Another Trip to Eatonville

It was a beautiful day in the Pacific Northwest and I got a phone call from Bev just after I finished my lunch asking me if I wanted to go get a few of the new caches that published last night.  I said sure.  We would be going to Eatonville again.

I got my query ready and my clothes on.  It was nice enough to wear shorts!  I was excited.  I drove over to Bev's house and decided to drive my car because it would have been in the way when everyone got home from work.  Bev was the navigator.

The first one she told us to go to was out by Camp Arnold and Webster road.  It was called Mooooo! (GC5J8N5) and we could see why it was called that when we drove up to it and parked.  There was a giant rock painted like a black and white cow.  We looked around the rock and didn't see anything then I looked at the fence and there it was, a micro attached to the fence.

Since we were over near Camp Arnold, I wanted to try and look for Camp Cook (GC20E1B) again.  I've had this cache solved for many years and attempted to go get it about the same time but when I arrived I didn't think my coords were right. I went into the brush and was only 40 feet from the cache. I decided to turn around and try again another day. Bev said she doesn't remember if she came out here with Bob when they found it. So I went in and searched around a bit. There were sooo many things to look through. I found ground zero and looked everywhere...high, low, under, over. Then something caught my eye. A piece of the container was showing. YES! There it was! I signed it, put it back as I found it and swam back through the brush to the car.  It was nice to finally get this one off the list.

There were a couple more caches outside of Eatonville to grab.  The first one was one of the newer caches that published last night.  We've been to Dogwood Park so many times to get caches.  This visit makes it three.  We got out of my car and we immediately took pictures of Mount Rainier in the distance.  This park was also a great stop for the mountain viewpoint.  In fact, two other sets of cars stopped to take pictures.

Bev and I looked for Dogwood Park (GC5Q23W) and found it quickly behind one of the signs.  It was a magnetic reflector with the cache inside of it.  The tape didn't do it justice.  They really needed to glue down the magnets and tape.  We signed it and put it back where we found it.

The next one took us on a one-lane unlined Ohop-Valley Extension Road.  We took the wrong road and had to turn around.  Neither of us have been down this road before.  As we got closer to Hole-y G-rail (GC55VBK), we noticed that the valley would flood really bad if this area got a lot of rain.  The small creeks were already as high as they could go without flooding the road.  We arrived at the guard rail over one of the creeks, got out and knew exactly where it was.  Bev added a trackable to it as I signed the logbook.  We all returned to the car and followed it through back onto Hwy 161.

We drove up the hill into the town of Eatonville.  Everyone was preparing to get out of school.  The buses were on their way to the school, parents were in their cars waiting...traffic at the four way intersection was even busy.  We put in the coordinates into Nuvi because we could not figure out what road to turn down.  It redirected us to some back alley roads and then onto the Alder Cutoff.  We then turned down a dirt road that led us to a trail head.  The Bud Blancher Trail  is a 2.3 mile non-motorized gravel trail that connects Eatonville to the Pack Forest.  We parked and followed the gravel path to the river.  We walked across a very nice bridge and started looking for Mossy Nook (GC5H20P).

From the look of the logs everyone has had trouble locating the cache because the coordinates were off by about 30 feet.  That didn't say which direction.  We looked at the huge stump first and did not see anything. We looked in every nook and cranny and did not find it.  We probably spent a good 30 minutes looking for the darn thing.  It was quite warm and Bev was getting tired and thirsty.  She said to give it one more look and then we will walk back up.  I looked at that stump one more time and I saw tiny plastic corner sticking out of the moss.  "Are you serious!?"  I pulled it out of its hiding spot and yelled at Bev that I found it.  She was also amazed.  We signed the book, put it back and walked back up the hill.

We got back up to the car and was very glad to have drinks waiting for us in the car.  We got back on the road and followed Hwy161 to Hwy 7 near the Pack Forest.  Target Practice (GC5Q24Q) was near one we spent a lot of time looking for a few years ago.  It has since been archived.  This one was found pretty quickly.  It was a film canister stuffed in one of the sign holes.  We signed it and walked back to the car.

We followed Hwy 7 to the turn towards McKenna.  It was such a nice day I didn't want it to end.  Because if it ended I knew I would have to go back to work the next day.  Ugh.  I took Bev back to her house and then went home.  I logged caches, started a blog, watched some basketball with mom and got ready for work the next day.

Next Adventure: Easter Fun

Paint Night in Federal Way

About a month ago mom got an idea for those paint nights you keep on seeing others do on Facebook.  There are several in the area, we did ours through Wine and Canvas-Seattle.  We tried to find the one closet south to us.  It was Grandma's birthday so we wanted to take her out to do something fun and this was right up her alley.  She painted on her own at home.  We got a hold of my aunt and asked her if she wanted to do this with us.  She said sure but she couldn't do it on the day we wanted to.  So we looked for another painting of the one we liked.  That one was in March on a Monday.  We asked Grandma if she had any appointments and she said no.  We asked Angela if she could go on that day and she said yes.  I asked my boss if I could leave around 4 and she said sure.  I had Grandma drive to the dentist office and that's where I went after work.  Mostly to change and to get everyone because we were driving my car.

Of course we didn't get out of there until after 4:30 and I expected traffic on I-5.  When we finally got to I-5 there wasn't any traffic at all.  I was really surprised.  We got to Billy McHale's in Federal way in about an hour.  So because it was dinner time, we ordered food and it hit the spot.  We all ordered burgers.

We had about a half hour to eat it before we had to be in the other room, checked in and in front of our canvas.  Since there were six of us we had to grab some spots before they were all gone.  The event was sold out.  Mom texted Angela and I texted Trish to see if they were on their way yet.  It was getting closer to paint time.

Trish and Amy arrived just as we finished our food and Trish got her some wine.  We moved into the other room, checked in and found a pod of six spots four our group.  Angela arrived shortly after.  We put our canvases on our easels and put our stylish aprons on.  We looked fabulous.

I used the bathroom one last time before we started.  I didn't know if it had a "half time" or "intermission" without missing any of the directions.  We began several minutes later.  On my blank canvas we were to paint the horizon line and then came our mountain.  Everyone took a different perspective on their mountains.  It was fun to see what everyone did.

I learned a lot about water based acrylics that night too.  Your paint brushes must always be in the water cup and use as much water as you can with your paints because it makes the paint last longer and your paint will dry faster.  After the mountain, we worked on the wind swirls and then the moon and stars.  We learned another technique to save paint.  I can't remember what she said but it involves painting long dashes and short dashes and then letting the dry and then adding white to give it the wave, swirl look.

Next we filled in our sky with a dark blue color and used some yellows and white around the moon and stars.  I had to wait for the sky to dry so I could blend in the areas better.  Then we picked up the one paint brush we haven't used yet and dipped it into the water and then our blues, blacks and purples to swipe the bottom for our water.  Then we added our Space Needle line and some buildings on the edge of our harbor.

We added harbor lights, reflections and finished our Space Needle.  For fun I added a 12th Man flag to the top of my needle and we signed our names at the bottom.  Here is our finished products.

I would definitely do this again.  It was something different than my normal hobbies that I like to do.  I really need to finish my acrylic painting I started in 10th grade.  Maybe some day.  Haha.  Everyone had a great time except for Grandma, I asked her if she had fun and she said I wouldn't call it fun.  Well then what would you call it?  Haha.  I think she did enjoy herself so did Trish and Amy.  I'm glad they got to come out and paint with us.

We got home late and we all had to work the next day but it was worth it.

Next Adventure: Another Trip to Eatonville

Pi Day Event

I saw that there were several Pi Day events all over western Washington on Saturday.  Of course Pi Day was on a Saturday...a day I have to be at work.  And it was a freaking busy day at work.  I was tired for days after.

I found one, PI Event at the Park (GC5NFZ2) that was in Lakewood at Dawson Playfields and it was at 6 p.m. hosted by Hoovers69, one of my caching buddies who also works on Saturdays.  He tries to make events as later as possible on days like that.  I thanked him later for having one I could go to.  You got a Pi day souvenir for attending an event.

I got off of work as quick as I could...which was around 4ish.  We had a lot of stays that day for some reason.  My boss told me this weekend wouldn't be that bad but it was.  We were severely understaffed and there was a lot to do.  I hope a weekend like that never happens again.  I changed really quickly in the bathroom and I was on my way.  My nuvi told me I would arrive in about 35 minutes without traffic.  I expected to be there just before 6...I expected a little bit of traffic.

I got there just after 5:45 and noticed some people walking around.  I wasn't sure if they were cachers or not.  Then I saw crystalcrypter pull up and get out of her car.  I grabbed my stuff and joined in under the covered area.  I talked to a bunch of cachers I've never seen before but have seen some of their names on caches.  There was a cache in the park but had not been found by the last two people so that kind of sent up a red flag.  I decided not to look for it.  However, when I got to the table, everyone was looking for Bag of Chips Let's Have a Picnic (GC48381) and found the nano stuck underneath the table.  I signed it and left it on the table for the others to sign.

I talked to Hoovers69, BobKai and finally got to meet Tightluv, a local girl I started following on Instagram.  I gave her one of my pathtags.  Frisbee'r, PioneerWoman and OhJoy were also there.  I talked to them for a little bit too.  Someone brought a pie and I am not sure if anyone actually ate it because I was engrossed with talking to people.  I picked up a few trackables while I finished talking to Goingup and Hoovers69.  I stayed until almost 7:30.

To get the other souvenir, you had to find a puzzle/unknown cache.  I had several solved but had limited daylight since I stayed at the event too long.  I knew I had one close by to grab and I solved it eons ago.  The Movie:  Al Pachino (redux) (GC1M5TM) was on my way home.  I found its hidey place, made my mark and looked for something to eat. I was very limited in what I could eat at this point and in this area so I decided on the newly remodeled Dairy Queen.  I got the chicken strips basket and ate it on the way back home. It hit the spot.  When I did get home I logged my finds, grabbed a shower, got ready for work the next day and passed out.  This weekend sucked.

Next Adventure:  Paint Night in Federal Way