Geocaching and my Second Adventure Lab

 Good morning everyone.  Today we stop in the panhandle state.  The most favorite geocache in Florida is 'Magic Kingdom'  GC10FB.  Placed in July, 2001, this virtual has been logged 12,755 times and has 1,397 favorite points.  It can be found at the center of Magic Kingdom in Disney world.  The very first geocache placed was 'Point Washington'  GC5E.  Hidden in September, 2000, it was found 22 times and no favorite points before being archived in 2002.  The oldest active geocache is very appropriately called 'Christmas Cache' GCFA.  Hidden on December 25, 2000, it has been found 1,203 times and has 499 favorite points.

It is Christmas morning as I sit and start writing this.  It was a total coincidence that today's oldest cache is called Christmas Cache.  That was not planned at all.  The real reason I came to my laptop this morning was to activate my second Adventure Lab cache.  Originally I was going to do another history AL.  That one would have taken you to five of the ten history plaques that make up the Scotia - St. Cross Heritage Walk.  You can see where the stops are here > Heritage Walk  I didn't get around to deciding which five locations I was going to use or visit the locations to take pictures.  At the last moment, I had a change of plans.  After doing SneakyShields' mural AL in Transcona, I found a website that lists most of the murals in the city.  That provided me with some background information when I featured her AL in my blog a few weeks ago.  

I know there are murals in the Seven Oaks/West Kildonan area of the city.  It wasn't hard to find five.  I didn't need a website to tell me that, but it helped with the background information as to who the artist was and the year it was painted.  Part of me feels I took an easy way out with this AL and I should have stayed with the original plan of the heritage walk.  If anyone has a second AL and they don't know what to do, there's an idea.  Let's get started on my latest Adventure Lab.

Our first stop is at the Gwen Sector Creative Living Centre for Seniors.  This mural was created by James Cullen in 2020.

Several blocks North is the Royal Canadian Legion.  This mural was done by Charlie Johnston in 2012.  There use to be a geocache hidden here.  Hidden by local geocacher Crackerjackie, it was cleverly placed.  What I remember the most about this cache was a newbie by the name of kevinspratt who discovered geocaching and decided to video his adventures.  He only found twelve caches, but he would reveal the hiding spot to all the geocaches.  We all know that is something you don't do.  This location was one of the ones he revealed.  This cache was archived in 2015.

This was going to be a part of the Adventure Lab, but taking a closer look at the mural, it's in slightly rough shape.  Located on the side of the Baraka Pita Bakery, it was painted in 2009 by Chris Velasco.

Continuing North on Main St. we find the Manitoba Hydro substation.  There is a total of five murals located here.  I could have made my entire AL at this one spot.  The five murals was created by Jill Sellers in 2001.  Each one depicts the history of West Kildonan.

A few blocks North is 7-11, our next stop in our tour.  On the side of the building is a mural promoting recycling.  'Take Pride Winnipeg' was created by Rachel O'Connor in 2014.  While we're here, let's pop in and get a slurpee.  Winnipeg is the slurpee capital of the world.  Winnipeg sells almost 200,000 of these slushy drinks per month, giving us the title of slurpee capital for twenty consecutive years.  There was a cache hidden here as well.  Appropriately titled 'Slurpee Capital', it was a brief series of caches hidden at 7-11 stores.  They have all been archived as the owner is no longer active.

Our last stop is very close by.  The only thing separating the two is a McDonald's.  Another one of the newer murals along Main St. is located at the Kay Four Properties building.  The artists behind this one are Mandy Van Leeuwen and Franklin Fernando.  This was painted in 2019.

At the last minute, I decided to make a quick change to my newest AL.  When you complete a stage, you normally get a congratulations message.  I decided to spice that up a bit with a 'Dad' joke at each stage.  They all had the same theme.  Here's a sample of one of the jokes.  A sandwich walks into a bar.  The bartender says "Hey!  We don't serve food here!"  Insert groaning here.

That is a quick tour of some of the murals.  I don't think Geocaching HQ will be rewarding a third Adventure Lab to anyone.  They are so fun to do and to create.  If there's too many AL's, then the ideas dry up and the quality of the AL's will go down.  

If you haven't entered my photo contest yet, you still have time, but the clock is ticking away.  Don't delay.  Get your photos in.  Send your submissions to thegeocachingguild@gmail.com  Until next week, be happy, stay safe, wash your hands and wear a mask, hug your furry critters, and most importantly, have fun.  Peace out.

You never know where these two will turn up.