.

 

Bottom line; there are few, if any, places within GH that can handle a group as large as this will likely be. Call Rock Pasta and see if they can handle a group. I done eatted there a few times and it's excellent and the beer is outstanding. I'm just not sure if they have a room for a group, someone may want to call them. Harmon or Old Spagetti Factory are still our best bets, easy to get to.

 

EDIT: Typo, made it worse than it was :yikes:

Edited by Criminal
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Lolita

+Lolita

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Harbor Rock Cafe is the one near the park and ride. It's ok. The food is really marginal and I'd be surprised if the beer selection was acceptable, but I've never had beer there so not sure. Moctezuma's is ok..but heck if we are having Mexican I'm drinking margueritas ! Last time I checked they didn't have a hard liquor license..Puerto Vallarta does - and it's close to a great Blind Umpire cache ! I hear Rotors is good - but I don't know first hand. There is a nice disabled cache nearby that might be open to this event... it's a nice one. ( Criminal ?)

Sunset grill is pretty much a big box in the middle of a strip mall...which is why in 10 years I've never walked in there. I would vote for Puerto Vallarta in the Harbor if you can handle the food being only ok at best, the margueritas really good and the beer selection decent ( south of the border not hand made brews, but ok ?)

 

I agree that Rock Pasta would be a great choice though, if they could fit us in. It's pretty small...great pizza, etc.

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NomadRaven

+NomadRaven

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I think I'll be there as well. I've been so busy lately that I doubted my dedication to geocaching and cache machines, but then I found out that someone I know is getting married on June 18, and the first thing I thought of was "Crap! That better not be the same day as one of the cache machines!"

 

Of course, I'd much rather go to a cache machine than wear a lime green and blue dress. ;) *dies*

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Stump

+Stump

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Posted
Less than that. They are separated by the Tacoma Narrows Bridge and that's it.

That's it?! Have you ever crossed the bridge? It can be quite a wait some nights. ;)

 

It would be great if we could stay in GH. Traditionally some of us get night caches after dinner and Criminal has some great night caches in Gig Harbor that would be perfect for that. If they're still around.

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