Tom's Takeover Tuesday - 5/25

Welcome to Tom's Takeover Tuesday...on Tuesday!!!

This week I have three FTF's. One in the north radius that took 2 hours to find! The other two were part of a series of 4 that posted along Commencement Bay. This brings the FTF total to 46.

So the first FTF this week was a micro (mini M&Ms tube) with camo tape hidden in a rock bed along the river trail. When I got to GZ there were three guys "looking." I passed one on his way out, one was leaving with his dogs when I started searching, and one guy left because he is a tow truck driver and had a delivery in Renton. This left me and one other guy to continue searching. When I got there, he had already been in the hunt for 30-45 minutes. Literally an hour and a half later I pulled up just about the only rock we hadn't turned over...and this was after the cache owner called to taunt my hunting partner. When I pulled it out another cacher arrived. After signing the log we walked down the trail and got the other 3 caches along that side of the river while swapping stories (my favorite!)

That concluded my Everett stay since that was Thursday and I came home Friday evening. The other two FTFs are uneventful stories except I could have gotten the other two in the series the night before if the LOST season finale event hadn't been in full swing!

I did manage to get my new puzzle out last night. We hid it, did the write up, and it posted all in about 4 hours. Then my phone never stopped blowing up with texts! From 10:30 PM to about midnight I got texts requesting more info on how to solve the puzzle. I was reluctant to give out too much information so I was my typical evasive self. :)

The texts then recommenced with another participant at about 4 this morning...those continued until about 2 this afternoon when the solution had finally been ascertained and the hunt was on! Two cachers had the solution because they "worked" together (if you consider prodding me for continual confirmation on their search efforts work. :p) I finally got a text at about 10 minutes to 3 PM that the cache had been found and the fact there was no pen or FTF prize was disappointing. :p So picky!!!

I had high hopes for this puzzle lasting a couple days, but our locals always surprise me with their persistence in getting the FTF. I guess when I am not eligible it's even more competitive. :p I guess I just have to think up a new, even harder puzzle! Although, I do know all three kids were eating mini M&Ms last night...a new multi maybe? ;)

That's pretty much it for this week. It is getting harder and harder to think up interesting material for this segment so I think Lynette may want to start contributing again! See you next week!

Tom's Takeover Tuesday - 5/18

Welcome back to what has become more of a late week post than a Tuesday event. Either way, I'll try to keep it between the Tuesdays as far as an update.

There really isn't a whole lot to say about this installment. I spent another week in Everett/Marysville so the main focus was just keeping the streak alive. Mission accomplished!

So other than getting a cache everyday while away from home and visiting the Scuttlebutt brewery just about everyday after work, there was nothing exciting to report...

Except my first two FTF's north of King County!!! That's right, I managed to get FTF's away from home! I have a 10 mile notification radius set-up around my hotel and my unit's building just in case I can beat out the locals. One night after work we went to Scuttlebutt (like I said earlier, this was a fairly daily event.) Once we were done "eating," I noticed 2 caches had posted just inside the 10 mile radius of my hotel. That put them about 14 miles away from where I was, and they had posted 30 minutes to an hour and a half before I left. They were on the same trail so I thought I would give it a shot. With one posting an hour after the other I might still have a shot at one.

I drove to the parking coordinates and found a nice established place where the locals go quading and dirt bike riding. So I began my half mile, mostly up hill hike to the "closest" of the two. Made it to ground zero and pulled out the smiley and FTF #42. I couldn't remember which one posted first, but there were no cars at the parking when I arrived so I went for the second one.

This one was almost exactly 528 ft away from my current location, but the direct route was not feasible (I did give it a good attempt though.) So I backtracked up the trail and found the appropriate fork to follow. This one wasn't just off the trail like the first one so some bushwhacking was warranted. I, of course, did far more bushwhacking than necessary, but I managed to find the container anyway. To my surprise and joy this log was unsigned as well for FTF #43 and a nice two-fer!

That was the only real excitement for the week. Other than that and the Scuttlebutt, I sat in my hotel room and ate pizza. :p

I'm home this weekend so next week's update should be on time. Hopefully by the end of the weekend I'll post my new puzzle to celebrate our 500th find (a little late, but I've had the stuff ready since before I left.) This one is a real doozy! I found what I needed to make it while solving some puzzles up in Marysville. This should rank right up there amongst the great brain busters in the Kent/Tukwila area.

Thanks for joining me again, and I'll see you next week!

Event Pictures

As promised, here are pictures from the geocaching 10! Year event that we hosted:

The signing in, travel bug trading, door prize winning, name tag making, table

Let's see how many I can identify...
utox2rox, krnklnmn, ImLuckiest (family), NWCrew, & theBadCop

BloomingIdiot, swissnavy, Rianthe

Most of the revelers!!

When you find a cache you sign a "log." Here's the official log for the event:)

Tom's Takeover Tuesday - 5/11(ish)

So here another addition of my caching adventure update...late as per normal lately. :)

So from Tuesday to Tuesday I found a couple FTFs. That was pretty much it...except I went on a trip to get our 500th find!!!A couple fellow cachers as I mentioned last week invited me on their 2000th find milestone trek. We all stopped 5 caches shy of our milestones. Thursday morning we met at our house, and off we went to Raymond. We stopped in Olympia to pick up 4 caches along the way that sounded interesting, it also cleared up a DNF (did not find) for one of the guys that was on the trip. Once we had those 4 it was on to Raymond.This cache was a multi that started in "downtown," went to a grave memorial sign, a town water tower, and then some trails in the woods. Once we got to waypoint 5 (parking) it was a mile hike to the final waypoint. (This is where Lynette posts a couple pictures of my trip. :p) Once you see the pictures you'll be almost as amazed as I was when we got there. What a place for a cache...and what a great place to celebrate a milestone!

At the end of the hike, this is what we found! It is the trunk of a HUGE tree that somebody hollowed out to make a little cabin:) SO COOL!

The men of the caching teams:
Tom (FugeFinders:P), Eric (WellJointed), Jim (TerribleT's)

The throne...and fire pit.

Franki and Jim (TerribleT's)

To follow up that great day, on Saturday I went out with a caching friend from Enumclaw to Olympia. We found a few caches down there before an event to celebrate someone's 3000th find. Then we went to Tacoma to try for an FTF that we didn't find because it was stolen before anyone found it ( it's not in a good neighborhood...) From there we got a call for help on a cache 5 minutes from there we found a couple days earlier. We laughed at them for a bit before they found it then we went off to find more caches! By the time the day was done, I had logged 20 caches, and the boys logged 21. That of course cost me an FTF 2.6 miles from our house....but it was a good day either way!

That's about it for the Tuesday report...I'll have more on Tuesday (or some day near Tuesday. :p)

Tom's Takeover Tuesday - 5/4

I might actually get this post in before Tuesday is over!

Our 10 Years! Celebration Event at Aversano's on Sunday was a smashing success. Pictures to come later, but we filled the back room. We got lots of compliments on the food and the interaction with the attendees. We raffled off ready made cache containers with swag, some trackable items, and a couple other little things that people donated to the event. We also played a couple rounds of "Guess the Coordinates" to the two caches I placed in honor of our event.

Once the picture was taken and the coordinates were passed out the place cleared out like it was on fire, but Lynette and I stuck around a little while longer with a few of the stragglers. I soon got a text from Jay (fozroc) that there was a 4 way FTF on one of the caches with him, Mike (GPSWonderer,) Ray (theDarknyght,) and John & Ryan (WindingPath.) Of course I figured Ryan would find a way to get another FTF on one of our caches... :) The bad news about that one was the fishermen who had set up shop near the cache stole the FTF prize which was a fully stocked ammo can. :(

The other cache was FTF'd by someone who had never gotten one before so "Yay!" for first time FTFers! That ammo can was right where I left it so I expect to see a new ammo can cache soon from them. Of course with all the containers we raffled off we're looking at about 8 more caches. :)

Sean (The McMorrows) hid a multi-cache to be published while everyone was at the event, but it didn't publish until just before 7 PM. I left Lynette with the last couple guests and went on my own FTF hunt. WindingPath didn't show up, but Kelly, Mason, and Eli (psykokiwi, macemakaio, and EagerSeeker) followed me to Enumclaw. Jay, Mike, and Ray were coming from one of our new caches, and Sean and fam met us there. Long story short, it was basically a 7 way FTF. :)

I raced out tonight and got another one in Enumclaw which brings my FTF total to 38. I have to show some restraint tomorrow night though. I have been invited by some of the other local cachers for a trip to have a joint milestone find on Thursday. It will be our 500th, and the other two cachers will be out for their 2000th finds!

That's it for now...it's super late (as indicated by someone snoring next to me. :D) See you all again next week!