Category Archives: Geocaching

Getting My Head on Straight

Saturday afternoon, Sweetie went shopping with her Mother and SuperPizzaBoy went to hang out with his friend, Agent Q. So I went geocaching. I ended up in a park in the Tulsa suburb of Bixby.

Part of the reason I love geocaching and trail running is that I can get outside. I love the sound of the wind through the trees and how the sunlight feels on my face. It gets rid of the noise in my head.

There was a cache in a remote area of the park. It took a while to get through the thorns, shrubs, and brambles to get to it.

There was an old structure there. It looks kind of like an old railroad bridge but not near heavy duty enough, in my opinion.

I looked high and low, over and around, here and there, and everywhere. But I just couldn’t find it.

I knew it was there. Several people had found it the day before. M5 the cacher that hid it is known for his wickedly hard to find geocaches.

I finally gave up and walked on out. I wish that I had found it but that’s part of the game. I enjoyed myself thoroughly and was living totally in the moment while I was looking. Nobody in the whole world knew where I was. I love being lost that way. (I hope that it doesn’t bite me in the butt someday.)

What do you do to get your head on straight?

“A heart at peace gives life to the body…”

Proverbs 14:30.

Baloney’s Perfect Pairings

A Home for Little People

My favorite cache from the geocaching campout we attended this past weekend.

Keystone Caching Caper – Fall Fest 2011

The Tulsa Area Geocacher’s had their annual Fall Fest geocaching event at Keystone State Park in northeast Oklahoma. This year it was called “The Keystone Caching Caper.”

SuperPizzaBoy and I attended this year. The guys and gals that organize it do a great job. It is always lots of fun.

Sweetie couldn’t go. I’m sure that she felt bad, sleeping in her own bed rather than sharing our tent.

Home sweet home. Not bad for overnight. Tell you what though. There is a railroad track adjacent to the park. The sound of the big trains thundering through the woods at high speed is awesome. I don’t mind the sound of trains and these trains sounded like they were headed right at me.

SPB always looks forward to the smores. He is quite the accomplished smore chef.

The fun at at geocaching campground is finding the caches. They have tons of temporary caches that are fun to find.

Should I be worried about SPB? He loved dancing with this skeleton.

Should you be worried about me? I love lifting skirts, especially leopard print skirts out in the woods.

This one was called “greased pig” or something like that. What a mess to find. But unique!

And a geocaching event is kind of like a running event. The event is fun, but you had better get the T Shirt.

See ya next year!

Our World

Return To Turkey Mountain

Well, its October and the weather here in Oklahoma is wonderful. Cool nights, warm dry days. Makes me want to get out of the house. So I decided you know, its time to plant another geocache.

I had the container. Sweetie never complains but I use lots better containers for geocaches than she gets for our household use.

And then some Walmart camo duct tape. I scored the last roll they had. Sorry!!

Voila, makes me want to dig up all my poor dead arts and crafts teachers and tell them See!! I actually can do something. Is that terrible? You don’t know 99% of what I think!!

So off we went to Turkey Mountain. Sweetie begged off because of severe allergies. Poor old SuperPizzaBoy had no choice. We first checked out a cache we set out years ago called “Boys Night Out – Firefly Swamp.” We set it out in July 2007. It has been found 94 times. We named it because it was on Sweeties book group night which is our monthly boys night out and it was very muddy due to rains, thus the swamp, and it was at night and the fireflies were out in force. Absolutely beautiful.

This cache is a hybrid. It is a geocache and also a letterbox. Letterboxing is a precursor to geocaching. Boxes are hidden but the descriptions are given by written directions rather than GPS coordinates. Also, letterboxers use stamps, to show that they were there, rather than a written log. So, its low tech but involves hiking and finding. I haven’t really gotten into it except for this one hybrid.

I took photos of some of the stamps people left. I think they are very cool.

The last two on the left are SPB and my stamps. I forget whose is whose. We bought them on sale at Hobby Lobby. One family found the cache on Easter Sunday last year.

I went through the pages of the regular log. Those are always interesting. I’ll translate for you. “TFTC” means “Thanks for the Cache,” “TNLN” means “Took nothing, left nothing.”

Here I show the last page. A cub scout group came through in September. When I take groups to find a cache I make everybody sign the cache!! They are entitled.

That done we went looking for a good spot to hide the cache we brought. SPB was running out of gas.

We had to do some climbing and found this trail.

And then I found a good spot, hid the container, and found the coordinates. So now I have to get a permit from the Tulsa RiverParks Authority and apply to Geocaching.com to post. It took about two weeks last time.

Some vandalism we found on the way out. I don’t know if JJ Shill is the lover or beloved but whoever left this is a loser.

SPB brightened up as we got close to the parking lot.

Not a bad time, all told. Then off to dinner at NaNa’s.

Our route, I just love technology, when it works.

Deer Capital Geocachers

Over Thanksgiving on 2006 about five years ago, I along with son SuperPizzaBoy and my Father in Law, “Boompa”, placed a geocache at the Wildlife Heritage Center in Antlers, Oklahoma a small town in the former Choctaw Nation of southeastern Oklahoma. Lots of forests, rives, and lakes and very very outdoorsy.

The cache is called Deer Capital. (Because Antler’s is the Deer Capital of the World, haven’t you heard?) I had to keep pestering Geocaching.com to approve the cache. They like caches to be hidden, not in museums but they gave up under my relentless ~~whining and crying~~, persuasive arguments. I put a camera in the cache and asked finders to get photographs of themselves.

There have been only 50 finders of the cache in five years and not too many took photos but I like the variety. You have crusty guys.

And grandmothers with the grandkids.

And some close knit families. Note the deer in the background also.

Geocachers come in all ages and shapes.

I have to tell you though that the little guy down below in front with the red hair,

might be the cutest geocacher kid I’ve ever seen.

Anyway, if you find yourselves in Antlers stop by the museum, ask for the cache from the volunteer on duty, sign the log and get a picture of yourself with the included camera. Take the photo outside because it doesn’t have a flash.

The Journey to Rock City – Planting a Geocache On Turkey Mountain

Well, I found another old recyclable camera in the house on Labor Day. I was looking for trade trinkets that we were going to plant in a new geocache. It has some exposures left on it so I decided to take it along to document the geocache planting process.

SuperPizzaBoy and Sweetie on the trail. It’s about a mile and half hike to the cache site from the nearest parking lot. People who want this cache are going to have to earn it. Many people think I’m crazy but I love the look of film, especially old film, especially old film that is exposed in a camera with a plastic lens. I’m just wild about it. I’m crazy about bad pictures. I really am.

It’s been hot here and many of the leaves have fallen off the trees. The temperature was in the 70’s though so we were lucky.

Here we are at Ground Zero. The place is called Rock City because, well I think because it has lots of rocks. Of course there are rocks scattered from one end of Turkey Mountain to the other but this area is called Rock City.

Sweetie is kind of acting like she is mayor of Rock City.

Here is your clue. If you don’t have a GPS receiver just walk around until you see that forked stick. The cache is real close. I hate giving it away like that.

Yep, that’s me, I saved my biggest widest grin for this pic. I hope you appreciate it. And I know I’m thinning a little on top. I’ve been warned by the FAA not to take my hat off if I’m within five miles of an airport. Pilots have been blinded by the glare off the ground.

Mission Accomplished! We’re all happy, especially SPB. He doesn’t understand pointless walks in the woods.

So we went somewhere he could understand.

Next steps? I have forms to fill out for the Tulsa RiverParks Authority that administers the park to get a permit. That in hand I submit the cache to Geocaching.com and hopefully they post it. Could take a week or so. I’ll let you know.

Also, when I got the camera developed I found some photographs I took during my Dad’s 80th birthday party a few years ago.

Geocaching 101

Snap, Crackle, Pop

I really love exploring cities and towns including where Tulsa where I live.

Earlier this week I went to Rose Hill Cemetery here in Tulsa to look for a geocache and found the above monument. Dedicated to the “Veterans of the Grand Army of the Republic.” The Grand Army of the Republic was basically the Union Army during the Civil War. Well that’s good, there are lots of memorials to the veterans of that war, both Union and Confederate. This one was a little different though.

This was dedicated in 2008, 143 years after the war ended. (It ended as far as the Union is concerned. Many of my friends who live in the South, are still fighting the “War of Northern Aggression.” But I’m getting off track.)

So my interest was piqued. “Who would spend the money, time, and energy on such a project.” I mean, it is a really nice memorial, about nine foot tall and made out of granite and landscaped.

So I turn to my best friend Google and find out that it was three organizations. The Sons of Union Veterans of the Civil War, The Daughters of Union Veterans of the Civil War, and the Daughters of the American Revolution. They got together, raised some money and got a monument built in a far forgotten corner of an old cemetery. I think that’s cool. I think remembering is important.

It turns out that of the 35,000 people interred at Rose Hill Cemetery there are about 35 Union Army veterans. It reminds me of one of my favorite Bible stories: The Valley of Dry Bones in Ezekiel. The passage is:

“So I prophesied as I was commanded. And as I was prophesying, there was a noise, a rattling sound, and the bones came together, bone to bone.I looked, and tendons and flesh appeared on them and skin covered them, but there was no breath in them.”
(Ezekiel 37: 7-8 NIV)

I loved that passage as a kid and still do. I could see a whole valley of dry bones as they came together. Legs and arms popping into place, the skeletons rattling as they stand up and look around for their missing parts. And then the ligaments appearing then the skin. Somebody ought to make a movie.

Check out my friend Baloney for more pairing of text with images.

Oh, yes I almost forgot, yes I did find the geocache.

The Children’s Children

Those of you who know me or read my blog know that my favorite hobby is geocaching. My hobby takes me to many out of the way places including many long forgotten remote cemeteries like Mount Zion Lutheran Cemetery in Washita County, Oklahoma. It is truly in the middle of nowhere. Down a long dirt road.

With only a few cows, and a compressor station that processes gas from the Colony Wash gas field as neighbors.

There are lots of sad stories in these old cemeteries. I always wonder if anybody remembers these stories. Young Miss Rosie Lee Kolb would be 83 now. She has been buried in the red dirt of western Oklahoma that long, through the baking summers and the ice cold winters and the wind that may change direction but never quits.

And then there are the mysteries. “Unknown”, was the person unknown when the died, or is their a grave and they don’t know who is in it. It may be possible that these people are not remembered by anybody.

But there is hope.

¹⁵ Our days on earth are like grass;
like wildflowers, we bloom and die.
¹⁶ The wind blows, and we are gone—
as though we had never been here.
¹⁷ But the love of the Lord remains forever
with those who fear him.
His salvation extends to the children’s children.

Psalm 103

Baloney Sunday Challenge

Scripture and a Snapshot

San Antonio River Geocaching

I was in San Antonio last week to attend a convention. I have been before several times and have found almost all the caches in the central part of downtown so I have to go farther and farther to find more. I have to do my geocaching early in the morning mostly.

So off I went at first light.

By day and night the walk is bustling. Early in the morning its just walkers, runners, and geocachers, and lots of security folks. I’ve always felt pretty safe on the canal at odd hours. I keep my wits about me, just like I do anywhere.

The canal is a masterpiece. A walker’s paradise.

Away from the core tourist area the canal winds its way among condos, apartment buildings, and office buildings.

The caches are mainly “microcaches” they are small because they are not that many good places to hide big containers.

The above might be the worst hidden cache in Texas. See that black thing underneath the trash can? Yep that’s it. I don’t suspect that this cache will last for long. I spotted it from over a 100 feet away.

There is no cache here, I just liked how the trees wrapped around each other.

No cache here either, I just liked how the rising sun was peeking through the trees.

I just love locks and dams. I don’t see too many so I like to stop and ponder the technology and how they work and all that.

As I got farther and farther away from downtown the caches started getting a little bigger.

The oldest VFW post in Texas. Note the Tower of the Americas. That is close to where I started walking, and it wasn’t a straight line. I just love walking long distances.

I love whimsy. I posted other photos of this scene earlier this week. I love’em.

Mom and her kids on an outing.

There are all sorts of plaques and explanatory diagrams along the canal. This was my wow moment. I always wondered what they did during floods. The divert the river to a 24 feet diameter tunnel, three miles long, 150 feet under the river. It cost $150 million and they have used it a few times.

Aren’t engineers wonderful. Find one and give them a big kiss would you? Be gender appropriate, if you know what you mean. I don’t need any smooches from guys. Just saying.

This is called “The Grotto.” I found it kind of creepy. Sorry.

Found a big geocache! I love the big ones. They are easier to find than the small ones. It was time to get moving. I went back to the hotel overland.

I passed this hotel, The Havana on the way back. Maybe I’ll stay there. I love the look of it. It really isn’t close to anything I need to do but it is cool. Maybe I’ll just see if they have a bar and have a drink. That’s almost as good as staying there in my book.

That’s about it folks. I walked close to to 10 miles, didn’t find that many caches but I had a a great time.

To find out more about geocaching check out my Geocaching 101 Post.

That’s My World

Jungle Love Geocaching and other Guilty Pleasures

About a week ago on Sunday afternoon I dropped SuperPizzaBoy off at his confirmation class at his church. Usually I stick around in the lobby as a kind of security blanket but he does great without me so I sneaked off to go find a nearby geocache named Jungle Love. In the summer it would be hard to find with all the high grass and brush but it kind of stuck out in the dead of winter.

The kid never knew I was gone!! Its all for the best.

Nope, this isn’t Moab.

Later in the week Turkey Mountain Wilderness Park showed a new cache on their Facebook post. It was called “Cache May Bite.” It was about lunchtime so I drove to the park.

Thread the needle, go down the trail a ways and this is what you find.

Again, I was back before anybody missed me. Doesn’t anybody miss me?

Third guilty pleasure: SPB participates in a Improv Comedy workshop at one of our local parks. He loves it. He doesn’t need a drama workshop, shoot, he could teach drama, he is good at comedy but he has drama down pat. Sorry, I digress. I usually take my Kindle with me and read while he is doing his Improv thing. I mean I like watching him and the other kids but how much “Zip, Zap, Zup” can a guy take? Even if it is his son. Well you guessed it, somebody planted a geocache in the park. So I left the kid with his comedy and Sweetie with her knitting.

And off I went. I could show you where I found the cache but it would be a dead giveaway. It is close to this though.

A cover over a swimming pool. Kind of a Mid Century Modern thing maybe? There are people in town who just swoon and need smelling salts when they hear about Mid Century Modern. Its the new old, run down, and ugly is beautiful concept. All those smelling salts does something to their sense of humor also, either that or they didn’t have a sense of humor to begin with. Oops, you can tell I’m off my meds this morning. Sorry.

This cache required some water. Why? I am not going to tell you except that if you have done this type of cache before you know exactly why and what kind of cache this is. Trust me, if you go looking for this bring some water.

Here is the cache.

As you can see, I brought some water.

Again, I was back in my seat with my Kindle before anybody missed me. That’s the kind of life a geocacher leads when he is the only one in the family that likes geocaching.

Check out That’s My World for other views of our planet from all over.

Check out Geocaching 101 if you are wondering what Geocaching is.

YogisDen.us

Welcome to my world