I got up around 7:15 and got all my stuff ready. I was out the door by 7:50 and on my way to Bonney Lake to meet him at his house. I got stuck behind a bus and a huge truck hauling gravel pulled out in front of me just before I got to Roy. I was rather annoyed. I finally got some road behind me and was on my way up the 410 highway just before 9. Ben slept all the way until I got there. While he got ready I took a very short nap. We went upstairs and had some scrambled eggs before we made our way to Enumclaw. We took my car because his was being strange today. I set the GPS to the parking coord that was given. We decided to access the north end of the trail and work our way south. I didn't realize we would be doing a lot of gathering as we went.
There were traditionals along with a multi (and waypoints), a letterbox and a puzzle bonus cache at the end after you collect all of the letters and numbers. We should have read everything before we went. However, it all worked out in the end.
The first one, Birch Grove-EPT, was a small lock n lock container. I had to change my batteries because I was getting bogus readings. Ben searched until I had the GPS ready again. We walked past the container at least 8 times before going, oh...here it is, duh! Haha. The next one Bridging Watercress Creek-EPT, took us across a small single lane bridge over a pretty wide creek.
We climbed up the bank on the other side to a very large rock. Ben checked one hole and I checked the other. My hole contained the cache.
When we got to Horizontal Tree-EPT, you could tell how many people have walked down to where the cache was tucked away. I had Ben go find this one to give him some practice for upcoming caching trips in the future. He had no trouble with it.
Ben found and signed Guarding the Trail-EPT, one of the two magnetic caches of the day. It started getting warm outside.
As we trudged on to the next cache, I studied what to expect from the next cache, Teensy Weensy-EPT. The last cacher could not find it. I looked further into the logs and it looked like it was there, just very tricky to find. We were game. We looked in all the obvious places and then started expanding the search. I looked up and eventually saw something that didn't really belong but it blended in very well. I could see how people could miss this one. I think this was the cache that Ben used my forehead to write our names on the log, haha!
Arboreal-EPT was a little more than a tenth of a mile down the trail. When we arrived we totally looked past it. I looked up and it was on the back of the tree right in front of us. I should have brought glasses with me because I overlooked a lot of them this afternoon.
We moved onto the next cache along the rural trail. Posted Coords-EPT was actually at a post and of course I looked on the backside of it and Ben found the hole to the right that it was hidden inside of. We made our marks and walked to the next cache.
When we arrived to Off the Beaten Path-EPT, it was obvious of where the cache was hidden. Someone had piled sticks on top of it, lame. We pulled it out of its spot, signed the log, gathered the clue and put it back. This time we stuck leaves on top of it to make it a little harder for the next cacher to find.
The next cache was sure fun and memorable. City Limits-EPT was definitely awarded a favorite point. Funny thing is, if I was prepared I would have picked up all the cans along the trail today. I collect aluminum cans and recycle them when I get a few hundred pounds. I use the money to go on a vacation during the summer months. But when I got to the cache site with Ben, I was curious to see what we would find laying around. One of the hints was you can see Rainier from here. Yes, you could see Mount Rainier from the trail most of the day but from here the trees hid it from our view. The only other logical thing would be is if it was a Rainier beer can. I saw the can, Ben picked it up and shook it. You could hear the bison tube rattling around inside. We both thought it was pretty awesome. We got the tube out, signed our names and had some photo fun with it.
Endgame-EPT was the last traditional on our journey heading south. I saw the stump, tipped it over and didn't see anything. Ben saw my error and made the find. It was a bison tube attached to a screw on the stump. After signing our names and putting it back where we found it, I looked ahead to the letterbox, the multi and the puzzle bonus cache. We should have read them before we started in on the traditionals. We could have gathered the waypoints for the multi and the letterbox so we didn't have to back track. We only back tracked on the letterbox but it worked out for the multi and the puzzle cache.
We just drove to the finals after we figured out where they were. The math for the multi for some reason was wrong so I had to do it twice. Duh.
Before we left the area, we grabbed Up the Creek, which was a magnet attached to the guardrail near a small creek over a very busy road. The road eventually takes you up to the state parks, where I was last June for the state parks kick off celebration.
We parked the car at the south end and walked to the multi final. Ben found the cache.
We plugged the coordinates to the bonus cache after retrieving our last letter and number. It was less than a quarter mile south of where we were. We took the short little walk and grabbed the bonus puzzle cache.
We were hungry after our few hours on the trail. Ben suggested we eat our sandwiches at Ellenson Park. We hoped they had benches or picnic tables. We enjoyed our food, kicked the soccer ball around and played PIG. We took the soccer ball and kicked it at various points on the play structure. Officially it was a tie but I said I won. Haha. We stopped by one of my favorite locations in Enumclaw to grab one more cache, Ski Graveyard. I was here in January with Bob and Bev and loved the location. The cache wasn't all that exciting but a find is a find.
We went back to Bonney Lake, hung out and ate some dinner. I had to leave and go back home because I worked in the morning. I had a great time and here's to more in the near future!
Next Adventure: Taking the Camper Apart
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