Man it has been a crazy couple of days on the geocaching front. Where should I begin really? Well what about the beginning of the week?
Monday July 21st:
As I mentioned in an earlier post I was able to grab two "First-to-Finds" and my new earthcache was published. I was really excited about that and the week just kept getting better.
Wednesday July 23rd:
A good geo-friend and I drove to Lake Anna State Park specifically to try some of the "hydrocaches" there. We arrived at the park a little after 8 in in the morning and we put the kayak into the water. While on the water we were able to paddle to three different caches and had a couple more that we could have visited, if we thought that we could have done it. The first was called "Cedar Island" and involved a .3 mile paddle to a relatively large island to a find a cache. "Clambake" was on a small peninsula about a mile away from there and then we continued onto "Among the Pines". The last one involved the greatest amount of searching, but we found it pretty quickly due to the amount of ground that we had to cover, literally about 32 square feet. After we returned to where we put in, we loaded up the kayak, changed our clothes and found about a dozen more in the park. Mostly micro caches that had been placed, probably for an event in the past, but interesting and "unique" containers. We weren't done there though. On the ride home we cleared up a "DNF" from about 6 months earlier in Fredericksburg as well. On the way home I told my friend that I probably wasn't going to go back out anymore this week. Little did I know that I was wrong...
Thursday July 24th:
The same friend called me while I was at my sons' swim lessons and told me about a new cache being published and being interested in trying to snag another FTF. I said "Maybe" and that I would need to check with my wife. Upon getting home, I mentioned it to my wife and she said that I should go. My friend and I headed over to White Plains Regional Park in Waldorf, MD, after finding one other cache in La Plata. "Green Acres" is a small cache hidden in the park and luck would have it that again we were First to Find. We got back into the car and my friend mentioned that she was interested in traveling a little further to clear up another DNF we both had. At about the same time, my wife called to tell us about two more caches that had been published. I convinced my friend that we should head towards home to try and be first on the two new ones. We arrived at the parking area for the first to find a familiar car parked. Long story short, we were not FTF on that one. We then headed over to "Drop Box" the other new cache. Upon arriving at that one, I jumped out of the car and quickly found the container, and learned that again I, and my friend, was not first. In fact, many of my geocaching friends had known about the cache for sometime because it was a cache dedicated to me, set up by my wife and friend, to help celebrate my 40th birthday. Inside of it was a note that informed me that I should go over to a nearby restaurant. When I arrived I was greeted by my family and many of my friends. I was completely surprised.
Saturday July 26th:
Saturday was the day of the Maryland Geocaching Society's Summer Picnic. A group of good friends and I set out early so that we could visit an earthcache on the way. "Kilgore Falls" has now got to be one of my favorite places in the state of Maryland now. After visiting such a place, I can say that I am very happy about all of the places that geocaching has brought me. It was BREATHE-TAKING and I hope to return very soon with my wife and sons. After that we headed over to the picnic and had a great time visiting with our friends from around the state. We were able to find about 12 of the 16 or so cache published for the event. I thought it was pretty cool that I got a chance to meet and even cache with CC Cooper Agency, one of the highest "finders" in the world. What a great lady!
Sunday July 27th:
Well as you can see - I have been pretty busy on the geocaching front. AND I think I need a break. AND I think I am pretty serious this time. I know that new caches will be published, and friends will call to see if I want to go out and find a few. But I am going to try and take a break for a little while. I am going to shoot for two weeks. Two weeks, 14 days, without getting on the site, without searching for caches. I'll have to let you know. If you are interested - stay tuned!
