Ben's New Car and New Year's Eve

Ben had saved up enough money to replace his Explorer and finally give his mom back the truck back he had been borrowing for a few months.  He found two cars on the internet in the Puyallup area that he wanted to test drive.

The day before, he got up, came and got me and we drove out to River Road in Puyallup.  The first car, a CrossTrek at a small dealership...was the first one we test drove was a really pretty car but it had been in three accidents.  The dealer only knew about the one accident that rendered it totaled.  The insurance company paid to have it fixed.  We drove it down to Trish's work and had it looked at.  The mechanic said it wasn't worth it...we thought so, but we had to make sure.  Then we test drove the second car, a Subaru Impreza.  That one was much better and worth his money.  He was sold on it but we had to come back on New Year's Eve to go through the paperwork, which will take some time.

I got up after staying up late the night before.  I waited until Ben got to my house.  Today he got here earlier so we had more time for paperwork and driving time.  Unfortunately we had to kinda be in a hurry because he had to work on his day off at the casino.  They needed all hands on deck for the New Year's Eve party the place was putting on.  He said that he might get off around 11.  Here is hoping.  We got to the shop and immediately started doing paperwork.  I got popcorn and went upstairs to talk to Trish for a while.

Downstairs, there was a lot of waiting around and paperwork.  About two hours into it, he had all the papers signed and the financial stuff taken car of.  The next step was to be handed the keys and walk out the door for some pictures.

Basically, we headed home immediately after we drove it off the lot.  I knew he was stressing about getting to work on time.  He dropped me off and I got all of my stuff ready to go over to Celeste's house for our party.  I immediately got all of my stuff I had packed inside my car and drove to Yelm to pick up pizza's for dinner.  Then I got a text message from Ben that kind of hurt my feelings but I understood.  He apologized about it later and he felt bad about sending it but he was stressed at the time.  I got the pizza and headed out towards Celeste's house.

To my understanding, Nicole, Kathy, Jim, David and Celeste were there already and Megan, Matt and Mason will be arriving later on.  Ben was going to try and make it after he was off work at 11.  Lindsay and Justin were sick and Lance was in Chelan for the holiday.

When I got there I realized I did not get any gluten free pizza and I felt bad because now Nicole doesn't have any dinner to eat.  I was glad Kathy had some gluten free buns to make a pizza on.  We get the pizza's in and while we waited for them we played Kings Crown.  I had a couple of good rounds and a couple of not-so-great ones.  It was fun watching David and Kathy try to play.  Jim got the hang of it.

We ate pizza, chips and dip and some other appetizers we had at hand.  Then we started a round of Cards of Humanity.  We even got to play with some cards I haven't seen before and they were just as inappropriate as the cards we've been using.  As it reached 10ish, we had to start thinking about what worldly New Year's traditions we were going to do.   We made some Marzipan pigs, got our 12 grapes together, got the champagne out and wrote our wish down to burn, we all talked about what color underwear we were wearing and what each color meant for the new year.  We had black-eyed pea dip, we were going to step on the right foot and drink our wish.

About 11:30 we had everything laid out and ready to eat, drink or do at midnight.  I set aside some for Ben if he made it on time.  I saw some headlights coming down the driveway at 11:55.  He made it to Celeste's house with five minutes to spare.  I was very surprised he got there in time from Rochester.  I knew he sped here.  I was setting up the GoPro when he came through the door.

We counted down the last few seconds of 2014 and indulged with our traditions from around the world.  When we were done we all had our kisses at midnight.

We all loitered for about another hour and decided to all go home.  Ben came over to my house and took a 2 hour safety nap before I had to kick him out.  It was an interesting NYE and I've never spent one like that before.  Here's to many more!

Next Adventure:  Welcome to Renton, Home of the Seahawks and the WSGA Holiday Party

Nicole's Birthday Party at Skateland

We've been running through ideas on how to celebrate Nicole's birthday party.  We wanted to combine it with Fitzy but she really didn't seem to care all that much about it.  We came up with wine tasting at Uncork and Unwind, same place as last year, and some skating at Skateland.  I haven't been there since January 2012.

I decided not to go to the wine place mostly because I work on Saturdays and I needed to go home first to change, eat food and grab the roller blades.  I thought it would be fun to film some of it on the Go Pro, so I got that ready.  I grabbed Nicole's birthday gift and headed out.  I texted Amber to see if she wanted to come since she was in town until January 3rd.  She responded with, "where are you guys?"  I was within minutes of the place.

I paid my $4.50 and went inside to try and find everyone.  Megan, Matt, Amber, David, Celeste and Nicole were all inside getting their skates on.  I was the only one who brought their own.  Nicole was the first one to fall on her butt and we weren't even on the rink yet.  But then again, I am not sure how much wine they had earlier.

We skated from about 7:30 until 9 off and on.  They played games, had couples skating and we played around with the Go Pro, visited and laughed a lot at Nicole and Celeste.

I am so lucky to have gotten this shot of Celeste as she falls into the side of the rink.

And of Nicole and Amber laughing at her.

It was a fun night.  Plus, we got to do something different we normally don't do when we all hang out.  I guess we are trying to broaden our horizons a bit while the weather is cold and or rainy.  I stopped by Nicole's house with my present and we visited for a few hours.

Next Adventure:  New Year's Eve

Christmas!

My dad came in around 8:30 saying that I had to get up and move the cars into the backyard.  I slept for about 15 minutes more and then got up and got some warm clothes on, grabbed all the keys and started each car.  I moved dad's first.  When I got to the back yard I found out the suburban wasn't pulled up far enough and I couldn't get into it because it was frozen.  I gave up and tried plan B.  I moved the duck gate and backed dad's car in as close as I could.  I went and got Doug's car and backed it up next to dad's.  I put the duck gate back up and parked mom's sideways in the driveway next to the gate.  I moved mine down the hill out of the way since there was no more room in the back yard.  I came back inside and got ready for Christmas.  Everyone started to arrive at 9.

Tracy was going to be late so we ate without her.  This time mom made a tater tot casserole and we had fruit, cinnamon rolls and orange juice.  It was tasty.  Grammie of course was the last person eating when we were done.  She gets caught up talking to everyone.  We continued visiting and Tracy showed up a bit later.  We let her eat, dad did the dishes and we all got the dining room and kitchen cleaned up.

We went into the "Christmas room", sat down and got all situated.  Then Karla got up and passed out presents to everyone.  Due to the economy and people having circumstances and whatnot, we all picked names and kept it under $50.  I had my mom and Tracy had me.  We all opened our presents and then threw waded up Christmas paper at each other...something we do every year.

I got two storage bins, a gray one and a red one and inside was a Seahawks shirt, hat, a pen, cougar mug, ninja turtles buttons and a package of goldfish.  Everything I liked inside of a bin.  She did a good job.  Everyone else got stuff they wanted as well.  We continued chatting while a few of them went outside to teach Tracy how to use her new propane heater.

Usually everyone is out of here before noon to get ready for dinner later and to take naps.  Everyone came back in from outside and we took a picture of everyone.

I gave out copies of the pictures for people to have.  They all loaded up their stuff and away they went.  Mom and dad started getting ready for dinner and I got ready to go to Puyallup.  I left around 2.  I put the address into the Nuvi and she told me I would get there in about 40 minutes...plenty of time before 3.

I arrived twenty minutes before 3, found a place to park and went in.  Trish, Amy and Ben immediately found me and we opened gifts.  I brought some stuff mom made them, including a card...Ben gave me my second gift.  Our first actual Christmas together...we mutually agreed that last Christmas we were just warming up.  Then he showed me what his aunt and uncle gave us.  Gift cards, Bailey's and some winter mugs for coffee or cocoa.

We hung out for a bit talking to his cousins, aunts, uncles and grandma.  Then his uncle went around and asked how they wanted their steak.  I was like steak?  We're having steak for Christmas dinner?  Yeah, steak and lobster.  Okay, now we're getting fancy and I am way under dressed, haha.  I am really not into lobster so I just had the steak.  We all sat down at dinner and ate.  There were the main courses, potatoes, asparagus, rolls, jello salad, salad and dressing and whatever we wanted to drink.  I've never had a Christmas dinner like this before.  We visited a little bit more before everyone had to go home for the evening.  I was dreading having to get up in the morning and go to work.

We went over to Walt and Wendy's house to hang out and I got to meet Chris's fiance, Rosa.  We chatted and then got talked into playing a game.  I really didn't want to get into a 2-hour game only because I needed to get home and in bed as soon as possible.  We ended up playing Catan and staying until almost 10:30.  We hustled into Bonney Lake and Ben wanted to take me to see the Christmas lights on Sky Island...we did this last year and are trying to make it a tradition.  We also found a cache, Sky Island Viewpoint (GC2D4YG).  It was really cold outside so we tried to hurry.

We went to his mom's house and got everything he needed to do done.  I had planned on a gift for his mom but had to collect the items first.  We got almost all of them and now I can start working on it.  We got everything in the car and headed back to my house.  Of course it was 2 a.m. and I was exhausted.  I barely got 10 hours of sleep in the past 2 days, tomorrow was going to SUCK!

Merry Christmas everyone!

Next Adventure:  Nicole's Party at Skateland

Christmas Eve

I got up around 10 and started helping mom clean up the house.  The previous day, we did a few things around the house and did some last minute shopping.  I ate some lunch while I watched the latest Christmas movie on the Hallmark channel.  Mom started with the dining room and then did some stuff in the family room where the Christmas tree was.  A few weeks ago Grandma and I went to Gerrits Greens and got our trees.  When I was done eating, I worked on the dining room where I started with the bird cage.  I have a parakeet named Jimmy and sadly, his cage has been neglected the past few months...

Once that was done I worked on the area around the pellet stove and then vacuumed the rest of the living room and under neath the chairs and coffee table.  Then we took a couple of breaks because mom had to stay off her foot as much as possible.  He has tendinitis in her foot and had to wear a walking boot for a few weeks.

We took a bunch of stuff that belonged in a shop or garage into the garage, neatly.  Dad got all of his cartridge casings and boxes out of the family room and into the extra bedroom and his bathroom for the time being.  They were in the family room for at least two to three months.   We washed all of the door towels and futon blankets.  We took another break for food and then watched part of A Christmas Story...a Christmas Eve tradition.  We try to watch at least one showing of the 24-hour marathon on TBS.

Ben came over around 7:30 to come see me before he went over to his mom's house for dinner.  We didn't know when Doug would show up so we let Ben open his presents because he had to be somewhere.  He opened my presents, then dad's and then the one thing mom got him.   Jonas helped him unwrap presents.

He went out and got mine.  They were the climbing shoes we bought in Spokane a few weeks earlier.  We took a few pictures before he had to leave.

Doug got home a little bit later.  Mom and I did some of the dining room and decided to do family presents before dad fell asleep.  We all went into the family room and did presents.  I got a power stick (a device that allows you to charge your phone or Ipod without a power source) and a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle sweatshirt.

After presents we finished the dining room, did some laundry and mopped the floor.  I went to bed around 1:30 that night.  I really didn't want to get up at 9 tomorrow morning.

Merry Christmas Eve everyone!

Next Adventure:  Christmas!

White Elephant Party

Last year we had a white elephant gift exchange, games and food and this year we wanted to do it again.  We all got together and discussed over our online group what we wanted to do, where, what food and what time and what day.  We came up with Thursday at 6 at Celeste's house.  The food would be holiday-ish, ham, mashed potatoes, rolls, dips, casseroles etc.

Megan provided the ham and the casserole, I made mashed potatoes and gravy and got some rolls.  Nicole made a dip, Celeste made asparagus bacon wraps and ham sauce.  Lance would cut the ham and get everything into their bowls and containers once it was done.  I could not wait to eat the food!

We played some Phase 10 while we waited for the ham to finish cooking.  Ben and I busted out the Go Pro and played with the many angles as we took turns with our cards.  He got some fun views.

Then the ham was done.  Food!!

We ate our food in harmony and the ham and mashed potatoes idea was excellent.  So far the best food to date.

Once everyone arrived, Lindsay and Justin were late, we decided to open our gifts and play with the Christmas frame.  It was a true white elephant gift exchange.  I went first and got some Christmas socks, a movie and candy.  Ben got Mac n cheese and pot holders.  I gave the 50 Shades of Gray trilogy and a winter hat and Ben bought a mind puzzle maze ball from the White Elephant store a week ago.  I love random.

We played Nicole's Cards of Humanity Christmas style and her Christmas Jeopardy featuring movies, reindeer, Santa, Elf, etc.  We all had a blast and my team only lost by $100...which is an accomplishment since we started off slow but made up for it in double Jeopardy.  A few of us had to work the next day so we called it a night just before midnight.  I hope we can do it again next year.  Happy Holidays everyone!

Next Adventure:  Christmas!

Interview, Shopping, Cache Advance and the Trip Back to the West Side

We got up the next morning with enough time for him to shower, put his suit on, gather our stuff and leave.  We would eat food after his interview.  We planned it to where we had exactly enough time to get up the hill to Airway Heights and to the fire station.  When we got there, I told him good luck and that he knows how to answer every single question they shoot at him, and there was another kid from Oregon sitting in his truck waiting for his turn.

In the meantime, I went and found a couple caches.

The first one was literally right down the street from the station.  For some reason I didn't add Airway Heights to my query so I had to use my phone.  I knew I would have enough time for a few but not a ton of them.  Plus, it had started to sprinkle.  I drove the quarter of a mile to the end of the road with a cement block preventing people from driving into the sage brush, dirt and rocks.  Roadside Snag II:  Concrete Blond (GC2CZPJ) was a quick find.  It was hidden underneath some of the rocks on the side of the road.

The next one, TB Executive Hotel (GC53MEN) was on the next street over.  When I got there, the end of the road was a very large cul-de-sac with a homeless guy on a bike.  I sat in the Escape for a bit hoping he would leave soon.  As soon as I decided to get out he pedaled away.  I jumped down a small embankment and near a pile of dirt and rocks.  I looked for the obvious rock pile and there it was.  I signed our names and put it back better than I found it.

I drove across Hwy 2 to a small park.  I thought I knew what I was looking for and where it was.  I didn't find it and the rain was coming down harder.  It may have not been there too.  I decided to move on to another one before Ben called.  As I was getting closer to the next cache, Ben called and wanted me to come pick him up.  I told him it would be a few minutes.  I went back across Hwy 2 and down the road towards the station.  I picked him up and asked how his interview went.  He said on a numeric scale from 1-10 he believed he did an 8.  And now we wait for the results.  I could be a few days to about a month, Ben said it varies.

He wanted pancakes so we drove to Division and found an IHOP.  The place was busy!  Lots of old people wanting pancakes in the middle of the afternoon on a Thursday.  Our waitress was strange but we enjoyed our pancakes, bacon and eggs.  I had blueberry and Ben had pumpkin.

We decided to go do some shopping.  We went to the Mountain Gear Retail to look at climbing shoes.  He wanted to get me my own for Christmas so we can go more often and have the comfort of not wearing rental shoes.  I found some blue ones that would do the trick.  We went across the street to a billiards/furnature store that was being remodeled to ask questions about resurfacing a pool table.  I saw some of the cool Cougar tables, bar stools and lamps.  Go COUGS!

We went across the street and a few blocks south to the White Elephant Store!  This is a must go to when in Spokane.  It is the coolest, most random store you will ever go into.  Anything from sporting goods, to guns to fishing gear to toys.  We looked at some stuff for present ideas.  I found a couple things to give my dad and Ben for Christmas as well as a small Grumpy Cat just to have.  Then I had an idea.  We should go visit the new Cache Advance cache cave!  I looked at the hours of operation and it said closed for Thursdays.  I contacted Lisa and she said she would come open it just for us to come and visit.  We drove up and met her at 3.

A few years back during the Coeur d'Alene cache machine, we went to a brunch at her residence, where she did the business out of her basement. When you get a lot of people downstairs you're basically rubbing elbows with your neighbor.  A few months ago, she had the opportunity to expand the business into a warehouse and I couldn't wait to go see it.  We went in and she showed us the office, the merchandise room and the warehouse.  We talked about random things, mini vacations, caching stories, milestones, etc.  We found the cache, Cave-Inn (GC4RMEP) and signed the log and looked at her FTF Magazines.  I submitted my 10,000th cache milestone a few months back and they said they would try and publish them but no promises.  I thought they would contact you if they chose you.  I just figured that I wasn't chosen because I never heard back.  Turns out I was published in the Sept-Oct issue of FTF Magazine!  I was so stoked!  Lisa said she would have given me the copy but it's her only one for the business.

My photo and description is the second one down on the left.

It was time to say goodbye and start thinking about heading back to the west side.  We thanked Lisa for taking the time out of her day to let us come visit the cache cave.  We drove back to Chaz's to make sure we got everything and to thank him for letting us stay with him. He gave us this blue soda with jalapeno juice in it. We told him we would let him know the next time we are over this way and when Ben found out if he got the job or not.  We left Spokane and got onto I-90 around 5.

I listened to music while Ben did a little bit of sleeping.  I wish it was the summer time so we could have more daylight to stop and see some things.  I really wanted to cache in the gorge area and Vantage.  Maybe next time.  It was reaching 7:30 that evening and we needed to stop and get gas and eat dinner.  We really weren't sure where we wanted to stop for food so we drove around for a few minutes.  The only thing that stood out to us was the Rodeo City BBQ.  Ben's beer came in a boot and we had some delicious bbq'd meat and sides.

We called our moms to tell them were we were.  Mom said the wind was pretty bad and the power went off as I was talking to her.  Great.  Just want I want to come home to, no power.

We went over the pass and the wind was not an issue.  By this time it had died down a lot.  We got onto Hwy 18 and merged onto I-5.  I still had to drop Ben off at the fire station.  That meant I was not going to get home until at least midnight or later.  It was almost midnight when we made it to the station.  A lot of guys were on shift mostly because of the downed trees, power lines and other hazards.  I helped Ben bring in his stuff while we visited with the guys.  He let the guys taste the soda and a lot of them were like what the heck is this?!  We laughed and told them what it was.  I had to start heading home.  I was late and I had to work the next day and the power is out.  When I did get home, I unpacked some stuff, got ready for bed via flashlight and bottled water and went to bed.  Long long day.

Next Adventure:  White Elephant Party

Trip to Spokane for Interview

Ben got himself an interview.  It was in Airway Heights, just west of Spokane and it worked out that it was on our days off.  A few weeks ago he drove over to Spokane for a physical exam in which he passed pretty easily.  Unfortunately, he had to do this drive over and back in one day and he had to miss a day of work.  He said it was a long day and hopefully worth it.  He took the Escape.

We heard back a few weeks later for an interview scheduled on December 11.  That week, we both had Wednesday and Thursday off so we planned to head on over Wednesday.  Ben got a hold of his cousin Chaz, who has lived in Spokane for over a decade with his girlfriend Karen.  We asked if they had room for us for a night and they were excited to have us.  We prepared for those two days as best as we could with the amount of time we had between work and other responsibilities.

I tried to get as much stuff together as I could and packed in the Escape.  I knew this day would show up really fast.

On Wednesday I got up around 10, ate something really quick and packed up the rest of the stuff.  I made sure I had both sleds, my warm clothes and the Go Pro because we were going to stop on Snoqualmie Pass and go sledding for about an hour.  I told Ben he needed to get up around 11:30 to get his shower and to start getting ready so we could get on the road as soon as possible.  Mostly because it would start getting dark around 4:30.

I called Ben on the way to Rainier and he did not answer.  One of two things could be happening:  he is in the shower or he was still asleep.  I was hoping in the shower.  I got onto 507 and headed towards Tenino.  Just after the equestrian center and the bridge, I saw the ROAD CLOSED sign up ahead and the giant tree over the highway.  Ugh.  I turned around and headed back to Rainier.  I wish they would have told us in Rainier so we could have taken the back road the first time.  I got to Rainier and went up the hill to Military...the back road to Tenino.  I was so glad we were leaving town for the biggest windstorm this year.  I just can't stand hearing and watching the trees try to kill me.

I got to the station around noon and one of his co-workers saw me and let me in.  We woke him up when they knocked on his door and told him that he had a visitor.  I walked in. You're not up yet!?  He rolled over and looked at his phone.  I didn't hear my alarm or when you called.  You need to get up and start getting ready.  It's going to be a long trip and it will get dark soon.  He got motivated, clean and got the rest of his stuff together.  We left around 1:15 and topped off at the local Arco before we got onto I-5 north.

On the way to Federal Way and the Hwy 18 junction, we ate our peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, corn nuts and vitamin water.  We listened to music and talked about various subjects.  We got onto Hwy 18 and merged onto I-90.  There were a lot of trucks out today...must be a truck day.  It was great to be in a vehicle that could actually make the grade up to the pass without over heating, having to pull over and waste time.

Just before we got to the pass, Ben got out the Go Pro and we filmed part of the drive and took some pictures.

We got closer to the pass and we saw absolutely NO snow.  There was NO snow on the pass in December.  There wasn't even any compacted snow from previous storms.  We couldn't go sledding.  We were so disappointed.  We drove on towards Ellensburg.

I wanted to stop at the Rye Grass rest stop to get a cache that wasn't there the last time I drove on through.  We got through Ellensburg, waved to Willmarth over the hill in Yakima and made our way to Vantage. The rest area was up on the hill just before you got to Vantage.  This area was known for their windmill farm.  I turned the GPS on and we pulled off the freeway into the rest area.  We used the bathroom and took pictures of the windmills with the really cool fog.

I could almost walk to the cache off pure memory but decided to put it in the GPS...apparently my query didn't load all of them, but we managed.  Ben wore the Go Pro and I navigated.  We both walked towards Ryegrass East (GCXW6B) and found Mr. Gadget's cache and this time it was there and he made sure by locking it to a nearby sage bush.  It was not going anywhere.  I added some swag, we took the TB and we signed our names.

When we got back to the Escape, it was getting dark and it was time to switch drivers.  We put the Go Pro away and got back onto I-90.  I told him we had one more stop in George, Washington.  The entire time he thought that place was called Gorge, Washington.  I told him it is part of the gorge but the town in called George.  He laughed.  I also said we had to stop and pick George Washington's nose.

I got the GPS set to AgFarmation Travel Bug Motel (GC3RQAB) and led him right to it.  If we had more daylight I would have gotten the others to the north of us.  We got out, circled around the coffee shop and found the cute little bird house the cache was hidden inside of.

After the cache, we drove the short distance to the statue of George Washington.  I picked his nose and Ben posed with him and a dollar bill.  We tried to hurry because we didn't want to look weird to the lady walking her dog...and we needed to put some miles behind us.

From there, it was smooth sailing to Ritzville, where we topped off the gas and almost ate Ritz crackers because they were in the back just for fun.  The one thing about the Escape is that it won't make it from my house to Spokane on one tank of gas.  You have to be strategic on where you stop and how much gas you have.  If this turns out to be a real lifestyle change, we will need to be prepared for when we drive back and forth across the state.

It was about 7:45 when we came down the hill to the sparkling lights of Spokane.  Many memories came back from when I lived in Pullman, about 90 miles south of here, when we would come up for the weekends to enjoy a bigger atmosphere.  Ben put his cousin's address into his GPS and off we went to a part of Spokane I've never been to but recognized some of the street names.  We found his road and then the front of the house.

Chaz got home about the same time we pulled up.  He hadn't eaten and neither did we so we all piled into his car and we drove to a diner up the road.  He took us to Ferguson's Cafe.  While we ate, I got to know his cousin a little bit.  He was a pretty cool guy.  After dinner we went back to his house and played some Ninja Dice for a while.  We got ready for bed, set up the futon and passed out.  Tomorrow will be a long day.

Next Adventure:  Interview, Shopping, Cache Advance and the Trip Back to the West Side

South Hill, Orting and the Puyallup River

I wanted another adventure in the frozen tundra before the rain started up again.  It's a lot easier to geocache when it's not pouring down rain and everything you walk through is wet.  Plus it's a lot more fun when you're caching with others instead of by yourself.  Ben didn't have the day off so I asked Bob and Bev if they wanted to go somewhere.  I had to be somewhere at 4:30 and Bob had bowling so it had to be local.

Bev and I came up with a plan to cover Sunrise Blvd in South Hill, some in Orting and along the Puyallup River.  All together if we got to all of them would be about 20 caches.  I made a list and did a little research on them...mostly for parking coords and to find out which caches were on what side of the river.  That half hour of looking turned out to save us a lot of time and confusion.

I got all my stuff ready the night before, queries and warm clothing and some food and set it aside.  They wanted to leave around 8 so I set my alarm for 7:30.

My alarm went off and really had a hard time getting out of bed.  Bev texted me saying they were going to be a little late...so look for them at about 8:15.  I slept in for about 20 more minutes.  It was glorious.  I got my layers on, grabbed my food, ate some waffles, found my back pack and made sure I had everything.  I locked the door and hopped in their car.  We were on our way to South Hill via Hwy 7 towards Hwy 161/Meridian.

The first one both GPS's agreed on was Rock Wall 4 You (GC5ATGA) and it was inside a rock wall near the pharmacy drive through of the Walgreens.  Bev found it quickly while I wandered up and down the wall.

From there, we found a parking lot and a trail that lead us into the woods.  It was a 1.12 mile wooded trail called Silver Creek.  Bev had gotten some coords for By the Numbers (GC1XHBK) from another cacher and we failed to find it.  The last time it was visited was back in August and three different cachers could not find it...and that was during the summer!  We gave up after about 10 minutes or so.  We would have to come back another time when we actually know it's there.  Kepton Woods (GC5BKEX) was the next closest one.  We parked so close to it we could have reached out the window to find it.

Next we drove over to Sunrise Blvd to a cache we both didn't have, This One's For Noodles (GC4KK9).  We found a place to pull over, ran over to where the coords pointed and found the cache behind a cement structure. The entire time a truck's horn was blaring. Not sure why.  We ran back over to the car as quick as we could because it was chilly.

There were a few along Sunrise we needed to get, one was called Pooper Scooper 2 (GC4WGB7) which was a nano hidden on a dog poop bag and waste container, Sunrise Parks #1 (GC4WG74) , #2 (GC4WG8N) and #3 (GC4WG9J) , all were placed by EMC41, the cacher who passed away hiking up to GCD this past August. One of them we couldn't find so we started walking back to the car...then a guy and his dog came out from the house across the street and knew exactly what we were doing...we never got his name, and he said, it should be there, it's really camouflaged.  We followed him and he got on his hands and knees and started digging in the fern bush.  He was right, it was there.  We thanked him and he and his dog continued on their walk.  We went on and found the next two in the series...along with the snow.

I remember reading about one of the caches and a great view of Mount Rainier.  It was behind Emerald Ridge HS at a blocked off road.  We followed our GPS's down a long road past a ton of housing developments and along the high school.  Up ahead we saw the cement blocks obstructing our way.  The view of Mount Rainier was stunning.  Blocked Off View (GC58Z7P) had not been found by the last cacher...so of course we worried about not finding it.  I went one way, Bob went one way and Bev went another.  A few seconds Bev shouted out, "found it!"  That's two today we've found that others could not.

We got back onto Meridan and made our way down towards Taking the Back Roads #6 (GC4R977).  I had gotten the first 5 back in August while I was trying to set myself up for my 10,000th cache for the Block Party.  I didn't realize there was one more I forgot to get.  That one was a magnetic small Altoids can stuck to the back of the fence.  I dropped it trying to put it back.  There was a hole in the fence so I shimmied through and put it back safely.

Then we had our dreaded DNF's of the day.  On the Orting-Kapowsin Highway, we tried looking for Charcoal (GC5EQHG) and Firewood (GC5DQK7) and had a really hard time between the 3 of us looking for it.  We read the logs, the hints, double checked the spots we looked...the snow just made it hard to look for them.  We gave up and decided to come back another time.  Down the hill into Orting we went.

We were all hungry and needed to use the restroom and since we know Bob pretty well, we knew he would stop at the McDonald's.  I am so glad I brought my own food.  We were there for about a half hour...a good enough time for food and potty.  And now onto our Puyallup River walks.

We weren't quite sure where to go on this set of caches along the river.  I am glad I took the time the night before to find out which were on the west side of the river and which were on the east side.  Bob meandered his way through the houses and found a perfect spot to park and walk down to the road/trail.  We made sure to take coords and post them in our log for others.  Bev found the first one, Double Cedars-SFR (GC537X9), it was tucked in the crotch of two cedars.

Further down the trail Bob lead the way.  We found Peek-a-Boo (GC537WM), Round the Cedars-SFR (GC537QP) and Beaver and Duck Pond-SFR (GC537RN).  All were hidden well off the trail.  One was a micro, hanging from a tree, one was a plastic ammo can and the other was a medium sized nut container.  We encountered a giant frozen mud puddle and I used it like a skating rink.

We walked back to the car and put in the next set of parking coords to the other side of the river.  We looked for this gate they talked about in the description.

We did find the gate, parked the car and went to grab the last 5 caches for the day.  Bob had to go bowling and I had to go meet Jen in Tumwater.  Bob decided we were going to go get the caches to the left of the trail and come back to get the other ones.  We were like, okay.  We're going to get them all anyway...doesn't matter the order.  Riverside Stroll (GC53QHF) was a small with a flat brick on top of it.  The ground was frozen so we used our boots to kick it loose.  Strolling the Riverside (GC53QJC) was next and luckily Bob brought gloves because this one was thrown inside some sticker bushes.

We walked closer to the Orting Golf Course and saw a great shot of Mount Rainier in the distance.  We grabbed Be Aware-Flying Objects (GC53QJR) and then got our pictures.  I had to hurry because my phone was dying and I didn't bring my car charger.

We walked back and grabbed the last 2 caches of the day, Commence the Puyallup River (GC53QGK) which was tucked underneath two rocks with leaves on it and Puyallup Brambles (GC4YPGK) which was closer to the river and again stuck to the ground.  I had to use a stick to get it loose.  Bob traded some pennies for marbles and I signed the logbook.

It was a great cold afternoon of caching, hanging out, laughing and talking about random things while we enjoyed the day.  I wished the winter weather was like this all the time, cold and dry.

Next Adventure: Trip to Spokane for Interview

Thanksgiving, Seahawks vs. 49ers and a Go Pro

This year, like the previous years, Thanksgiving has been spent at my aunt and uncle's house in Tumwater.  I invited Trish and Amy to our dinner because Trish felt it might be weird to go over to her inlaw's.  I told her she can do whatever she wanted to and to know that the invite was there.  Ben came off of a fire station shift so he was tired and did manage to get up in time to meet me at the Walmart in Tumwater so we didn't have a gazillion cars in their driveway...especially a giant truck.

We got there about 2:30 after turning around twice earlier.  Trish and Amy were stuck in Lakewood traffic and would arrive as soon as they could.  They ended up getting there not too far after we did.  Meanwhile, Ben and I worked on our turkey arts and crafts and everyone got dinner ready and did some visiting.  I finished mine and then later had to finish Ben's.  I gave mine to Grammie and he gave his to his mom.  Gobble gobble!

As soon as everyone was there, we gorged on food and told some really weird stories...like we always do.  Somehow the conversation always leads to poop or similar to poop.  We always have to remind Grammie to do less talking and more eating.  Historically, she is always the only one still eating when everyone is done.  She tried her hardest but always managed to find something to talk about.  As soon as we all had our fill, we got rid of our plates and such and met in the living room for a birthday party and pictionary.  We were too full for dessert.

It is hard to celebrate birthday's once fall hits so we celebrate them all together during Thanksgiving since we all know most of us will be there.  We celebrated September, October and November birthdays...Grammie, Dad, mom and me.  This year, we recognized Trish, her birthday is also in November and I thought it would be nice to get her a card to make her feel part of the family.  They all went beyond the card.  We sang, opened presents, took pictures and Kevin took video of everything.  We started a rousing game of pictionary while some of us had pie.

Ben and I had this plan to go to Best Buy and purchase a Go Pro because it was $100 cheaper and it included a lot of free accessories.  Why not right?  We all left around 6ish, some of us went home, some of us went home to watch the Seahawk game and some of us went and started our Christmas shopping.  We were suppose to go hang out with Ben's friend Josh but that fell through at the last min.

We got to Best Buy and expected to be disappointed...the doors opened at 5 and we got there about a hour and a half later.  I dropped him off and found a parking spot which turned out to be an awesome parking spot.  I walked in and he already was buying the Go Pro.  We just now own a Go Pro!  I was stoked.  We stayed and chatted with the sales rep for a bit.  Then we wandered the mall a bit and then got bored.  We took our stuff to the car and decided to watch the rest of the Seahawk-49er game at Pints and Quarts.  We had a beer and watched the game with the rest of the people.  The game was actually played pretty good for once.  We held them to only 3 points but should have capitalized on the turnovers with touchdowns instead of field goals.  We got the win on our end with 19.  The rest of the season depends on how we stand at the end....playoffs or not.

Because Josh canceled, we went back into Tumwater and went inside the Walmart just to see how insane it still was.  It was disappointing.  We found a few things just because they were on sale and very discounted.  I bought a new camera tripod because mine broke last spring and you can never have too many $4 sweatpants.  It was only 9 so I followed Ben to Rochester and back to the station.  There, we played Ninja Dice, ate apple pie and drank beer.  It was a nice end to Thanksgiving.  Until next year!

Next Adventure:  South Hill, Orting and the Puyallup River

Puzzles and Muiltis, a Hawks Prairie Adventure

I had three days off this week and I wanted to make them count since it isn't raining at the moment.  I haven't geocached at all this month so I called Bev the other day to see if her and Bob wanted to go somewhere and get a few.  Going down to Oregon was thrown around, Orting Valley was thrown around and even Lacey and Oly were thrown around.  It just depended on what Bob felt like doing.  She texted me the next day saying we were going to pick up a few puzzled in the area we've been staring at, that we can't solve, for years.  Bev had gotten some help with them from various people.

I got my stuff ready the night before. I knew it was going to be cold so I put out all of my warm clothes.  I set my alarm for 7:30 because they were going to be here around 8.  That night around 3:30 I woke up to my room smelling like smoke.  I got up really fast and checked to see if it was coming from my room...it wasn't.  Then I heard mom walk down the hallway because she smelt it from their room.  I got out and wandered the house with mom holding flashlights.  We could not find anything that would suggest the amount of smoke that was in the house except for the pellet stove.  It had to be coming from there.  Dad got up and aired out the house.  Of course it was 20 degrees outside so the whole house was colder but it got the smoke out and some of the smell.  They turned the stove off and we all went back to bed.  I had to sleep with my window open because of the smell.  It was cold.

My alarm went off at 7:30 and I immediately turned my heater on and started putting my clothes on.  My room was probably 25 degrees.  I was freezing.  I made sure I had everything and they rolled down the driveway at exactly 8:00.  I hopped in the car and we drove to Denny's for breakfast.  We all ordered the $4 everyday Grand Slam.  We chatted and enjoyed our food.

The first one we had on the list took us to the RAC for a cache called Trapped in a Bottle (GC5D1XF).  We were not prepared for this cache.  We parked and walked towards the patch of trees on the north side of the park.  We searched for a brown 4 foot long PVC pipe and Bev spotted it first.  It took us a while to get the top of the PVC pipe apart because it was frozen.  We got the lid off and saw the thing we had to get the log out of.  It was a plastic bottle that contained the bison tube log book but we had to take the stick, nuts and bolts off of it before we could get the log book.

But how do we access the nuts and bolts?  We had to phone a friend.

After talking to our source, we had an idea on how we were going to tackle this cache.  Since it was really cold out that morning we took the bottle to the car to do.  We needed a strip of paper to stick up to wrap around the nut and turn it until it fell off.  It took a little trial and error to actually get the nut off.  Once I did, pulled the bolt out and the stick I celebrated in the back of the car!   I handed Bev the log book.  Now putting it back together...

It was really frustrating.  It was a good thing that they bottle was plastic or it would have been impossible.  I had to get the bolt sideways, pinch it and some how get the bolt through the stick.  That took a couple of tries to do.  Once I did, getting the nut on it was even harder.  When I did get it on and pressed up against the bottle to keep it on.  I found out by using friction on the nut and bottle I could screw it on.  Once I got it threaded on, I stuck the strip of paper back up, wrapped it around the nut and tightened it so it wouldn't  come off for the next set of cachers.  We returned it to its hiding place.

The next cache was a multi on the other side of I-5 called BQCSD ZOXBS VLVNU QWTYD RSZ (GC4FMH5).  It was an enigma based cache using ciphers.  We parked the car and got out.  It started warming up a bit but still cold.  Someone had cut a bunch of trees down for surveying.  We had hoped they didn't disturb the cache.  We looked and looked and upon further investigation, after I had walked past it twice, Bev found the log with the pull bottle inside of it.

 We moved onto the next one, Pythagorean Theorem (GC316F8) but chose the wrong side of the trail.  We ended up walking a half a mile to the other block to retrieve it.  Meanwhile during the walk, I grabbed A Christmas Cache (GC43N9H) and Where the Heck is Wall Drug? (GC3P2C3) since Bob and Bev already have both of them.

And then Bev took a tumble on a sheet of ice.  The side of her foot barely touched the ice, she slipped, fell and rolled onto her side.  At first I didn't know what happened becasue it happened so quickly. We helped her out and she walked it off.  She is a really tough lady.

We got to the end of the trail and Bob decided to send us to the cache while he walked back to the car to meet us at the corner where the rock wall was.  Bev and I got to the rock wall that contained the cache and found it within seconds.  Some rock walls take a bit while others do not.  I pulled out the container and we celebrated with a high five.

 We waited for Bob to show up in the car.  He did after a few minutes and then went to the next closest one, Ganoderma (GC2ZFKZ), another multi cache.  We had help with this one too so we just walked ourselves across this grassy field and through a hold in the fence into the woods.  We followed Bob through the brush.  We reached a broken tree and ground zero.  We looked for a film canister and based on the hint it was suppose to be hanging from the broken tree.  I looked down for a few seconds and spotted the film canister.  "Found it!  But I don't think it's suppose to be here."  We had Bev sign it and Bob and I put it back into the broken tree.

We walked back to the car and headed over to Cabela's.  Bob had to exchange some binoculars and they had to get a present for their in-law Will.  Bev and I walked around the store for a bit while Bob stood in the customer service line.  Bev mentioned some sort of device that takes deer's buttholes out of the carcass.  I laughed.  She said that it was real so we went looking for it.  Several helpers and minutes later, we found it in the archery accessories.  Low and behold...a deer butthole ripper outer!

They found a gift for Will and I found a Christmas present for my dad.  We paid and started heading home but stopped at Taco Time because there is always time for tacos.  They dropped me off at home and they had to get ready for a birthday party at Red Robin later on.  It was a fun chilly day and I was so glad to get some caching in.

Next Adventure: Thanksgiving, Seahawks vs. 49ers and a Go Pro