Poker Run and Family BBQ

Brenda and Ray had talked about doing a poker run at some point this summer at the TriCities Geocoin Challenge.  I was really interested because the TriCities did one before the meet and greet on Friday night and I was curious on how they planned it.  I didn’t even know one was going on until they announced it over the microphone. 

A few weeks later Brenda mentioned that they set the date and to look for it near Centralia and I was stoked!  I got the notification for the WSGA SW Chapter Poker Run & BBQ (GC6MHVK) event and saw that it was going to be at Shafer Park outside of Centralia.  I haven’t been there for several years since picking up a few inside the park that are since archived.  I told Ben we were going to do a poker run at the end of July.  He said sure, sounds like fun.  I added my name to the will attend log on the cache page.

The day of we got up around 9 and had a quick breakfast.  We left around 11 and headed to Centralia via Rainier Road to Rich Road to Old Hwy 99 into Tenino and then followed 507 through Bucoda to the park.  I saw Bev’s car and Brenda and Ray’s red hamster car.  We parked next to theirs and walked out to the picnic area they had reserved.  We said our hi’s, how are yous, signed the logbook and received a raffle ticket.  We visited for a little bit longer until the caches published at noon. 

Brenda gathered everyone around the sandwich board and went over the rules and handed out our event sheets.  Then they set us loose.  Bev, Ben, Don, Wayne and I rode together is Wayne’s car.  We decided to get the ones outside of the park first. We all piled into the car and put the coords in for Oakview Grange (PR#4) (GC6NVMG) and headed out.  We parked at the grange and walked the 100 feet to the tree with the large cavity in it.  Bev pulled it out of its hiding spot.  We passed around the log book and picked out our designated colored card packets (I wondered how they would prevent cheating) and put the cache back where we found it.

Jitterz (PR#5) (GC6NVMY) was just down the street near the Nervous Ned’s coffee stand.  We pulled into the parking lot and wondered if the owner would come out and ask what we were doing.  She did and said, “oh you must be those geocacher people.”  We told her yes we were.  She told us it was by the sandwich board.  As soon as we walked over there, a green hamster car drove up really fast, pulled over and a girl got out waving her hands and trying to take her jacket off as quickly as she could.  She told us not to be alarmed but she said there was a bee in her jacket.  Bev saw a bee fly out of there.  The girl was a little embarrassed and we joked about strangers taking their clothes off.  She told us to have a good day and she left.  We put the cache back for the other cachers to find.

We drove back to the park for the other three caches.

We walked over to the west part of the park for Shaefer Park (PR#1) (GC6NVNB) and found the small geotrail.  There were nettles mixed in with the tall grass so we had to be careful what we brushed up against.  The cache was stashed up against some trees and Ben reached down and grabbed the ammo can.  We all shared the log book and we each blindly picked out our card to add to our collection.

We walked over the bridge and there were some kids swimming down below in the Skookumchuck River.  It wasn’t warm enough for swimming.  We followed the trail to the right and as we got closer we could see the tree that was hiding Shaefer Park (PR#2) (GC6NVNF).  It was tucked away in a lower tree cavity.  I thought it was a great hiding spot.  We grabbed our card packet, took turns signing the log book and put it back better than we found it.

The last one, Shaefer Park (PR#3) (GCNVHN) was clear in the back of the park at the edge of the property.  The trails zig zagged all over the place and we weren’t certain which one looped back around.  Wayne, Ben and I took a chance at some of the trail and found the main gravel one that took us to a smaller trail.  We knew we were going in the right direction because we saw a lady standing next to a tree with an ammo can.  We joked about muggles and rehiding the cache.  She knew we were cachers…even though there were some strange people walking the trails today.  We got our last envelope with our card in it.

We headed back to our picnic area and Ray was still annoyed at the people who took over the main covered area for a one-year-olds birthday party at a first come first served basis.   Not that it really mattered because it was a nice day; it was just the principle of the thing.  They showed up at 6 a.m. to set up, basically sat there all day and the party still hadn’t started when we left.  Why would you need to waste an entire day for a one-year-old’s birthday party when you could have it anywhere else?  Whatever I guess.

We took our packets of cards to Brenda and she scored the cards we picked.  Bev, Ben, Wayne and Don basically had nothing and I had a pair of 8’s.  I was in the lead for a while until everyone else finished and brought their cards.  A guy won the whole thing with a pair of kings.  We ate hotdogs and chips, had a cookie and drinks while we visited with everyone.  It was a nice little event.  We did the raffle soon after.  I actually got picked!  It’s been a while since I won a prize from a raffle.  I picked a geotag.  Bev and Ben also won an item.

We helped Brenda and Ray pick up everthing and put it in their car.  We had to trade out the ammo cans for some lock n’ locks so they didn’t get stolen.  They were some nice ammo cans. Ben and I walked across the bridge to those two caches and replaced them.  We saw some weird people along the way but it didn’t surprise me…it’s Lewis County.  They were going to make this poker run a yearly thing but move it around to the different counties in southwest Washington.  We said our goodbyes and told them that we needed to come visit them soon.  They said they might come up here to do my asphalt adventure caches.

Ben and I headed to downtown Centralia to grab our fourth cache of the heritage series, WSHS 125 – Centralia Depot (GC6JBZ).  We turned down the road and there was a small SUV parked right next to the cache in the street.  We swerved and found a place to park about 100 feet away.  They decided to go somewhere else so they drove away.  Where they geocachers?  We walked out and sure enough they were parked right next to it.  I reached into the spot and they got out of their vehicle and asked me to sign it for them.  They were cachers!  They introduced themselves as hidenfind.  I’ve found a lot of their caches.  I told them who I was and they’ve found a bunch of mine as well.  We stood there for a while talking to them.  They were unaware of the event that we just came from but were very excited for some new caches to find.  They had an appointment so they had to go but they were glad they ran into us.  We put the cache back and on our way back to the Escape, we passed a 20-something year old black guy wearing red boxing gloves.  He mumbled something as we passed and Ben said excuse me?  Ben was ready to rumble.  Clearly the kid was out of his mind or high and just mumbling to himself.  He really wasn’t any threat to anyone.

We get back onto the main road and we were near the Olympic Club when we both saw a cop talking to a woman outside of a bar.  At first we didn’t see what was going on until we had passed and I looked out my side mirror and saw buttcheeks!  The woman was not wearing any pants!!  The cop was trying to get her to put her clothes back on and was probably waiting for some back up.  Lewis County had set a new low today.

I got a text message from my mom asking me to stop at the store for some miracle whip for our BBQ tonight.  She was making potato salad.  The closest store was Dave’s in Tenino and the stuff there was expensive.  We get into Tenino and I get the stuff really quick.  When we got to the house, I found out my grandparents were also coming to dinner.  We also came over to help mom with her Plinko board for the relay for life event this weekend.   Mom fixed dinner, Ben worked on the board and I helped dad do a few things in the yard.

Everyone came over about 6 and we had hamburgers, potato salad, chips and fruit.  It was delicious.

We visited for a bit and explained what we were going to use the Plinko board for.  Everyone went home including us.  We got home around 8:30, got cleaned up and ready for our work week.  It was a busy but fun day.

Next Adventure:  Relay For Life