Next Stop... Las Vegas

I should be able to find a few caches this weekend and perhaps a few the weekend after when I'm in Albany. But what I am really looking forward to is the 9th through the 12th when I'll be in Las Vegas. Most people probably focus on the casinos and nightclubs... but I've been focused on the geocaching. There will be plenty of time for gambling after dark. Oh sure I have to attend a conference for a good portion of the day but I should be able to get a few caches in. I'm even trying to plan a bit of a road trip.

skydiving

I did it... I went skydiving. Yes me, the guy that doesn't even like to climb ladders or walk down steep hills. I've never even flown in an airplane before.

So this was all my friend Dave's idea. For some reason he got this idea in his head that before he got married he was going skydiving... and for some reason I agreed to go.

The process was easy enough. We drove up to Molalla and signed a bunch of waivers... then we paid our money and went through about 15 minutes of training. After that we waited forever and finally got the call to go suit up. I told my guy I was not a big fan of heights and could never jump on my own... he said not to worry he'd jump and I'd go with him. Soon we loaded on the plane like a bunch of sardines... we climbed to 13000 feet and they opened the doors. The experienced people jumped first and I scooted down the bench. My instructor told me to walk toward the door turn toward the cockpit and that he would step left and I'd follow... and thats what we did. After tumbling a bit we steadied out and it was amazing. After a few seconds of freefall (120 MPH) he pulled the shoot and we floated softly back to the earth.

Pictures

Here is a picture of Bobby lake from an area near the cache.



And a picture of a small island on Waldo Lake... would be a great place for a cache but is too often full of muggles.

Camping

I went camping to Waldo Lake over the weekend. Found a few caches while I was out

Crestview St.
CHARLATAN
Bobby's Booty
Diamond View
Up From The Ashes

I loaded the nearest 300 caches to the lake in my GPS but didn't have any real plan's except for hiking to Bobby Lake for the new Bobby's Booty cache. I was a day late for the first find on that one. Stopped at the store in Oakridge and decided to check the GPS... sure enough there was a cache just a couple hundred feet away on Crestview St. On the way back we stopped by the Diamond Peak viewpoint and ran into a couple of geocachers... one of whom happens to be the sister of Beaver Lover. I'll post some pictures later.

Adventures in the sky

I've been a lot of place in Oregon and to several states but I have never flown in an airplane. Not even a short trip. Some people find that amazing. I don't really... all my family lives close and I've always been too poor to travel far. However, a conference in Las Vegas is coming up and I have scheduled my first airplane flight for September. Well that was the plan until today... today I got booked on a much different flight.

Skydive Oregon

My friend wanted to do this before his wedding... so I agreed. On August 25th I get the rare distinction of jumping out of the first airplane I ever rode in.

30?... dang

Well today is my 30th birthday. I don't really feel 30... well except my left arm has been pretty sore lately and I can't see a thing without my glasses anymore.

I saved a nearby cache just to have one to find on the occasion

Elk Lane Park

oh my

I actually found a cache yesterday

Nebraska Canal Trail

I haven't had much time for anything, but with the bank conversion done and the newest branch open I should have my weekends back.

Today is also my nieces first birthday.

Happy 4th of July

I have been so busy lately that I never thought I'd find my 1200th cache, but since I had today off I went out and got the 7 I needed.

What’s in a Name?
BUSted
2nd try
Park Here
SPARCY
Mow and Stow
The plane truth

All but # 1200 were hidden by Turner and Stitch. If it weren't for a couple of no finds I would have ended up with on of their caches for the milestone, but I couldn't find cornered -- Centered and ODS Snoogan's 5 - GP. The first one I think is missing, the second was a tough hide and I had to give up due to the heat which was in the mid 90's by that point.

Now I'm just relaxing on my day off before I have to go back to work. Hope everyone has a great 4th of July and a happy 231rst birthday to the good ol' U.S.A.

One more

The last cache I found on the weekend is now active so I could log it

Those who came before us #3

That leaves me with 7 finds for the 1200 milestone. I'll be pretty busy with work the next 2 weeks so it might have to wait, but I do have a lot of local caches saved. We'll see how it goes.

A few more

Yesterday was the Oasis In The Country event. It was a fun one with a pretty good turnout for the short notice. Depending on if anyone else wants to host I might put on the July event myself.

After the event I went with Iseek & Eyeseek2 for a few new caches

Where's John? #1
Where's John? #2
Davey come back 2

In between a couple of those we also teamed with IVHS76 and son to find a few of his new caches. We were happy to have him guiding us.

French Peak Multi
Those who came before us #1
Those who came before us #2
Those who came before us #3 (as yet unapproved, but the coords are in #1 and #2)
Bolan Creek Cache

The French Peak cache was a 11 part multi... probably the longest I have completed for just one smiley face, but I think it was meant to tease a couple of evil cachers in the area so I think maybe its fitting. Also while logging caches in the area I discovered one I forgot to log on our last cache outing.

FOR JOHN & CHRIS,LUCKY 300!

I was hoping the the Firehouse Tour cache would be fixed in time for us to find it this weekend, but it was not to be I guess. I'm hoping the owner will give us the coords to the new final cache if it changes any.

It was a fun weekend. If the #3 cache above gets approved one of these days I'll be just 7 caches from 1200.

Sunday of Geocaching

On Sunday I got away from work for a bit of geocaching with Iseek and Daveydude. We headed toward Cave Junction with a few caches in mind and we found all but one, Firehouse Tour. You needed 6 caches to find this one... each contained a part of the coords, but someone had replaced the logbook of the second cache and not written in the coords needed. We attempted to guess and finally asked for help from Uncle Duck... the area he mentioned fit the rest of the coords perfectly (and was later confirmed correct) but we never found the cache. Didn't log a DNF as of yet because we were unsure of the coords. Beyond that I ended with 21 finds on the day and had a good time caching with friends. These were the finds for the day

21 GUN SALUTE
Impowered
S.O.S , VECTOR
Butterknife
Barracks 146
Cave Junction History Lesson #1
Where'd J'rome?
Rocky View
Not the Dump #1
Not the Dump #2
Not the Dump #3
Not the Dump #4
Not the Dump #5
Not the Dump #6
Not the Dump #7
Not the Dump #8
Firehouse Station Two
Firehouse Station Three
Firehouse Station Four
Firehouse Station Five
Firehouse Station Six

GeoWoodstock VI

GeoWoodstock VI is coming to Sacramento May 25, 2008

While we have a year to wait for it I find this pretty exciting news. Over 700 geocachers have logged GeoWoodstock 5 so far. That is a lot of geocachers to meet. So as of right now I'm planning to attend, but we'll see what is happening in a year.

Bike riding

Saturday when daveydude and I went caching I showed him my PDA. He has an effective but time consuming method of writting down everything he needs. So yesterday he bought his own PDA so in exchange for some help getting started with it he took me around to a few caches... 22 to be exact

Larry made me do it!
reflector stick
BOWLING IS FUN!
ATTRACTIVE!
WICKED BITS
GOLFING?
TREELINE
The Road to Home
DUCK DOO DOO
TRICERATOPS
TAKE A SEAT,REST YER FEET!
I Hate I-5 / Lucky Dog
ROCK SCENE
EROSION!
HIGHWAY 99 PIT STOP,REVISITED
CONCRETE MONOLITH
BABY CROC
FORKED TREES AND BIRDHOUSES
SPOTTY
ROCKY CORNER
BCT 13 - Phoenix-Talent - Orchard Path
Which?

Many of them were along the bikepath and we rode bikes down. I'm not use to such physical activity... I'm lucky I survived.

Caching in Glide

Yesterday I went caching up by Glide with daveydude... we managed 13 with a couple of no finds. I got a 14th at the end of the day as we came back. These were the finds for the day

Quick Change
The Eighth Sign of the Zodiac
Bank On It!
Lone Rock
Red Barn Ruins
Boat Slide
Dead End Valley
WHISTLERS
Cache a Frisbee
Where's Ben?
Whistler's Cache
Collision Course
Sorry, Try Again

The last one on my list is a famously frustrating cache... it is a micro in the woods, but it has not been maitained and what was left was wet. ***SPOILER highlight the paragraph below only if you want to reveal secrets of the cache. ***

The cache was a micro hanging from a tree, but there were 30 of them and only one has a log... each other has a hint. We searched them all... most were wet and soggy. We replaced the log in one.

When looking for that last cache we stumbled on this covered bridge



My last cache of the day was R.V.CACHE which was hidden by daveydude... so he pointed me in the right direction. It was a fun day... good way to start a 3 day weekend.

More on the NBA Draft

Yesterday, I was so happy when the Trail Blazers got the #1 pick that I almost cried.


I've been a blazerfan since around 1989-90... I was in the 6th grade and that season I started watching and they went to the NBA Finals. It was easy to be a fan then. Unlike other people I never quit being a fan... I've pretty much watched every game I could for the last 18 seasons. Even in the mid 90's when they were constantly out of the first round of the playoffs... and those great teams of 99 and 2000... and the "jail blazer" years that followed. For the last couple of seasons we've had a nice change of personel and now we have a great core of young guys... the future looked bright and then with this Draft Lottery the future just got a whole lot better. Other years the #1 pick might not mater so much, but this season has two potential superstars... and we get our choice. It can't get much better then that.

Go Blazers!!!

My Blazers just got the #1 pick in the NBA Draft. This is a great day... I am still stunned...

Off the list

Well I crossed the nearest active unfound cache off my list today

GP Trees - California Black Oak

I had looked before with no luck but spotted it today. It was a super micro container and hidden in such a way that I couldn't get it. I have tweesers but still couldn't get it. I finally reached into my first aide kit, got some tape and put it at the end of a stick... worked like a charm.

While I like urban micros of this kind (the type that aren't in residential areas) it is a big change from the adventures of Miller Lake yesterday. Funny to think that they are both part of the same game. It just goes to show that there are caches for everyone if you bother to look.

I'll attach one more picture of my adventures of yesterday.

A Trip to Miller Lake

Last June SallyC and I drove up to visit Miller Lake and found the last bridge gone making it a hike we were unprepared for. Months later my dad and I drove through the creek on the quad and got to the trail head. We ended up with two caches.

Dead Ends! It's Miller time!
Miller Lake Ridgeline Cache

We were FTF on the ridgeline cache which was hidden in October. It was a hard hike the way we took... you'll have to read my log to get the full story.

Neat

I discovered this website http://www.itsnotaboutthenumbers.com/. You can upload a pocket query of your finds and it will give you all sorts of interesting stats and it will create maps for you like this map of Oregon Counties color coded for how many caches I've found in each.

So I've found at least 1 in every county and I've found many in surounding counties. It might not be good for anything but it is interesting to see everything in detail.

GeoBreakfast

Today was the Breakfast with Bears GeoEvent. It was a good event with a pretty good turnout. After the event I found a few caches with rock&crystal after they mentioned Peanuthead's Valley Floor cache, and I offered to tag along. It is one of the oldest caches in Oregon and for some reason I had never found it. So with their help I crossed these 4 off my list before taking off for some mother's day shopping.

Valley Floor
BITTERROOTS
DEAD WALKMAN HIDDING
DEEP,DARK,CACHE.

After picking out a gift I decided I'd had enough for the day.