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