Geocaching Leather-man

It’s been a while since the last post even though we have done a bit of caching. Sometimes it becomes hard finding anything to write about and other times it boils down to having enough time in the
day to post about our activities.

We did go out this past weekend despite trying to get ready for our first art show of the year. We started by picking up a stray cache we must have over looked on our way to the Dansville, NY area for
a day of hiking and caching.

Our first stop in the Dansville area was at their water reservoir. It was more like a large pond with some easy trails that go around it. Here is a shot of the pond from our second find of the day here:

It was a clear day and a nice view of the early season before the trees were all leafed out.

There were four caches we picked to do at the reservoir before we moved on to pick up a few in the town and areas around it. We then decided to try a couple caches in the Stoney Brook State Park. We
have been to this park in the past and the falls and terrain are better suited for the beginning of a day of hiking. So, we chose to do them in the late afternoon adding to the challenge of finding the
caches and getting back to the parking area before the sun went down.

There are several trails there and lots of waterfalls. We chose to do some caches that were off the beaten path and to check out the smaller falls that most hikers and campers miss along the way. This
is a shot of one of the smaller falls:

This falls it very tiny compared to the main attractions of this park but were well worth the hike. From there we went to another cache about .50 miles away on an even more obscure trail. The cache
was pretty easy to find but there were no direct trails and getting there was the fun of the adventure.

On the way back to the parking area we crossed a stone bridge and here is a shot from that bridge:

Right after we crossed the bridge my wife slipped into the creek as we were crossing a smaller section of the same creek and soaked her right foot. We were .75 miles from the car and in that short distance
we had to clime 750 feet of steep trail to get out of the park. These are the times when I wished I had my full pack on complete with dry socks and shoes but of course, we were hiking light. The hike
out was slow as we tried to avoid any blisters from the wet foot wear.

It turned out to be a good day of hiking and neither of us were to sore after taking a few months off from our fun times in the woods.

It’s been a few months since I have made a post here about our caching adventures.

With 197 finds we only have 3 more to go to meet our 2007 goal and we have been going out. The main problem is there hasn’t been anything memorable to write about. I could bitch about micros in the woods described as “Small” containers so they aren’t caught in the micro filter or even caches where the cooridinates were off by 90 feet or more on both of our GPS units, but I’ll save those rants for another day.

As soon as we find something worth writting about I’ll take the time to do it. In the mean time, I’m working on a couple of things about our work and spiritual quests.

Last year we started this hobby by finding large caches on the scenic trails in and around the Finger Lakes of NY. The views of the gorges, overlooks and trails were just what I needed each week to give me a re-charge knowing nature in it’s glory was still in charge. We did visit some suburban caches on some local trails and even picked up some lamp post micros. That prompted me to set up a filter to delete all micros.

This year, I added the micros back into the pocket queries and removed multi caches and puzzles. Our goal was for exercise and chasing down leaky film canisters 50 feet from the car wasn’t getting it. Spending time entering coordinates for multis and solving puzzles doesn’t fit into the exercise equation either. Since adding back the micros we have found 3 of the tiny nano caches smaller than a dime. The first one was neat.

In order to get the walking in that we wanted, and needed, we have started increasing the amount of caches we go after. Last year 4 caches on the deep woods trails was a days work and usually a 7 mile hike. Last weekend we mixed it up and between the micros and short hikes we grabbed 18 caches in one day and only walked 7 miles. Most of them were in towns and out of the 18 there was one “Rails to Trails” Kodak moment.

With only 23 caches left before we meet our yearly goal the plan is to grab them up early and then go back to the long wooded hikes away from populated areas and take our time enjoying what got us into this hobby to begin with.

I should really be writing about more of what we do besides geocaching as that hobby has taken a back seat to our craft work this year.

That said, we did take this past weekend to do some catch up caching. On 6/9 Saturday morning we were behind our goal of reaching another 100 caches for 2007 by 16 caches. I dug around on GASK and came up with a couple of spots that we could go to find larger numbers with less hiking. We ended up finding 11 on Saturday and another 8 on Sunday to get us back up to speed. On Saturday we worked our way around Keuka lake and picked up some interesting caches including one of those tiny micros the size of a large pencil eraser in the town of Hammondsport.

At the top of that same lake we were hiking on a wide trail along the lake to grab one of Rocky’s caches. As were turned a curve on the trail Bambi was there to great us. He must have been less than a week old based on how wobbly he was as we approached him. I grabbed a quick shot as he moved away. It’s not as clear as I would have liked but we were both moving when I got the camera ready.

Now that we are caught up we plan another outing involving some longer hikes in Sampson state park were the large white deer herd is located. Maybe I’ll be able to get some better shots.

After a long Winter of catching up on business we finally got out caching again. I was surprised at how out of shape you can get in 3 months time. We kept our hiking down to a short 7 miles but still got pretty tired and sore by the end of the day.

Hiking in the Finger Lakes of Upstate New York in the Spring can be a bit tricky with the water and mud but we had fun just the same. We started out at the base of Hemlock Lake here:

It’s one of the smaller lakes and is one of the water supplies for Rochester, NY so a permit to hike there is required. We only worked one side of the lake saving the other side for summer when the views will be much more colorful with the leaves and wildlife in action.

This was our last stop and the shot was taken in the middle of many fresh signs of the bear in the area:

Many of the older and dead trees in the area had deep claw marks through the bark from 2 to 4 feet above the ground. Bear claw marks and scat were everywhere. I kept my eyes out but we didn’t get to see any of them on this trip. We have them in our back yard several times a year but have yet to run into them on the trail.

As the weather warms, we plan on as much hiking or more than last year and can’t wait for the plants to green up.

As we were sitting back on New Years Eve, an email came in announcing a new cache being approved about 20 miles from home.

It was located in a park where we have hiked before and we didn’t have enough time to go out to get it before the park closed so we decided to get up on New Years day and try for the First To Find (FTF) on the new cache. We had a bunch of work we wanted to catch up on so a run for a single cache was set up and we sat back to ring in the new year.

We got up in the morning and took our time getting ready as it had rained all night and the thought of hiking in the mud slowed us both down a bit. By the time we got ready the sun was coming up and it was a bright, sunny morning, which is unusual for Upstate NY in the winter.

We arrived at the cache site to see a couple of cars in the lot and as we were getting ready, another car pulled in. Our thoughts of being first to find were now past. We started hiking up the path and passed a couple of dog walkers on the way. As we approached the cache location there was no one around so we grabbed it to sign the log just as another cacher was approaching. As it turned out, we were the FTF and the lady cacher we met had driven from Buffalo to get the same prize we were after.

That cache signaled several firsts for us. It was the first cache of the year, the first time we ran into any other cachers while on the hunt and we got the first to find prize which was the Geo Coin pictured below.

We came back home to get back to work and noticed it was a warm 50 degrees out with bright sunshine. On a normal day, we would have worked, but heck, lets go back out and try to find a few more since we had such nice weather on a January day. We made a quick run to the town of Wayland to find a few caches and as could have been expected, the weather caught up with us and by 2:00 PM we found ourselves walking in a park, in the rain. We did score 4 more finds before we called it a day and returned to the shop.

With the end of the holiday rush and all of our web site orders filled, we decided to spend a couple of days cleaning up some close by caches and hiding our 4th for the year.
Our hide was scaled back from the original plan in hope there would be more visitors, as the original spot was a 2 mile hike in some pretty rough terrain with no trails to walk. We moved it to less than
  a half mile hike in the still rough area. I submitted the cache at 11:00 AM yesterday and it was approved by noon with the first finder hitting it at 6:00 AM this morning.
 
Today we went for a special Christmas cache that was a decorated, live Christmas tree on some state hunting lands. Cool idea by the hiders and made for a nice diversion on Christmas eve morning. The
  second one we found today was a road side micro not to far from the Christmas Cache and was fun to find also. 

With the approach of hunting season we decided to finish up our goal of 100 cache finds for the 2006 year this past weekend.

Rather than go into a blow by blow description of each of the finds I thought about listing my choices for the top 5 out of 100 finds for the year. These are the most memorable caches for me and the reasons why.

1. Number 1 on this list has to be The Spot GC39, the main reason is that it’s the oldest surviving cache East of the Mississippi. The hike was an old style hike, which means, if you want the find you are going to have to work for it. The greatest part of this cache was being followed down the trail, on the way out, by an eagle.
2. My second most favorite was Above Ground Railroad GCQEEF, there were 2 directions that you could approach this cache and I chose the one which required crossing an old and abandoned railroad tressel, scored a big point with that and then the hide was in plain site and it took some time to spot it.
3. High Tor Rabbit Trial GC11A8, another old cache placed in the old style which required lots of hiking. Bob Bowter has a bit of a wicked mind when it comes to his hides and this one is placed in the middle of a berry thicket. Very tough to get to and the last 50 feet can be painful, I loved it.
4. Canadice II GCC18, another of the older hides and another evil one by Bob Bowter. What made this one tough was the last 3/4 of a mile had to be done by bushwhacking up a very, very steep grade. It was the hardest hike in the first 100 finds, bar none.
5. Doin it Italian Style GC1F5A, I cant list my top choices without including this one. The reason I remember it over so many others was the location. It was placed about 1/4 of a mile off a circular trail and we hiked most of that trail before realizing what was going on and just broke into bushwhack mode to find the container. It was a good thing I marked the location of the car on the way in because we were so turned around up there it could have taken hours of hiking to even find the trail again.

Those top five will probably stick in my mind for awhile. We may have met our 100 goal, but we are not done for the year, heck, there’s 3 months left to hunt caches and I’m sure we will grab a few more before the year is over.

Just as we expected, it’s been a month since we found the time to go caching again.
With 19 caches left to meet our goal we chose to do another cache run to clean up an area north of us. We had 12 caches loaded in our GPSr and Palm and off we went.
We always take our camera along just in case there is a memorial shot we can take and this time we left it in the car. Of course, one of the finds was on the rails to trails system and we didn’t think to bring the camera for this one. It turned out to be one of the best caches I have found so far this year.
What made it special for me is that it was located on an old and abandoned rail road tressel that ran over a road below. I had to cross the tressel by staying close to one side as the timbers that used to support the rails were pretty rotten. The length of the crossing was only 150 feet but it was a challenge I had not expected. After reaching ground zero, I looked high and low. I climbed over the edge, looked under the frame work, looked all around the structure and was about to give up for the very first time. I finally pulled out the Palm Pilot and looked at the description and past logs of the cache. It was a 50 cal ammo can and it was on top of the tressel so I put the Palm away and decided to look one more time as a 50 cal box is pretty hard to miss. Just then I looked down and my right foot was only 6 inches away from the box. I must have stepped over it at least 5 times while I looked above and below.
I’ll remember that one for awhile
The rest of the 9 finds we had for the day were pretty normal. Now we are at 90 for the year with 10 more to go. With hunting season starting in less than a month, which will hamper caching in the woods, we are thinking of doing the last 10 before the end of September. Our busy season is about to hit and between that and hunting season there wont be much time to be out on the trail.
It looks like I’ll stay at 3 hides for the rest of the year. After  recalling the few out of 90 that are memorable for me I don’t want to hide any that wont be memorable for others. I also visit my own caches to keep them stocked and nice to find which is something most other don’t do. Having 100 hides may look good on the screen but if half or more are just plain simple with no redeeming qualities and are empty or wet then what’s the point. Oh Ya, I mentioned that last month, it’s all about the numbers.

When we started this hobby, it was to get exercise by hiking in remote areas. In order to push us to do it, we set a goal of 100 finds by the end of 2006. That number meant we only had to find a couple of caches a week. Sounds simple but our leather business picks up in sales around the end of August and gets down right crazy by November and December.

We knew we would have to push it during the summer and there were times when we were to busy to go hiking. Our solution was to go for caches that were simple hikes but to target 6 to 12 a day to make up the numbers we needed. We never hit 12 but did get 11 in one day. Our average day of hiking is around 6 miles but we did do 12 miles last month in a single day for only 4 caches.

This weekend we went caching both Saturday and Sunday. Saturday we hiked 6 miles for 4 caches back in the area in this post, Geocaching: The Highs and Lows . On Sunday we had to make up some ground so we went to the town of Victor, NY where there are around 20 or caches pretty close together that don’t require miles of hiking. After finding a few caches on the rails to trails system like this:

We both got pretty bored with the terrain, the scenery, the cinder trail beds and the vegetation. Maybe you get to see a curve in the trail and once we even went over a bridge and a stream. Other than that is just straight trails with few or no points of interest. We have gone to less interesting places while geocaching in order to keep our find count up. With our 100 goal in site, we are now wondering what we will do to keep our interest up for 2007. We do get exercise by going for the easy caches, but none of the places we have been while doing them are inspiring enough to warrant a return visit. I guess we are spoiled by where we live and the trails we have here. Traveling farther to be able to just hunt these types of hides would be tricky because of our limited free time and the price of fuel.

With less than 20 caches to find by the end of the year and so little free time to get them I’m sure we will have to visit another cache dense area for at least one more numbers run. For next year we may drop back on the number of finds we set for our goal but add a number of hides to the list so we can still get our exercise but by placing them and maintenance runs to take care of them. I’ll keep you posted.