Geocaching and Easter Weekend

Good morning everyone.  Project-gc has a stat called Caching Karma.  Basically it's the number of logs you have received on your own caches divided by the number of caches you have logged.  The top Manitoba geocacher in this category is harvwallbanger with a 30.9 caching karma.  They receive more logs than caches they find.  They haven't been really active since they started in 2007.  Only four of their 62 caches are still active.  In North Dakota, SaeSew has a caching karma of 27.39.  They haven't been really active either since 2007.  Twenty six of their 36 caches are still active.  As for myself, my caching karma is abysmal.  0.67  I find more caches than people find my caches.  Considering I haven't hid a geocache in a year and a half doesn't help.  Eighteen of the 68 that I'm credited to owning (this includes events) are still active.  My number will go down further as I plan on going out and finding a couple later to keep my Jasmer calendar up to date.  You'll be able to read about that adventure in the coming weeks.

Last weekend was Easter Weekend.  For those who observe the Easter holiday, it is a time to get together with family.  For geocachers, it's an extra day of finding geocaches if you were able to leave your home.  For myself, it's a four day weekend as I get Monday off as well in lieu of Easter Sunday (one of the perks of being unionized).  Since majority of businesses and stores are closed on Good Friday, what a good time to try and find those caches in high muggle areas.  That's what my game plan was up until this year.  With the world going crazy with this pandemic, I didn't really want to go geocaching in an urban area.  I don't even know if there are any caches that I haven't found in high muggle areas.  I decided to go outside of the city, but not too far.  I was thinking of some of the powertrails that are out there, but with the snow melting, that could mean ditches full of water.  Where to go?  I decided to attempt a small powertrail that's along the Southern edge of the city.  All the cache names start with the letter V and was placed by local cacher Bike4Me.  I know I have my rubber boots in the car (they've been in my trunk all Winter), but fingers crossed that I won't need them.

The entire series was fairly easy to find.  It was at the first cache that I also found my first golf ball of the season.  I have no idea how many golf balls I have found while out geocaching.  I do have a couple in my car.  It was also at this cache that a couple walked past while I was searching.  I kept an eye on them and noticed the wife kept looking back at me.  Probably wondering why is that strange guy wandering around amongst the trees.

I found one more before arriving at the third GZ.  I noticed that GZ had switched sides of the road.  The first two were on the South side and getting to GZ was good.  Seeing that the next few were on the North side of the road, I couldn't help but notice the ditch on this side.  Looks like I'll be pulling out the rubber boots from the trunk.  They should be cold on the feet when I put them on.  The embankment at the third GZ was steep but I got down ok.  I slowly put one foot in to see how solid the ground was at the bottom.  The water didn't look too deep.  As I put my foot down, my boot kept going down into the muck, therefor, the water was creeping up closer to the top of my boot.  Nope.  I'm not going to try this one.  I don't have a change of clothes with me.  I've found myself in situations before where the water was deeper than my boots and I ended up with a booter.  Basically a boot full of water.  Not today.  So close to GZ and yet so far away.  The next two after this one was the same.  Two found and three did not attempts.

As I came up to the fourth GZ, I noticed a car pulled over and two people on the South side of the road, about where GZ could be.  I hung back, keeping a safe social distance from these geocachers.  Once they left (I waved at them as they pulled away), I swooped in to make the quick find.  Off to the next cache only to meet up with the same geocachers.  It was a Mother/Daughter team.  I chatted for a wee bit with the Mom as the Daughter was signing the log sheet and then leaping across the water, back to their vehicle.  Now it's my turn and I made my way to GZ to sign the logsheet.

Although the water wasn't deep on this stretch of road, there was still plenty of mud and muck.  There really wasn't anything handy for me to use to scrape the mud off my boots before getting back into the car.  Luck would have it, I found a stick that the geo-dog had in my car.

The rest of the trail was the same and basically uneventful.  Water in the ditches, plenty of mud, and easy finds.  I ended the day with ten finds out of a possible thirteen.  Not bad for a little adventure.  The rest of the day was spent finding Munzees and raiding pokemon gyms.

I was basically on my own for Easter Sunday.  With the exception of a brief visit from my boys and the geo-dog.  They stopped by to grab more stuff.  They're staying at their mom's boyfriend's farm during this pandemic.  They feel safer out in the country and have more stuff to do on the farm instead of being house bound in the city.  Once they left, I was off to do more gym raids, find more Munzees, and grab a cache or two.  The first one was sort of impromptu.  I was raiding a gym when I recalled that there was a geocache very close by.  Is it still there and active?  I switched apps and sure enough, it's still listed there.  Last log was a DNF back in February and it did indicate there was plenty of snow.  No snow today.  I made my way over and made the quick find.  Signed, replaced, and back to my car.

I did have one geocache on my list that I wanted to get over the weekend.  This one was in a very familiar location as there was a different cache hidden here years before.  This one was an ode to that cache.  It's at the back of a Wendy's restaurant.  Although the drive-thru was still open on Easter Sunday, there wasn't many cars coming in.  That allowed me to quickly move to GZ without notice.  I was able to make the find on a well disguised bison tube.

I didn't do any caching on the Monday.  Twelve finds over the weekend.  Not bad.  When will my next adventure be and where will it take me?  There are a few Adventure Lab caches in the city I could try.  That could be fun to do.  With me, my plans constantly change.  As I do a final edit on this blog, I've decided to go after a couple of caches, as mentioned at the top of this blog.  I will also try at least one Adventure Lab.  Until next week, be happy, stay safe, stay healthy, keep your distance from others (at least six feet, unless it's an ex-spouse, then it's six miles), try to have fun, and wash your hands.  The sooner we flatten the curve, the sooner the world gets back to normal.  Peace out.

I did get to visit with the geo-dog as she sits in her favorite chair.