The Elk Grove Experience

It's been a while since I posted any geocaching adventures. Unfortunately, I still don't have any exciting adventures but I can tell you about our day spent geocaching in Elk Grove. Ann (Imawahl) and another caching friend, Don (Dstoye), went with us.

We left early this AM and returned home around 6:30 PM. We were a little shy of a 12 hour day, but we managed to find 44 caches. We covered the area of Elk Grove between the two major highways, I-5 and 99. We had moments of peace and quiet and moments of lots of activity. We enjoyed the peace and quiet in the parks we had all to ourselves. The rest of the world was staying indoors and out of the heat. We, on the other hand, were braving the heat and wandering around in the empty parks. The lots of activity occurred when we were finding caches in the shopping centers. We were almost run over by the people rushing from their cars to get into the air conditioned buildings. We were the ones sitting on the benches in the heat waiting for the mad rush of people to disappear into the buildings so we could quickly grab the cache that was hidden under the bench.

The four of us did enjoy a little time out of the heat. We managed to stake out a table at the BJ Brewery in Elk Grove and shared lunch and a pitcher of beer. We needed an afternoon nap after lunch, but we had to forgo the experience as we had lots more caches to find.

We finished in Elk Grove and started for home. But wait! There were two more caches in the Franklin-Hood area. We couldn't go home before finding them. OK, so they were 4 miles south (the wrong direction), but what's 4 miles when you are geocaching! Off we went, picked up the two caches and finally headed for home.

We were almost there when Don suggested we go get the new cache about 1 mile from our house. There was no way we could refuse! We signed the log and headed for home. The day was over, but we still had to post all our finds, take a shower, relax, and prepare for the next day. Who knows where we will be tomorrow but we will be geocaching!

Blitz that Fizzled!

We (Geo-Jeeper and L2--Larry is still in Utah) started the day intending to go for the numbers. We were sure we could get 50! Afterall, with all the end of the road caches, it should be an easy day.

It didn’t quite turn out that way. We started in Woodbridge to grab a couple we had missed on previous trips. We knew we would have a short walk, but it turned out to be longer than that because we missed the correct path the first time and had to back track a little. Fortunately, it was a nice trail through a pretty park so we didn’t mind too much.

Then we picked up all the miscellaneous caches in Lodi proper. We even managed to get a couple we had not found before. So we were feeling good and still had high hopes for the day.

Our route led us out into the country next. There was a little more distance between caches and we had a few more side trips off the main road. We made it all the way to Clements. We chose not to look for one of the caches in this area because it appeared to be in the middle of a field full of baled hay. That reeked of private property and we were not willing to risk “prosecution”. Fortunately, we found another one faster because a local resident gave us quick directions to a “future” development, the site for the cache. We think this may have been a future development in the past. Presently, it looked like a area of neglected streets and end of road signs.

We continued to make our way through the back roads. We were unable to located a couple of older caches--we are sure they are missing, but we managed to find 16 before heading back across town and beyond to the Panera Bread we had passed earlier in the day. The place was crowded, but we found a table and enjoyed our lunch. Too bad they didn’t list coordinates for the restrooms and the drink dispensing machines. We would have found them faster if they had.

After lunch, we elected to head south and pick up some old and new caches. We ended up in Oak Grove Park. It is a beautiful little park with a lake and paddle boat rides for the kids. Too bad we were there for other reasons. The shade, in particular, looked inviting.

We followed several of the trails and found several caches. Three of the caches contained clues that led to the final cache. We found the first two easily and headed for the third. The third was a problem. It was somewhere in the pile of logs. We actually found the correct spot almost immediately, but nothing was there. We were not about to give up so we kept looking in case the owner had outsmarted us. After searching for quite a while, a bike rider came up to us and said we didn’t have to look that hard--we were starting to lift up heavy logs. He turned out to be the owner. We pointed out where we thought it should be and declared it was missing. He agreed! It was supposed to be there and after he searched extensively himself, he agreed it was missing. We asked if he could give us the clue we needed to find the final and we asked if we could log this cache. He agreed we could log this cache, but he couldn’t give us the clue because he didn’t have his notes with him. In fact, he didn’t even have his GPS receiver so he couldn’t give us the final coordinates either. He did give us directions of a sort and we headed out. Fortunately, it was in the same park. He stayed behind to continue looking for his container. We were about halfway to the possible final when he came up from behind on his bike. There had been a fire through here on Wednesday and the area didn’t look the same to him. Then he told us that he had given us the wrong directions. He redeemed himself by riding ahead of us until he found something familiar and then he directed us to the tree--behind it was the cache! We thanked him for his help, signed the log and made the trek back to the car. Good thing he was so helpful. Who knows when we would have been back in this area again!

By the time we finished this cache, it was late. Cynthia and I decided we would head home and Mike was grateful. But wait, there are two other caches on the other side of the freeway. It won’t take long to get to them and they should be easy! Mike agreed and we drove practically right to them. But wait, there are two more just a little south of us on this same road. Again, Mike agreed to drive just a little further. One of these caches was out a bike path so we had to walk just a little bit. The other one was in a park and right where some group was having a large gathering. We had to pass on that one.

Now, we really were done for the day and we headed up I-5 toward home. The day wasn’t as productive has we had planned, but we were glad to find several caches that had been on our list for a while. And......we got in our 10,000 steps! See, even if you don’t meet your expectations, there is always something good about a day of geocaching.

Up Up and Away

Geocaching has given us many moments of new and exciting adventures. Yesterday was no exception.

Larry is out of town, but I didn’t let that stop me. I teamed up with Geo-Jeeper (Cynthia & Mike), dstoye (Don) and imawahl (Ann) and headed for the Oroville area. The weather was nice, the traffic was pretty light, and the whole day was loads of fun.

We started caching just a little ways north of Marysville. We wanted to pick up some of the caches in the outlying area that we had missed on previous trips! We found the caches and made good time the rest of the way. To our surprise, this was the first time Ann had ever been to Oroville. We introduced her to a lot of it! We were in town and out of town. We were crossing water ways and climbing rocks. We even climbed a slope to get a cache and then slid our way back down. It is always easier climbing up than down!

We saw some beautiful sights and I did take some pictures. The pictures were mostly of the rest of the group. At one point, I turned the camera on myself and got a self portrait! It wasn’t great, but at least I can prove I was there.

Lunch was particularly interesting. We arrived at the Thermalito South Forebay and discovered two helicopters and a whole slew of men in all the appropriate garb for making water rescues. Two men would stand on the “feet” on the outside of the helicopter and it would head out over the water. In the meantime, a boat was dropping off another man in the water--he was the “victim”. The chopper would fly in low and one of the men on the outside would drop off into the water near the “victim”. The man still on the chopper was there for backup. The chopper lowered a harness and the man in the water put it around the victim. The chopper would then haul the two men in the water to the shore. They did this several times while we ate our lunch and watched. We talked to them briefly and got the skinny on this annual rescue practice session. The things you get to experience while geocaching--amazing.

The afternoon was uneventful, but we ended the day with lots of caches. It was a blitz sort of day and we accomplished our mission.

Poor Baby!

Our Golden Retriever is sick! She has been sick for over a month. In fact, she has been sick since a couple of days after we returned from a trip that included a bumpy ride along the route of the 2007 GBES Rally (see story below) and a journey to Utah and Wyoming! She has been bed ridden in the garage since we discovered transmission fluid all over the garage floor!

Today was the first day she was able to venture out. Unfortunately, she needed help and we had to call on AAA to get her to the doctor! The doctor has not been available until now because of an important jeep jamboree during the month of July. I guess it is a good thing we didn't want to participate in this jamboree!

















We called AAA at 6:30 this morning. The tow truck arrived about 6:45. Wow--that was fast! We were impressed! I hopped behind the wheel of the Golden Retriever, turned the key ( not far enough to start), released the brake and put her in neutral.

Larry and the tow truck driver pushed her out of the garage while I steered her backwards onto the street. Then they moved to the rear and we guided her to the edge of the tow truck platform. The driver attached the tow chain and slowly inched her up on to the truck! It was a heart wrenching moment!

By now we had attracted a couple of the neighbors and we had to withstand the usual ribbing. It was a rough moment!

Larry signed all the "admission forms" and made arrangements to meet the driver and our Golden Retriever at Extreme Gear. We jumped in our Sequoia and followed our jeep down the road. We were sad, but we finally experienced something we had never experienced before. Instead of following GeoJeep down the road, we were following our very own Golden Retriever. Talk about a change of scenery!

We arrived at the jeep hospital and Larry backed GR down the ramp and into a parking space--sort of. He misjudged the arc of the curve at the end of the ramp and ended up a little "cattywompused" in the parking space. Oh well, that is the way she was going to have to stay!

She is still at the doctors. We aren't sure how long she will remain there. Hopefully, not too long! We may lose a few arms and legs to get her out, but she is worth it as she has taken us on many fine adventures! In the meantime, we will continue to do some urban caching and save the more adventuresome caches for sometime in the future!

I wish we had pictures!

Ann(imawahl), Larry, and I went geocaching on Sunday. It was quite a day, but we didn't get any pictures!

We started the day on our bikes. We met up with Ann's bike group (including 2 brand new geocachers) and rode to Woodcreek Oaks Golf Course for breakfast. The bike ride was over 12 miles and Ann and the other new cachers found a couple of caches both coming and going! We were pretty worn out by the time we got home!

But, the day did not end there. A new geocache had been released that morning and the owner just happened to be DStoye (a friend of ours). Naturally, we had to make the effort!

The cache (Don's Revenge) was described as an evil cache. Trust me, the word evil does not describe this cache! There were a total of 5 stages but we must have found several decoys along the way! Each stage was more devious than the last! At one point, we were prepared to give-up, but we chose to call Don for a hint. It turned out that the coordinates we had found at one of the stages were incorrect! He provided us with the correct information (and fixed the problem for other cachers) and we were off to the next stage.

I will avoid any specific hints on the different stages, but consider the various activities we performed to get to the final stage and the all important cache! We waded through a creek (Ann did this one), climbed a wall, walked through stickers, made a couple of round trips, crawled under bridges (felt like the military drill where you climb under things on your stomach and then switch to your back), reached in questionable places, battled spiderwebs, solved puzzles, tried to use x-ray vision (didn't work), wished we had more water to drink, out maneuvered some other geocachers, and touched who knows what! Of course, not all of this was necessary, but most of it was!!!

Just in case you were wondering, it took over 4 hours for us to find all the stages of Don's Revenge! We were pretty exhausted when we finished. We were anxious to head home for showers, but first we had to go to Starbucks to celebrate. We were the first people to find it and the prize was a Starbucks gift card! I'm not sure the people at Starbucks were excited to see us--we were pretty dirty--but we didn't care! Our frappuccinos were mighty tasty!

Some people would think we were weird! Some people would think we had actually lost our minds! Some people would just shake their heads and pretend they didn't know us. But if we get a nod and a smile from you, then we know.... We know you are as obsessed as we are and will be going for this cache sometime soon!

We had quite an adventure during those 4+ hours and we really loved it. I just wish we had pictures!

We Made It To Wyoming!

But wait! Wasn’t our destination Tremonton, Utah? It certainly was, and we got there but we just couldn't resist the temptation. We arrived in Tremonton on Monday after a lengthy drive (including geocaching) from Reno. We spent a good part of our visit chatting with family. We did take a break occasionally to run to the store and pick up a few geocaches along the way. We justify the geocaching by claiming it is our exercise for the day.





Now it was the 4th of July and we thought we would see some of our country Larry and I had never seen before. We left everyone else behind and headed out across Northern Utah. We had a destination in mind, but we didn’t know if we would get there or not. We did! We made it all the way to Wyoming and found a total of three caches. One at the border but on the Utah side and two in Wyoming within 12 miles of the border.

To get there we followed The Behive State Hiway 30 from Tremonton, through Logan, through the Cache National Forest (interesting but we didn’t find a cache here), along Bear Lake, passed the town of Pickelville, passed the Redevous State Recreation area, through the Old Laketown Canyon, to the border and a little beyond! It was an interesting trip. We were obviously not in a pretty part of Wyoming (by our definition) when we got there but we saw signs directing us to follow this road to Jackson, WY and on to Yellowstone. We were tempted but given the distance and the fact that we were not prepared to extend our trip, we were able to ignore the temptation.

We had accomplished our goal for the day so we headed back to Tremonton. We debated taking the longer road leading back to Salt Lake, UT to make a bigger circle, but we figured we had abandoned the family long enough. It was time to get back in case we wanted to see the 4th of July parade in nearby Riverside.

Breaker! Breaker! We've Got Ourselves a Convoy!

We just spent the last weekend (June 30 & July 1, 2007) running the 2007 GBES Rally Route. We covered a lot of territory and all I can remember was that is was “way rocky”! Actually, the first day was the rockiest and we spent so much time bouncing around, I couldn’t do a thing with the computer except hold on to it! So, check out Geojeepers blog to get the more exciting version! The second day was a little easier but it was much hotter and there was less shade than the first day so we spent a fair amount of time in the sun finding caches.

We started the first day at the parking lot at Albertsons in Carson City. We were joined by Geo-Jeeper (Cynthia & Mike), our illustrious leaders, and Geospyder (Jim & Marja), they had the middle spot, We brought up the rear. After filling up the cars with gas and ourselves with the traditional Starbucks, we headed out. It was 7:38 AM. It wasn’t too long before we picked up our first rally cache. Now we knew what we would be looking for at each stop for the remainder of the day. It was a piece of pvc pipe with caps at both ends with a piece of paper (log) inside. Sort of sounds like a pipe bomb. It sort of looked like a pipe bomb as well! Good thing we knew what it was! According to my pedometer, we took over 13000 steps during the day to find these caches. In reality, I think it was over 13000 bounces along the rocky roads.

During the day we saw some incredible views, drove down some pretty rocky and steep roads, enjoyed the company of our fellow travelers and hit 4300 caches. Geo-Jeeper hit a milestone of 4000 caches and Geospyder hit 1800 caches (he is the baby geocacher in the crowd). We were wishing for a champagne toast, but we settled for a beer at the restaurant at the end of the day. By the time we got home, we were all so tired we posted our finds for the day and were all in bed and asleep by 9:00PM. Guess we aren’t party animals any more!




For our second day, we again met in the Albertson’s parking lot. This time, Nevada Wolf (Teri) joined us. We had done most of the day rally caches yesterday and some of the night rally caches. Today we did the majority of the night rally and finished up with a couple of the day rally caches in Virginia City. It was fun for us because we had a change of scenery. Instead of GeoJeeps rear we saw the rears of two jeeps and a Toyota 4-Runner. We could tell exactly where the road would turn by watching the position of the three vehicles in front of us. Again, for the real story, check out Geojeepers blog. Mike said it so much better than I could at this point.

We ended the second day at Jim & Marja’s house for beer and pizza. We were all pretty exhausted so we enjoyed the rest before heading back to Cynthia & Mike’s house for a good nights sleep!

One of the things we like about geocaching is the people involved in this great “sport”. It is such fun to share your experiences with others and this was a great group--both days. It is also reassuring to know that if you get in trouble, others are there. We were on some very interesting roads and experienced some “hold your breath and pray” moments! We were glad the others were there!

A Day of New Beginnings

Today we took some new geocachers out to find some caches. We decided to walk the bike trail in various parts of Miner's Ravine and see what they could find. Hopefully, they would see several types of containers and hide locations that would prepare them for the great world of geocaching.

The new cachers are our neighbor (imawahl), her son (Skiritai72) and her three grandchildren (they were along for the fun). We let them follow their GPS receivers and look for a bit before we offered clues. OK, occasionally we whispered a few additional words in the ears of the grandkids so they could make the find. It was a learning opportunity for all of them and they did well!

It was a long hot day, but we were all having fun so we hardly noticed! Our last cache in the ravine was the Alice in Wonderland--Pool of Tears. It was the highlight of the day as it gave them an opportunity to cool off a bit. Unfortunately, we forgot to take a picture so they will each have to create their own image of the cache.

We ended the day at Starbucks courtesy of imawahl and Skiritai72--thank you very much.

Great fun! Maybe there will be at least two more geocachers in the world.

Tahoe in June

I can’t believe it, we actually left Cynthia & Mike’s house before our projected departure time of 7:00 AM. True, it was only by 20 minutes, but 20 minutes is 20 minutes. Besides, we had to make our traditional stop at Starbucks. By the time we had our coffee in hand, it was still before 7 and we were on our way to Tahoe. We headed out via the Mt. Rose Highway. Up, Up, Up we went. Round, round, round we went! It was a “steep” climb from roughly 4100 ft. to 8260 where we stopped for our first cache at the Mt. Rose Ski Resort. We actually got to 8889 before we crossed over the “Highest Year Round Sierra Pass” and headed down into the Tahoe area.

One of our first caches we found was just off the Cave Rock Trailhead, The walk to the cache was pleasant enough, but then we had to suspend ourselves on the side of a hill. Mike and I headed down hill, first to the trees and then to some rocks. We were “climbing” all over that tree as we were sure it was there somehwere. I eventually found the cache a little further down the trail. It was a fake rock next to a larger rock under a bush. I was precariously balanced while I signed the log with our geocaching names. There are lots of pictures of that one!

We spent a little time in a wooded location along a fire trail and found the cache decorated with the pieces of a pine cone. After finding the cache, we walked to a nearby park and watched a few minutes of a baseball game in progress. One ended and another started while we watched. We were taking a rest.





After that we headed to a nearby cemetery. It was an old cemetery and one of the neighbors came over to ask if we knew anyone residing in the cemetery. We told him no, that we just had an interest in old cemeteries. I took some pictures and we chatted a while to distract from what the others were doing. We had quite a lengthy discussion about cemeteries, genealogy, and the important Tahoe families that were buried here. Eventually, he got tired and returned to his house. Then we could get down to business and find the cache! He was a talkative sort!

At one point, we were on the edge of a fabulous meadow. It really was beautiful. Cynthia and I posed for Larry to take our picture while Mike grabbed the cache and signed the log. The neighbors were right there in their backyard so we had to be stealthy! We got a good picture out of the deal and all their attention was focused on us.




A little further along on Hwy 89, we came to the Promanade Walk. The Old Tallac Hotel used to be the site of a major resort at Lake Tahoe. There is an old walkway that connected this hotel with the Tallac Point House. The walkway was called the Promanade. The guests could walk between the two at night along this lighted path. We met another geocaching family (hawaiilovers) at the start of the path. We all walked along the path together. It was one of the sons who made the find. Nice family. This was such a nice walkway. We could imagine how much the guests enjoyed it in it’s day. Too bad they had to take down the resort. I guess the daughter was concerned about the impact on the environment even back then.

We stopped for lunch at a location familiar to Larry & Me--The parking lot by the Vikingsholm Trailhead. We have hiked the Rubicon Trail along the west side of the lake from this point to DL Bliss State Park so we were familiar with the area. We had a fantastic view of Emerald Bay from this location.. We set up a tailgate party in the parking lot as it was a little breezy to be eating from a point where we had a view. This way we could enjoy our sandwiches while we watched the other cars jockeying for a parking spot. I’m sure they were wising we would hurry up and eat.

Along our route we found several Mile Marker caches. A geocacher named “AppleJohn” has been working on placing a geocache near every mile marker around Lake Tahoe. He has now placed a cache near every marker but three along the westside of the Lake from South Tahoe to North Shore. We found some of them in interesting locations. They were not always right at the marker. Sometimes we had to follow trails off the road a bit and one of them was a multi which meant we had to find a couple of stages before we found the final location of the cache. At one point, I ended up at the bottom of a pile of rocks in a crevice. They didn’t snap the picture until I was already out from the depths!

All and all, it was another beautiful day. It was a little hazy and breezy at some locations, but we still had some beautiful views and ended up on some interesting trails. We left the lake at Kings Beach and headed back to Truckee. Once in Truckee, Cynthia & Mike headed back to Reno and we headed back to Roseville. Here’s to future fun-filled geocaching trips!

A Leisurely Day

We relaxed today. The “boys” got to sleep in while the “girls” rushed out to get a First To Find Cache. We pulled up and spotted two suspicious looking characters. They turned out to be AppleJohn (from the Tahoe area) and Randallh from Reno. AppleJohn had already signed the log and returned the cache to its hiding place. The rest of us finally got around to finding the cache after we chatted for a while. We always enjoy meeting fellow geocachers in our travels.

The “boys” were up and around when we returned. Once we were organized , we headed down to Carson City to see what we could find. Fortunately, we never know what we will find. In this case, we found the Carson City Sheriff’s Department Motorcycle driving competition. They had taken over one of the local parks and mapped out a course for the cyclists to follow. The participants were from all over--even Rancho Cordova and Sacramento. We were in the park to complete a multi-cache challenge. We completed our challenge and several of the officers had completed their course challenge by then. We don’t know the results, but we saw a great display of some pretty sharp motorcycle driving skills.



Our jeeps were at home and we were traveling in Geo-Jeeper’s Sequoia. We did have to try a dirt road and actually made it fairly close to a cache before we had to stop and walk the last 200+ feet. After that we drove up the Kingsbury Grade for a guard rail cache near the 6000 ft. elevation.
We had some beautiful views of the valley below, the mountains behind and the storm clouds forming over the mountains. Based on the cloud formations, we were expecting a thunderstorm later in the day .

We ended our day back up in Reno at Rancho San Rafael Park. We parked near the dog park and watched some of the dogs romping. The actual cache was up a walking path just outside the dog park. I think we were glad as it might have been difficult to explain why we were there without a dog. As it was, no one paid any attention to us. Then it was back to Cynthia & Mike’s house. The clouds were looking nastier but we didn’t care as we would be safe and sound watching the lightening and listening to the thunder from inside the house.