Blog Template Musings about Geocaching: 2007-01-28

Musings about Geocaching

Friday, February 02, 2007

Another great hike in the Hollenbeck area

I met up with the Anonymous Geocacher this morning for a hike into the Hollenbeck area to finally find the two caches I missed getting a month ago when I hiked with fisnjack.

There were four caches on my list to find, and I'm not sure I would have found three of the four without hints from my companion. Two of them are under a lot of tree cover, so the GPSr accuracy left a lot to be desired. One time I had 16' accuracy and the GPSr said I was 65' away from the cache . . . when I had the container in my hand. A minute later, I had 35' accuracy, but the GPSr said I was only 13' away from the cache hiding spot.

We hiked more than nine miles and created an interesting Profile as we hiked up to 3cds' Terracache before going back down to get "IHO: The Mountain Bikers" and "My Dad's Gonna Kill Me."



"My Dad's Gonna Kill Me" is hidden near this car.



Just like fisnjack's "Chevy No-Va" and TrailGators "Reliable Off Road Equipment," you really wonder how these vehicles got where they ended up . . .

It was a beautiful day for a hike and I had a great time. It was nice to have the rainy weather gone and have our Southern California blue skies back.


posted by Miragee at 3:42:00 PM | 0 comments

Thursday, February 01, 2007

Whoops . . . I placed three more caches today

The sky was still overcast and it was cold. But, after days staying at home, I wanted to get out. So, I started my afternoon by driving to the location of a cache of mine I archived after it had been muggled again. This time I put out a waterproof match container. Maybe that will stay for a while.

Then, I came back and headed for the Sycuan Peak trailhead. At the nearby pullout, I parked the car and walked along narrow Lawson Valley road to the trail. The sky was cloudy, but it wasn't threatening rain.

Since the rain, someone had driven a large, 4WD vehicle up the trail. I wonder if it was an "Authorized Vehicle?"




The other day when I hiked this trail, the ground was so hard, I couldn't see the tracks of the group of cachers who walked up the trail the day before. Now, after the rains, this vehicle had left behind big tracks and deep ruts where the ground had softened up in the rain . . .

Near the top, I walked around on the rocks where there was a great view. I found a good spot to hide "lostguy"'s container and then before hiding it, I wrote a bit in the logbook about the cool, cloudy day. I took a few pictures, but the heavy overcast was not conducive to good pictures of the fantastic views.

After hiding the cache and taking the coordinates a couple of times, I headed for the top and then walked down the other side where the two Puzzle caches are hidden. I hoped I could "duganrm-them." No luck. The trail on that side was faint, and there was no way to follow a "Geotrail" like we found over on the west side of McGinty for that Puzzle cache of Team Adelos.

I wandered around for a while, enjoying being outside again. Finally, when I realized there was no hope of finding the caches without the coordinates -- only duganrm can do that -- I turned around and walked back down the hill.

This is what the profile of the hike looked like:



At the car, I decided to place a little cache to give cachers a guide to the parking area. There should be more caches coming out this way now that there are four more caches on the mountain.

I put the container as far away as I could get from the cache on the hill, which is still less than 528 feet away. I hoped Marco Ramius would approve the cache anyway, since it is a walk of .2 to actually get to the other cache.

I named that cache "Only Two Redeeming Qualities" because it is really a lousy cache hide . . .

I named the other cache "Second Time's the Charm," since it is the container that was placed on McGinty and had to be moved.

The other cache on Lyons Valley Road, which is the location of my very first cache hide, I called, "Another Lyons Valley Roadside Distraction."

So . . . now, counting my Terracache, I have 79 caches out there . . . Who knew when I put that first cache out I would enjoy hiding caches so much . . .


posted by Miragee at 8:46:00 PM | 0 comments

Tuesday, January 30, 2007

A day of hiking foiled by the weather . . .

             


3cds and I hoped to hike to a cache that still hasn't been found, more than a month since it was placed. However, the road to the "trailhead" is dirt, and passes through a section of road that is often flooded.

So, I'm sitting here feeling restless and wishing I could get out and get some exercise, but the rain keeps me inside.

I am glad we are getting rain because the backcountry vegetation is so very dry. This will lessen the fire danger for a little while. I don't think this storm is big enough to replenish the wells for people who depend on them for their water supplies however. Maybe we'll get some bigger storms next month that will help that.


posted by Miragee at 1:21:00 PM | 0 comments

Sunday, January 28, 2007

Another FTF on a cache near my house

A new cache popped up this afternoon that was only 2.2 miles from my house . . . as the crow flies. It was almost a five mile drive to the trailhead, and almost a mile walk up a lonely road to get to the cache container that was right on the numbers.



As I was up on the mountain, I wandered around and played on some of the interesting, dark-colored, lichen-covered rocks. As I played, I was looking for evidence of TrailGators' puzzle cache he hid on the mountain yesterday as well as looking for a place to hide "lostguy"'s container I retrieved from McGinty Friday.

The sky was getting more and more overcast and gray during the time I was up there. I could still see way off in the distance, but the peaks were not as photogenic as they can be on bright, shiny, and clear days.

Off to the east, I could see the broad shoulders of Gaskill Peak.



As I walked along the trail, it was so quiet. All I could hear was my footsteps and the occasional metallic clink of my walking stick when it made a direct hit on a rock.

It was a great hike. I had forgotten how much I enjoyed those hikes up that peak when I first started Geocaching two years ago. I was glad Team Adelos placed a new cache up there for me to find . . . and get a FTF prize of an unactivated Geocoin.

Thanks, Paul.


posted by Miragee at 8:34:00 PM | 0 comments

 

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