Outdoor Expo at Millersylvania State Park

A few weeks back I saw an event posted to our Cachers of Puget Sound about an outdoor expo at Millersylvania State Park, the same park my cache is located.  It gave me a reason to go and check up on it as well as talk to some WSGA/cachers and browse all the booths.  The weather wasn't that great and I hoped it cleared up before I got there. 

Between Rainier and Tenino it poured down rain.  I was not really happy to see this since I will be outside for most of the time.  When I got to the backside of Tenino the rain magically went away and I was happy again.  The event might be better than I expected it to be.  I had no idea where the expo was being set up so I ended up driving around the entire camping area, which I was upset about, saw a park worker, stopped and asked him where the expo was being held.  He told me over where the kitchen areas were, next to the lake.  I thanked him and knew exactly where that was.  It wasn't too far from my cache.

I parked in one of the lots and decided to check up on my cache first.  It's gone a while without something dumb happening to it.  When I approached the stump, I saw some people with it signing the log.  I just waited until they put it back so I could go check on it.  I stood there waiting and then got the courage to say something to them and I cam up with, "how long have you guys been caching?"  They shared their answers, told me where they were from, where they started caching and their geocaching names.  I told them that this was my cache and they said that this state park geotour series was really cool.  I shared with them some of my stories on the geotour and then they decided to get going on the lab caches in the park.  I checked up on the cache and added a pathtag. 

I walked over to where the tents were and spotted our WSGA tent.  I talked to Mc3cats, Sproutter, PhatBldGuy, Terrible T's, Winos, Frisky Biscuits and various other cachers I don't remember their names.  I handed out a few pathtags to people that I knew didn't have one of them yet.  Then I spent the remainder of the time talking with everyone and wandering the booths.  There were a lot of groups in the Puget Sound I didn't know about.  I took a couple of brochures and booklets for future endeavors...like kayaking the waterway trails and the scenic drives up in the north cascades. 

I called Ben around 1:30 and he was still in his bed!!  He was suppose to meet me at the expo but oh well he must have needed the sleep more.  I forgave him. :)

When we got there we were issued a raffle ticket.  I was really hoping they called my numbers.  After a few tries and some disappointment, my number was finally called!!  I was stoked!  I haven't won a raffle in quite some time.  My prize was a book called 100 Classic Hikes in Washington by Craig Romano.  Now I have a book with updated hikes in it!  Wooo!

As the expo was winding down, I stuck behind and helped Mc3Cats and Terrible T's break down the tent, the table and pick everything up and take it to their vehicle they came in.  We wrapped up our conversation and I walked to the Escape and headed home. 

Ben came over a while later and we went to Lacey to grab a cache, Just Another Light (GC6J7E0) found near our favorite sub place, Maconis.

 
Then we had sushi and teriyaki at Koibito's, then played laser tag, first time in nearly 10 years.  It was subpar after playing at Laser Quest in Spokane.  I had trouble with my gun the entire time.  Both my hands were securely on the darn thing to fire it but it kept telling me both my hands were not on it.  I struggled and ended up getting like 14th place.

We had some time to kill before we saw the second Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle movie at the mall, so we went to the Olympia waterfront to grab one of the heritage caches, WSHS 125 - Percival Landing (GC6HX4J).  It was hidden inside some brush to keep it hidden from muggles.  We found it in the evening to prevent a lot of people watching us retrieve it. 

The original commercial steamship wharf, a well-known maritime landmark in the Pacific Northwest, was built by Sam Percival in 1860. It provided access for the steamboats collectively called the Mosquito Fleet that used the Sound as a watery freeway to move mail, products and passengers.
The Mosquito Fleet era ended as customers switched their allegiance to cars and paved highways and traditional steamers became obsolete. In 2004, a study of the structural condition of Percival Landing revealed that if nothing was done, the entire facility would need to be closed, resulting in the loss of a treasured recreational area and waterfront access.

We arrived at the mall and still had some time to kill.  We bought our tickets and then had a beer and played connect four at Pints and Quarts.

The movie was awesome!  It brought in Casey Jones, Beebop and Rocksteady and even Krang.  It started to follow the old cartoons from the 80's and implied that there was going to be another movie at some point.  I was excited.  We went back to my house and hung out for a bit before he had to go back to the fire station.

Next Adventure:  Swede Day and Fire Trucks

A Weekend in Bonney Lake and Geocaching

It was Amy's birthday this weekend and I talked to Trish about how to celebrate it.  Her driving class made it more difficult because it was from 10-noon and we couldn't stay up extremely late.  I had planned on doing karaoke Friday night but it just didn't happen this time. 

Ben and I didn't get there until late because he fell asleep after work and I couldn't get a hold of him.  I was hungry, I had everything packed and I was bored.  We headed towards Bonney Lake and they left us some pizza to scarf down. We watched Amy open her birthday gifts then played with some Legos and then some dice and then went to bed shortly after.  It was a pretty chill evening.

We slept in the next morning while Amy was in class for drivers ed.  We started some French toast, and some eggs for breakfast while we waited for Amy to get back from class.  She was upset she didn't pass her test and would have to take it again. 

Trish wanted to get out of the house for a while so we called up Bonnie to see if we could come see them for a while in Auburn.  We took the long way around just to give her enough time to get settled back at home.  We grabbed 11 caches near Sumner, Lake Tapps and Auburn.  We even found some of the Auburn geotour from last year.  There wouldn't be enough time to finish it plus all the coins were now claimed. 

We started out near Lake Tapps and then headed down the hill into Sumner then back up to Lake Tapps again.  We stopped at Sunset Park and got a great view of Mount Rainier and grabbed Auburn 2015:  Sunset Park (GC64G6Y) .  It was hot so we made sure we had plenty of water with us.

We stopped at two more parks before making our way over to their grandma's house near the Muckleshoot Casino. It was getting hotter by the minute.  We get to her house and we all sat in the patio area and visited.  Bonnie gave Amy a birthday card and we caught everyone up on what we've been doing since the last time we saw her.  We stayed for about an hour before we all got hungry and decided to go down towards the Super Mall for some dinner.  Before that we picked up one more cache along the East Valley Hwy.  I let Trish and Amy look for Sumner's Sod Fields (GC10YBH). 

We picked up a few more in Sumner and then decided to go home because it was getting dark.  All together we got 11 for the day.  When we got home, we relaxed for a bit and then talked about where we wanted to go and float the next day.  It was suppose to be the hottest day this week and we wanted to enjoy it.  Trish suggested Deep Lake over by Enumclaw's Nolte State Park and I suggested just staying close and hanging out at Lake Tapps.  We came up with a plan of bringing sandwiches and chips with us so we could eat lunch while we were there.  All we had to do now was get everything together, blow up our inner tubes and enjoy the day.

The next morning we got up later than we wanted to.  We ate breakfast, I helped Trish make sandwiches and get some fruit and veggies together, Ben filled our inner tubes up with air in the garage and we started loading the truck.  We had decided to try Deep Lake at Nolte.  We drove all the way out there, stopping at the store really quick for a few more drinks and some chips for our sandwiches.  When we got to the state park entrance it was insane!  The parking inside was full and at least a half a mile on either side of the road were covered in vehicles.  We said no to that and continued up to Kanaskat-Palmer State Park to float in the Green River.  We said no to that as well.  We turned around and headed back towards Lake Tapps to Lake Tapps Park, owned by Pierce County.  That place was also packed to the brim!  Holy cow!  I think we got a late start this morning.  We should have come sooner.  We waited in the line and eventually got to the gate.  They were charging vehicles $3 to get in.

We drove around for 10 minutes until we found a spot.  We got our inner tubes out and prepared for some floating.  Ben got the GoPro ready and we got in.  It felt so nice just to relax and float for a while.

We were out there for about an hour or so before it was time to eat our lunch.  We sat on the tailgate and munched on our sandwiches.  We used the restroom and decided it was time to pack up everything and head home.  I actually saw someone I knew from work.  I talked to her for a bit before we loaded up the truck and headed towards home.  We stopped at Dairy Queen for some blizzards to finalize Amy's birthday weekend. 

Ben and I packed up our stuff and headed home.  We both had to work pretty early the next day.  We got home between 9 and 9:30.

Next Adventure:  Outdoor Expo at Millersylvania State Park

A Dam Tour, Geocaching, Dry Falls, State Park Caching and Home

It was much warmer this morning than it was yesterday morning.  I got up around 8 because it got too hot in the tent.  I got Ben motivated to get up and start getting ready for breakfast and packing up our camping stuff.  I really didn't want to leave but sadly, Ben had to work on Memorial Day.  Today was going to be busy with the stuff I had planned on doing around the area and on the way home. We were going to start off our afternoon with the dam tour.  We thought going to the noon tour would give us enough time to eat and pack up our camping gear.

Breakfast was similar to yesterday, we ate some cereal, powered up our propane stove and had some sausage and eggs.  Again, it was delicious.  He cleaned up, washed the dishes and put everything back into the tub while I started on the tent.  I took everything out, deflated the air mattresses, folded  up the sleeping bags and blankets and then tore down the tent.  The hardest part is always trying to get everything rolled up perfectly to where it will fit back into the bags and into the back of the Escape.  After about a half hour, everything was clean, rolled up and fit perfectly back into the vehicle.

We decided to do a third of the D3 Challenge while we were here.  They were caches we were going to get anyway so might as well right?  The first one, after we checked to see if we got everything before we left, was at Crown Point State Park.  I know we were just here last night but it was too dark and there were way too many muggles around to grab it.  Instead we waited until this morning to get it.  Every challenge I've done so far involved finding a container and writing my name on the log book.  This was the first one we didn't do that with and it threw me off.  We walked up to A Dam, A Clock & What A View (GC3JAPZ)..."is this it?"  We grabbed one of the sheets of paper with the questions we had to answer on it and that was it.  Easiest geocache ever!  We spent some time at the view of the dam from up here and I had Ben go grab the geocache that I got four years ago, hidden in the rocks down below.  This time it was condom free, haha!

We had about a half hour until the next dam tour started.  We got in the Escape and made our way there.  We wanted to make sure we got there in time so we didn't have to wait for the next one.  We were two of  the 25 people for the noon tour.  We sat outside for a bit until it got closer to noon.  We went into this little portable building and waited to hear the safety precautions and how tight they had to make them since September 2001 and terrorist attacks.  We listened to their presentation and then went through the metal detector without our phones and keys and stuff.  They gave us back our belongings and we filed into the two passenger busses.  Last time we got into two passenger vans.  They've upgraded since 2011.  This time they drove us onto the other side and gave us a tour of the 3rd power house unlike last time. 

We rode the elevator down to the power house level and I think the tour guide told us we were 300 feet below the water line.  We were under water!!  They told us the history of the power house and how its been converted to how it's ran now.  The entire place vibrated and I still can not believe how much water runs through the place every minute.  The fact I find fascinating is that the Grand Coulee Dam contains enough concrete to wrap a four-foot wide sidewalk around the Earth, almost twice!!

After standing on top of the dam we got back in our tour busses and went back to the portable to the Escape.  Our tour guide told us a funny story about some kids who forgot he brought some nunchucks to the tour with him, freaked out and tried to hide them in the porta potty.  What a way to end the tour huh?  Haha!

We decided to pick up a few caches around town before we left for good towards home.  We started out with the rest of the D3 challenge just to get it done.  Don't Bust the Balloon...a Point of View (GC3DETZ) and we knew where it was because we wanted to stop here before the dam tour but we were running out of time.  It was in a small area overlooking Lake Roosevelt.  There was a giant statue of Roosevelt's head and the geocache was on one of the signs holding a bunch of papers.  Another one done which leaves us with one more for this dam. 

 
We grabbed two of the letterbox's on the way to the last D3 challenge cache.  Both letterbox's overlooked Lake Crescent.  Rattlesnake Canyon #8 (GC59D3D) and Eden Harbor #7 (GC59D34) were both easy finds.  One was along a trail system while the other one took us along a dirt road towards the boat launch.  A lot of great views.

The edge of town held our last D3 challenge cache, A Means To Reclaim the Land (GC3JD35) near the canal that contained the excess water from the dam that filled Banks Lake.  It was a pretty cool sight.  We picked  up our last piece of paper and claimed our smiley. 

We grabbed one more at the baseball fields near by, Center Field Home Run! (GC6DMAA) and that didn't take us very long to find either.  It was in a rock wall on the outside of the baseball field.

We drove back towards the visitor's center to turn in our sheets of paper with our answers on it.  We stopped by Safeway first to get a few things and to use the restroom before we officially left town.  I worked on the word search, which was the last page we worked on because it took the longest to complete, but we managed to get it done quickly.  We spent some time inside the Variety store, just because we could.  When we got to the visitor's center we were excited to turn in our paperwork and get our passport.  We even received a piece of the dam.  They gave us a cable that they took down in 1981 and made souvenirs out of them.  We thanked them and found a place in town to sit and eat our lunch that we brought with us.

I chose the park on our way out of town where the Secret Garden (GCB7BC) mostly so Ben could find this cool virtual and sit and enjoy our food.  That afternoon the wind picked up a bit.  We had to chase napkins and bowls.  We ate the same thing we did yesterday for lunch, chicken and noodles with a pesto cream sauce (we replaced the pesto that leaked), grapes and chips.  It was delicious.  We cleaned up our stuff and headed hit the road towards home. 

I had a few caches on my list to grab along the way.  I hope we had time to do them.  The next one was out near the airport, Airport #6 (GC59D2Y) and it was tucked up against a pole inside some shrub.  I could see how people could miss this one.  We found it pretty easily.  Another letterbox done and a few more to go!

We put a few miles behind us as we entered the scenic coulee area.  Painted Hills LBH #4 (GC59D28) took us to a pull out off of Hwy 155 near some of the coulees.  The views were sweet.  The cache was a really easy find by Ben.

I wanted to stop in Coulee City for two more letterboxes.  Ben was asleep when we arrived at Last Stand Rodeo LBH #2 (GC59D1G).  Aaaand the rodeo was in town.  Finding a parking spot and maneuvering around all the cars was a challenge.  I finally found a spot to park and we both got out and walked to the tree.  The only thing we found was a bird nest with a stick in it.  We looked at all the other trees in the area and could not find the cache.  I reported it to the cache owner as a DNF-need to check.  It was so frustrating being all the way here and caches are missing...especially certain types of caches.  Moving on now.

There was one more letterbox in town just down the road from the rodeo.  Coulee City LBH #1 (GC59D0F) was at the welcome to sign.  I've been to so many welcome to signs over the years even before geocaching.  It was hidden among the rockery behind the sign.

I wanted to stop at Dry Falls again.  Like I mentioned, it's been four years since I've been to this area...which is four years too long.  This place is amazing and unbelievable all at the same time.  It is basically earth porn.  We parked, got out and just took in the view.  Ben did the earthcache and the traditional while we were here.  We took our pictures, I got some stickers and we had a milkshake before we left.  We needed to go down below to get the state park cache quickly because it was getting later and later and we still needed two more state parks before we went home.

I've never been down to the bottom of Dry Falls and I was excited to see what was actually down here.  Of course there were the campsites, swimming areas, trails, roads and various other activities to participate in.  We followed Nuvi to the parking coords at a trail head.  We parked next to the other vehicles probably hiking around the general area.  I wonder if we will run into them?  I plugged the coords into the GPS and it did some spinning.  Then I saw the trail and we both followed it.  It led us to WaStatePks100: Sun Lakes-Dry Falls (GC4AZT5) and the spot was pretty obvious when you got there.  It was basically a rock cairn built up against a large boulder.  One more state park down!

We made our way through Soap Lake and Ephrata.  I remembered the last time I had been here and I actually played in the lake for an earthcache.  I would have went full blown swimming but we had places to be and I didn't want to be soaked.  This time we still didn't  have time to go swimming but some day we will be back again.  I set the Nuvi to our next state parks in Vantage.  The wind picked up even more.  We felt it full force when we drove over the Vantage bridge over the Columbia River. 

I chose to get WaStatePks100: Wanapum Recreation Area (GC4B9H8) first.  We followed Nuvi towards the posted coords but made a wrong turn and drove through the entire camping area before making our way to  the cache site.  I could barely get out of the Escape.  The wind was so strong I almost slammed my leg in the door.  It took us a while to locate the cache because I was looking for an ammo can near ground zero.  Instead it was a spray painted Nalgene bottle about 20 feet or so off the coords.  I'm just glad we found it.  We got our stamp and signed our names and had a tough time getting a picture without our passport blowing away!

Now just one more state park before we head home.  I haven't been to the Gingko area for at least four years but the actual park probably back in 1997 on a family trip.  All I remember about that visit was Doug being a total moron the entire day.  Oh well.  We pull over on the side of the road because it was literally right there.  There really weren't a lot of places to hide the cache.  This one probably has been taken a few times.  We found it hidden near a rock at the edge of a turn around...we should have pulled into there instead of the side of the road.  Again, it was hard to get out of the Escape, the wind was pretty brutal.  One more state park down!

We grab just one more on our way back to the freeway at the Ginkgo Gem Shop.  It is always closed when I am here...it never fails.  Someday I would like to go inside and see the cool gems.  Dino's Cache Stash (GC3P22P) didn't exist the last time I was here.  I was happy to see one at this location.  We spent some time looking for it because the coords were slightly off and it could have been anywhere honestly.  I got an idea and it yielded success.  It was on top of one of the petrified stumps.  You would not be able to see it if you were short.  We had fun with the cache and took some pictures before making our way to Ellensburg for some dinner.  RAWR!

We've always wanted to stop at the Iron Horse Brew Pub but have never made it to Ellensburg in time.  Today was not an exception.  It was closed...again.  We were disappointed.  Our consolation prize was Pita Pit, a place I have not been to since college, which was like over 10 years ago now.  Wow, 10 years ago.  I'm old.

We took our pita's to go, used the restroom and inhaled them on our way home on I-90 west.  Ben fell asleep a few times and I sung my songs.  I brought him back to the station, we unloaded his stuff, and said our goodbyes, he unfortunately had to work the next day but I had the day off.  I got home around midnight.  I unloaded some of our gear, took a shower and went to bed.  You better believe I slept in the next day. 

Next Adventure:  A Weekend in Bonney Lake and Geocaching