Second Helpings

Geocaching Adventures

Last Saturday dawned dry and sunny, so ignoring any housework or laundry battling for attention, I donned my walking boots and set off in search of two geocaches a few miles from our house. Hubby said to call him if I wanted a lift home from anywhere.

On arrival in the vicinity of the first cache, I discovered the hiding place to be on the side of a very busy road, with no pavement. There was no way I was chancing scrambling over a grass verge overhung with hedgerow shrubbery, so decided to abandon that one for the time being.

The second one was not exactly in the area I’d assumed it to be from its name, but I decided to continue my search despite it being a long walk from where I was starting out. Eventually it became apparent I’d have to cross farmland where a flock of geese were honking around the gate, so I gave up on that one too. I'm a cowardly lion.

I phoned hubby and suggested we have lunch out as it would be a shame to waste the rare good weather. I asked if he’d mind pulling into a lay-by where the first cache appeared to be hidden and he joined me in my search for the hidden container. After a while another car pulled into the lay-by and hubby’s daughter and twin grandsons appeared. They’d passed by and seen two old fogies rummaging in the grass and wondered if we’d finally lost the plot completely.

We explained our mission and they were all quite fascinated and joined in the search. Eventually hubby found the cache hidden behind a concrete block, so we signed the log and the twins added a small item to the box. Hubby and I set off to eat lunch outside a nearby pub. It was there he discovered there was another cache hidden nearby and suggested we go and hunt it out. It took a while but eventually he found a magnetic tube attached to the underside of a bench.

Later my stepdaughter informed us the twins are now hooked and thanked us for altering her weekend plans as the boys were pestering to go in search of caches in the area where they live.

Sunday morning dawned and I started food preparations for son and family’s stopover. Hubby appeared in the kitchen and asked if I was ready. Ready for what I asked. To go geocaching he replied. So we spent the next hour or so driving from one place to another and came back with four more geocaches discovered and logged. Later in the afternoon Angel and Dylan asked if we could show them one so off we went again.

It seems my family are now all infected with the geocaching bug. I have just found my tenth this afternoon, so am thrilled to be in double figures. Only one million, nine hundred and ninety-nine thousand, nine hundred and ninety to go.

I'm not a big Harry Potter fan so didn't realise that's where the term muggles comes from, so you live and learn. I'm seeing places I've never been before and discovering the ingenious ways geocachers hide and disguise their caches. None are buried underground, but they are frequently placed in unusual and sometimes comical places. They can range in size from micro tubes, to large boxes and may or may not contain items which may be swapped or moved to another cache.

I managed the third writing class in between hunting, but more on that another time as I have to go and consult the map to find where the caches are hidden in the city when I go to meet my sis there on Monday.