Folsom Day 2

We actually slept in this morning. Well, sort of. We didn’t need to leave until 8:00 so we figured we could sleep in a little and enjoy the morning. Unfortunately, my body didn’t cooperate and I was up at 5:00. I managed to get lots of things done while I waited for the others.

At 8:00 AM promptly, we headed to Folsom for the second day in a row. We were bound and determined we were going to clear out a bunch of caches in another area of Folsom. I think we did a pretty good job. But first, we had to start our day at Starbucks. Somehow, it just seems better to start the day this way.

Throughout the day we found several wetlands areas, shaded bike trails, various parks, wooden bridges, and several caches. Throughout the day, the weather couldn’t make up its mind. We had moments of downright cold (the wind was a little tough), and moments when it was on the warm side. We couldn’t decide whether we needed our jackets or not so we changed from moment to moment! It was an interesting day.

We returned home sometime around 6:00 and managed a quick fajita dinner. We are all tired but it was worth it. We came pretty close to getting in our 10,000 steps for the day and we found over 20 caches. One of these days we will have to travel some of the trails we discovered today as they are intended--by bike.

Looking into the Whale's Mouth

It was raining! Ok, it was a heavy mist. I think it is semantics! The weather report says we would have occasional showers. Right now it is more than occasional. Fortunately, Raley’s was open and had ponchos, hats and gloves! We stocked up for the hike to the cache. We were not going to let anything get in our way of finding this particular cache.

We did see occasional blue patches in the sky as we headed north from Ukiah. Hopefully some of those blue skies will be over the coast near the cache. Doesn’t matter, though. We will make this “walk” to the cache. We will be celebrating three things when we reach the cache: 1) Cynthia’s birthday (officially tomorrow); Geo-Jeeper’s 5600 find; and just the fact that we did it. We have been hearing about this cache (Looking into the Whale’s Mouth--GCKE5K) since the beginning and it is one of those “must do” caches to gain the respect of others who have completed the Northern California Delorme Challenge. We won’t let a little rain stop us. Hopefully, it will stop the Elk from creating a problem on the trail--one of those things frequently mentioned in the posts on the cache page.

We arrived at Needle Rock Museum and prepared for our hike. You should have seen us! If you look at the pictures, you can see how ridiculous we looked. We were all decked out in our rain ponchos when we started the trip. By the time we returned, we had shed all the rain gear and a few other layers of clothing.

It was a gorgeous hike. We thought it would be a quick in and out, but it wasn’t. The wild flowers were in full bloom and the elk were in abundance. We spent a lot of time pausing to take pictures. We were practically eyeball to eyeball with the elk and they were not the least bit afraid of us. I could say we weren’t afraid of them either, but we did worry about maintaining our distance. We did not want to deal with an elk charge.

Some of the time it was like we were in a rain forest. No, it didn’t really rain that much--just a lot of sprinkles. It’s just that the vegetation was lush and wet from the rain and the flowers were gorgeous. At times we were under trees crossing creeks and then we were in the full sun skirting past the elk. We probably took a lot more time than we needed.

When we arrived at the end of the trail, we still had to head downhill along an animal track for about 300 feet. Unfortunately, the animal track was not clearly marked. I guess the animals have chosen other routes through this area and the plants have grown over the trail. So we headed down the hill very carefully. If we slipped, we would actually be on the beach at the mouth of whale cove, but it was a long way down. We reached the exact spot of the cache and pulled out the rusted ammo can and signed the log. Of course, we had to take bunches of pictures. This was Geo-Jeeper’s (Cynthia & Mike’s) 5600th find and tomorrow is Cynthia’s 60th birthday. Plus, this took care of quad 62 of the Northern California Delorme Challenge. It was a great day for celebrations.

The hike back to our car took a little less time than the hike to the cache. We were concerned at one point that we might be a little delayed. As we approached one meadow, we discovered that a herd of elk had set up residency on and around the trail. They didn’t seem to care that we were there and they were in no hurry to move. So, we advanced slowly along the trail. A couple of them moved aside. A few others tried the old stare down. We kept a steady stream of conversation going and did a little picture taking while we moved through them. We wanted them to understand that we had no intention of hurting them as long as they didn’t hurt us. It wasn’t until we got back to the car that we saw the sign that said: “Wild elk! Danger! Do not approach on foot!” Un oh! I guess we were just plain lucky or they have gotten so used to people that they never considered us a threat. It really doesn’t matter. We arrived back at the car without a single elk mark on us.

Our main adventure for the day was over. We piled back in the car to make the long trek back to Roseville. We won’t get there until passed “wine time” and the boys in the front seat will be whining about that for a long time. Of course, the most important thing will be whether we will be able to move by the time we get to Roseville. The muscles are achy and starting to stiffen a little, but we had a great time the whole trip.

The 2008 Sonoma County GeoRally and Winter GeOlymp

Time to get on the road and head to the Sonoma 2008 Georally. Since we were in Ukiah, we had about an hour and a half to the start of the rally. We did manage to grab one cache in Ukiah that was just down the road from our hotel. We figured we needed to start the day off right to give us incentive.

It has been a while since we have been in this part of the state. We were surprised to see so many vineyards this far north. They have probably been here a long time but we haven’t so everything was a pleasant surprise on this trip! It was a pretty drive. Too bad we were on a mission so we couldn’t stop to enjoy all aspects of it. We couldn’t even stop for caches as we wanted to be at the rally in time to get all the instructions.

We arrived at the Cotati Park and Ride along Highway 101 a little before start time. We had an opportunity to enjoy a cup of coffee from the local java place before we received the instructions for the 2008 Sonoma Rally. There were three routes and we ended up on the Northern route that took us north of Cotati to places like Rohnert Park, Healdsburg, Sebastopol, and on a lot of back roads through the vineyards.

We had lots of questions to answer as we followed the predetermined route. We did take a little time in the beginning to find some caches along the way, but soon we were in an area that was outside our anticipated caching area and we didn’t have any caches to find. So, we concentrated on the route and the questions.

Along the way, we passed two dairies of the year, a purple hubcap lady, a black and white metal cow structure, an orange truck with a dog sculpture in the front seat, several churches, a few bagel shops, a couple of old bridges, historic district 2, a druid, poor man’s flat, at least six palm trees, and, a few roads twice. We also saw emil, pinestone, R-L Ranch, a mailbox covered with ladybugs, a tree farm, a man carrying a canoe, Black Emerald Winery, the home of the hounds, hoof beat park. West North Street, and a couple of school roads.

When we were all finished and joined the others for a pasta dinner, we learned that we make a pretty good rally team. We came in tied for second for those following the north route. We could have filed a protest because there were really 5 churches on one road and everyone agreed but the “judge”. He said there were only 4. We all wanted to take him for a ride, but since it had been a fun day, we let him off the hook. Besides, we were happy with second place!

After dinner we headed back to Ukiah for the night. We had one more mission on this trip and that was to look into the mouth of the whale--tomorrow. We needed our sleep tonight!

The California Coastal Run

It’s great to be out geocaching! What more can I say? It has been too long and we really needed to get out and about! We were on another great adventure with Geo-Jeeper (Cynthia & Mike)

Friday, April 4, we drove up the coast along Highway 1. We are bound and determined to complete the Northern California Delorme Challenge this year. It was a beautiful day to drive along the coast and pick up several quads along the way. It was also a beautiful day to take pictures.

We headed south to go north. We worked our way over to 101 south and then picked up CA Highway 1 North near Sausalito. We were trying to figure out the last time we actually drove up Highway 1 from this location. Basically, we haven’t--or so we thought. As we drove along we racked our brains and eventually decided we had been here before. We decided that a long time ago we had been to Muir Woods and to Bodega Bay. Regardless, we were properly impressed with the wooded surroundings--the eucalyptus trees were beautiful. At one point we passed fields of purple bushes. We finally decided they were heather. Of course our cameras were in the back of the car! Isn’t that the way it always is?

We started with Quad 103 (Stinson Beach) and headed up the coast through 93 (we already had this one but we covered it again), 92, 82, 72 and finally 73. We just picked caches along the highway. They were not difficult caches, but they led us to some very interesting locations. The views of the ocean and the coastline were incredibly good.

We stopped for lunch at the Rivers End Fine Dining in Jenner. The selections were a little out of our taste range, but they did have a burger and fish and chips so we were happy. We did have a lovely view of the ocean and one bird that was entertaining us by “riding the airflow”. He spent a lot of time hovering outside our window.

After lunch we made a “Stop for the Sea Lions”. We found the cache quickly, but then we spent some time enjoying the Sea Lions sunbathing on the beach below. They looked like rocks on the sand. Every once in a while one would move. We took lots of pictures, but the sea lions were all too tired to entertain us. One of them finally went into the water, but mostly they slept.

A little further up the road we were headed for “Amazing View but Watch for the Cows”. As we approached the coordinates for the cache, we ran into cows all over the roadway. Ok, we didn’t actually run into them, we approached with caution. They didn’t seem to be bothered and kept munching away on the grass. One cow stayed in his lane and kept meandering up the road. We eventually made our way through them. Cows in the road--seems to be a routine when we are on a quad run. On one of our last big quad runs, we were right in the middle of a bunch of cows being herded down the road. We have also encountered cows on other trips. I guess we should just expect to see them in the road from now on.

The further north we traveled, the grayer the skies, but the more yellow the poppies. It was probably the contrast, but they were pretty.

We finally reached the little town of Gualala. This is where we were supposed to eat lunch, but I had my info wrong. Too bad, we would have a few more choices here than we did back in Jenner. We were concerned about this cache (JJRQ) but we had no trouble finding it. I guess some previous finders felt intimidated by the people inside the building and didn’t look hard enough. We figured the people inside must know about it, so we walked right up and retrieved the cache. We will have to wait until next time to try out the lunch places.

Finally! A light house! If you go to the coast, you have to go to a light house. Right? We thought we had found one before but it turned out to be a solar light (with a cache inside) along the side of the road. “Lighthouse Stay” was actually on the road to a lighthouse. We went all the way to the end and took the required photos of the lighthouse. As lighthouses go, it wasn’t so spectacular, but at least we saw it! We didn’t go into the museum as we have one more quad and we are running out of time. We still have to make it to Ukiah tonight.

Our final quad took us to the town of Mendocino. One of the caches was out along the cliffs and required a pleasant walk to get there. I’m glad we chose to make the walk. We did enjoy some beautiful sights. We also found an excellent coffee shop here. Sorry---it wasn’t Starbucks or Peet’s or any of the other well known coffee houses. It was Moody’s Organic Coffee House. The coffee was excellent! We recommend it to others and will stop by again the next time we are in the area.

The day actually ended in Ukiah at the Holiday Inn Express. I think this is the first time we have stayed at an HIE that wasn’t full. It was kind of eerie. There weren’t many cars in the parking lot. If we wanted to be ridiculous, we could blame it on the fire truck parked outside sounding his siren now and again. Our guess is that a firefighter from somewhere else, or a relative of one of the local firefighters was staying here with us. He had two children. The fire truck showed up to entertain the kids. They got a tour of and a ride in the fire truck and, of course, got to listen to the siren several times. No one offered us a ride in the fire truck! Maybe next time.