On the way to Cayucos

Yesterday we brought Karen’s Mom back home and today we headed west on highway 46 towards Paso Robles, eventually to end up at Cayucos for a few day stay. West of Blackwell’s Corner, a small county road leads off to the southwest through Bitterwater Valley. There are a number of caches dropped along this road. It was scenic this time of year; hillsides were green and wildflowers were popping up.

We found Tower Gate at 11:12 AM followed by Why Ask Y? at 11:30 AM. Found BowJon at 11:44 AM, even though the coords were a little off (we were on the wrong side of the road). I thought better coords are N 35° 32.861 W 120° 059.27. This is claimed to be the site of a compressed air windmill, but it was too far away to make out any details. Then we got Gypsum Water at 11:54 AM; site of a large gypsum mine, but not much left. Pallet Town followed at 12:07 PM, then Greensberg Store at 12:21 PM. There were a few more on a side road, but we were getting kind of bored with this area.

We joined back up with highway 46 just west of Cholame. I had known for years that James Dean was killed in a auto accident near here--at the intersection of highways 41 and 46. I did not know that there was a memorial at Cholame, which is now a virtual cache; James Dean.

Just a few miles west is a rest stop (just before Shandon) where I found Take a Break at 12:52 PM. Then we took a short drive to the Shandon Cemetary to find The Ghost of Tomlin at 1:03 PM, where the coords are really off (by over 400 ft). I measured the coords as N 35° 40.155 W 120° 21.228.

We checked on one in a Paso Robles park, but it was so busy we didn’t even get out of the car. So we drove on to Atascadero, where we stopped at Atascadero Lake (in all the years, I don’t think I’ve ever stopped there) and found Fisherman’s Cache at 2:56 PM. We briefly looked for another one here, but it was hard to find.

Driving on toward Morro Bay, we stopped and grabbed San Gabriel bridge at eye level at 3:25 PM, followed by 3 bridge cache at 3:39 PM.

We decided we wanted to go to the San Luis Obispo farmer’s market for dinner, so I dropped Karen downtown to do some shopping while I went to grab a couple more caches. The first was Space Open Hill Terrace at 4:44 PM followed by Battlefield Park at 5:03 PM.

Briones

Before going to Briones Regional Park, I grabbed Land Rover. I had passed on this one before--just not comfortable with the location. But, Dan encouraged me--easy he said. Indeed it was, and I had it in hand at 9:30 AM.

I probably hiked a total of 8 miles in Briones. The weather was slightly overcast, hazy visibility, temperature in the high 60’s. I started at the Bear Creek staging area. Here’s how it went.

11:06 AM found Stumped again? Wow, this one was a challenge. Had to search for a long time. Then the cattle got curious and came up close to see what I was doing--funny.

11:43 AM found Mini-Sprint 2. Started looking in the wrong tree, but once I got that straightened out, it was a quick find.

11:56 AM found Mini-Sprint 3. Very straight forward find.

12:11 PM DNF on Mini-Sprint 4. Like others, I don’t think it’s there anymore. There’s only one bush in the area, and it’s been severely chewed on. I suspect the clue meant it was hidden in about the middle.

12:29 PM DNF on Mini-Sprint 5. Coords lead to bare hillside. Hint seems to indicate a log. Searched wider and found nothing. I think its gone too.

12:55 PM found Bye Bye Birdie crushed (destroyed) on the ground. Log was signable. Stuck all the parts in a zip-loc baggy and put it in the tree. Maybe it will last a bit longer.

1:14 PM found Mott’s Peak in an unimaginative spot and container is getting squished. At least log has been put in a baggy.

1:53 PM found Mini-Sprint 1 on return to parking lot.

I drove to the other side of the park at Alhambra Creek staging area.

3:05 PM found JAY’S #1 Cache. Easy, big cache.

3:28 PM found Happy Cachin’ after a good climb. Coords are off. Found it when I used coords from the logs.

3:46 PM found Ken’s Comix. Another easy find.

4:34 PM found Sit Awhile after I drove to new area on Hidden Ponds Road. Just as I got to the cache location (where the cache page suggests quiet voices to not disturb the neighbors) a half-dozen screaming kids erupt from the bushes with a couple of Dad’s in tow. Guess it’s OK--they were the neighbors. Cache was easy to find. Took Blue Blaze Irregulars geo button and left a quarter.

Diablo Foothills (mostly)

With an invitation to lunch at relative’s in Danville, it was a perfect opportunity to do some caching before and after. But first, I hunted Prudence The Pretty Piglet #3 here in Livermore. Dan was FTF, but had no trade items so wanted me to trade for a Geocaching keyring (micro cache). It was an easy find. While signing the log, Annmarie called me and wanted help getting her car out the garage because the power had failed, and she couldn’t release and raise the door.

After helping her out, I drove to Sugarloaf open space (off of Rudgear Road). Sugarloaf East was just a short ways from the trail head and an easy find. A bit more of a hike (and climb) brought me to Three Pines. Actually I think these evergreens are deodora cedars. Anyway, this also was a quick find, but the log was wet so I had to be careful in removing and signing the log.

I hunted for Oasis. The last finder (Walruz) couldn’t find it and replaced it with a micro, but I couldn’t find anything. The area is getting heavy use by the cattle so it may have been crunched or munched.

Then it was time to get to Danville for lunch and an enjoyable visit with Ron and Karin. There house borders open space, and while we were eating a cock ring-necked pheasant wandered into the backyard. Very striking.

After lunch I headed for Borges Ranch (a Walnut Creek open space park that borders Diablo Foothills Regional Park). Without maps, I had a difficult time finding the right road, and wasted some time. Finally got there. I made a loop hike and picked up 7 finds in all.

Acorn to Oak; 3:06 PM.
Papa Cass; 3:19 PM.
Playground Madness #6; 3:28 PM.

Book It was up on top of a hill (good climb). Great view; easy find at 3:43 PM. The exposed rock boulders were packed with shells.

WTC Memorial Cache; 4:01 PM. Wish I could have stayed longer to reflect on the contents.

In The Hollow was found at 4:20 PM. At this point I felt I was running late and began to really hoof it.

Got back to the car and drove down to another lot and found Kooter’s Gearhead Garage at 4:52 PM.

FTF and more

First thing this morning I noticed there was a new cache in Livermore, Prudence the Pretty Piglet #3. And then I noticed that Dan had already found it, followed closely by fizzymagic. Then close to noon, I saw another cache pop up out on Old Altamont and Carrol Road, Altamont Silo. I drove out and was FTF, but not before I stupidly tried to climb up an embankment, slipped, and slid down in the wet grass and mud.

Then a little later, I drove to Dublin and retrieved Lincoln Highway. I got there close to 3 PM again, and this is when the road gets very busy as drivers try to bypass the freeway jam up. I timed my grab, however, in a short traffic lull.

I checked stage 4 of Dog Years again, and today the playground was empty. Found stage 4 and headed off for the final cache. I made a mistake in computing the coordinates and ended up behind a veterinary hospital, which almost made sense, but not quite (there certainly were a lot of dogs barking). I rechecked, corrected my mistake, and got to the right place to retrieve the cache.

Stop & Go

This morning I noticed that Stop & Go -- Alameda Co. was right on the way to church, at the corner of College and L Streets. This is not a fixed position cache, although it is always at the same type of location. The rules state that when you find it you must relocate it to a same type location in Alameda County. So, I put it out by Annmarie’s when I went out there after church.

Pleasanton in the rain

Even though it was going to rain, I wanted to hike up in the north part of Pleasanton Ridge. At the last minute, Karen decided to go with me. It sprinkled on us on the drive over. We entered at the trailhead on Longview, and on the way up the hill, it showered heavily for about 5 minutes--enough to soak us pretty good. The first cache we came to was Augustin Bernal Park. I hadn’t read the logs and concentrated searching where the GPSr zeroed out, but we didn’t have any luck. Very frustrating. Finally, I read a log that had different coordinates, and that took us right to it.

Next up was LeChuck’s Hermits Treasure. We couldn’t find it, so I called Dan who gave us a hint. We still couldn’t find it, so I called again, but couldn’t reach him. So we passed on this one.

Just "monkeying" around was the first one we came to after we reached the top of the ridge. It’s up a tree. At first I had trouble zeroing in on the right tree, but then I climbed up a ways and spotted the cache. I didn’t feel safe trying to get it with the limbs wet and more slippery than normal. Even when dry, it might be too high for me to feel comfortable.

Just One Thing was the next one we came to. I don’t know if it was cloud cover, tree cover, or just me, but the GPSr was not satisfying today. After hunting around a few trees, and trying, probably unsuccessfully to avoid all the poison oak, I got a different, reasonable reading and found it. I poured water out of the cache, and even though the log was in a zip lock baggie, it was soaked. My pen just barely worked, and I had to carefully peel the logbook pages apart. Zip locks are not sturdy enough to keep water out.

At the gate between Augustin Bernal and Pleasanton Ridge Regional Park we found Natural Cloning easily. Since we were wet and I was a bit discouraged, we called an end to the hiking and headed back. I called Dan again for a good hint to LeChuck’s Hermits Treasure. I looked low and Karen looked high. She spotted it.

We logged just over 5 miles of hiking. This means getting to the north trail end for the last cache in the park will require an estimated 12 to 13 miles of hiking. I called Dan and asked if he wanted to meet us in Pleasanton and look for the newest caches there, while Karen went on shopping. He agreed, so we grabbed a sandwich at Erik’s on Santa Rita while waiting for him.

Park N’ Hark is in a little park, and Dan had it in hand almost immediately. Cache N’ Release is in a little shopping center at the corner of Valley and Hopyard. We knew it was in a particular landscaping median, and again, Dan had it almost immediately. Harvest’ N Pinion was a little difficult for us to figure out where to park, so we walked farther than we needed to. Janet found this one.

Dublin Tree Fort

I thought I would finish Dog Years in Pleasanton and get a couple of new ones in Dublin this afternoon. Didn’t work out that way.

I first tried for the multi-cache Lincoln Highway. I got the first stage, but the cache turned out to be at a location where at 3 PM the traffic was so heavy I didn’t think I could safely cross the road, let alone hunt without being very conspicuous.

So I just headed on up Silvergate to look for TREE FORT. I was surprised by kusanagi appearing--thought no one was around. After we got introduced, he decided he wanted a flashlight from his car (and I had also left mine in the car). I looked while he was gone, and concluded it must be where he was looking, but couldn’t see anything. The flashlight made it clear. We talked for quite a while.

Then I headed over to the Dog Years stage where I had been blocked before by too many kids and parents. I figured with today’s showers that wouldn’t be a problem. No kids and parents, but there were a couple of teens sitting right under where I think the cache is.

Into the Gold Country

Today I took Karen and her Mom to visit Nancy in Pine Grove. While they visited I hunted a few caches, and as it turned out, most of them were in cemeteries.

The first cache was Pioneer Cemetery Series #2 in the Sutter Creek cemetery. It was pretty straightforward to find, which I did at 12:23 PM. The second, Pioneer Cemetery Series #6, is in the adjoining Odd Fellows Cemetery. Had to hunt for this one a bit, and never did find the grave marker mentioned in the cache description. Found it at 12:41 PM.

There were another couple of caches close by, but I didn’t care for the locations. So, I drove north to Amador City and found the virtual cache Watch where you are stepping!! at 12:58 PM. Photo and cache owner comments are in the spoilers.

Bryan was painting at the gallery where he displays, so I stopped and talked with him for a little bit, and got a tour of the gallery. Then I drove back to Sutter Creek to grab Earth Angels. This is a little planter garden right next to highway 49, so I was expecting the worst, but I found it easily at 1:40 PM.

Next I drove out to a modern day cemetery on highway 88 which was well maintained and very interesting. The cache, Sunset View, was easy to find (1:58 PM), but I spent quite a bit of time taking pictures and talking with a visitor who really seemed to want to talk.

It was time to start back for Pine Grove, but I made one stop in Jackson to hunt for SOSO. This was a great photo op. After I had taken a couple, I checked the GPSr to see where to go, and it was zeroed. So I just looked, and there it was. Since this church was marked as historic, I thought I might be able to claim the Time to find something Historic! locationless cache. After getting home and checking, it had not been claimed yet, so this was a two for one stop.

FTF! FTF! (again) and More in Morgan

I headed out to Morgan Territory first thing this morning where two new caches were still unfound. More and more I’m realizing what a narrow road Morgan Territory is and how risky it was to ride my bike down at 30 mph. I went for the two unfound ones first.

I found Rolling Meadow first at 8:20 AM and I was first to find. Had a bit of a search--there were numerous possibilities.

Another FTF was The Black Hole, found at 8:37 AM. This one was pretty straightforward.

Green Briefcase was close by, so I backtracked a bit to grab it at at 9:06 AM. My GPSr was off a bit, but there was a pretty obvious hiding area. This is a pretty old cache. Next I hiked back toward the staging area and hiked down to the pond to pick up Trails Challenge: Morgan Territory at 9:32 AM.

In finding these four caches, I hiked 3.14 miles. I then drove north down Morgan Territory to another trail head and hiked in to get Highland Ridge--Stone Corral Cache at 10:21 AM. Always Coca-Cola was fairly close, so I kept hiking to grab it at 10:34 AM. Survival Cache was only another 0.5 miles (but mostly uphill), so I hiked on and found it at 11:07. This is a really old cache--been out there for more than 4 years. And all this hiking added another 3 miles of hiking.

I realize this is the kind of cache hunting I like, far better than hunting a lamp-post hide in front of fast food drive through window. In fact, I’m coming to the conclusion that it’s OK to not hunt caches in areas I don’t enjoy. My objective is to have fun, not find every cache in an area.

Back in Livermore, I hunted up Altamont Creek Hills (found at 12:33 PM) and Forget me not (found at 12:52 PM). Then it was time for a Carmel Frapachino and a short drive out to Airport Way where I found FIT N PEPPER at 1:18 PM and IT BEES THIS WAY at 1:55 PM. I had to wait for a guy to finish eating his lunch right at the cache site, so I went looking for Land Rover, but this turns out to be one of those types of cache hide locations I don’t like.

FTF! FTF!

A few new caches popped up this weekend (and even today), so this morning I drove out to find Woodpecker’s Lair. After a short diversion on the wrong side of the creek (lot’s of water in it right now), I found it fairly quickly at 9:40 AM. I was First To Find (FTF), so I headed off hunting the special FTF prize N37° 37.638 W121° 45.434 (in nearby Veteran’s Park). As I was walking out I met another obvious cache hunter on the way in who turned out to be Fisherwoman, who along with her husband, DavidT21, really rack up the finds.The FTF prize was also a quick find.

Then, this afternoon after a dentist appointment, I took a short detour and stopped by Robert Livermore Community Center to look for Black N Blue. I had to twiddle my thumbs for a bit to wait for a photographer who was wandering around in the swim area, but then found the cache at 2:10 PM. Whadda’ya know? Another FTF.