Grab an organic latte, this one’s a long one.

A trend that Gwen and I have noticed is that for a lot of the caches we have tried to get, there are playgrounds near by. It’s essentially a function of finding urban caches … the caches tend to be in forested areas (easier to hide), and playgrounds tend to be near forested areas. Therefore, the two go together.

First, some shots from last weekend. Here’s the playground by Kits Beach — this wasn’t on a hunt for a cache, but it’s close to a couple.

Here are a couple of shots also from last weekend, in Horseshoe Bay. This playground was much closer to a cache. Well, it should have been. If you recall, we didn’t actually find that one.

This weekend was no different. On Friday, we spent a little of time at the playground by False Creek Elementary. Look at the leisure suit baby! And, notice he’s sitting in a big-kid’s swing and not one of the toddler swings.

On Saturday, we grabbed a BCGA (BC Geocacher’s Association) geocoin from a cache near QE Park in a dash-and-go (we pulled up, dug the cache from under a lamp post, grabbed the coin, and put it back all in about 5 minutes) and then headed down to White Rock.

Before we searched for any caches down there, though, we came to a level crossing where a train was about to cross. We quickly pulled over and hustled the boy out of the car. He just quivered with excitement and yelled “Train!” for the whole time that it roared by. For the rest of the evening we continued to hear the train whistles and every time he heard one, he yelled “Train!”. This bodes well for our planned “Thomas the Tank Engine” excursion coming up in June.

Our first couple of White Rock caches were on Blackie’s Spit. No playground there, but there was a film crew (although we couldn’t see what/where they were filming).

So, I hear you wondering, what do caches look like? Here’s a shot of a cache. Well, actually the cache is about 15 feet into the bush there. That one was a “regular” cache, in a lock-and-lock about 1 litre in volume.

Here’s another shot of a cache. That one was a micro-cache, in fact it was a pill container. The stones were neat, with inspirational writing on them. What’s that in TheBoy’s hands?

We headed up to Crescent Park afterwards, going after three more caches. Unsurprisingly, there was a playground there too!

The first cache was in the woods, by a “fitness trail”. The “fitness trail” consisted of hurdles, parallel bars, and other odd equipment in a deep-woods environment. This was also a micro-cache, and you can see the excitement of finding it!

Aidan loves being on trails in the woods, and you can see that he really likes it when he’s not confined! I wish he were a little *less* independent, though.

The next cache was a bit of a challenge, but we eventually found it. You can see some of the cache contents below. There was a “True North” geocoin as well as a travel bug. There’s a shot of the travel bug in action too.

The last cache we tried to find required quite a bit of bushwacking. Neither Gwen or I could find it, and after stirring up a bees’ nest, we abandoned the search. We were going to drop the coin in that cache, so instead we went back to the previous one and exchanged the BCGA for the True North geocoin.

We found four caches today too. The first one was up in a tree and easy to find. It was in “The Circle” in Shaughnessy. We dropped the True North geocoin in the cache while Aidan ran around in the park, exercising his independence. Again. After that, it was down to Vanier Park to pick up a few caches. The first one we tried was already discovered by a family — two kids, two parents, and a grandparent — who were sitting on a bench. We approached them, asked if they were geocaching, and swapped stories while filling out the logs. While we were doing *that*, the cache owner came by and joined in. She mentioned that the cache had been there for a year, and she walks by it often. And she had never seen anyone with the cache and today, there were two teams at once!

We made our way down to the next cache, out on the point behind the Vancouver Maritime Museum, and what do you know? There was another family there with that cache. This group was trying much harder to conceal what they were doing, but if you know what to look for (it’s not much) it’s hard to be invisible. So, once again it was an easy find. The hilarious thing was that after we left the cache, the first family we encountered went down to try to find it. The second family hadn’t replaced the cache, so we had the following situation: the family with the cache was trying to be invisible, waiting for this new crowd of people to leave the area where the cache needed to be replaced, and the family looking for the cache was trying to be invisible which searching for the cache. It was hilarious, because they were both trying to ignore the cache location while at the same time focussing quite intently on it. They must have resolved it because when we came back that way an hour later, they were both gone.

We headed down to Granville Island, picked up a “virtual cache” and searched once again (and unsuccessfully once again) for the one we had previously missed on the Island.

Whew, what a weekend. We doubled our cache count from 9 to 18!

Still reading? Wow! Well, if you’re that interested, you can check out a map of all our finds, and take a look at some statistics on them.

See that? That’s our new “mark”. We’ve printed up a bunch of stickers with that on them so that when we come across cache we can make a distinctive entry instead of wet hen-scratching. Or “teacher printing” when Gwen makes the entries.

We were out both Saturday and today with the intention of finding some caches, but both days progressed quite a bit differently.

On Saturday, we went over to Horseshoe Bay via Home Depot and Wal*mart. No, really. We were looking for a step-stool large enough that Aidan can reach the sink in the bathrooms. And maybe other places. Home Depot, surprisingly, had nothing at all. So, we stopped at the North Van Wal*mart on our way to Horseshoe Bay (where we did buy one of the reasonably priced, folding two-step plastic variety). These little trips meant that by the time we actually made it to the village, it was lunch time, or slightly later. The first cache we were looking for was pretty near a playground (a surprising number of them are!) so Aidan spent some time running off steam in it. We tried to feed him some day-old cucumber rolls after that, but he wasn’t so interested. We wandered around near where we thought the cache was supposed to be, but a few things were working against us:

1. We were looking for a buffalo tube. What? Yeah, we have no idea either. It’s small though.
2. We were trying to shepherd an ambulatory toddler.
3. There were lots of parked cars around.
4. There were lots of people milling about.
5. A group of young people set-up a game of “toss-the-football” near to where we thought the cache should be.
6. The wind was excessively cold and neither Gwen nor I thought to bring a wind-breaker.
7. Did I mention the ambulatory toddler?
8. And, by this time, it was into/past said toddler’s nap-time.

As a result, we felt overly conspicuous and decided to abandon the search. No harm, no foul — there were plenty of other caches. This one seemed even more exposed. This one seemed to be in the middle the Sea-to-Sky highway construction through Eagle Ridge Bluffs. And, we couldn’t find the entrance to the park for this one, as I forgot to copy all the important information to the PDA. I had solved the pig-speak puzzle, though, and we found another playground. Due to the crankiness of TheBoy though, we didn’t spend long there.

Determined to make a better go of it, today we headed out to the Pacific Spirit Regional Park near UBC. My bike was still at work since Gwen and Aidan had picked me up to go for take-out and a beach supper on Friday night. Instead of just driving out there ($1.295 for gas on Saturday!!! $1.209 today. Go figure.) and picking it up, I figured we could pick up a few “easy” caches. By the time we pulled into the parking lot of the first attempt, it was drizzling pretty good. This one gave the coordinates for the beginning of the hunt, and then written directions from there. There were three segments: from the parking lot to an intersection of trails, along another trail to a bench, and from the bench along a third trail a set distance. Except I forgot to mark the location of the bench in the GPSr, and so we didn’t have a good sense of how far we needed to go. After walking in the ever-increasing rain much too far, and searching in tree-stumps that were guilty of nothing more than being “large, old stumps”, we walked empty-handed back to the bench. I marked two locations: the place we thought looked promising at another trail intersection, and a second location about half-way back that also looked promising. When we arrived back to the bench and measured the distances between all the points, we discovered that we had gone much too far and the second point I had marked on our way back was in fact the most likely place for the cache. We backtracked and after some 5 minutes or so looking in a few “large, old stumps” Gwen pointed to the top of the stump we had been giving the most attention to. I climbed up it and lo’: the cache was actually in the stump from the top.

Feeling buoyed (yet somewhat saturated) we returned to the truck and decided to attempt another cache. Mind you, the first one had taken us nearly an hour and three-quarters to suss out. Reckoning the second would be easier (because I mistakenly thought it was close to the trail head) we made our way down to see if we could find BC’s first geocache (placed in February 2001). We parked the truck at the trailhead on 4th Ave and went into the woods. It was drizzling significantly harder by this time. The trail we wanted to go down was blocked by one of those “chicane” gates designed to prevent bicycles from getting through, and guess what? They’re pretty effective at preventing strollers too. We wandered down a parallel trail but after going some distance, it became obvious that we werent’ getting to where we needed to go. So, we hiked back to the gate and lifted the stroller up and over it. Then it got interesting. The trail was pretty muddy and slick, and since it wasn’t a “main” trail, there were lots of rocks and tree roots. I was glad we had the All Terrain Stroller with us, but there were a few times that I was concerned that I was going to push it through a mud hole and not get it out. Gwen was having a tough time with it, slipping around in the mud and slick rocks. Eventually we made it to where the cache was, or close to it, and Gwen hiked off into the woods a bit to locate the box while I entertained TheBoy. TheBoy seemed to think that we were on a great adventure, singing pretty much the whole way, interjecting with “wheee!” and “whoa!” when I pushed him through the mud holes at high velocity and tried not to dump him out. After a few minutes searching, Gwen came back out of the woods victorious. We placed our stamp, left a speckled frog, and beat our way back through the mud to the car. It was just after 7pm by the time we made it back to the car. The stroller was caked with mud. We’ve decided to leave it in the back of the truck overnight (and through part of the day tomorrow, I’m sure) so that it can dry out before we try to clean it up.

So, things I’ve learned this weekend:

1. Bring appropriate clothing for unexpected weather.
2. You cannot over-prepare a hunt: more information sucks a whole lot less than not enough.
3. Related: The waypoint and hint (in the GPSr) are not enough: the cache info page (including relevant maps) need to be in the PDA too.
4. TheBoy controls the schedule. If trying something before his nap, do it well before. Early enough that you can get him back for the nap. If doing something after his nap, be sure to finish well before bedtime (7:30!) and if cutting it close, bring supper for him.
5. Don’t try to find caches without Gwen.
6. Trust the technology rather than your sense of direction. (Anthony)
7. Trust your sense of direction rather than your husband’s (Gwen)

I’m sure there’s others (don’t overfeed TheBoy too far after bedtime is one) but those deserve another story.

We returned to Queen Elizabeth Park today. It was another gorgeous day, and we wanted to tackle the puzzle cache again.  This time, armed with the knowledge that the cache was 30 m south of the given coordinates, we found it in no time.  Well, yes, you guessed it,  Gwen found it.  But to be fair, I didn’t even get a chance to look as I was taking the long way around the garden with Aidan.  That cache gave us another set of coordinates, and after making our way there, *I* found the next part of the cache.  This third location was pretty close to another cache in the park.  This one was up a small semi-buried pipeline into the trees.  Aidan and I played in the adjacent field (“catch me! catch me!”) while Gwen searched.  She didn’t find it so we switched jobs.  I located the cache, which was a peanut butter jar.  It was hidden behind some rocks buried under some tree roots.  The jar had lots of loot in there, but nothing that appealed to us.  However, we were able to leave our first speckled frog!

The fourth part of the puzzle cache was located beside a small stream in the park, and after 10 or 15 minutes of searching we found the cache.  We got the general location from the GPSr, and set about finding “large flatish” rocks under which the cache was supposed to be located.  I fixated on one good candidate, but it wasn’t the right rock.  Gwen suggested moving downstream, and after locating several more candidate rocks, I managed to point out a likely location and Gwen pulled out the lock box.  This one also had lots of loot, and we took a small metal heart-shaped “worry stone”.  We left another speckled frog too.

So, although we found four caches today, we were only able to log two.  :(  Oh well.

It’s been a great weekend — Aidan and I walked Gwen to church today and spent some time in the playground at the Granville Loop.  We’ve easily spent 5 or 6 hours outside both yesterday and today.  The boy slept well last night and I’m sure that it’ll be a good sleep tonight too!

Today, we went geocaching in Queen Elizabeth Park. The park has at least 6 different caches, only had time for two. Well, actually it’s a bit more complicated than that…

When we got back to the park, again (we forgot the PDA with the cache notes the first time), we were parked pretty close to a cache, and so started with that one! This cache was the start of a multi-stage cache. This means that the first stage contains information on how to find the second stage, the second tells you how to find the third, and so on. The GPSr got us pretty close — right beside a tennis court — and after a little bit of searching, I found a magnetic key holder stuck inside a metal overhang/flashing. That’s right kiddies, I found one. Inside the cache was a laminated piece of paper with a new set of coordinates and what seemed to be a Roman numeral III or maybe a drawing of a ladder, we’re not sure. Going to the new location, which was beside the lawn bowling club, we had some problems. There wasn’t anywhere obvious where the cache was hidden, and we didn’t have any clues other than the coordinates. We searched for quite some time and then decided to go look for a different cache.

So we headed up the hill a bit and discovered that the parks board apparently installed a pedestrian plaza beside the Bloedel Conservatory, replete with a huge fountain and what seemed to be bus shelters. It’s hard to explain. The weather was gorgeous, so we let Aidan out of the stroller and run around a bit. Well, kinda. Gwen kept pretty close tabs on him.

After spending quite a bit of time at the fountain, we made our way down the hill a bit to the next cache. This one was a bit frustrating. It was in and about a clump of trees, so the GPSr wasn’t great in locating the cache. And the hint was “Between the tree and the boulder”. In a park. Do you know (a) how many trees are there? and (b) how many boulders are there? Worst. Clue. Ever. Seriously. So, we pushed the “mall stroller” up and down a rain-saturated lawn, several times, looking around every single tree and boulder combination we could find. There were many. I looked under one particular tree that happened to have quite a thorny bush beneath. Or so I discovered once I dropped to my knees to look closer and duck under some branches. I can’t believe there wasn’t blood.

Gwen picked up one box she thought was the cache and, um, it turned out to be a rat trap. Ewwwww. And then she found another. Didn’t pick that one up, though.

We spent quite a bit of time looking for that darned box. Eventually I gave Gwen the GPSr and not 5 minutes later she called that she had the box. Keeping score? Gwen: 4, Anthony: 1.

This particular cache is the Vancouver Travel Bug Hub. Inside the cache box, there were tonnes of travel bugs! The picture below (taken near, but not at the cache location) shows what we found in it!

We didn’t take anything, but we’ll be sure to visit this cache before we go travelling next (when ever that will be).

On our way back to the car we tried to find the second stage of the multi-cache again. And once again we were stymied. Fatigued but not defeated, we headed home. Where I discovered that there were clues to the other stages, but they weren’t available on the PDA! The clue for the second stage was, of course, to look for the cache 100 ft south of the given coordinates! Huh? No wonder we didn’t find it. Maybe we’ll head back out tomorrow to close this one off.