I was glad I dressed myself in my hiking clothes the night before, that saved us all some time in the morning. I started with the blankets, pillows and then the sleeping pads. Ben finished getting his socks and boots on and then helped me take down the tent and roll up the tarp we had under the tent. It was still moist and had lots of tree debris on it but I will deal with it when we got home. We got our hiking stuff ready and crammed in the backpack, walking sticks, GoPro, my camera and quickly ate cereal and a raspberry-filled doughnuts. Ray, Brenda and Zuri were already at the trailhead waiting for the picture. We would have to come back for our stuff after the picture. Which might put us behind everyone. We took the picture and then ran to the cars to grab our stuff.
We hustled up the trail. I remember two years ago we took the road instead of this trail head. I wonder why? The only thing I could think of is that the trail was under construction because of weather damage. I have not confirmed this yet. This section of the trail was very steep. I was out of breath trying to catch up with the group. I ended up giving Ben the pack to carry. With a half a mile behind us we finally caught up to the back of the pack and met up with Brenda and Zuri.
When we got to the top of the hill for the second tier of the trail she and Zuri opted to stay behind and wait for us because she said she would hold up the show on the way up. We didn't care when we got up there and we tried to change her mind. She still decided to stay and meet up with us when we got down. We said okay, we will see you when we come down.
We hiked up and passed a few people and a few people passed us. There were a lot of Germans on this hike.
Along the way I made friends with a gal (jvet) from Austin, Texas. She was on the slower side but I didn't want to leave her behind. She was by herself and I kinda felt bad. Plus this hike is designed to meet cachers from different places, states and countries and I took full advantage of it (and obviously find GCD). She shared where she grew up, why she ended up in Texas, some of her favorite things to do besides geocaching, tornadoes, hurricanes, some of the favorite geocaches in Texas etc. She was fun to talk to. Once we got to the switchbacks, I left her behind only because we needed to get to the top and back down so I could go to my shift at the Ape event.
The view, like two years ago, was absolutely breath taking. There is just something about being on top of the world in the pacific northwest in the summer that's addicting; it makes you wanna explore more and more! I just wish we had the time every weekend to go but Ben's schedule right now does not allow us to.
We hiked higher and higher and the tree line finally disappeared. We were now less than 500 feet from GCD, the last remaining geocache with a three digit code. I took them on the shortcut and around to Geocache (GCD). Of course there were a hoard of people around it. I picked up the container just to see what was inside. I did notice that the container changed from when I found it for the first time. We waited patiently in line for Ben and Ray to sign the log. I got a picture and a video of Ben and I took a few pictures of Ray on his phone for him.
We made our way to Living on the Edge (GC31H5Q) and I let Ben find the cache mostly because I couldn't remember where it was! Haha! We enjoyed the view from up here for a while, took some GoPro pictures and decided to go meet back up with Ray, he decided to stay put because of his balance...he didn't trust it walking out to this ridge.
We started our walk back, picking up caches as we descended down the cascade foothills. We followed Ray because he had time to put a query on his GPS, ours on the other hand didn't get a query put on it so our GPS was just for show, lol. Whoops. There were so many people around it really didn't matter. We grabbed I've Fallen and I Can't Get Up...(GC1W7KE), 56 Miles and 4 Days (GC2F9DV), the new one to honor ECM41 who died last year on his way up to GCD, ECM41 Remembered (GC5E9EW) and lastly Mt. Margaret Trailhead (GC1GMZN). I've gotten all these caches except for ECM41's memorial cache, which was left out with an electric candle burning next to it.
Getting down took us less than an hour, it probably would have been quicker if we wouldn't have gotten stuck behind a line of people walking slow. When we did get down to where we left Brenda she and Zuri weren't there. Did she go back down to the car? We continued on towards the cars. I was so done with walking and really needed to get down to the event for my shift. It was already 10:30. When we did get to the cars I expected Brenda to be there. She wasn't. Uh oh, where did she go? Ray and Ben followed up behind and I said, "she's not here!" Ray immediately went into freak out mode. I didn't blame him. Where could she have gone?
We had three scenarios. She saw someone she knew and they took her down to the event. But then she had the keys so how would Ray get the car down and her phone is still in the car, she would have taken her phone with her and possibly called. Or, she walked up to GCD with another group of people and she is on her way down or she is wandering around the forest with Zuri. Ben and I grabbed a sandwich because once we got to the event we would not have enough time. We sat there and waited about 20 minutes. We asked a lady who stayed inside the car while her group went up and she said she hasn't seen a lady or a dog. We finished our food and told Ray we would drive up the road to see if she was around, we ran over something as we left. I assumed it was a rock or a stick. We rounded the corner and saw her a two other cachers immediately. I rolled down the window and yelled out. "there you are! We were looking for you and Ray is so worried!" She said "these two guys found me and asked if I wanted to walk up with them because they walked the same speed as I did". I asked how on earth did we not run into you on the way down? She said probably because she walked towards Margaret (GC4KY24) after GCD and we walked to the other one and finished before she walked down. That was the only possibility. We turned around and met Ray and Brenda before we headed down to the event. I got out really quick just to make sure we didn't leave anything behind. Ray said I left my walking stick and our GoPro attached to the monopod behind. The monopod is what we ran over. I was so glad it wasn't the GoPro, that would have sucked! We told them we would see them down at the event. We drove off.
We arrived at the Going Ape Event (GC5F58Q) just as the clock reached 11. I had an hour to kill before my shift as ape handler with JCar. We got to park in the main lot which was nice, we changed our clothes because it was warmer than it was on the mountain, I put on my WSGA shirt until I got my volunteer shirt, I got my name tag and walked on over to the tents. Ben stood in the huge line to go potty. I told him to meet me over at the tents when he was done. They found my bright yellow volunteer shirt and I talked to a few people, Lynette, Karin, Jim, Annette, Chris, Abby, and other cachers who were wandering about doing what they were suppose to be doing.
Noon finally hit and I found Jcar in his ape outfit. Chris handed me the Sharpies and Jcar handed me the water bottle and the sandwich board to put over the top of him for it to rest on his shoulders. He was going to get hot really soon. The cachers would come in waves. We would get a lot of people wanting to sign the log and then there wouldn't be anyone. Most of them were the people that went into the tunnel first thing and then came out to sign the log and get snacks. There were many people taking pictures and asking what the code word was to the lab caches. There was one on the sandwich board the ape was wearing.
Ben did some wandering around and finally came back to where I was. We had about a half hour left on our shift. He took some pictures, signed the log and just kept us company while we waited the final minutes until we were done. Quite a few people came that last half hour including several HQ Lackeys. Ambrosia brought a few stuffed animals to pose with the ape and to sign the log (see picture above). MissJen gave me one of her trackables and I told her thank you. She smiled, logged her name and took a picture with the ape.
After our time was up, we put the log book and all the Sharpies and left them on the welcome table, said my goodbyes and off Ben and I went towards the tunnel. We did the labcaches along the way including naming the no-named ape. This was his first time here so he did the state park cache right outside the tunnel, he did the earthcache inside the tunnel and we walked halfway to the labcache and the Bloody Fingers, Dirty Diapers (GCJMDK) inside the tunnel. I told Ben we would do the rest another day with bikes and with less people around. He agreed.
On our way out and back to the parking lot, I saw Grumpy_Geocat and immediately turned around. I was suppose to meet him and his owner, Melanie, who I met on Instagram, at the TriCities Geocoin event but I left Saturday night and our path's did not cross. I got lucky this time and actually got to meet her and her friends in person. It was pretty cool.
We used the restroom one more time and got in the Escape and left Hyak. Ben picked up one more cache, I was Framed (GC58YVQ) and we merged onto I-90 towards home. I wanted to stop at Olallie State Park to grab the WaStatePks100 cache (GC4B5YG). Since this series is now 3 years old and a lot of the stamps are missing or the stamp and the cache so it's always a gamble when you stop for one you don't have yet. We were going to grab this one on the way home from the day trip I took with mom when this geotour launched but we read that the stamp was missing and decided not to stop. It worked out for us stopping this time around.
We found a place to park and followed the GPS on well manicured trails towered by giant trees overlooking downed logs being nursed on by new trees and brush. It was a beautiful park and I want to come back another time to explore more. Ben hugged one of the biggest trees along the trail. We had an interesting time looking for the container but we prevailed. We also found out that Mc3Cats just recently replaced it but it was a butthole to open though. We signed the log and put it back where we found it. I wanted to hang out down by the South Fork of the Snoqualmie River. I took a few pictures before we decided to leave...we were getting hungry.
We got back onto I-90 and talked about what way we would like to go home. We called his mom asking if we could come visit and have dinner with her. She said sure! He suggested that we find some sort of a sporting goods store so he could replace his golf gloves that were disintegrating. I told him okay. We ended up skipping the Hwy 18 Auburn exit just because there was a huge back up and no one had time for that. We continued west and decided to get off on the 405 and head towards the mall. Ben said there should be a golf place there. Sure enough we stopped at the Puetz Golf Superstore and we browsed the gloves for a while before he found a pair he wanted. Then we looked at bags, and putters, drivers and then used a few of them to practice hitting balls. I used the restroom, paid for his stuff and then left...they closed at 6 anyways.
We got onto 167 and headed towards Bonney Lake. We got there just after 7 and his mom was making hamburgers and brats. Brad was over to we shared our weekend with him. I showered before dinner just to get all the sweat and filth off of me from the previous two days. We ate food, visited, watched TV and ate ice cream. We decided to come home instead of staying the night and getting up early the next day and he had station the next day which meant a long day as it was. We got home around midnight and I helped him unload his stuff and put it in his car. We brought my stuff inside and then we said goodnight. I was so tired I fell asleep as soon as I knew he made it back to the station in one piece.
My swag I acquired over the weekend. Thanks to those who shared!
Next Adventure: Grandpa's 80th Birthday
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