Wednesday, August 29, 2012

A Golden Birthday

About two months ago Tony asked me what I wanted for my 50th birthday. I told him I'd get back to him.

Not long afterwards I found out that one of the Gold Country Launch Events was happening in Clinton and it was happening on my birthday! "I know what I want." I told him. "I want to go to this event, I want to geo-cache ALL day and I want you to be happy about it ALL day." "Really?" he said, "Can't I just buy you some jewellery?"

Honestly it was the best day and I thought it was very appropriate to be celebrating my 'Golden' Birthday by seeking a bunch of Gold Country caches.

Gold Country Geo Tourism program geocaching
If you're not familiar with British Columbia's Gold Country GeoTourism program you really should check it out. Recently featured in the Wall Street Journal and listed under GeoTours on geocaching.com, Gold Country GeoTourism is a world class program that draws geocachers & explorers from all over the world to our beautiful province.

Along For The Ride 1 & 2
The morning of the launch, August 26th, we all descended upon Reg Conn Park. It's always so great to meet up with old caching friends & make some new ones. Even Tony made some new friends as he hung out with the guys we had dubbed "Just Along for the Ride." I think they're planning to start their own support group!

After a speech by the mayor of Clinton and even the local Member of Parliament we were off and running. Literally. The thirteen new caches we were given that morning took us to amazing vistas, historical sites and even filming locations - a new twist in Phase 2 that I absolutely love! Every cache was well researched and well written and fun to find.

So thanks everyone for the awesome weekend!
DisneyGirl & the Wild Thingys


with Knitting Chick & fisher007
  • Thanks to the Wild Thingys (aka Peppermint Patti, Rallymaster, Nature Owl, laphamclan & Chilcotin Sam) for hosting a great Meet & Greet on Saturday night. I haven't heard so many good caching stories (or laughed that hard) in a long time!
  • Thanks to Knitting Chick & fisher007 for joining us on the hunt and the adventure. What we won't do for a smilie eh?
  • Thanks to the people at Gold Country for their GeoTourism program. I love that it encourages us (and the world) to get up off the couch and explore.
  • And a big thanks to my very patient hubby, who searches for 'geotrails' and 'geopiles' like an expert and who has put thousands of kilometres on the truck just for me. And thanks for asking me what I want for my birthday!





Saturday, March 10, 2012

Leap, Leap, Leaping

February 29th.
It only comes once every 4 years. For most of the world it is just an extra day in the year but for a geo-cacher February 29th represents the 366th day. The chance to fill that elusive square in your 'Each Day of the Year Calendar'. It's a huge motivation to take the day off!

And that's just what a whole bunch of us did this year on February 29, 2012. Our fellow cacher, Adroit Seeker, planned an event called "Leaping From Cache to Cache" that took us along the Suiattle River in Washington State. The plan was to hike the trail and then get as many caches as we could along the road on our way back. This power trail includes more than 100+ caches in all. It meant that many of us would break records that day. It sounded like a whole lot of fun.

5am is so early!! but it still astonishes me what I will put myself through just for a whole whack of smilies on my caching profile page. I met tabbywmn at the border, we picked up Fisher007 just across the line and then we made our way to Bellingham where we met Adroit Seeker, Cyclepath Cacher, sweet-marie, 32fordroadster & Team ItTakesTwo. From Bellingham we travelled an hour & a half to the Snoqualmie National Forest where we met our American cacher friends. It was time we got started on our Leap Day!!

The road to the Buck Creek Campground has been closed for about 7 years but if you're up for an easy 5km hike then I highly recommend it. We were treated to beautiful views of the river, waterfalls along the way and towering trees. We had lunch at the end of the trail in a great log shelter with a view of the river, watching the snow drift down as we ate. It doesn't get much better than this.

 I had never cached on a power trail before but now I know what "power trail" means! With about 20 of us we literally leapt from cache to cache and we made short work of the series and a bunch of us broke our 'most caches in a day' record. On top of that we also had the privilege of watching fisher007 find his 1000th cache. As you can see he was pretty excited!

After we finished the trail and the road (in record time I might add) we made our way back to Bellingham for one more event hosted by the Three Bottles family. Yummy Mexican fare, an ice cold Corona and meeting more cachers. What a perfect way to end the day.

Thanks again to Adroit Seeker for planning such a great day for us and thanks to all my caching friends, those kindred spirits, who made the day so fun and enjoyable. I had an awesome time. Hope you did too! I'm sure we'll all remember Leap Year for a long time....too bad we have to wait 4 years to do it all over again.