CacheCrazy.Com

For those of you who didn't know it I, BigAl 437, was the roving reporter at GeoWoodstock IX. I had a great time, found lots of caches, ate lots of food, found more caches, and met lots of other cachers. Well can you believe that GeoWoodstock XI is fast approaching us? It's only 113 days away and I can't wait.

This year I have once again been appointed by the President of CacheCrazy.com to cover the event as the Roving Reporter. I was told this is an all expense paid... I mean no expense paid trip to South Central Florida with only one stipulation; Don't get eaten by an alligator. 



Yes, our family (Craftimom, me, and CacheKing1998) are going to the Mega Event this year. We decided that as a family we would go to the event, especially since it is being held in Florida, which is not too far from where my other family members live. I just love killing two gators with one stone.

                                        Craftimom and Me

                                        CachKing1998 and Me

We will be at GZ for the entire event and we'll keep you updated as to what's happening, who's who among cachers, and what Vendors are there. There will also be lots of pictures, eating, and of course plenty of caching, making new friends and reuniting with old ones.

You may be saying to yourself "self, why is BigAl talking about this now?" Well let me tell you IT'S BECAUSE I'M EXCITED ABOUT GOING! I really hope this year's event is bigger and better than the last one I went to. (I was not able to go to last year's event due to a scheduling conflict; mainly my daughter's graduation from college.) So over the next 113 days I will periodically give you an update about the upcoming event. As it stands right now they have not released all of the details for the event.

At GWS9 we went on a Train ride. At GWS10 they took a Steamboat ride, and who knows what they have in store for this year's ride. I sure hope it's not an alligator ride.


I'm sure of one thing though, the event will be lots of fun because we are doing what we enjoy... Geocaching. Visiting family will be the icing on the cake. So if you plan on being there shoot me an email, make a comment below, or send me a Facebook message, and let me know. We'd love to meet up with you and get a picture taken of all of us riding an alligator. Hahaha.

Our new friend Matt tells the story but, the video speaks for itself. Enjoy a little boat trip and all the wonderful sights along the way as we charter a geocaching adventure! Climb aboard.....


We anchored out next to Decatur Island. The water was still aside from the occasional wakes of passing boats. The Velkommen and Remedy were rafted together and Bill and Sharon climbed aboard. We lowered the dingy. My father at the helm, Sarah and I climbed in. The three of us motored over to an unnamed island for the first geocache. We came to shore next to an old abandoned lime kilm. Sarah found the cache after a short hunt and continued to tromp around the small island discovering all sorts of other treasures ranging from freshly eaten crabs still swarming with scavengers to the bleached out bones of a fawn.





We motored over to Decatur Island for the next cache. My father motored back to the boats to pick up the rest of our crew. My mother, father, Bill, Sharon, Sarah, and I all made the hike. The trail winded around the edge of the island and revealed some stunning views. My father carried the GPS to ground zero, but my mother made the find. We hiked back down and spent the next hour combing the small sandbar while basking in the summer sun.

By the time we made our way back to the boats it was time to head back, ending the day two caches ahead of where we started. We shoved off Remedy and headed back to the marina. A number of seals were lying on the dock to welcome us back, taking in the last rays as the sun fell dipped below the horizon.

Every once in a while a cache comes along that raises the bar.  I was fortunate enough to stumble on just such a hide right before Christmas.  I’d like to share it with you.

An experienced cacher recently suggested that I check out Sears Island for its caches and scenery.  I expected tourists, summer homes, and nicely groomed walking trails but upon arrival, I realized how little I knew about the area.

There is one road that leads to Sears Island from the mainland.  It is blocked with cement barriers preventing any traffic from traveling on the island's one "road."  The first thing I learned about this place was that they mean business when it comes to dog business.  It must be a popular place for pups and their owners to walk because not only did I see a few, but there are doggy waste bags and trash cans available.  

This article was written by Kim from Snug Harbor Bay which is her personal blog and a must read! She is an Honorary Author at CacheCrazy.Com and I consider her my best "blog" friend :). We all appreciate her great work and I'm so happy to have her on our team.
Thanks Kim!


(photo taken from Google photos) 

One of things I like best about geocaching is that it gives me the opportunity to combine 2 of my favorite activites.  I love to be out in the woods hiking around .  But if there's a geocache hidden nearby, well, so much the better.  The gals over at the blog Hiking Lady had a recent post about geocaching and I was telling Carol over there how much I like to combine the 2 hobbies.  



We're not exactly what I'd call hard core hikers.  I'd term us more as "hiker's lite."  My husband is usually good for 5 or 6 hours, so I like to grab my back pack and accomodate this.  I can usually tell when he's had enough and that's when we call it a day.  We live in the midwest, so there isn't a lot of what I'd call "mountain" hikes, but we do live near lots of places with great hiking trails and we like to visit those.




I especially like the trails where there is a little something different to climb in, on, or around.....






I also LOVE it when I get a chance to climb a tree.  For this cache I had to stand onmy husbands shoulders, up inside the tree, to reach the cache.....  











We spend a lot of time in Kentucky and the trails around Kentucky Lake are wonderful!





Wisconsin has some beautiful hiking spots also and I'd like to go further into northern Wisconsin sometime in the near future....




When I was out in Colorado last summer I got a chance to hike St. Mary's Glacier and that was definitely the best hike of my life.  At 11,000 ft, it was also the highest I've ever been.  I have to say - I am HOOKED!  I loved it!  I will definitely be going out there again for some more hiking.

I try to cache by the rules.  When I say rules, I mean those unwritten, unofficial bylaws of the game such as a find not being an official smiley unless you sign the log.  Don't post spoiler pics on the cache description page.  Don't remove the container from it's location.  You get the idea.  I not one for ruffling feathers in other aspects of my life, and it carries over into geocaching.  I don't like to tick people off.

I went looking for a cache last week in New Jersey.  The cache description page said I was looking for a ten stage multi-cache.  WHAT?  Ten stages??  Does the cache owner think I have all day?  Well, in all fairness, he did request any cache seekers to budget a good deal of time on this cache.  All things considered, the cache piqued my interested, so off to Newton I headed.  The entire multi-cache happened to be contained within a single park.  Stage one brought me to an ice hockey rink, where I needed to solve a field puzzle to get the stage two coordinates.  I counted the necessary bleachers, speakers and light posts, then plugged in the numbers.  Said numbers pointed me to the foul pole of a baseball field.  Odd.  Unless the stage is at the TOP of the pole (unlikely),  I needed to recheck my numbers.  Back to the hockey rink I went.  I took a second glance at my math, which was correct.  However, I failed to tally up the correct amount of speakers, which threw off the coordinates.  I recalculated the equation in the puzzle, and plugged the new numbers in the GPSr.  No longer was I staring at a pole in an open field.  I was now at a storm basin, all of thirty feet from a pole in an open field.  This was going nowhere, fast!  I broadened my search, yet came up with a big handful of nothing for stage two.  I put my tail between my legs and headed to work.

Only 21 more stages to go!

Sometime, later that morning, I brought the cache page up on my computer.  I scrutinized it for clues, as well as to make sure I understood the stage one puzzle.  Everything on the page was rather cut and dry.  I then thought back to the ten stages, and how I had nine of them yet to find.  I had a brief flashback to A Walk Into Darkness, where we spent most of the day thinking we were looking for 21 stages.  You know how time seems to move slowly when you stare at a clock?  That is the same feeling I get when looking for mulit-caches with a large amount of stages.  I thought about a sentence on the cache page about the stages being multiple types of hides.  "A little bit of everything", says the page.

Then I had the following thought race through my head- What if I could just find another interim stage, using a calculated guess?

The hint said "Under a rock."

I've never really tried to "brute-force" a cache before.  On previous multi-cache, or unknown cache finds, I've always done the cache in it's proper order.  I did the first stage first, last stage last, and interim stages as they come.  I never thought of guessing where a stage would be.  That being said, I thought I would have a good chance at lucking out and finding an interim stage.  The park was large, but it contained many of the normal "typical" hiding spots-bleachers, fences, heck-even guardrails.  I thought perhaps one of those "el-cheapo" hides fell under the umbrella of  "a little bit of everything."  So, back I went to the park, ultimately hoping to find, if I was lucky, stage nine.  (I figured the final was in the woods somewhere.)  I went back to the original spot where I believed stage two to be, and poked around the baseball field.  Nothing.  I checked all the normal hiding spots at the adjacent softball field.  Nothing.  Making my way down field, I came across a picnic area.  Plenty of tables.  Not a single cache container.  I made my way to the other end of the park, where there was a playground, pavilion, and several monuments, honoring war veterans.  I struck out there as well.  When it was all said and done, I spent two hours searching for a stage- any stage- and all I had to show for it was a set of coordinates for stage two, which may or may not have been correct.

Has anyone attempted to find a cache using this method?  Is it "wrong?"  Let's hear your thoughts!  Should I have stopped lazy, and looked for cache the "right" way?

BBBrrrrrrrrrrrr! It's cccccold outside.

WELCOME TO FROSTY THURSDAY!

Grab a cup of something hot to drink, sit back, and put another log on the fire.

Have any of you noticed lately how cold out it has been? I'm sure you have. Around my house it's been anywhere from minus something to about 32 degrees. The temperature seems to be fluctuating a lot recently and it just makes me cold. Brrrrr. Now something that probably doesn't help is the fact that I'm still on a medication that makes me cold. I can't wait to get off of it.

Now that it is cold outside I thought I'd give you two recipes to help warm you up on the inside. The first recipe is one that my wife makes for me for Christmas and it is soooooo good. It is called Fireside Coffee. This is a great hot beverage to make ahead of time and keep in an airtight container. You can then just add it to some hot water anytime and have a wonderful hot drink. You can also make some up, put it into a thermos, and take it with you on those cold hikes as you are out there looking for those cold caches.

Without any further chills here is the first recipe.

FIRESIDE COFFEE

2 Cups hot chocolate mix
1 Cup instant Decaf coffee
2 Cups non-dairy creamer
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
1 1/2 Cups sugar

Blend these ingredients thoroughly. When well mixed add 2 to 3 Tbsp. of the mix to a cup of hot water. Sit back and enjoy. Store unused mix in an airtight container for later use. (Another option is to use the hot chocolate mix with the little marshmallows in it.)

                    Fireside Coffee

Fireside Coffee makes a great gift for that someone special in your life. Just put it into a small tin and wrap with a red bow and tell them here is something to keep you warm when I'm not around.
Mmmm good!!

Now this next warmer upper is not for the faint of heart. I really enjoy a cup (that is a really large cup) of it on those really, really, cold days. It's not something I share with the kids, usually. It's also something my wife will not even come close to touching, let alone ingesting it. Now don't go thinking it's something with alcohol in it because it's not.  It's called SOB's Fiery Soup. My profile picture should give you a little hint if you look at it closely.

When you've got one of those really cold days and your out searching for that FTF cache, and the temp is below zero, this is what will warm you right up as well as melt the snow around you for at least 25 yards. This makes the cache easier to spot.

So without further chiles (unless you're like me and you like chiles) here is SOB's Fiery Soup.

3 Cups chicken broth                     1 Cup onions
1 tsp garlic powder  *                    1 red or green bell pepper
1 tsp salt ***                                  1 Thai Dragon pepper
1 tsp parsley flakes **                    1 Portuguese Hot pepper
4 Tbsp butter                                  2 Cayenne peppers
10 Tbsp flour                                  2 Jalapeno peppers
 2 cups milk                                    1 Tbsp Worcestershire Sauce

In a saucepan combine broth, W. Sauce, dry ingredients (except flour), onions, and all peppers chopped up. (If you really like it hot leave the placenta in the peppers. It's the white lining that the seeds are attached to, and it's the hottest part of the pepper.) Bring mixture to a boil. Cover and let simmer on low heat until peppers and onions are tender. Place part of the mixture in a blender and blend until creamy. Place this sauce into a bowl. Do the same with the rest of the mixture and set aside in the same bowl
.
Melt the butter in the saucepan. Stir in the flour and add the milk all at once. Cook and stir constantly until thickened. Add mixture from bowl above. Once the soup is heated thoroughly, taste and season with salt and black pepper. WARNING!!!! Be cautious not to breathe in the fumes from the hot peppers as you cook and blend them. (This has been known to cause coughing episodes; just ask my family.) You can use fresh hot peppers or dried ones if you have them. I usually dry a lot of them by hanging them over the fireplace until totally dry. Then I package them with my seal-a-meal and they will last for a long time.

                   SOB's Fiery Soup

I hope you enjoy these favorites of mine as the weather continues to get colder and colder. And, if you can't stand the heat then get out of my hot peppers! LOL.