I had the alarm sent once again to 7 a.m. but got up a little bit earlier because it was getting warm inside the tent again. Today was supposed to be warmer but we won't be here this afternoon to enjoy the hot weather. I was hoping that we would bring the warm weather home with us so we can finally have summer on the west side.
We got dressed and started unzipping all of the sleeping bags and deflating the two sleeping pads. It took a little bit of time, but we eventually got them bagged up and in the Escape. We folded the blankets and stuck the pillows on top of the pile. We rearranged everything and tetris'd everything so it would fit into its place. Everything fit better in the Escape than when we arrived.
Before we headed to the event, I wanted to talk to Jen and express our appreciation for her and her volunteers for this event we look forward to every summer. We drove over to the cul-de-sac and found her in the trailer her and her wife stayed in over the course of the weekend. On Friday, she told me we would catch up later and I nodded. I thought it would be easier to catch up after the craziness of the event and she agreed. We stood outside the trailer and chatted for about 15 minutes. She thanked us for the kind words and bid adieu until next June.
Ben and I made sure we had everything and drove over to the bathrooms before driving up to the event. I was in and out quickly, but Ben had to sit there and play his video games on his phone. I was getting tired of waiting for him and called and texted him a few times. He eventually came out and we were finally on our way up to the event. I had Ben navigate me to the correct coffee house.
"What a Weekend" Wrap Up and Goodbyes! (GC9TYZT) was an hour-long event at the Kozy Kup that started at 9 a.m. We tried to get up there somewhat early, so we had a parking spot. We had no idea how many people were going to come. We did manage to find a parking spot and we went inside. Bob, Bev and Gabe were already there. We signed the logbook and Ben got in line for some coffee. I don't drink coffee so I did not partake. The event was hosted by a guy named Socks from the Southern Oregon geocaching chapter. His trademark was the crazy socks he wore.
We stayed for a little while chatting with Bob, Bev, Annette, her new boyfriend Dick, Brad, Jon and Blundeen (I am not sure of his real name). It was fun chatting with people we knew and others we don't get to see very often. As the event started to approach 10 a.m. and wearing thin, it was time to say our goodbyes and head out to Findley.
Along the way, we stopped at a few caches not on our chosen power trail. The first one was Don't Ditch Me (GC5J8ED). We pulled over, changed our shoes, applied some sunscreen, a lady stopped by to ask if we've seen her dog that got loose, and Ben had to find a place to emergency poop. Probably from all the coffee he just had not too long ago. We were there for about 10 minutes or so. The lady stopped by again to let us know she found her dog. Haha.
The next one, Whiterun - Skyrim Cache #1 (GC60KK0) was along the side of the road, over a ditch filled with tumbleweeds and to top it off a neighbor dog barked the entire time. It was a pill bottle next to a power pole. It was a quick park and grab.
We got onto Highway 397 and then turned onto S Nine Canyon Road to do the Find It Again, Sam Series (GC60X9M). This series was missing a number one, so we started with two and worked our way through them on a nice, paved road.
We were not going to get that dusty today. I started jumping for them and then at #10, we switched places and Ben got out to get them. We did the rolling log again because it's quicker and easy to do with series like these. A couple of them we found out were way off the coordinates and we found a few that people couldn't find so they made their own so there were two caches to find at a location. We took those away and made a note of each of them for our logs. Now, we had extra containers if we needed them.
We decided to forgo the earthcache for another day. It required a lot more than just a quick stop to complete it. We blew by one and had to turn around to get it. It took us about forty minutes to do all of them which was pretty quick with the backtrack and the ones that weren't exactly at the posted coords. We continued down the road and made a turn onto E Coffin Road to finish the Zombie series. Last September we had done just the one and someone had added seven more to the road.
Zombies This Way! (GC9NAXX), Zombies Ahead (GC9NAXV), Zombie Warning (GC9NAXR), Zombie Road Trip (GC9NAXQ), Zombie View (GC9NAXK), Zombies Galore (GC(NAXJ) and Zombie Parking (GC9NAXN) were all guard rail caches in the middle of a road hardly anyone uses except the locals and cachers who come here every year for the TriCities Geocoin Challenge. We have plans to finish these power trails next June when we come back, unless someone adds more.
We got back onto I-82 and headed west towards Benton City and Prosser. I looked at the caching app really quickly while we were driving and noticed a small series near Benton City. I decided to stop so we could get them. We figured that it shouldn't take more than 20 minutes or so to do.
Abducted Again by Aliens - Tumbleweed2 (GC483E3), Abducted Again by Aliens - Sissyta (GC483DX), Abducted Again by Aliens - Firesafe (GC483DQ) and Abducted Again by Aliens - Rcbpasco (GC483DB) were all the caches we had to collect along the side of the road, gather the waypoints off the top of the lid and arrange them for the final cache, UFO Bonus (GC483FF). We did the caches backwards by accident and found ourselves having to park on the opposite side of the road while Ben got out and looked for them. One of them was hard to find and I had to get out to help. Other than that one, the other ones were easy to find.
We drove to the small convenience store to find Quick Stop (GC9GTP3) and to figure out the final coords to the UFO cache. I arranged the coords we gathered and noticed the final was down a different road nearby. We got on that said road and followed it while we watched the phone get closer and closer to the final.
Upon arrival to ground zero, we were convinced that we had the coords wrong because they were about 200 feet beyond the gate (that was locked) until I read some of the previous longs that said it was on the other side of the gate. There were also two vehicles parked near the gate as well which we thought were just locals hanging out. We waited until the two vehicles left before going further because I really didn't want to leave the area empty handed. So, we waited and then a truck pulled up beside us after closing the gate behind them and wanted to talk to us. We explained geocaching and that there was a geocache beyond the gate about 200 feet. We asked for his permission to enter, and he said he was okay with it today but in the future, he wanted the container to be relocated. We told him that we would contact the cache owner and he thanked us. He drove away and I got out and walked to the coordinates. There was a container there, so I signed our names, grabbed the trackable and the card for a chance to win a set of coins at GeoWoodstock in August. I planned on contacting the cache owner, when we got home, to let her know about the cache.
We left the area and grabbed one more before leaving Benton City until next summer. Yellowstone Trail - Benton City East 224 was at the small park and ride near the roundabout. I remember coming here years ago to grab one from this exact park and ride. Pretty sure it was in the guardrail back then too. We parked nearby and found it quickly.
We got back onto the freeway and got off in Prosser again for gas, ice and a bathroom stop at the Love's. For some reason this time I had to wait in line a long time just to purchase my bag of ice. I was rather annoyed.
I didn't have any other caches on my list to stop for, but we were going to stop at Miner's. We have not been here since before Covid in 2019. We made pretty good time from Prosser to Union Gap. Bev was texting us the entire time. She wasn't happy that Bob and Gabe were taking a long-time caching and then they stopped at Zip's for lunch instead of Miner's--where she wanted to go. We got into Union Gap and made our way to Miner's off of First Avenue near the mall. We saw it was busy but when isn't it busy? We parked, got out and stood in line for a little bit. This is definitely a place you can't be in a hurry to eat at.
We ordered, received our number, grabbed our napkins, ketchup, tartar sauce, fry sauce and found a place to sit. I brought in my notebook so I could make some notes while we waited for our food. Ben wanted me to take his picture with the sign so we could compare it to the first time we both came here together in 2014. I managed to find that picture.
Our food came and it was delicious. We were disappointed we had to wait almost three years to have Miner's again, but we were here and loving every minute of it. Their hamburgers are amazing, and we shared our fries because it would be too much food for one person. We finished up, used the restroom and left.
I wanted to stop one more time before going over the pass at the Historical Yakima Adventure Lab in the middle of downtown. It took us a little less than a half hour to complete the whole thing. It took us to some old buildings downtown and to the trolley museum. I had no idea Yakima had trolleys! I love learning new things about the random towns and cities we visit. We even had time to ride the saddle before we left. Haha.
We left Yakima, drove through Naches and hoped we wouldn't have to follow any slow vehicles, trucks, horse trailers or motorhomes over the pass. It was slower on the way home but not too bad. It helped that it wasn't a holiday weekend like it was last September--traffic was horrible. We got over the pass and went home the same way we came over. Ben fell asleep a few times while I listened to my stories.
We got home around 6:30, unloaded the Escape, put our stuff away and got cleaned up. The kitties were happy to see us, and we put together our A/C unit we got from Amazon a month prior. We were not going to be miserable this summer--if it ever started.
Next Adventure: 4th of July Weekend
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