Sugar Pine Point

We all went to Sugar Pine Point State Park for hiking and swimming. Our first find along the trail was the first stage of Thunder and Lightning at Sugarpine. We recorded the coordinates and then continued on the trail.

The next cache we came to was See Der Inside. Obviously, it was inside a large, burned out, but still growing Cedar tree. But it wasn’t easy to find. Janet finally got it with persistence at 12:51 PM.

We also found the cache at The World’s Highest Working Lighthouse (although now it’s just a light on a tall pole). After we found it at 1:28 PM, we hung around playing and taking pictures for quite a while. Cortnie was jumping on the lighthouse platform and found about the only sharp edge around--she came up right underneath it and sliced her scalp. Lots of blood and tears, but luckily it closed up so we didn’t go to emergency for stitches.

We hunted for Light My Fire with no luck. It had been deactivated on July 25 after we downloaded our waypoints.

Intro to Dendro III: Calocedrus decurrens was pretty easy. In fact, when Cortnie caught up to us I gave her the GPSr and told her to follow the arrow. After a small hint about an area to search she found the hidden cache. She liked that. Completed this one at 3:09 PM.

While the rest of the crew went swimming, Dan, Janet, and I went to find the last stage of Thunder and Lightning at Sugarpine. We found the tree that had been struck by lightning at 4:15 PM.

On our way back to the house, we stopped in Tahoma for Tahoe Cottages. An easy find (although very public) at 4:22 PM. Then just a short distance away we got Tahoma Trove at 4:33 PM, although this one looked like it was in someone’s corner lot.

A great hike

Dan, Janet, Mark and I went to the Cascade Falls trail-head for a nice hike, some of which was off trail. The girls went to a nearby park for play time.

The first part of the hike was fairly flat and easy. At the top of Cascade Falls we found Kolly Wobbels #10 Cascade Falls at 9:22 AM. This is a nice overlook of Cascade Lake and Lake Tahoe beyond. The creek running nearby makes this a very enjoyable spot.

Then we headed up-hill, off trail on lots of sloping granite shelfs. We found Kolly Wobbels #11 Survivor at an old cedar tree about 9:45 AM.

Next, we headed up to Kolly Wobbels #12 Non-Survivor. Found it at 10:11 AM.

Continuing on up to an even steeper part of the hill, we went to Kolly Wobbels #13 Cascade View. The climb is not technically challenging; it was just steep and getting hot. We found it at 10:25 AM.

On the way back home, we found a parking space beside the road (it was very crowded) and took our pictures at the virtual cache at Inspiration Point.

After hiking back to the car, we began driving back to our house. Stopped at D.L. Bliss state park (just parked off the highway) and looked for Balancing Cache, so named because of a huge granite boulder that is supported at just a couple of spots. Janet found it at 12:15 PM as we all looked at the promising hiding locations.

Kim’s Overlook was another stop beside the highway. It’s easy to not see this cliff that towers over the highway. We took a trail around to the backside, but then followed a trail under a power line that was a steep, dusty ascent. We found it at 1:05 PM.

After an outside dinner at the Bridge Tender cafe, we all walked over to the park area by fanny bridge. I didn’t have my GPSr, but Dan acted like one since he had already found the cache, and pointed in a direction and said, "200 feet." Well, there was a pretty likely spot in that direction, so I checked, and sure enough, found All Shapes & Sizes II at 7:32 PM.

Burton Creek Canyon

Before heading for a swimming beach, we did a short hike up to Burton Creek Canyon. At the creek crossing we debated which way up would be the easiest. I chose the wrong way and hiked up the road. Ended up on top of a cliff looking at the cache location about 300 feet away. Backtracked back down and then up the creek, then up the hill and then found it at 12:28 PM. (Dan already had).

Tallac historical area

Today we went to the South Lake Tahoe area, specifically the Tallac Historical area where there are three large historical estates that are now a state park. Lucky Baldwin Virtual Cache was the first one we found at 12:27 PM. It’s at a marker and we needed some info from the marker.

Then we found Iva-Kay Each-Bay. Actual Dan went off and found it and then I went looking for him. So we went back together while I hunted and found it around 1:20 PM.

Tahoe, ho!

Today we started our week long vacation with the kids at Lake Tahoe (except we do have to return tomorrow night for a Tuesday morning pre-op appointment in Walnut Creek). We caravaned up with Dan and Janet, stopping along the way for some cache hunting. Dan had a couple marked in Stockton, but we DNF’d on both.

Our next stop was in Loomis at a Starbuck’s for C.B. #7. It was hot and I wanted something cold to drink right away. Dan got impatient and found the cache and had it waiting when I stepped back outside, at 11:19 AM.

Out next stop was a little farther east on 80 for Clipper Gap Travel Bug Depot, which we found at 11:46 AM. It was a drive up, immediate find.

E/B I-80 Gold Run was our next hunt at a rest stop. Bouncing GPSr’s made it a bit difficult. I passed by the cache once and just overlooked the obvious. Got it on the second pass at 12:24 PM.

At Donner Pass Summit we stopped at another rest stop and hiked a bit to find I-80 Summit at 1:21 PM.

A punch in the gut!

A bad news day! Karen’s biopsy tested positive for cancer.

Not on the road to Mom’s house

Having completed On the road to Mom’s house, I had the info to complete the puzzle cache, NOT on the road to Mom’s house. Hiked up a hill, searched likely locations, but came up empty. So, I rechecked how I put the coords together, and discovered my mistake had taken me .1 miles too far north. I had walked right by the cache. Going back, I found it quickly. Glad my mistake wasn’t worse, because it was getting hot today.

CVC and coffee

The CVC Coffee and Jeep Parking event was held this morning at 8 AM in Ripon. I drove over and got there just a little after 8. Several folks were already there and it just got more crowded. I got to talk to several new folks, but failed again to win a white jeep in the raffle.

After the event, I fooled around at some nearby micros, but felt there were too many muggles, or I just didn’t like the area. Went over to the park along the Stanislaus River and looked for Cache Ninja. He’s kind of lost his disguise, so I rehid him a bit more than I found him.

Went searching for stanislaus tupperware, for quite a while. Heavy grass and weed cover made the search hard. After a while a group from Sacramento came, and we all searched for a while. Putt made the find, in a place that didn’t correspond to the hint (perhaps I shouldn’t put too much stock in them).

I followed them after a while to Master of Disguise II, but was too late to participate. I looked for a long time, but no luck.

Just before leaving for home, I stopped and grabbed SuDoKu (Easy), a puzzle I had solved in about 20 minutes last night. (This is another cache where I think the hint is off.) On the way home, I stopped in Manteca to look for Fore!, again, but bailed out because the area was crawling with people.

An afternoon with Dan

Dan and I decided to go to Garin Regional Park--north part--this afternoon, even though it was the hottest part of the day. Luckily it wasn’t really hot, and it was a bit cooler in Hayward. We started from the Zeile Creek trailhead.

Our first hunt was for Trail View Cache. We had to climb up some steep, dry grass covered slopes, and it seemed more slippery than mud in the winter. Footing felt treacherous. We found it at 2:46 PM.

Zeile Creek #1 was close, so we took a trail that appeared to be blocked off. Had a tough creek crossing, not because of water, but because of vertical sides that were hard to climb. We needed to find the coords for stage 2. Not sure what we were looking for. Finally used the only thing we could find that had numbers on it. We plugged the numbers in, and that took us to an area requiring serious bushwhacking through a jungle of over our heads weeds, a thicket of thistles, and a steep hill. Dan wasn’t wearing bushwhacking clothes so elected not to go, and I chickened out when the going got very steep. I just wasn’t very confident of the numbers. I should go back and really check it out. Other find logs could correspond to the area.

Our next stop was for Fungus Humungus, a pretty quick find at 3:29 PM. Then we had to do a bit of hill climbing to Top of the World. This one had us searching around for a while, but we finally located it at 4:04 PM.

Bay Tree Bay View was a little confusing. The cache description was incorrect, but it made so little sense that I just decided to ignore it and look for it. Found it at 4:26 PM. The next closest cache was Kansas City A’s, and we made a poor choice on how to approach it. It was right off a trail, but we bushwhacked down to it. Dan especially chose a tough route. Hope the PO doesn’t get him. We found this one at 4:44 PM.

We hunted for Rock Jungle for a long time. I’m not sure we were hunting in the right place. Not all the conditions of the description were met where we were hunting.

We also couldn’t find Oak Tree Cache. I wonder if we were on the wrong trail and wrong gate. Our GPS may have led us slightly astray. After these 2 DNFs, it was after 6 PM, and we were tired and hungry, so called it a day.

Evening hunt with Dan

Dan was over for dinner, and afterwards we went up to Danville and San Ramon. I was hoping he could help me find some difficult ones.

We started with Blue iis It took long enough. I’ve already been here twice. We searched all over. Dan even started to take apart a picnic table (which would be an ‘evil’ hiding place), but just could not spot it. I emailed Blue iis for a non-spoiler hint.

From there, we went to Red Willow View, which I thought wise to do before it got dark. We climbed the hill just as the sun set. We found the cache immediately.

By the time we got down and to the car it was getting dark. Drove over to the park for Diablo Vista Park. I found the first stage of this multi quickly. The second stage was farther away than I thought it might be, but it was a quick walk to the location. It’s the kind of hide that I was glad no one was around.

Headed west on Crow Canyon into San Ramon and stopped for The Commens in a shopping center parking lot. Dan had it before I could get out of the car.

Rexy’s Book Club was just across the freeway. I focused on the wrong thing. The right thing was just around the pillar, and Dan found the cache right away once he turned the corner.