Heading Out to Seabrook for the Weekend

I had a 4 day weekend ahead of me for my birthday.  Last year I didn't take it off just because it would look poor since I was a new employee.  This year it was on a Sunday but I wanted to take the Monday off so Ben and I could do something fun.  I've really never done anything other than dinners or movies on my birthday so this year it would be fun to do something different.  I wanted to drive down to the redwoods in Northern California but it didn't work out because Ben had training on Saturday morning at work.  Instead he suggested a place called Seabrook, just north of Ocean Shores, for the weekend.  I said sure.  Having an autumn birthday sucks most of the time in the Pacific Northwest because it is always raining...majority of the time.  The only time it didn't rain is when I lived in Pullman.

He got all of his stuff packed up the night before.  I got up around 10ish, got my stuff together and he went and got his haircut, got home around noon and we packed, got gas and left in his car towards the ocean.

Since it wasn't raining, I decided to grab some caches along the way.  I had a few mapped out along a route.  We drove up the 101 towards Shelton, got off on Hwy 8 and drove towards McCleary with a pit stop in Squaxin Island to get one of the heritage caches.

WSHS 125 - Squaxin Island (GC6JV81) was located in a pretty neat area.  The museum was insane and so was the koi pond.  The koi were very curious at what we were doing and demanded that we feed them.  Unfortunately there wasn't any food to give them.  Ben and I looked for the cache that was hidden among roots down a small walking trail near a picnic area.  It was pretty easy to locate.  We opened it up, grabbed the log book, signed our names and put it back where we found it.  We enjoyed the pond a little while longer and walked carefully back to the car...the boardwalk was very slippery.

We got back into the car and drove Hwy 8 into McCleary to find Fire Me 24 McCleary (GC4Y32H). I  haven't been through this little town since at least spring of 2011, when we got the only two in town...which are now archived.  We drove up to the fire station and started searching.  We were fooled by the toy in the front of the bay doors.  We expanded our search and found it inside a fire pipe with a screw thread cap.  I let Ben find it because I wanted to find some of the Fire Me series and I knew he would enjoy them. 

We got onto the highway and got off in Elma to follow the Monte-Elma Road to the only other letterbox, Little Tomato (GC2B93V) I haven't gotten in this area.  I am still trying to get 50 letterboxes to finish the challenge so I can get the only one in Rainier I don't have yet.  It's been a long journey because there just isn't that many letterboxes close by.  I am now at 38 and have 12 more to find.  Ugh.  We stopped at the coords and realized that it was a veggie and fruit stand.  I could see where the cache was from the car.  I got it, logged our names, got my photo and was back in the car within 5 minutes.

We continued to follow the Monte-Elma road into the tiny town of Brady.  We pulled over at the fire station there and started looking for the Fire Me 13 Brady (GC4119Z) .  It was actually near the fence line near some bushes.  The last few we found were actually near the building.  It was hanging from the only bush in the area.

We headed into Montesano to grab the last Fire Me cache in the series for the day.  This one was at the Montesano Fire Department, where one of Ben's friends worked.  She was on shift for the day but in class for training.  She knew we were coming but we didn't know if she could come out and see us or not.  We found Fire Me 16 Montesano (GC4118N) in front of the station underneath a rock.

We sat out in the parking lot for about 15 minutes waiting to hear back from her.  We never did unfortunately.  It would have been nice to meet her.

We drove down the road a little ways, parked the car and walked to a cache called Triangular (GC2G60T).  It was similar to my Triangle series back home.  It was located inside of a triangle of land.  We knew it was at the tree but according to the clue we would have to look at it from the right angle.  We spent some time looking and came up with nothing.  Then I had an idea.  The only place it could be is on the tree.  I squatted down and looked up.  There it was crammed inside a hole in the limb.

We got into Aberdeen after a short drive from Monte.  While we were driving through we thought about stopping at Walmart for some milk and realized we didn't bring cereal for our breakfasts this weekend.  Instead we decided to have a late lunch instead.  We ate at the Happy Teriyaki.  Ben had his General Tso and I had my chicken teriyaki and yummy white sticky rice.  We spent less than an hour there.  We got going west towards the coast.  We took the cut off on the 101 and took the back way to Seabrook.

Seabrook is a new beach town that was built around 2004.  They designed it to be self sustainable.  You can walk just about everywhere within a few minutes.  There is a pool, shops, a store, outdoor activities, a farm, a town hall, a gym and other various amenities.  You can rent a house or own one.  It is a short walk to and from the beach down below the bluff.  I had no idea it was this involved.  I thought it was just a place to rent beach houses.  It's an actual town!

We found the rental place to check in and get our keys to the Crow's Nest.  We followed the map and found our home for the weekend.  Originally I thought we had the right place but when I opened the door it was unlocked so I thought we had the wrong place.  We looked at the other place, which was the main house, and saw people's stuff inside.  We didn't want to walk in on anyone so we called someone to meet us to make sure we had the right place.  It turns out the first place we went into was ours.  I just found it odd that the door was unlocked.  We parked the car in front and started taking stuff upstairs.  A neighbor cat helped us bring in stuff.

Ben threw pillows at me at the stop of the stairwell as I was coming up the stairs.

We got settled in and played Trouble and Yahtzee and ate popcorn while we watched some of the college football games.  Ben was really a sore loser at Trouble.

We walked to the town hall for the event in town and decided it wasn't very exciting.  There was a band playing music really loud for the venue, you had to buy a sample of the Waska Valley Distillery if you wanted to try it and there were just way too many people inside the building to make it worth while.  We walked back to the Crow's Nest to hang out some more. 

UW lost their first game of the season and WSU won keeping our undefeated Pac-12 streak alive.  It was nice to finally be better than the Huskies.  I rubbed it into everyone's faces on Facebook.  They all freaked out and started talking about the Apple Cup.  I told them that doesn't matter.  Tonight we were better than you.  Then they all made up a bunch more excuses about why they didn't beat USC and compared our game to theirs.  Apples and oranges.  Every football game is different you can't compare them.  Oh and my Penguins won too.

I got a shower in and then Ben gave me a back massage.  My lower back had been hurting really bad the last few weeks.  Every time I woke up in the morning I felt really old.  This actually made me feel better.  We watched Train Wreck and fell asleep before the movie was over.  I was tired.

Next Adventure:  My 33rd Birthday, Geocaching and a Big Seahawks Victory

Veteran's Day Rainier100 Caching in Lewis County

I had the day off on Friday and I wanted to go somewhere since it wasn't raining.  I talked to mom the day before to ask if she had anything planned.  She said she didn't so far.  I told her to plan to go somewhere.  At the time I really wasn't sure but I knew I wanted to get some of the Rainier100 caches before the weather got bad and started snowing.  I started planning.

I chose the Mineral and Randle area off of Forest Road 25.  That would get me about 7 of them and maybe the virtual cache I didn't have yet in Mineral.  This would be my second attempt at it.  The first time I had the wrong coordinates.  I made a list of all of them and some hints just in case my GPS didn't download all of them.  For some reason every time I made a pocket query and put them on the GPS from the computer they all wouldn't be on there.  I trusted my phone more even though this trip my phone would not have any service.  I made sure I could view them offline.

I told mom I would meet her at 10 to head out.  I reminded her the later we left the less time we would have to explore.  It would roughly take us 45 minutes to get to Mineral.  When I got there she wasn't ready.  I was disappointed.  She was outside helping dad with a well pump "dog house" project.  He couldn't of picked a better time.  Ugh.  She made me clean and fill the duck pools while I waited for her to finish.  I even had enough time to pack some lunches.

We wasted about an hour of daylight.  She finally got ready and we left around 11.  We headed towards McKenna, got onto the 702 and onto Hwy 7 through Elbe and on to Mineral, which was tucked away off of Hwy 7 on your way towards Morton.  The last time I was in Mineral was with grandma just last May, when I was hiding my cache for series 3.  Mom said the last time she was here is when she went on the train with dad back last winter when they rode it from Elbe to Mineral and back.  She said it was fun even though the small children were loud and obnoxious. 

I decided to get Rainier100 3:  Mineral's Micro Post Office first.  There, we had to find the small structure which is the smallest Post Office in the United States, and answer questions off of the sign located at that site. 

We filled in all of the questions and found the coords to the final.  I stopped by a spot that grandma and I found the last time we were there, a really nice view of Mount Rainier and the lake.  Mom took several pictures before we moved on into finding the final. 

I looked at where the coords were for the final to Rainier100 4:  Flying Saucers?!? (GC6HN6M) so we didn't have to do a lot of back and forth in Mineral.  Plus, we really didn't have a lot of time to waste.

They both were about a mile from each other.  The final for the post office was near the Mineral Cemetery.  We parked at the cemetery because the coords were leading us there.  Turns out they were on the outside of the cemetery along the tree line.  We corrected ourselves and found our prize.  There was a guy at the cemetery, we guessed morning for his son who was killed in Iraq, because of what day it was.  We could have been wrong too.  It just was the likely scenario. 

We scooted down the road to the final for Flying Saucers.  That one was at the sign for the Mt. Rainier Scenic Railroad and Museum.  We found the cache pretty quickly and put it back.  This is also where the virtual was for MSR Silver (GC12B2) but the place was closed while they got ready for the polar express train rides for the winter.  I will have to come back to Mineral again once the museum opens.

We left Mineral and drove south on Hwy 7 towards Morton and got onto Hwy 12.  We had 25 miles to go so we ate our lunch of sandwiches, chips and apples while we drove to the next cache.

We quickly grabbed Rainier100 4:  Blue Star Memorial (GC6NPVC) in Randle before we went into the Gifford Pinchot forest for the others.  The hint threw me off.  It said large rock so I went to the large rock.  No cache.  Mom stayed in the Escape and watched me wander around all the rocks looking for the container.  I finally found it and it wasn't next to what I would call a "large rock" but nonetheless I found it, got the code word off of the lid, signed our names and got back into the Escape to head into the forest.

We headed up FR25 to get two of  the caches on our list.  The last time I came out this way was with Bob and Bev Fall of 2012 to grab a few caches.  I put the coords into the Nuvi but ended up putting a number in wrong somewhere and ended up going 17 miles the wrong way into the Gifford Pinchot without getting a cache. 

I felt dumb because we wasted a good half hour of our daylight but we did take some cool pictures of the river and some of the dense forest plus we were able to use the restroom as well.

Went back down the hill to get Rainier100 4: Iron Creek (GC6NPTX).  Since it was a camping area and that the gate closed after Labor Day we had to park on the road and walk in. The trailhead was easy to spot and it was pretty straight forward.  We walked right to the cache site and found the container.  It was quick and simple but had to run back because I forgot the code on the lid.  Doh!

Rainier100 2:  Woods Creek Trail (GC63QNQ) was a little further down the hill on the same forest road. I took a picture of a woodpecker and then followed the trail to the small bridge and where the cache was hidden.  We were on a time/darkness crunch so we hurried back. 

We got to a cut off that would take us to FS23 to get Rainier100 1:  Layser Cave (GC5VDWV), we were so stoked to see a cave.  We parked up at the top of the trailhead and walked down.  We saw two guys and asked where the cave was.  They said right around the corner.  We found the cache and then headed to the cave, which was like 50 feet from the cache site.  Mom slipped down a hill and got her pants dirty.  We admired the view of Mount Adams before we went back to the vehicle.

We rushed back down the hill so we could get the last one in the Randle area before it got dark.  We had been to this spot once before.  They must have archived it to put Rainier100 3: Hopkins Creek Falls (GC6KA2F) out in its spot.  Mom stayed in the car while I ran and got it really quick.  There was more water coming down the falls this time.  I quickly ran back so we could start heading back towards home.

We started our drive back home.  I stopped in Morton to get some gas.  Mom wanted a hamburger and I told her that there really wasn't anything out this way especially mom and pop burger joints.  I suggested Harold's in Chehalis/Centralia.  She gave them a call to see how late they were open...til 7.  We had some time to get there.

We talked about work, Thanksgiving, Christmas, sports and other stuff as we made our way to I-5.  Ben called me as he was heading home when we got to Napavine.  I talked to him for a little bit and then had to go because we were almost to Harolds.  We both ordered the burger and shakes.  Ate in the parking lot.

Headed back to Rainier to drop mom off and then I went home afterwards.  It was nice to clean up and relax before bedtime.

Next Adventure:  Heading out to Seabrook for the Weekend

Election Day and 65 Degrees in November? I'll Take It!

I went to work and when I was done I saw the weather was awesome for a fall November day.  I could have worn shorts.  I grabbed a few things at the store before I wandered around the Hawks Prairie area clearing out the newer caches I haven't gotten yet.

The first one, Travelin' Stan's First Can (GC6R0B3), was behind the Walmart.  I had no idea there was a small "greenbelt" area between Walmart and the neighborhood.  It had a sidewalk and lights and even a rock wall.  I'm sure a lot of people bring their dog here to poop.  I watched where I stepped.  The coords were off a bit and I had to look at the hint before I found it next to a tree with bark over the top of it. 

I drove less than a quarter of a mile to the next one. Quick Stop (GC6RWDP) was near the Chinese Buffet and the Big Lots parking lot.  I parked where I thought it would be and walked.  The coords were off, took me right to the middle of the parking lot, I read the name of it again and knew where to look.  It was a small nano cache with a point on the bottom of it and they tucked it into one of the holes in the stop sign.  I found some room on the log sheet and signed my initials.  I had to wait for a few cars to pass before I could put it back.

I checked the app to see where the next one was.  I've had my eye on Marvin Road, Exit 111, Travel Bug Hotel (GC65ZGV) for the past couple months but either didn't have enough time to get it, it was dark or pouring down rain.  I knew there was a better day to go get it hoping that it wasn't muggled or archived before I could get it.  It was on the side lot next to the Mayan Mexican Restaurant.  I parked pretty close to it and noticed all of the garbage people left behind.  There were a few TV's, a couch, trash sprinkled all around, glass and car parts.  What a great place for a cache right?  I found the cache. signed my name and got out of there as quick as I could.

Speedbumps (GC6G2D9) took me over to the Costco.  I thought the hide would be harder than it was.  The difficulty was a joke because the bakery was nearby and it might be hard finding the cache while smelling fresh bread and or doughnuts.  I smelled the bakery as I got out of the Escape.  The cache was easy to find and there was a bonus inside, a pathtag from the last people who found the cache.  It's been a while since I found a pathtag inside of a cache.  It was pretty cool actually.  I signed my name and put it back.  No muggles were around surprisingly. 

I drove over towards River Ridge High School to the small forested area.  I've found caches in the past here before.  They've all been archived since then.  I parked the car across the street at an apartment complex and ran across the street.  I didn't think the Presidential Suite:  A Travel Bug Hotel (GC6TXP6) cache would take me very long to find.  Turns out the coordinates bounced all over the place.  I had to read the hint.  It was going to be next to a bush...but which one?  I scoured as fast as I could because the mushroom farm poop smell was pretty ripe.  After about 7ish minutes I finally found the darn thing.  I thought it was appropriate since today we find out who our new president was.

I thought I had some time to find two more.  Since it gets dark an hour earlier now I had to hurry.  Plus I wanted to leave the area before everyone got off of work at 5.  There were two more in the direct area that weren't too far apart.  I got crappy signal before I could use the hint to find Pam's Silver Bullet (GC5YKRM).  So I had to just guess where it could be.  I made a pretty good educated guess and found it very quickly.  I didn't have to be there that long.

The last one was less than a half a mile away near some houses at the edge of a cul-de-sac.  Not For Fire (GC678XT) I originally thought might be a fake sprinkler head or a fire hydrant.  Nope, it was  a fake log next to a small tree.  It was a quick find, sign and place back.  I walked back to the Escape and made my way home before traffic got insane.

Then the election stuff was out of control.  I really didn't think Trump would get elected but he did.  I hope the next four years we don't regress in all of the progress we've made.  I would like to see Obamacare disappear though.  Four years is so long, ugh. 

Next Adventure:  Veteran's Day Rainier100 Caching in Lewis County