Cornell Finch

12 Of 12: September 09 – Geocaching

I can’t remember the last time I actually remembered to take part in a 12 of 12, some months ago, I suspect it was around Juy of 2008.

However, having discovered Geocaching 12 of 12, the 12th being a Saturday and the dogs needing a walk, I remembered and took part.

For those that don’t know, 12 of 12 is Chad Darnell’s project to take 12 photos on the 12th of the month and post them online for all to see.

Geocaching is a global treasure hunt using GPS technology to hunt for boxes (caches) hidden by other players. Today was cache find numbers 159 and 160 for me. We decided to walk the dogs in the Forest Of Bere (AKA Hundred Acres) (Google Map link) where two caches, The Cache of Bere (GCN8P1) and Across Land First (GC193AD). So, the photos (with a little more text for each):

First job of the day, before heading out, was to replace the vehicle travel bug sticker in the car. The old one, I realised a couple of weeks ago didn’t match the unique identifier allocated on the geocaching website. This one arrived during the week so, replacement was due.

And there it is, sitting proudly on the left hand side of the car window. The Travel bug is called “Shelby Clubman Mini II“.

With every Travel Bug the owner gets a dog tag (well, a pair actually) with the tracking number on it. Once I had the sticker in the car I made this keyring (a simple lanyard knot and Portugeuse Sinnet) and attached it to the car keys. I am thinking about using these keyrings as a signature item to drop in caches. They are cheap and easy to make and I think they might go down fairly well.

Any dog owner will recognise this look. It’s the one that says “take us out for a walk or I will bite your head off”. Well, who am I to argue?! A little fussing on the geocaching website to figure out where to go, a spot of lunch and we were off.

Wandering up the trail towards the first cache – The Cache of Bere. This is what (for non cachers!) is called a multi cache. This means that you have to do something to find the coordinates for the final cache. In this case the coordinates were hidden in a waterproof tube not far past where this photo was taken. It took me well over 25 minutes to find the tube as people kept walking past. How rude of them when I was trying not to look suspicious, in the woods on a sunny Saturday afternoon! We found it eventually, plugged the coordinates into the GPS and we were off again towards the final location.

Unfortunately, on the way to the final location, the dogs found this pond. Now, it has barriers all the way round to stop people getting to the pond, danger signs posted around it and chicken type wire really close to the water. As you can probably guess the dogs ran up (they were off the lead) ignored me completely and jumped straight in for a swim. A paddle. A clamber over the wood at the edge.

I had to climb the barriers to rescue them and from there on for the rest of the walk they went on the leads.

The cache. Generally, certainly in this area, the caches are this type of plastic box with locking tabs. Occasionally we get to find an ammo box (without the ammo!) but generally tupperware is the order.

A quick grab shot of the state of the dogs after their little swim. Also available in white. Off to the next cache. At this point I was a little angry with the dogs and forgot to get any photos of the hunt or the cache itself. The only thing I got was

This fella. He’s called a Geocoin and like the Travel Bug above has a unique tracking number. These travellers are moved by cachers from geocache to geocache and the movement is logged on the website.

Back at home there were three jobs left to do. Shower the dogs and then bathe me. This is Cooper, just out of the shower looking more than a little pissed.

People say that dogs cannot make expressions. I don’t believe them. This shot of Harley, mid shower, really does say “I hate you”. I hated him too at this point but he was desperate for the shower!

You’ll be pleased to know that there’s no image of me in the bath, it would have broken the camera and the lens doesn’t have a wide enough angle anyway!

Even if I was hating on the dogs, they were really good in the shower and certainly deserved a treat afterwards. Thankfully they have now (5 hours later) calmed down from their day’s activity and are currently sleeping in their favourite spots in the living room.

I hope you’ve enjoyed the adventure, perhaps I will remember and play again next month!