Good morning everyone. Coming back to the mainland, we look at Nevada. The oldest cache is First Nevada GC6C. Hidden in September, 2000, it was never found and only one DNF before it was archived. The oldest active cache is XKD - 380 GCF9. Hidden in December, 2000, it has been found 1,647 times and has received 652 favorite points. The most favorited cache in Nevada shouldn't come as a surprise (I haven't run the stat yet and I already know which one it will be). I'm right. It's Welcome to Las Vegas GC729A. This virtual was placed at the Welcome to Las Vegas sign in July, 2002. To date, it has 10,101 logged finds and 1,719 favorite points.
The weekend wouldn't be complete without a fire to sit around. As we enjoyed the fire, I noticed the full moon rising up over the wheat field. A good quality camera would have taken an awesome picture. For now, I'll continue to use my phone.
The first Monday in August is a holiday that is commonly referred to as the August long weekend. Prior to 2015, it was simply known as a Civic Holiday. Starting in 2015 and moving forward, that first Monday in August was renamed Terry Fox Day in Manitoba. For those who don't know who Terry Fox is; Terry was a young man who was born in Winnipeg in 1958. He lost his right leg to cancer in 1977, at the age of nineteen. In 1980, Terry decided to run across Canada to raise money for cancer research plus awareness of this horrid disease. He started on the East coast by dipping his foot in the Atlantic Ocean. From there, Terry would run the equivalent of a marathon each day. On September 1st, after running 5,373 kilometers (about 3,300 miles) in 143 days, Terry had to abandon his quest as cancer had spread to his lungs. By this point, Terry had become a household name and a national hero. Terry lost his battle to cancer. Even though he didn't complete his run across Canada, the Terry Fox run continues on each and every year to keep raising money for cancer research. The province of Manitoba recognized Terry's efforts by renaming the August holiday that didn't have a name to begin with, to Terry Fox Day.
As for myself in terms of geocaching, the August long weekend is memorable. It was five years ago that I set out on a day trip with Auntie Mo, that took us to some interesting tourist locations and finding the oldest active geocache in Manitoba. C1BUA - cache 1n a built up area (GC21C) was the primary goal of that trip.
Fast forward to 2020. Myself and sm66 will be spending the weekend visiting her family in Austin, Manitoba (not Texas). I had absolutely no geocaching plans at all. There are a couple of geocaches in the general area, but I found them both. With sm66 off visiting her parents on the Sunday, I was offered to tag along with her brother-in-law to go see a motorcycle he was thinking of purchasing. The bike is about half hour or so North, just outside of the town of Neepawa. A road trip wouldn't be a road trip unless we have some munchies and a beverage. A quick stop at the gas station, and now we are set. I still didn't have any plans to stop for any geocaches. Going to Neepawa reminds me of that one geocache that I never did find. It's still there, but I haven't been back to fi d the final stage to that multi. Titanic #1: Mistaken Identity (GCNC02). Someday I will return to Neepawa and finally get that cleared up. We saw the motorcycle, a nice blue Harley Davidson. MP59 as he will be known as, is more of a bike expert than I am, and saw a few things that deterred him from buying this particular machine
As we leave, we take a different route home. MP59 asks if there's any geocaches around that I would like to find. I check the official Geocaching app on my phone and see a couple of geocaches that I haven't found in the town of Gladstone. We're stopping in Gladstone for a geocache. The first one we go to is one that I have attempted in the past as well and left with a frown. It's magnetic and somewhere on a caboose that's on display. Some geocachers found it quickly, so they claim. Others need some time. I was one of those that needed some time. I searched, I crawled, I stuck my head in places that normal people wouldn't. Our poking around the caboose got the attention of one of the volunteers working in the museum where the caboose is located. He came out to talk to talk to us. MP59 explained to him that we were geocaching and what geocaching was. I eventually found the container. The volunteer had no idea what geocaching was and was excited to learn that there was one hidden on the caboose. That's one ancient DNF cleared up. I would have been ok with just the one find. MP59 asked if there was more. Yes, there are two more that I haven't found yet.
We drove to the next GZ where we searched along a tree line for a medium size container. That's what the description says but over time, the containers can change but not the description. It wasn't long before I found this one. When I went to sign my name, I noticed that someone wrote something that shouldn't be in a logbook. It wasn't profanity, but it was something suggestive. I couldn't rip the page out as there were names on the other side. I did my best to scratch it out and used one of the swag inside the cache to block it out when I took the picture.
The last one wasn't far away, but we had to be careful as we were around a camping area. This one was the hardest of the three, although the caboose hide took me long enough to find. The host seemed fairly obvious. I read previous logs for a hint and kept seeing that the container blends in really well and very tricky when the leaves are out. We searched here and searched there. It was MP59 that spotted the tiny nano hanging in the tree.
One more stop before heading for home. I wanted a better picture of Happy Rock. The one that I have, I'm holding the geocache that's hidden beside Happy Rock. I wanted one of Happy Rock himself. Happy Rock is the roadside attraction located on the outskirts of Gladstone.
The weekend wouldn't be complete without a fire to sit around. As we enjoyed the fire, I noticed the full moon rising up over the wheat field. A good quality camera would have taken an awesome picture. For now, I'll continue to use my phone.
Another August long weekend is done. What will next year be like? Who knows. Until then, be happy, be safe, wear a mask (some stores are making it mandatory, no mask, no entry), wash your hands, and most importantly, have fun. Peace out.
I was being watched through the window by Tinkers (left) and Sassy (right).
Thanks for sharing your experiences.
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