Road to cache in SD

Road to the school house

The school house.  Notice the outdoor johns behind the school house.

 

Ellsworth AFB is on other side of the ridge in front of the Jeep - about 10 miles  I was searching for a geocache in the beautiful countryside of western SD.  The school house was not functional - windows and doors all gone, one of the outdoor latrines (visible at edge of Jeep window) was pushed over.  Other, (visible at back edge of schoolhouse) look functional.
 I enjoyed the afternoon driving the "outback" of Rapid City.  The gravel roads were straight to the horizon.
  Geocaching is the way to explore new territory.  Will write more about this day later.


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Geocaching with the Girls

The day dawned bright and sunny (unlike yesterday) and we had promised the Girls to go geocaching! It is sort of a worldwide treasure hunt; you search for hidden caches using GPS info from the website.  You can place caches and/or search for them.  I am in the search mode, since if you place one you also have to be around to check on it periodically.  One of reasons I thought it would be fun was doing it with the Girls.  And, today was our first time geocaching with them.  We all had a ball, but geocaching was only part of the fun.

Frequently, the caches have little trinkets inside them and you trade yours for one in the cache.  Rule is you leave something at least as nice as you take.  Some caches are too small for that, you just sign a log book and go.  We did not want the kids to think of this as a "treasure hunt" for goodies so we decided to go first for a cache that was log book only and it was only about 1/2 mile from the starting point - their house.   Well, it seemed close enough to walk so off we went.  However, the distance on the GPS was "as the crow flies" and after taking a number of turns to follow the available roads and not getting much closer we headed back to get the car!

So we head out in the car and soon find the playground that is our "target".  But, finding a parking place was another issue - a issue the Girls did not understand or like!!  But, eventually we found a spot surprisingly close to the campground!  (Besides, I figured I could spot a cop writing a ticket, if it came to that!)  So after discussing the geocaching plan with the kids, they immediately headed for the playground and forgot all about geocaching!  Which turns out their plan was better then mine!  I searched and searched for the cache and with BJ's help (while she watched the kids, too) homed in on the benches immediately outside the small playground.   A little later I found the cache - it was the smallest I have ever encountered.  About half the size of a sewing thimble and magnetic so it stuck to the metal bench.  Fortunately, the kids were about ready to move on so I showed the cache to them and Reagan was interested in the log which was  a long narrow ribbon of paper rolled up to fit inside.

We pressed on to the next one which was also adjacent to a playground.  While the kids hit the play equipment with BJ in attendance I thought I would check out the cache first.   Fortunate that I did as when I found it it was a little too far off a walking trial through nearby woods and thorns abounded and I knew it was not a good location for the kids.  I went back and after a while we moved on.   The Girls asked about the cache briefly but that was it.

I had one more cache to check out and it was near a local library - I figured BJ would like that one!  BINGO, we found it pretty quickly and it was a gallon plastic jug full of treasures for little geochachers!! 

The Girls and their treasure cache!

Well, after this exciting afternoon of geocacheing we retired to the Girls house and had a cool apple juice together and started planning the next trip!!  Not!

Treasure Hunting in the Keys

BJ and I got into geocaching which you can check out by clicking on this link.  Actually, I think I am into it more then BJ but what interested us about it was doing it with Reagan and Addie, especially Reagan.  Most of the cache's have trinkets included that you can trade with trinkets you bring - rule is don't take anything if you don't leave something!!  There are hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of cache's worldwide.  At the website after you have registered (free) and agreed to abide by the rules you can get the GPS coordinates of caches where ever you are or are going to be!  We have found several dozen in and near Key West.
While BJ was working on here quilt the other day I decided to go up to Big Pine Key and do some treasure hunting for caches there; also was expecting to see some of the Key Deer!  I downloaded about 8 caches to the GPS, already had some along the route there downloaded, and headed out about 1PM.

First two were right on the edge of the Keys Deer refuge and I found the caches fairly quickly; one was in the hallow of a dead tree and the other was buried under some rocks at the foot of a phone pole, but no Key Deer.   I next headed to No-Name Key which is connected to Big Pine by a bridge near the No-Name Key Pub - a traditional watering hole in Big Pine!!  In this case there were two different caches in back country away from the main road across No-Name.  It is prime territory for the Key Deer.   I parked off the road near a path leading into the wilderness and headed down the path.  First think to greet me was a Key Deer.  She backed off the trail a little, but did not run or show fear.  Just watched me go by as I continued along the minimal path.

Shortly however, the path became even more minimal to virtually non-existent.  I was making my way thru the woods headed in the direction my GPS was pointing.

I was surprised to run across a very rusted out auto frame; no engine, no body parts, just a frame with a bright chrome bumper attached to it.  Not enough for me to tell the vintage of the original car, but was amazed that the chrome bumper still looked so good - they don't make'em like that anymore!!  See the pic of it I have included.  

Eventually, I broke out on a slightly more civilized (barely) trail that was going in the general direction I needed to go.  I continued along it thru several intersections with equally primitive trails until I came to a "road" thru some wetlands that were not wet, because this is dry season.  The road bed was raised and there were culverts under it to facilitate the flow of water when it was there.  The road continued toward the shoreline which is where the cache was located.  Shortly, I approached the shoreline and found a break that ended up right at the foot of the dock that was my "target". 

 After finding the cache and signing the log I headed for the second cache in this area.  It was about a half way back on the trail I came in on and off to the side.  Here are some links to the two caches if you want to see what the cache webpage tells you.
No-Name Key dock  and Dirty Dog Pond on No-name Key
Note the coordinates are not shown unless you are a registered user, but all info is otherwise there including all the logs and pics entered by the geocachers that have "found" these treasures!!

After returning to the Jeep and thanking the Key Deer that had been guarding it for me, I decided I still had time to do a few more.  Both were on the main N-S road of Big Pine Key.  One was a nice little one that Reagan would have been delighted with.  It was a box full of "treasures", it would have taken all day for her to figure which one she would have traded for!!  The other one was at the Blue Hole, a pond in the Keys Wildlife refuge that is a fresh water pond.  This was a virtual cache, i.e. there was no physical cache as is normal but you have to provide the person who placed the cache with info, and sometimes a pic, to show that you were there.  I collected the info I needed took a pic of some Key Deer and alligators that were hanging around watching the tourist and went on my way.

                                                        
It was getting too late and I skipped the great temptation to stop at Sally's Ice Cream shop where they hand make the best frozen custard in the Keys!

I headed on down what is I believe one of, if not the most, beautiful drive in the World, the Overseas Highway aka US Highway #1.  One of the reasons I skipped Sally's was because I wanted to see the vista's across the islands and seas the road traverses and it would have been after dark if I had gone for the custard!
                                                                                                                                                      
However, it was still light when I got to MM17 and I could not resist one more hunt.  There was a cache near Perky's tower which I have seen a dozen times because we frequently drop our kayaks in the water nearby.   I found the cache with minimal delay and signed the log book and moved on!  The tower was build in late 20's as the bright idea of a fine Yankee gentleman to control mosquitoes which were a real problem in the Keys in those early days.
He knew bats consumed prodigious amounts of mosquitoes so he reasoned if he built accommodations for them they would move to Sugarloaf Key where his bat motel was and make the area mosquito free!  In theory, it sounded good and he certainly did his part.  The bat tower has survived multiple hurricanes, including the 1935 killer hurricane, and stands today pretty much like he built it.  But, nobody has ever seen a bat in it!!   Meanwhile the Mosquito Control Commission has controlled the mosquitoes quite well, while unleashing one political turf battle after another!  The Executive Director is the highest paid civil servant in Monroe County!!  It is another of the many political entities that make life in the Conch Republic so interesting!