The Drive to the TriCities, Caching and the Meet and Greet

I set my alarm for 9:30 because I wanted to get an early start to my day so I could get to Sacajawea at a decent time and get my camping spot.  I got ready, started packing my stuff up and took it to the Escape.  I helped them clean the house for a while and visited some more before it was time to go.

I knew they had to get ready to go to Spokane so I left around 11ish.  I thanked them for letting me stay with them and to visit.  This time it has been too long.  I think the last time I came over was last June when I went to coin challenge.  I would have come in October but he had knee surgery and we weren’t able to do the Pirate Plunder this past fall.  We hugged it out and I headed down the hill to top off with gas and to get some more ice for the cooler.

I got onto I-82 and drove east towards the TriCities.  I ate my “breakfast” of a pizza lunchable and got some all over the front of me and my seat belt.  Luckily I had wipies within arm’s reach to clean myself off.  Along the way I talked to Grammie and she told me that grandma’s house was broken into on Wednesday while she was doing her errands.  They kicked the door open and looked for drugs.  Grandma doesn’t have drugs except for her diabetes medications and the standard over the counter aspirin and cold medicines.  They looked through her bathroom, the kitchen, stole some jewelry that wasn’t worth anything except for the personal attachments, they took a check out of her checkbook but left the computer, laptop, the TV’s and the quilting stuff.  Clearly it was about drugs and not goods.  We suspected it to be a teenager, a relative or a female because they tried stealing one of her locked boxes with personal information on it but it got too heavy so they left it on the floor in the living room.  They freaked grandma’s cat, Whiskers, out to where she was weird for a while afterwards.  Now came the annoying part, calling the bank, the credit report, social security and the police report.  I asked her why no one called me.  She said that no one wanted to worry me.  I told her about my trip so far and that I was getting close to my destination.  She told me to be safe and to have fun.

I called grandma soon after and we talked about her break in for about a half hour.  She said she was getting a lock for the gate and deadbolts for her doors.  I got to Sacajawea around 1, checked in and continued talking to grandma until I needed two hands to set up the tent.  I told her I would call her back on Sunday sometime.  After I got the tent set up I called mom and talked to her for about 45 minutes.  I got the bedding all set up and now I just had to wait until the meet and greet later on this evening.  Bob and Bev were already in town doing caches and wanted me to go eat with them but I wasn’t ready to leave the park yet.

Around 2:30 I left the park and cached around the TriCities myself.  It was warm and I had to do it by my phone because I didn’t have enough time to put together a query on the GPS before I left.  I found about 13 caches between Pasco, Kennewick and Richland.  I talked to Ben and he got off work around 3:30, got his stuff ready and headed over White Pass because I-5 north was a mess and I told him to avoid it.  He got a late start anyway and was in Mossyrock/Morton around 6:30 after getting gas and dinner.  He wasn’t going to be here for a while.  Plus, a large chunk of the trip there was no cell phone service.  There was a small window on top of the pass where it worked.

There were a few caches that were park and grabs, one guardrail, a bunch in the industrial part of Pasco and I wrapped it up by finishing my evening up in Kennewick along the Columbia River at the park.  I found one called Kennewick Man (GC15463), Arno Doria (GC5KZNX) which I had to climb up in a tree for and another called Columbia Park Adventure #2 (GC5KZV4) which snaked me around the trees next to the freeway.  I saw a deer wandering around while I signed the log.

I made my way over to Richland and met up with Bob and Bev at the meet and greet site around 5:30.  We got there early so we decided to walk over to A Wicked Manicure (GC1VMJF) in the park next to the building.  I followed Bob since he manned the GPS.  We found it quickly next to a building with a metal box.  It was a face plate cover.

We walked back over to the parks and rec building, walked into the large meeting room, signed in, got our raffle ticket and found a place to sit down until more people arrived.  We got our bingo card and people came to us to fill them out.  We just passed ours around for fun.  I didn’t plan on finishing mine.  Brenda and Ray got there shortly after and sat with us.  They shared their geocoin they minted for their 10,000^th geocache which would be at the event tomorrow morning. 

We ate cookies, popcorn and watermelon while we waited for the actual event to start.  We saw a bunch of people we knew, met some new people and I was sad I forgot my pathtags at home.  I could have handed some of them out.  None of us won anything for the raffle.  We left around 8 and I chatted with Brenda, Ray and Richland lady outside the building for about a half hour.

I went back to the campsite around 9ish, made a sandwich, used my computer for a while and chatted with a few people.  Brad and his kids arrived in the fancy red Camero and came over and visited with me for a while.  We got caught up, he told us about what he’s been up to and my new changes in my life.  We talked about the Cougs, football and geocaching.  It was nice to catch up with him.

Ben got to the state park around 11:30.  I had already gotten ready for bed.  I helped him unpack his car, he got ready for bed and he was just wired up from the late trip over.  I was glad he came.  He hoped that driving all this way was worth it and I told him it was.  He got settled down and we went inside the tent and went to bed.  We knew we had a long, busy day ahead of us tomorrow morning.

Next Adventure:  TriCities Geocoin Challenge:  West Richland, Richland, Kennewick and Pasco