Geocaching Rocks!

Finally... a cache fix!

2006-10-15T15:30:00.000-04:00

We were finally able to find a cache a few weeks ago. I was so excited! The first we attempted was Ai caduti di Motta which was a virtual of a WWII memorial statue. Tony stayed in the car with sleeping Lil Sunshine and I braved the walk up to the monument. I say braved because it is highly unusual to see a girl walking in the neighborhoods of Italy on her own. I wish I had taken my camera with me to take a few pictures, but I didn't want to walk back to the car and back to the cache again as all the town's men who were sitting outside their businesses were watching me. Although, it probably would have helped make me just look more of a tourist. hehe... Afterwards, we went to find WWII - Motta S. Anastasia Pillboxes which is an area that we drive near at least once a month, but for some reason, we couldn't figure out which road to take to get to the cache! So we kept ending up on the autostrada (highway) and had to drive 6 miles before we could turn around! lol... we ended up doing that about 3 times until we Tony finally noticed a bridge we hadn't tried going over... and what do ya know? hehe... so we found the cache fairly easy. It is located near a German Pillbox that was used in the war. Looking at the beautiful surroundings, it's hard to imagine war going on in the area:

So, those are the two caches that we've been able to do since getting here. There aren't many around our area. It's a big geocaching shock since we just moved from Jacksonville... lol. But we're hoping to hide some soon. The only problem is that almost all of the land around here is owned by someone. It's all crop land. We hardly go into the cities yet either, but hopefully as we learn more of the language and learn where the parks and site seeing places are we'll get some caches hidden.

One Degree of Separation Geocaching Project

2006-06-13T00:01:00.000-04:00

Here's some more info on the ODS project:

ODS forum

ODS Prime's Profile

ODS Prime Cache

This project is so cool, I'm looking foward to following it. I can't wait to hide our seed pod when we get to Italy. :D

Terracaching

2006-06-08T22:22:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, we joined Terracaching.com. I would love to do more challenging caches, but they will probably be few and far between since we tote the one year old around. :) We did our first one today while out getting a few caches in Lampasas. Both MrCC and I spent a few years there in our early childhood, so it was awesome driving around town again. The terracache was a virtual at the fire department. It was a memorial to 9/11 and its victims and heroes. It was sad but I appreciated the cache because it made me stop, remember, and reflect.

There is another terracache at Enchanted Rock Park about an hour from where we're staying now. I went to E-Rock with my grandparents back when I was a kid, and even then we only climbed one of the mountains. To claim this terracache, you have to climb all 6! I think I read that it's an 8 mile hike and 2000 feet total ascension. We might try to get a sitter for Lil Sunshine one day and attempt it. Don't know for sure yet though, but it would be a blast.

Lil' Sunshine recently got her 200th cache! It was ODS: TKtrekker-Abbe-Kefer on June 6. This cache is part of a really cool idea brought up by Snoogans. It's putting into practice the concept of the Small World Theory. We are also taking a container of seed pods to Italy when we go. So, we'll be a part of this caching history. :D

Geowoodstock 4

2006-05-27T20:47:00.000-04:00

Originally we thought that we weren't going to be able to make it to GW4 this year. We would be flying home to Texas anyway, so it was a bummer to know we were going to miss it. Then we got tickets to Austin on Thursday night, which would give us all day Friday to rest up. That was going to be perfect for a drive out to Dallas to go! So we did! woohoo! I didn't tell Caraloopy that I might be able to go because we wanted to surprise her, and boy was she! I will never forget her reaction when she saw us walking up, and that made the drive worth it. :) The event was a lot of fun too. We met so many awesome people and geohounds. It was a blast!

CacherCrashers and Lil' Sunshine with the Original Can of Beans from the very first geocache! How cool is that?
We found a lot of NEFGA folks hanging out at GW4 also, so we had to take one more picture! It was great seeing all our friends one more time before we head out to Italy next month. It was kind of weird seeing all of them in our home state though, lol. :D
I convinced my mom, Spanish Rose, to come out with us. This was right before we left. We left right before the food was served, Lil' Sunshine was quite fussy and it was time for us to go. We had a blast.

Wings Over Orlando

2006-05-25T23:31:00.000-04:00

This was our very last cache find in Florida. We had to drive down to Orlando to drop the car off at the shippers to be sent to Italy. We arrived with plenty of time and gas to spare. We actually had to waste about a quarter of a tank of gas because it could only have 1/4 left in it. So we found 3 caches: Where Shopping is a Pleasure 2, Have You Seen My Mother?, and Wings Over Orlando. They were all very cool and worthwhile. The second was especially special since our good friends November Babies + 1 hid it, and we got to visit her parents. So that was cool. It was definately a fun way to waste gas... Caching always is. lol...

Pics

2006-05-16T23:39:00.000-04:00

Stress made this for the event's cache page. :D

Pranzo D'addio Per I Crashers del Nascondiglio

2006-05-16T22:02:00.000-04:00

The event was so awesome. To have all of my close friends together to see me off was just great. And I cried... a lot. lol. I was presented with a Farewell card signed by everyone (that made me cry), a journal of messages from the group (that made me cry), a speech by Stress (that made me cry).. lol, I was crying the whole time. hehe... Stress even gave me an ammo box filled with some of his camo creations. So, the Italians will get a taste of "the Camo Factory" and the factory will soon have international precense. lol (It might already, not sure)

I've had so many great geocaching adventures here in NEFGA territory. StressMaster and Caraloopy are family to me now. They were there for me when MrCC was deployed and throughout my pregnancy. They are both there when I need to talk, when I need a shoulder to cry on, when I need a babysitter, and especially when there's a new cache in my neighborhood and I just don't want to go to by myself. :) One more time guys, thanks so much. I love you guys, and I already miss ya'll.

Farewell pics

2006-05-16T22:01:00.000-04:00

where did my milestones list go?

2006-05-05T10:13:00.000-04:00

I realized last night that I lost it... somewhere between transferring from my old caching webpage to this nifty so easy to update blog. :( So, last night I went through all of my caches found and tracked down all my milestones and FTFs. Boy did that take a while! lol... but it was worth it. I thought about making a blog entry for it, but decided to use the fairly new bookmark feature on geocaching.com so here they are:

Our Milestones
Our FTFs

I was also searching for caches in Italy, near where we'll be living pretty soon. Liquid Earth is a cache in Sicily. The cache owner is an American that is in Sicily 1-2 weeks out of every month. So, I'm thinking I will try to contact him when we get there. Geocachers are always cool.

awww shucks...

2006-05-02T13:47:00.000-04:00

I hope I don't cry.... :) too hard anyway.
I'm looking foward to the event and seeing my friends one more time, but not to leaving. :(

racked up 25 more today

2006-04-30T22:42:00.000-04:00

Today I went out caching with my usual crew, Stressmaster, his boys, and Caraloopy. MrCC stayed at home with Lil' Sunshine, so I was able to cache nonstop with no worries. We had a blast! Half of the caches we were all racing eachother to get to it first. lol... it was hilarious. One was King of the Hill by sights2c and while we were all racing to get to the top of a huge hill, Stress decided to cheat and pushed me to the side. lol CHEATER FACE! hehe.

I started taking notes at each cache again. I used to do it all the time when I first started caching, so that I could remember which cache was which, and what happened at each one, so that I could write a semi interesting log. So, that made logging my finds take a couple of hours, but it was worth it.

I meant to take some pictures... but I was too caught up in racing to and looking for the caches. lol But now I'm up to 727! With a month to go before we leave Florida, and a few weeks in Texas... maybe I can try to get closer to 800 before we head to Italy. :)

#700!!!!!

2006-04-15T22:47:00.000-04:00

Saturday I reached 700! woohoo! I had a blast. MrCC stayed home with the baby, since he's not so much into caching with me anymore, but that's okay because it was nice to not have to worry about the baby for a whole day! I had Loopy and Stress to keep me company though. And they were so nice to navigate around town helping me get to 19 caches that I needed in order to do Claustrophobia as #700. It was so much fun.

I've had Claustrophobia on my to do list for probably over a year now, and have been wanting to do it for a milestone cache... well, probably for the last 3 milestones, lol. And now I can say I survived it. Stressmaster is mean when it comes to caching... evil is how most describe him. He really puts you to the test. In this cache, you face your fear of being inside small, dark, possibly water and spider filled spaces to get the clue for the next stage. Quite a challenge. The first time, Loopy went in first, because frankly I was too chicken, so I followed her. But on the second and third times we had to do it, I mustered up the courage to go in.

Claustrophobia was definately the highlight of the day, but I also found some awesome camo jobs part of the Serial Finder series, walked through some pretty parks, some more Stress Evilness, and of course made a bunch of quick grab-n-goes. After all the stages, and a full day of caching, we were exhausted, but it was so worth it. This pic is me trying to cross a fallen tree to get to Serial Finder 9. :)

And here is another reason why Stress is so mean:

Big Plans for the Weekend

2006-04-13T13:05:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, Lil' Sunshine and I went out for a few caches with Caraloopy. We looked for about 6 but only found 4. Two, we dnf'ed, both we think are missing, but aren't sure. Anyway, we Meffed a new one at the beach. So that was fun, and Lil' Sunshine loved the walk out there. With those finds, we are now at 680 and Lil' Sunshine's up to 180. We both need 20 to get to our next milestone. So, Friday I'm planning to meet up with Loopy again to get as many as possible near her place. Then on Saturday we plan on getting together with Loopy and Stress and doing Claustrophobia, which is a long multi that has been on our Goal List forever! and it would be an awesome milestone cache. So, I'm looking foward to it. :D

some caching with a baby humor

2006-04-12T12:31:00.000-04:00

Lil' Sunshine's log for Popeye Series: Popeye by Marine Biologist:

Gosh! Are we DONE YET!?! I was so fussy by the time Mommy found this one, I was beyond READY to go home... and then they decide to get FOOD? GOSH!!! geez... hello? I'm P'Oed. Let's go home... but after I make sure you definately signed my name too. Yeah? ok, let's go! :) TFTH!

MEFF!!!!!

2006-04-06T18:06:00.000-04:00

MEFF= Most Esteemed First Finder aka First to Find

A Fish Called Helen by DuckBandits

Woohoo!!! Tuesday night I was surfing gc.com and I noticed a new geocache not far away from us. It had been approved on the 2nd, and it was STILL unfound! (which is unusual in this area) So, I decided that Wednesday, I would get up early with the hubby and take him to work so that I could keep the car and go search for the cache. Well, Wednesday morning came sooner than I thought, and I happily agreed when MrCC offered to bring the car home at lunch time. Well, that plan didn't happen, and since he had duty he didn't get to come home until this afternoon.

Around lunch time I was chatting with Stressmaster, and I told him about the new cache. He asked for the coords, and so I gave them to him, not even knowing he was about to get off of work. LOL... So he said, "Allright, I'm gonna go, I have to run by that way anyway, so I'm going to go try to find it." I gave him a hard time about going to go look for it when I wanted to go MEFF it. :) He offered to come pick me up, but I didn't have the carseat, otherwise I would of accepted. After a little while longer, the phone rang. I picked it up, and it was Stress. I thought he had called to tell me all about the cache, lol, but really he was calling me to tell me he couldn't go by the park and I still had a chance to meff it. :) Maybe he just wanted to be nice... lol.
So after a long day, a long night, and another long day, MrCC finally got home. Surprisingly, he was still willing to go with me to find this cache. :D Do I have a keeper or what? We knew the park area because we had found a few caches there already, and even hid one there, but we've already archived it since we'll be moving soon. It's a really pretty area, right on the river, perfect for fishing, which we've done once there before. Boy were there plenty of fishermen out today! But thankfully, none near the cache's area.

So, we drove into the park, found the spot, and I got out and looked for it. It was a quick find. I brought the ammo can back to the car to search through the contents. I grabbed one of DuckBandits' little duckies and left one CacherCrashers sig token and one Lil' Sunshine sig token. They had a really nice log book, one of those rain proof ones you can buy online, so I stood for a minute writing a paragraph to fill our space. Put the cache back, and enjoyed the scenery for a few minutes, and took a few pictures before getting back into the car and heading home. YAY! This was our first meff in a long time! woohoo!

We LOVE Geocaching!!!

Our Caching Stats

2006-04-06T12:57:00.000-04:00

Last night I was chatting with some caching buddies, and November Babies Plus 1 mentioned this FizzyMagic's FindStat program. So I checked it out, installed it, and finally got it to work. :) It analyzes all of your finds. It's so cool!

Here's what it had to say about ours:

670 unique caches.
674 finds logged.
5 DNF logs (on found caches only).
Centroid = N 30 31.945, W 81 45.497
Avg. Difficulty = 1.73
Avg. Terrain = 1.53
Avg. Challenge = 1.84
69 hard caches (10%)
2 countries
6 US states
4 multiple finds (1%)
205 (30.6%) archived
First log: 07/20/2004
Last log: 04/2/2006
Most finds: 39 on 12/11/2004
Maximum one-day distance: 2480.6 miles on 05/28/2005 *This doesn't count because it's from logging traveling caches from Geowoodstock3* :D
From N 41 28.393, W 75 37.784 to N 37 45.100, W 122 26.600
Oldest cache: #15567 (GC3CCF)
Newest cache: #365042 (GCV1MF)

Cache types:
2 ( 0.3%) Cache In Trash Out Event
1 ( 0.1%) Earthcache
17 ( 2.5%) Event Cache
1 ( 0.1%) Letterbox Hybrid
6 ( 0.9%) Locationless (Reverse) Cache
10 ( 1.5%) Multi-cache
602 (89.9%) Traditional Cache
20 ( 3.0%) Unknown Cache
9 ( 1.3%) Virtual Cache
2 ( 0.3%) Webcam Cache

Containers:
5 ( 0.7%) Large
365 (54.5%) Micro
37 ( 5.5%) Not chosen
16 ( 2.4%) Other
194 (29.0%) Regular
39 ( 5.8%) Small
14 ( 2.1%) Virtual

Countries:
1 in Germany
663 in United States

US States:
1 in California
647 in Florida*
1 in Georgia*
7 in Pennsylvania
5 in Texas*
2 in Utah

*physically found caches, the other states are traveling caches, etc.

Multiple Finds:
2 finds claimed on GCK1W3
2 finds claimed on GCKPX3
2 finds claimed on GCM019
2 finds claimed on GCM7K5

100th Trackable!

2006-04-05T12:18:00.000-04:00

We logged our 100th trackable the other day! And what a beautiful one it was. It was:

StressMaster's Native American Geocoin

It's yet another awesome coin design by StressMaster himself. I fell in love with it when I saw it. I tried to order some for myself and my family, but we'll see if I got my order in on time. My sister and I are part Choctaw from my dad's side of the family. We also have a few other tribes in us from my mom's side, but the knowledge of which ones has been lost over the generations...

Anyway, the coin is beautiful. Great job Stress! and thanks for letting us log it! :)

Land Before Time

2006-04-02T15:54:00.000-04:00

Found this one, too, while taking a detour away from the Pirate's Booty Series. Lot's of fun! :D I also forgot to mention in my last post, that I took two geocoins from the "treasure pile" to help them on their adventures. They each have their own icon too, so that's cool. Picked up a "Not another Micro!" Geocoin and a "Bluebonnet" Geocoin. :D

*also added a few pics to March 25th entry. :)

Pirate's Booty Scenery...

2006-04-02T14:30:00.000-04:00

Hunting for the Pirate's Booty

2006-04-02T13:50:00.000-04:00

Today, MrCC, Lil' Sunshine, and I joined a group of cachers to find Pirate's Booty: The Plunder. The Pirate's Booty series was a blast! We haven't had a full day of caching in a long time, and we weren't sure how Lil' Sunshine was going to handle it, but surprisingly she was really good! There were 12 caches in all, one being a letterbox (our first one!!!) and another being a multi. There were lots of ammo cans, a few micros in the multi, and the final was HUGE! There was a nice long hike, beautiful scenery, and lots of excitement. Today was filled with everything that geocaching is all about.

Looking for the last stage of the multi: StressMaster & Stressboys, MrSuzyQ, GeoJoeChuck , April of Eason Trio, and MrCC.
Enjoying the hike to the letterbox cache. It was sunny and beautiful! Thankfully the bugs weren't too bad... there were a few, but not nearly as bad as it will get as summer gets here.
Lil' Sunshine taking a break with Caraloopy, and playing with her geoswag treasure that GeoJoeChuck shared with her.
One of about ten or so baby gators that we saw while looking for a different cache (we didn't find it). We watched the tiny gators, and the boys, of course, did more than watch... trying to get their attention finally worked when they called for their momma....
...... and then she appeared! Nobody messes with her babies! She made a quick splash and hit a nearby log as a warning... then a few minutes later she appeared again near her mudslide... MrCC got a little closer than I would of liked for this picture:
All in all, we had so much fun! I'll post some more scenic pictures in another post. This was actually the first series we've ever finished completely! and finding all of them brought us up to 674! only 26 til the next milestone! woohoo!

new caching motto

2006-03-26T19:37:00.000-04:00

I finally decided to "grab" back all of my coins and various personal travel bugs that were stuck in past events... after finding out that our Nuna travel bug had been stuck in an event that was held back in September 05, I decided my new motto would be:
"Sheepa... the slacker cacher...."
*sheepa is an inside joke with loopy, stress, and suzyqs*
hehe
:D

Stress has some competition....

2006-03-25T14:05:00.000-04:00

:D
Today, I went along with November Babies Plus 1 to help hide a few caches and of course find a few others too. :) She had some really good hides ready to place. I'm glad I went along. I found four caches, so with NB+1's 4... today's total was 8. yay! I also got to grab alot of her coins for a few new icons on my stats page. :D yay again! Marking a waypoint:

One of the caches I found was (subscriber only) BC: Wooden Lake Reflections by DigitalTangent. I found it pretty quickly, but only because I've grown used to Stress' evil camo, lol.... but now it seems, StressMaster has some competetion running around nowadays... greeeaaattt..... haha. Seriously, though, this cache was freakin awesome. I can see how so many have glanced right over it. The cache's surroundings were beautiful as well, a nice lake with some wooded area around it. Very peaceful, and it was a superb day to enjoy the sight. Admiring the camo:

Pics by November Babies Plus 1 :)

Carlee especially enjoyed the nice day out. She was very good all day, being quite happy with the walks outside. She never even got cranky until the very end of the caching day.... maybe she's getting old enough for us to be able to go caching more? hopefully! lol...

I also released a new travel bug... Shoe...well, it's not new, we've had it for a looong time, but I finally placed it. I chose one of NB+1's new caches to start it out in, and it's already been picked up! yay!

I had temporarily forgotten why I love everything about caching.... and this past week pretty much reminded me of everything... :)

finally!!!

2006-03-20T19:52:00.000-04:00

We finally got a few caches today... Lil Sunshine and I joined Stressmaster, boys, and Caraloopy for a short day of caching. We found 7 caches (one being a multi) and one benchmark! yay! Lil Sunshine got to swing at a nice park at one cache, and we even went to the beach for another cache. It was a fun beautiful day. :)

wow... a quick update

2005-12-18T17:33:00.000-04:00

I haven't updated this one in a while! We have hardly had the time to go geocaching lately... with the baby and all. I did find one a few months ago while I was out with November Babies, but I still haven't even logged it. And I went to the dinner part of an event last week (i think?) lol... but still haven't even logged that one either.

I got my NEFGA geocoins in. I like them okay... I'm not too sure about the gold finish though. I think I might get StressMaster to polish the finish off of one that I'm going to keep. I haven't been into trading as much as I had wanted, so I've been listing a few of them on ebay... they're doing well, and allowing me to get stuff I need for the baby, for Christmas, and some stuff just for me. :) I also bought two on ebay the other day. I can't wait for them to get in the mail. A PDX portland coin, it's really pretty, and a Bikedog smashed penny. pretty cool... AND I was so lucky that Mr and Mrs IceCreamMan gave me each of their coins. They are soooo nice!

I saw a Screw Geocoins geocoin... and it's really funny, but they're going for around $50 dollars... I don't need one that bad. lol.... anywho... that's all for this quick update.

Not for the Vertically Challenged

2005-09-27T22:15:00.000-04:00

The caching with November Babies Plus 1 today started out great. We started at one hidden by a Sweet Tomatoes, so we had lunch... yummy... then every cache we were hitting, we were finding! Then we made our way to Hail to the Chief- G by Macleod1, a cache that I have tried to find several times and never succeeded.... until today that is. It happened to be on NB+1's list of ones to hit, and I thought, "ugh... that cache... I'm NEVER going to find that cache."

We pulled up to the spot, and looked around, checking for muggles... no one, so we started to look. We thought about the hint (the title of this post)... and knew we were probably going to have trouble. I'm 5 foot 4 in, and NB+1 is a tad bit taller than me... "But, I don't know because I made MrCC look for it sine he's way taller than me," I told her. We continued looking anyway, we knew it had to be in this palm tree... we knew it... it felt like forever that we were looking for it, and finally, we kind of both gave up at the same time.

As I was getting into the car, I looked up at the tree, one last time in defeat.... and then, I caught a glimpse if something dark poking out of one of the palm branch things... could it be? yes! it was the cache!!! "I see it!" I yelled.

Wow. This cache was way up there, there was no way we were going to be able to get it... but we tried anyway. I stacked my two trade item containers at the base if the tree, hoping it would make me tall enough... not only was I still too short, they gave out and I slipped off of them... ugh! I was so close... kinda... lol...

I then decided I was not leaving without this cache. I had tried half a dozen too many times without finding it. "I'm going into the store to see if they'll let me borrow a stepstool," I said and then marched into the business with a mission.

I asked a girl. She looked at me funny, and then asked, "Well, where are you going to be?"

"Just right there in the parking lot." She didn't ask any more questions, and brought me a nice step stool for us vertically challenged. It was just the height I needed to grasp the cache... It was mine! I had finally found this cache!!! I was so excited! It was definately an adventure I won't forget anytime soon.

Green Cove Springs

2005-09-24T01:31:00.000-04:00

We went to Green Cove Springs tonight to meet some caching friends up for dinner and to get our Federation coins. what? no smiley? lol... nope, just friends, bbq, and coins, oh and a few caches before dinner. :)

We did A River Runs By It, by GatoRx and Meadowmuffin. We were with a group of people for this one, The SuzyQs, Mrs Kile Mates, Caraloopy, Some Dude, GatoRx, Meadowmuffin, and StressMaster. The owners showed up because at first we thought the cache might be gone from it's spot... but it was there, the dirt just needed some stirring up to find it. After finding it, we walked around the park. It is such a beautiful area. We saw a swan, and some turtles in the stream. It was really cool. Mrs Kile Mates took this picture:

We also found Green Cove Springs Swimming Hole, by the Federation, and it reminded me of home. It's a virtual by a pool that is naturally filled by the springs. When I realized what it was, I thought of the one that is back home in Lampasas, Texas. This one is really cool though, because it has a well that you can look into. MrCC joked about letting Lil' Sunshine go for a little swim in it. haha.... not. :)

After that we went to the dinner. The purpose of getting together was to get our Federation coins that we ordered. They are really really nice, and Fed said that there was going to be a puzzle cache out soon... and the puzzle is on the coin! That should be fun.... lol.

Nefga Does Union County

2005-09-18T01:14:00.000-04:00

Lil' Sunshine's 100th Cache!!!

Today we (Lil' Sunshine and I) went to the Nefga Does Union County event. MrCC was supposed to come to but ended up having to work :( so, lil' sunshine and I joined Stressmaster and crew for a great day of caching. The event was held with the purpose of hiding caches in Union County, since there were only a handfull of existing caches there. There were seven teams and each team hid a cache, and then we all met up and traded coords, and went and hunted everyone else's cache. After caching the day away, we joined up at a park for a bbq. It was a lot of fun. I took a few pics:

This was one of the first caches we found today. I thought it was a beautiful memorial, and definately a nice place to visit.

Stressboy Matt climbing down with "Monkey Girl" cache (by legna & sOulbAit) in hand. Those boys sure do come in handy sometimes! lol :)

StressMaster retreiving "Princess" cache (by Sights2c). He earned our smiley for us. :)

We enjoyed the view at this cache for a while. We even saw some huge butterflies flying around, they were really pretty.

Lil' Sunshine was pooped after a day of caching! She took a nap and let me eat dinner, but the nap was short, and she was back to entertaining (and being entertained by) all the cacher-kids. We had so much fun today!

HI-Tech Caching

2005-09-06T14:54:00.000-04:00

There are so many gadgets out there that can be used while geocaching. The GPS of course being the most necessary (though I've seen people cache without them, and we found our first cache sans gps), but many people also use PDAs and laptops. We've joined that group. :)

We took our laptop with us when we went caching the other day. It is so neat. We use GSAK, so if we need to look at a cache page, all we have to do is open the program and look. Another exciting thing was after we found our first cache that day, I was able to log the find from the parking lot of the park by using a wireless connection. It's definately not a necessity, but it is so neat to be able to do.

#600!!!

2005-09-04T17:38:00.000-04:00

FINALLY!!! We got #600 today! We have been so close for a few weeks now... and it's taken us so long to finally reach this milestone... almost five months! As of this morning we only needed four caches, so we decided to go out and get those four. But only those since gas prices have skyrocketed... We tried for a few that are close to our home, but couldn't find them... I give up too easily. :( But we drove down to the beaches and found the three that we needed. A cool one was #599, Larry71150 Coin Depot. The container was really neat, we've never seen one like it before, and the idea of the cache is cool too. It's goal is to collect the fifty state quarters. We added in a California quarter.

After that we tried to claim a multi for our #600, but it was at the beaches, and the beaches were packed today! Too many muggles made us decide to just go home and claim the locationless in front of our apartment office that we had been saving. So, we made USA Flag our #600. We claimed our complex's flag because it's extra special to us since this is our first home as a married couple. :) Hopefully we'll get back into caching more often... It took us too long to reach this milestone... lol... (Tony looks so excited in the picture...not. We were both tired of dealing with stupid traffic and moron drivers... lol)

Nefga's Rally Round the Campfire

2005-08-27T21:35:00.000-04:00

Today we went to the Nefga Rally Round the Campfire event held by Legna and sOulbAit. It was an event in Palatka to hold the elections for this year's board. Tony and I caravaned down there with StressMaster, and we cached along the way of course. After a while we caught up with Caraloopy at a cache (which I found, yay!) We ended up with 11 new caches before we finally headed down to the event around 5:30 pm. In the picture below everyone was looking for a cache called Home of the Triple S by Federation. There is Tony looking under the bench, Caraloopy sitting on the other one, Stressmaster in the grey shirt looking, Hikemeister in the blue shirt and Hike Jr. in the white shirt. The other boys are the StressBoys, as I like to call them. :)

Carlee was very relieved once we got to the event because we finally took her out of the carseat for good. lol... she was getting pretty fussy from having to sit in it for so long. It was so much fun to see everyone again. It felt like forever since we had been to an event! There was a GeoPoker game, where everyone who wanted to play got a card and had to hold it on their forehead (but couldn't look at what it is). Then they had to walk around and try to make a pair with someone without talking... lol... anyway, Tony and the person he paired up with ended up winning because they had the highest combination (no one got a pair) with a King and an Eight. It was pretty funny. Here he is trying to pick his prize... (there's another StressBoy, what a ham, lol)

So, we ate, talked, traded travel bugs, logged a bunch of new coins (for new icons!!!), voted our new board members, and talked some more. I had so much fun! Carlee really enjoyed it too, I think. She loved being held by and talked to by everyone. Oh, and we won two raffle items! Tony must be good luck, because I never win anything! lol... we won a ready to hide cache, and a travel bug tag. So after the day was over, we ended up getting to 591 caches, and Lil' Sunshine's up to 87. Below is a group picture of everyone.

Here's a show of the event that Zephyrus put together. It's really cool.

Lil' Sunshine coin survived!

2005-08-26T16:46:00.000-04:00

We left our sig tokens at a cache that we did recently called, "Canadians, Eh?", and I noticed that it was temporarily archived. So I checked the logs to see what happened. Apparently, a lawn mower got ahold of this cache, and DigitalTangent found the remnants and Lil' Sunshine's coin was one of the survivors! Check out his log and pics about it. I thought it was pretty neat. :D

Geocoin Collection

2005-08-26T13:06:00.000-04:00

Last updated 4-7-06

GW3 pewter coin
GW3 bronze coin
Today's Cacher smashed coin
USA 2005
Migo 2005
Texas 2005
Germany coin
Federation coin
USA 2006
IceCreamMan
MrsIceCreamMan
Joe Merchant
Serial Finder
OIFGA pewter
OIFGA bronze
NEFGA
Florida (FGA)

Signature Items We've Collected

2005-08-26T12:58:00.000-04:00

Cacher/Item (will add pics eventually)
last updated 4-7-06

Legna & sOulbAit *** "You're doing what?" geocaching pin (#026)
JenSedai *** info card
November Babies Plus 1 *** Geocaching Magnet
Greywolf and Momcat *** handmade macrame bracelet
Team Rocks *** Pokemon card
CacherCrashers (us) *** geotoken
Lil' Sunshine *** geotoken
StressMaster *** geo wooden nickel (#1 ver 1) and (#22 ver 2)
IceCreamMan*** quote card (#081)
Duckbandits *** Ducky
Paca & Pacas Pal *** turtle
Team Dinosaur *** info card
89GTA & Geo Psycho *** info card

Finally a few caches!

2005-08-25T12:07:00.000-04:00

Lil' Sunshine and I went caching today with our friends November Babies plus 1. I got to claim one new cache for us (nb+1 found it first) :) and about six (I think?) for Lil'Sunshine. The one I got to claimf or us was Deer Fly Oasis, it was brand newShe really seems to enjoy being outside, she's a natural born cacher.

We're going to the NEFGA rally event in Palatka on Saturday. I can't wait. We haven't been to an event in a while! I'm looking foward to seeing everyone again, and showing off Lil'Sunshine. :) and hopefully finding a bunch of Palatka caches.

A nice day of caching

2005-08-04T19:42:00.000-04:00

Carlee and I went caching today with my friends NovemberBabies+1. I had a blast, and I think Carlee really enjoyed being outside today. We first started out at a new mall that I have been wanting to go to. We ate breakfast at Panera's, and then grabbed the micro right in the parking lot. We grabbed a few more at the mall.

The neatest find today was Year of Independence by Mcleod1. The camo on it was awesome. It was an ammo box desguised as a phone box, which no muggles would think twice about if they saw it.

We then took a nice walk around a beautiful lake area nearby, and found two caches. Then, drove over to the hiking trails at the University of North Florida. Today was my first visit there. It really is a beautiful area. I got to find two caches along these trails with help from Clay. We also stopped on this bridge and I watched the kids feed bread to the fish, turtles, and even an alligator!

It really was a neat sight! If Carlee was older she would of been so excited, I know I was, lol... I wish I had remembered to take my camera along, I'll have to ask NB+1 if I can use some of her pictures. (edit:I've added pics) There are a few more caches along the trails there, so Tony and I will have to go back another day.

I also started leaving our new signature items in caches today. I've been making geotokens for the past few days. I'm so excited about them. They are simple coins made out of polymer clay. Ours has a star design stamped on it, and Carlee's has a cute smiling sun.

I'm planning on going caching again on Saturday, this time with StressMaster and crew. I'll try to take some good pictures.

woo hoo!

2005-07-25T16:49:00.000-04:00

I got our white jeep travel bug today! for doing the Rock On cache!!! I'm so excited! lol... a fellow cacher, Paintfiction, was nice enough to bring it by along with our t-shirts from GW3. Oh, and the other day we bought a garmin v gps from GatoRx... so now Tony has to decide which gps he wants to take with him when he goes underway and the other one is for my sister so she can get into geocaching too. So, that's the latest geo-news :)

One Year Caching Anniversary!

2005-07-20T17:42:00.000-04:00

Yep, we found our first cache exactly one year ago today!

Our First Year Summary:
Total Caches Found: 560
***Traditional: 501
***MultiCaches: 6
***Virtual: 8
***Mystery: 19
***Webcam: 2
***Locationless: 5
***Earthcaches: 1
***Benchmarks: 1
Total Caches Hidden: 11 (all traditional)
States Cached: Florida, Texas, Georgia
Events Attended: 15 (2 CITO)
Tbs/Coins Found: 44
Tbs/Coins Owned: 12

Rock On

2005-07-19T13:48:00.000-04:00

By The Federation (cache page)

This morning I was reading the NEFGA forum, and I read that Federation was offering white jeep travelbugs for the next people who found a couple of certain caches. Well, Tony and I had missed out on getting any of those oober cool travelbugs from GW3, and I really wanted one bad. So, I looked at the cache page for Rock On. It was a puzzle cache, and I thought maybe I could get it done. So I started working on it... I researched on the dang internet for probably three hours until I realized what I was really supposed to be looking for... so I had to start all over! lol... but that was okay. I worked at it for a long while and finally thought I had it figured out except for two numbers of the coords.

Tony finally got home early around 3pm and I asked him if he recognized either of the last two albums... "No," he said. So then he started looking on the internet. He found one, and we got the needed info. One number was left... but I knew that since it was the very last digit missing, that the coords would still get us really close to the cache.

So I asked Tony, "Do you want to go find it? Just one cache?"

"Okay."

"It's in Palatka," I told him.

"Okay, where's that?" lol... it's about sixty miles from here... and it takes just as long to get out of Jacksonville as it does to actually drive to Palatka. But we went ahead and drove down there so we could try to get the jeep tb.

We arrived at a hiking trails park. So we sprayed ourselves and a blanket with bug spray. I put Lil'Sunshine in the baby sling and covered her with the blanket, and we started off. Of course we took the scenic route to the cache, and it was a nice hike. I defintely got my work out today! Anyway, we finally got close to the cache, and I was the one who caught a glimpse of it! yay! Tony grabbed it and we signed the log, and hightailed it out of there because the bugspray was starting to wear off. I was so excited to find this cache!

We also did our first earthcache while we were in the same park: Boon or Boondoggle? by Eagle Dad. Earthcaches are educational caches that you have special requirements for logging. That one was neat too, but the highlight of my day was finding Rock On. Solving it was challenging, and getting a white jeep travel bug just topped off the experience.

GeoWoodstock3

2005-05-28T16:45:00.000-04:00

(cache page)

I was so excited about this event ever since I first found out about it after we moved here in summer 04. In September, however, we found out that I was pregnant, and that the baby's due date was the same day as GW3!!! So, throughout the whole pregnancy I wondered if I would even be able to attend the biggest geocaching event to date. Well, Carlee decided to arrive a few days early, and was six days old by the day of the event, so we went. We didn't get to participate in any of the cache runs or caching in the park though because I was just still too exhausted from having our child! lol... but we did get to eat lunch with everyone, meet alot of cachers from all over, made some new friends, and got to show off Lil' Sunshine to everyone. She was officially the youngest cacher to attend! We didn't stay long, but this event was definately worthwhile, NEFGA put so much hard work into putting it together. Too bad we didn't have the energy to have enjoyed more of it. *and I didn't even think to take any pictures there either! :( *

We also found out that Texas is going to have GeoWoodstock4 next year!!! Our Home State!!! Yay! I'm already excited about going!

Second Island

2005-04-13T15:15:00.000-04:00

By StressMaster(cache page)

This was #500!!!! Yay!!! And it was such a GREAT cache for us to do together for our first major milestone! After meffing #499 at The Park Trails, we headed down a ways on the same road to attempt The Second Island. I had been out in this area before while caching with friends, and knew what island the Master of Camo was talking about... When Stress found out we were going to attempt this cache for our milestone he decided to head out and join us in order to watch us attempt this cache that he is so proud of (and has a right to be too).

We had everything ready. Our bathing suits and water shoes on, our gps, and even a small floaty ring Tony bought for me just in case, since I would be attempting trekking through the St. John's River while eight months pregnant for this cache. Tony was first to start heading in. It had been a beautiful day, but now it was evening and the temperature was cooling down, and so the water was COLD! lol... I hesitated when I felt it with my feet, but excitement took over and I caught up with Tony.

There is a certain trick to getting to the island, and I had seen it before while visiting the island with StressMaster and crew. We couldn't try to walk directly to the island because the way the tide works, it creates a big channel, so we had to walk straight out where it was still shallow, and then angle in toward the island, where it still remained fairly shallow, except on me since I'm so short. I think the deepest part of the water came up right below my chest, so it wasn't too bad. Tony had taken his shoes off because it was hard for him to walk with them on, but then unfortunately a little past half way he cut his foot on a rock, or something sharp. But he trooped on. We finally made it to the island, and while Tony checked out his foot, I went in to find the cache. It was so awesome finding it. After signing the log and taking a geocoin out to celebrate, we headed back in the water towards our parked car and audience.

StressMaster happened to have a first aid kit handy in his car (I have NO idea WHY, lol) so they cleaned up Tony's cut. It didn't look too bad so we figured it would be fine. The next morning we ended up going in to the hospital on base, and found out it was 4mm deep and 1.5 inches long. They would of stitched it up the night it happened, but since we waited Tony has to dress it for a few days to make sure there is no infection, then they will stitch it up. Tony's first caching related injury was the only bad thing that happened during this cache, but if he'd of kept his shoes on.... lol... seriously though, he will be fine, and even gets a desk job for a few weeks to let it heal up.

This was such an accomplishment for us, I think anyway. A few others had attempted this cache, but didn't get to it. It is a very worthwhile cache and a great feeling to get out there in the water and to make it to the island. StressMaster did a good job with this cache, and it was great to have him there to take pictures of us attaining this milestone. And it was just so nice to actually achieve this cache and goal with Tony, we had so much fun caching this day and this cache was just the icing on the cake.

The Park Trails

2005-04-13T14:53:00.000-04:00

By StressMaster (cache page)

This was #499 for us! I really wanted to do this cache because no one had claimed it yet... It is a mystery cache, somewhat of a puzzle cache where you have to find answers to questions at the first stage to lead you to the next stage, and so on. StressMaster did this cache this way in order to show off an awesome National Park area here in Jacksonville, and you can't place physical caches on National Park property. This was a perfect way to show off the parks. The first stage started at Fort Caroline National Park. Tony and I had already found five other caches, had eaten lunch, and were ready to hike this puzzle cache. We first went into the Visitors' Center and looked around. There is such a neat display of information and artifacts about the Timucuan Indians, and the French colonization of the area. My favorite displays were the handmade Indian canoe and the totem pole. After reading and looking at everything, we got the National Park Passport travel bug stamped with the park's cancellation stamps. Then we headed off outside to start our hike.

On the way to the first set of coords, we passed by a neat Timucuan Indian hut, and took our picture there with the timer on the camera. There was also an old oven like they used to use. The coords finally led to the actual Fort which is 1/3 the size of what the real one was. It was so neat to look at and to see the view from it.

The next coords led to a monument, and the answers to those questions led to Spanish Pond area in the Timucuan Preserve. This part of the park has trails to hike or bike. The hike to the coords on this leg was about a mile one way. This stage was our personal favorite because of everything we got to see, and we just enjoyed the hike together. We saw so much Florida wildlife out there including a snake (that didn't bother us), a bunch of cute little lizards, pretty butterflies, and even a Bald Eagle soaring in the sky. At the end of the trail we stopped to rest at and enjoy the view of the observation tower, then finally hiked back after answering the last set of questions about a Confederate Soldier's grave that's located in the park.

The final stage of this cache gave us a fit... not due to the cache owner, but due to me... We had answered the last question right, even circling the right answer on the print out, but then I wrote down the wrong number, therefore putting the wrong coords into the gps... lol... we searched for over an hour for the final cache, an ammo can. We finally broke down and called Stress. When we finally realized out mistake, Tony found the cache right where it was supposed to be. This cache was so much fun, and really made our day enjoyable. And we learned stuff too! (gasp!) And what made it even better was that we were First to Find on this great cache!!!

Hurricanes Blow

2005-03-12T17:23:00.000-04:00

by UFBuilder and IceCreamMan (cache page)

This was the make up event for last year's end of the summer luau that was canceled due to hurricanes... At the time of this event I was already in my seventh month of the pregnancy, and at first wasn't even going to go to the event. I didn't want to hold anybody back since the hike of the event was a competition. Caraloopy convinced me to go, though, so we formed a "slow poke" team with the SuzyQs, Mrs.KileMates, Genuine Girl, and Amazing Grace. The hike itself was almost four miles through beautiful Osceola National Forest. Along the hike there were items to be found like on a scavenger hunt, some that could be found in the forest, and others were placed there temporarily. We came in last in the race, but we were all just glad we finished! Afterward, we ate and sat around a campfire and talked. I had a blast, and I was so glad I went. I only wish Tony had been home already, because he would of had so much fun too.

StressHouse Chupacabra

2005-02-26T15:50:00.000-04:00

by StressMaster(cache page)

We don't live far from this cache... But since I first started reading these logs, and watched the shows about chupacabras I knew this would be a dangerous one. And with my husband being deployed, I just never had the guts to go after it alone.. So while caching today with StressMaster and Caraloopy we ended up stopping by this one. It was everything I feared and worse... Pretty much everyone stayed behind in the cars, while I ventured toward the cache armed with nothing but one of the stressboys. Believe the logs! The stench is horrible! I cautiously inched my way foward, trying to hold my breath. And then suddenly I caught a glimpse of the monster, and the breath I had been holding escaped in the beginning of a scream. I stopped myself as soon as I had realized what I had done, but it was too late. It heard me and his hideous eyes were locked on us. The thing looked so evil, and knew what we were there for, because he held the cache in his fanged mouth, blood and saliva dripping everywhere. His monstrous gaze dared us to take one step closer, so I did the only thing I could think of. I took a few steps backward and with a running start pushed Michael ahead of me with all of my strength... The movement captured the creature's attention, he dropped the cache, and lunged after the unsuspecting StressBoy. Michael bolted as fast as he could as the creature was right on his heels, so I took my one and only chance and grabbed the cache and signed it. I threw it back and took off for the cars, once the creature had realized Michael wasn't after the cache he ran back to it, unaware I had already gotten to it. He picked it back up in his nasty mouth and took off running, I tried to get a picture, but he was just too fast. Michael will probably never forgive me for today, but hey, at least I got the cache. What an adventure. I will never forget it, and hopefully I will NEVER see another chupacabra in my entire life!

Jacksonville Proctology Series #10

2005-02-26T15:46:00.000-04:00

By IceCreamMan (cache page)

This was my second experience with a Jacksonville Style hide. I did this cache on the way to a GSAK event with Caraloopy and StressMaster. Tony and I had tried to do this cache before on our own, but spent more time laughing and trying to hide behind eachother. We ended up not finding it the first time because we didn't want to mess with all the muggles. Jax style hides are fun, and embarrassing lol... but mostly fun. This day the nearby store was packed with people constantly going in and out.

Jetty Man

2005-02-21T15:30:00.000-04:00

By IceCreamMan (cache page)

I did this cache with our friend StressMaster on the first day the "new and improved" version was released to the geocaching world. We wanted to be MEFF on the new cache, so this was our first mission of the day. When we got there we had to climb these big rocks in the jetty to get to the cache. The cache camo weighed over one hundred pounds and IceCreamMan got it up there all by himself! Just the effort put into hiding this cache made it worthwhile to find. The beach area was beautiful, and plenty of people were out enjoying it, but no one bothered us.

Jungle Cache

2005-01-02T15:26:00.000-04:00

By Tyler, Alexis, and Tony (cache page)

This cache was probably our very first challenging cache that we've claimed. I was five months pregnant at the time and did this cache with Caraloopy, Stressmaster, and the StressBoys. This cache is in the middle of natural Northeast Florida's forest, and you have to hike to it with no trails. The area is really pretty, and it was nice to just take in all that Nature has to offer. We even saw a tree that looked like it had been struck by lightening. That was interesting. The thing that made the hike tiring was having to push through all the natural plants and vegetation, and stepping over fallen trees and under vines. That's what gave me the workout... I don't even know how long the hike turned out to be, but after we found the cache, the StressBoys still had enough energy to be little monkeys and climb trees. I didn't even have 5% energy left in me that they had, but finding this cache was very challenging and really rewarding.

Off Your Rocker with Team Slytherin

2004-12-11T17:16:00.000-04:00

By Caraloopy (cache page)
This was a fun dinner event that was one of the few that Tony was able to attend while he was home. This event was even more special because it was our friend Caraloopy's first event that she held. The reason for the event was to welcome Team Slytherin and Ravenclaw to Jacksonville from England. During the day some of us had gone caching to help them get their numbers up. Tony and I had started off with the caching group and ended up get separated, and the traffic was just horrible since it was one of the last shopping weekends before Christmas, so we decided to just head home until the dinner started. The dinner was held at a Cracker Barrel and the food was delicious. It was neat meeting cachers from another country, and to swap travel bugs and stories. This was actually the event that we released our very first two travel bugs, Jeffrey and Ship Shape. Jeffrey joined Team Slytherin when they went back home and has accumulated many pictures of the UK already. Caraloopy did a great job putting this event together, and it really was fun.

FireTrucks and Gasoline

2004-12-06T15:18:00.000-04:00

by The SuzyQs (cache page)

This cache was a C H A L L E N G E !!!! And that cannot be stressed enough! It has been archived now, but it is still one of my favorites. I was invited to go search for this one by the usual caching gang: StressMaster, StressBoys, and Caraloopy, and I couldn't resist. This would be StressMaster's 600th cache so finding it would be even more special. We first tried to find it on the 5th of December, we didn't get to it until the evening. I thought maybe it would be pretty easy to find seeing as how there were six of us searching, but when we arrived to the coordinates we found ourselves in an area in the middle of a soccer field. Great... what were we looking for? A film canister, in the middle of the field. So, we all started searching, six people and three gpsr's and we weren't coming up with anything. Eventually the sun went down, and it was dark, and the flashlights came out. I don't even know how long we searched that first try, but eventually we gave up and decided to come back the next day.

So, on the 6th we came back with a plan. All of us lined up, got down on our hands and knees, and started searching a more methodical search. It still took quite a bit to come up with the cache, but as we were weaving our fingers in and out of grass, poking at little mounds of dirt, Caraloopy yelled out in excitement. She had found the cache! FINALLY!!! We were so excited, it was ridiculous. We all sighed a sigh of relief at finally having found the cache. This was such a fun cache to do together, if I'd been alone I probably never would have found it....

Jekyll-n-Hyde's Handle Scramble Returns

2004-10-30T16:35:00.000-04:00

by GrrlFrog (cache page)

I got to attend this event while I visited my family back home in Texas. Tony was still deployed at the time. I was excited because this was my first event where I would meet brand new people, and because my mom (Spanish Rose) and my sister (Trinket) joined me in attending. We were nervous at first because we would know no one there, but like I told my mom they would be, everyone was so nice, well, because cachers always are. GrrlFrog held the event and she did a great job. The Halloween decorations were awesome, and I really liked them since my birthday is on Halloween. So going to this event was also a way to celebrate my 20th birthday.

There was a multi cache to find at the event, and in order to find the first set of coords, you had too bob for film canisters, and only some of them had the coords in them, so some people had to bob quite a few times. I was lucky though, I think I only bobbed maybe two or three times. After you got the first coords, they led you to another stage where you found a small bucket with a hole cut in the top. You had to put your hand in it to pull out the next film can with the next stage's coords, and in these buckets were nasty feeling substances. They turned out to be normal food items, like corn and things like that, but in the dark it's still gross, lol.... There were a few stages like this, and then you finally found the end cache filled with Halloween toys. It was a really good idea for a multi cache, I thought it was cute and fun.

Another part of the event was the costume contest. You were supposed to come dressed as your geocaching handle. At first, I couldn't think of anything that I could do with "CacherCrashers," but then I made a t-shirt. One it were two pictures, on the left side was a picture of stick figures of Tony and me running towards a cache. The other picture on the right side, was a picture of us as though we had run into eachother, sitting on the ground with stars around our heads. I then made a headband for me to wear that made it look like stars and such were flying around my head... My sister wore the other headband for the night. It was fun, and I won the costume contest. :) There was also a Halloween dessert contest, with entries like KittyLitter Cake, and there was a grave yard cake. The food, company, and the hunt were all great, and I had so much fun.

Operation Osceola

2004-09-18T15:59:00.000-04:00

By IceCreamMan (cache page)

This was the first event we ever went to, where we first met all the great cachers in this area, and where we first introduced ourselves as the CacherCrashers. This was right before Tony left for his deployment, so we were lucky that he was still here to be able to go. The only person I had known before this event was Caraloopy because we had gone caching a few times together, besides her, we knew no one. In this event we drove all around Osceola National Forest with everyone, and hiked to caches together. This forest is so beautiful, and it was our first chance to see the natural state of land around here. Tony even had a chance to take our 2WD "four wheeling," and that was fun. All in all it was a great day to spend together for Tony and me before he left.

Sticker Delight in Cacheaway Island

2004-09-15T14:04:00.000-04:00

By nolefan1982 (cache page)

We claimed our first MEFF last night!!!!

I'd been watching it since it first got listed, and the first day (Mon) just as I was about to leave (to bravely try to find it on my own), it suddenly began storming... so, that didn't work. Then yesterday, after my husband got home from a 24 hour duty stand, I asked him if he was up to finding just one cache... (I know, I'm so horrible!) Well, he wasn't... too exhausted, which was understandable, (I guess... lol) and so he went to sleep. Well, I woke him after an hour's nap, because the day's rain had really let up, and I REALLY REALLY wanted this cache! I said (as innocently as possible), "hey, if we go get this cache, then we can stop by WalMarts and get that PS2 game you've been wanting..."

Bargaining!!??!! geez! this is getting bad!!!!

Well, he didn't seem to respond, just rolled over... so I gave up for now, and went to cooking dinner. Well, he woke up just in time to eat his food hot, and as soon as he was done, he said, "Ok... lets go get that cache, and then we can go get my game." I paused only for a second, realizing that that there was only thirty minutes of day left, I didn't know if we'd be able to find it before it got dark... and plus, I thought, geez what was I thinking? That is going to be one expensive MEFF!!! But, as always, my caching excitement took over, and I raced to get my backpack and gps...

We drove to the park using one of my hand drawn maps... and almost missed the turn because I only knew the general area... "There it is!" I said, and since he's now used to making last nano-second turns onto streets, we made it... I counted down the remaining feet until cache, 500, 400, 3-- no 250, 200, ok ok ok! STOP! I think it's right over there!!! I said and pointed to the special area... (I don't want to give too much away about the cache, sorry guys!)

Well, due to the heavily clouded sky, our gps was acting up, of course it would on our try at a MEFF... why not? It had us looking all over the place... and I was stuck on about 6 certain places that I knew it just HAD to be... Mr. CC said, "maybe it's over here, bring the flashlight." By this time the sun had just about set, and there was hardly any light... "No, I don't think it would be there, it HAS to be over here..." When will I just learn that for some evil reason , my husband's Geo-sense is a lot more better than mine, even though I love the sport more!!! (It's not fair!!!)

I finally gave up and walked over to where Mr. CC was standing, waiting for me to bring the flashlight... I shone it on the area, and in the first second, I said, " *sigh* You're right..." He said, "I am? are you sure?" "Yes, I can see it already!" I waited so that he could come around and see what I saw... sure enough, it was there and I pulled it out.

At this point I was more nervous than anything... (Why? you ask...) Well, I'll tell you why... See, I did attempt a MEFF on my own before one Sunday morning as I had enough courage to drive the standard over to StressHouse Carinos by Stressmaster... No one had logged it yet and I was so excited about maybe possibly being the first to find (and on my own no less!) When I finally found it (it took a few minutes, lol) I looked at the log excitedly expecting to be the only name, and then suddenly the world closed in on me, and my surroundings turned black... a tiny little name written so neatly in black ink that fit so perfectly into that tiny little rectangle... esco... esco had already claimed FTF.... and just hadn't posted yet.... I placed the cache down as the realization set in, and had to take a few deep breaths... Man! and Caraloopy had told me about certain FTF "enthusiasts" (no offense, hey, I'm the one writing the story about my first one! lol) Well, I ended up having to keep reminding myself that hey, I am a beginner! and a first LASF is still cool too... ok? (yes, I know that is an oxymoron, but I HAD to tell myself something!) I signed the log, and drove home in silence (uhh, yeah, I mean... of course it was silent, I was by myself...)

So that was why I was nervous about opening this cutely decorated StickerDelight... would it indeed be delightful, or another FTF disappointment? (Well, I guess you already know the answer due to my first sentence of this story, but hey, I'm trying to keep it suspenseful!) I slowly opened the film container, and carefully pulled out the piece of paper, unrolled it, closed my eyes, opened them.... and SURE ENOUGH!!! we were FIRST TO FIND!!!! I was jumping up and down like crazy, literally! I was so excited! My husband laughed and ran to go get the camera... (of course he knew about the Carinos story, so he knew how much this meant to me, lol) *Sigh*... so we took a few pics and placed the cache back in its hiding spot, and got back into the car.

Mr. CC said, "Well, why don't we try to get that one at the entrance since we're on our way out?" (StressMaster's I believe) "Ok," I said... but we looked for a while in the dark, and the mosquitoes were driving us crazy... "Come on," I said, "We can come back for the other three hidden here another day, let's go to WalMarts." I was already cache-content from finally being MEFF.

THE END.

The Federation MUST PAY!

2004-08-14T13:54:00.000-04:00

By Paintfiction (cache page)

My First Experience with "Jax Style" !!!

I found this one with Caraloopy on my third day of caching. LOL... boy was I shocked to learn where the cache was hidden! Tony was already deployed at this time, too bad too because I would of made him take a stab at pulling the cache out. It was stuck in there really good. The lion seemed to be "blocked up." All this fun and hoopla, and this fountain sits right in the middle of a busy intersection and in front of restaurants where people were sitting outside... I bet they thought we were crazy. We had a blast with this one... I can't wait to see family and friends try this one...

StressHouse "Before Nex"

2004-07-20T13:05:00.000-04:00

By StressMaster (cache page)

This is the first cache we've ever found! And we did it without a gps!!! I had been studying the cache page and the map for a few days before I finally convinced myself and Tony that we could find it... maybe. :) It just happened to be an urban micro right down the street from our apartment. So we drove down there, I remembered the clue and we found it right away! Tony finally thought this was neat after we found and signed the log. We tried to find a few more without a gps, one at Sonic, and one at a gas station, but with being so green and not knowing when we were close, we gave up looking. I ordered my gps right away after that!