2 Degrees West

Whilst out caching this weekend, I came across a cache with the westings w002 00.000  Well, why not? Off I set to grab that one! The furthest west we have cached though is w004 in Wales.

This weekend saw freezing temperatures and some light snow. Big QC wanted a 'Daddy Day' so I headed off on my own for a morning of caching. I set off for a series (or two) around Devizes. I parked up and walked round the 5 miles route in just over 2 hours. It was cold so I had to walk fast! With some spare time, I headed up to Calne and completed a short series of 8 caches before returning home. I was home, washed and recovered before Daddy QC returned with both kids.

Today, after a trip to the indoor playcenter, Little and Big QC went over to the Common where we found 3 caches, we then did a few drive-bys on the way home. One of the caches we found was huge. It was a 10L bucket (with lid) hidden in the cacher's front garden. It felt very odd getting the cache whilst the owners were home!

This week was an excellent week for caching. I found 72 new caches, which is my equal best week! My caching streak is now 89 days. How long this can keep going is now dependent on the weather.

Arghhhhhh!

My little Garmin Trex GPS has broken!

We parked up near the series we were about to walk round, I switched on the GPS to warm it up...and nothing! I changed the batteries to fresh new ones...and nothing! I banged it (a bit)...and nothing. The 'ON' button just would not click on. That was it, I knew the iphone would not last a 3 mile walk so we did a few drive bys and headed home.

Once at home, I opened up the unit and had a fiddle. I fear it will never be water tight again, but I got it working. I cached on Monday, then, on my final (and tenth) cache, it switched itself off and has failed to work since.

Today I had to cache using the iphone, which wasn't too bad. I found 2 of the 2 caches easily and hit the 1100 mark.

A new GPS system is winging it's way to me right now.

The Stiles, oh the stiles!

Stiles; the bane of my life! Big QC loves climbing them, but have you tried getting a buggy over one?

We were faced with this huge stile last week. You also had to be careful of the barbed wire strung across the top.

How do we manage stiles when it is just Little QC and myself out caching?

1. Approach stile and sigh
2. Unstrap Little QC and climb over the stile with him
3. Place him on the ground and climb back over the stile
4. Get the buggy and hoist it over the stile. Our buggy weighs in at 18lbs
5. Climb over the stile
6. Retrieve Little QC from a puddle/nettles/tree...and remove leaves/sticks/berries from hand
7. Fight to strap him back in the buggy
8. Walk on!

This was Little QC at the Old Stile Cache in Axford.

The Ridgeway

One of my favourite places to walk and cache is along The Ridgeway. Today I headed out to a cache called 'Lammy Down' set by a local cacher. The setter has some fantastic caches in the localish area. You can always expect a good walk and amazing scenery from him. I parked up alongside 10+ Landrovers and 4x4s and headed off. The walk took me along The Ridgeway and then up a bridle path to a place called Lammy Down. I found the cache easily, another ammo can, rescued the TBs that had been stuck in there for 6 months, signed the log and headed back down hill. 

I then decided that I had some more time before having to pick Big QC up from school, so headed over towards another cache. I was 0.22 miles from the cache when I rounded the bend and was confronted with the men from the Landrovers, all carrying large guns and surrounded by their hounds; it is pheasant shooting season. I was not about to walk through these men, hunt for a cache and then walk nonchalantly off! I double backed and headed back to the car.

The old caches

Earlier this week, I needed to find a quick local(ish) cache. I was pressed for time, but wanted to maintain the 'cache a day'. I headed out to one that looked a quick cache and dash, unfortunately the weather was hovering around freezing and all the leaves, sticks and foliage were stuck together making hunting for the cache too hard. I logged a DNF. So what now? I needed a cache. I fired up the iphone and saw a cache nearby, the down side to this cache was that it hadn't been found since April this year. I headed over, loaded Little QC into the sling and walked up a lovely bridlepath. Lo and behold, there was a huge ammo can dating back 7 years. I read through the log book spotting names I knew, signed the log myself, replaced and headed back to the car. This was so much better than the cache and dash I'd intended to do.

How are the TBs getting on?

Here is a quick run down on the Travel Bugs we have out:

Our car- Spotted 13 times, most recently on the M4 as we drove to Wales.
Marmalade- The Marmalade TB got taken to California. He is now there and being moved around quite quickly. He has clocked 5500 miles.
The Vendee Gem has finally been moved. This is the first time since July. It is somewhere in France.
Para (aiming for Sydney) was lost for a while. The person who had him gave up caching. He was tracked down and is now in Dorset...so has headed a little south!
Mountain Panda also got lost, but this time, he was lost in someones old car! After a quick email, he was placed in a cache, retrieved and then placed in the Lake District.
Little Dolphin is somewhere presumed missing.

We've now found 90 Travel Bugs and Geocoins.

Caching in Amsterdam

We spent the past weekend in Amsterdam visiting family. Seeing as we've maintained the 'cache a day' streak, we had to take in a few caches. We picked up a few caches near to Heathrow; we had some time to kill before picking up Daddy QC from work. These caches were easy drive bys.

We really needed a cache in Amsterdam that was big enough to take a TB (Travel Bug) I'd had for a while. It's goal was to go to Rotterdam, so I figured that Amsterdam was a good stepping stone for it. We found a TB sized cache but it had been muggled the day before. Thankfully, there was another cache close by. This though, involved lying on ones stomach and reaching under the bridge to retrieve the cache.

We picked up 2 caches on Sunday, including the one at Centraal station. This is a super busy cache with over 1,500 finds.

Today, I had to pick up some work for Daddy QC, so spent a few hours wandering round Basingstoke. I do not like urban caching as I always feel so conspicuous looking for some bit of plastic packaging hidden in some odd location. I got 11 finds and about 4 DNFs.

Moulsford Downs

What can I say except that this was a fantastic series. Little QC and I had arranged to walk round the series with some new friends. We parked up, headed over the first stile and then we were on our way. The series took us up hills, up more hills, up some more hills, down a little and then back up! Over the course of 5 miles we found all 14 caches. The views, the scenery, the mixed terrain, the variety of caches and the company made for an excellent walk. I really recommend a walk round. Naturally, we ended our caching day with a large cake. Who wants to cache and dash when you can cache and cake?!

I am now the proud owner of a new Geocoin! Thanks to A for finding it for me, it really sums up my quest to cache every day...which is still going strong! I will not be releasing this coin, this is one for my (small) collection!

1000 caches!

This morning, Daddy QC offered to take both kids out for the morning leaving me with a spare few hours. Decisions, decisions...what could I do in a few hours? The answer was simple; a caching route that we wouldn't be able to do as a family and/or one that couldn't be done in sections. I looked at the map and decided that Temple Bottom was to be my series of the day. The route was about 8 miles with 36 caches up, down and around Temple Bottom. In true stupidity, I decided to bike it; naively I thought it would just be Ridgeway paths with some hills! I managed to bike a good two-thirds of the route, the rest I had to push the bike. My bike (and myself) were absolutely caked in mud by the end. It was a fantastic series with some amazing views and variety of caches. I found 35 out of the 36 caches en route, plus a few extra that had been placed around the paths by other cachers. I'm not one to end a day's caching on an odd number so I did 2 drive-bys on the way home to give me a nice round number of 40 caches in one day; our best day yet.
I was home before Daddy QC and the kids got back from their indoor playcentre trip.
I can now show off my shiny new 1000 finds geocoin!

Today's caching is a great milestone for us. We started caching just over 8 months ago. In that time we have discovered new places in our local area, explored new counties, got to know South Wales fairly well and discovered lots of nice places to eat (aiding recovery)!  We have met new people, made great new friends and perhaps, got slightly fitter. As a family we have something new that we can all do together. We have something new to talk about, we have seen places we would never have seen without caching and we've had fun.

Here's to the next 1000.

La Cache, Les Vaches!

Zut alors, les vaches sont a venir!

Yep, we got chased by cows...again!

On our way to a cache we had to cross a field. In the distance we could hear (but not see) a herd of cows all mooing very loudly. The din was awful. Big QC was chatting happily and Little QC was babbling on as we picked our way through the cow pats. All of a sudden the mooing stopped and there was silence. It was eerie after all the noise that the cows had previously made. Then we heard hooves and the mooing started again. We couldn't see anything though so continued on our way...until I yelled "RUN". Big QC ran at the nearby stile and climbed over quickly. I pushed Little QC, unstrapped him, put him over the fence, threw BOB over, then leapt over myself just as 20+ cows drew to a running halt. Little QC promptly fell in a puddle, Big QC was screaming at the closeness of the cows and I was relieved BOB was ok!

Thankfully we found the next cache!

Caching in Wales

Last week, I took Big and Little QC to Wales. We were meant to go to France but de to their striking issues we decided against it.
In our week away we:
Found 56 caches including 2 EarthCaches, 2 Puzzles and 1 Multi.
We failed to find 9 caches which is a 'record' for us in one week!

We found a lot of  bog standard caches, plus we also got got some very innovative caches. We came away with a lot of new ideas for caches!

Our hardest cache was rated a 5/2. Whilst we waited for the GPS to settle, Big QC walked right over to it and announced her find! She was, and still is, feeling rather smug about this!

Oooo, spooky!

Today we set off round a section of the Aldbourne Circuit. This is loop of 12.5 miles. We did one section of just over 5 miles. We had a lovely walk on the hills. We spotted a longbarrow and tumulus en route. For once, this was a route where we didn't get lost as we basically walked in a straight line!

Just off the main circuit was a puzzle cache called Tom Riddle. I left Daddy QC with the kids and walked down the byway to get to this cache. I have never felt so spooked or uneasy in an area! I walked into the wooded area and within 25 meters, I had spotted a grave. It was about 2 meters wide, edged in large stones with smaller gravel covering the middle. A small memorial stone and flowers were placed within the gravel. My heart leapt as I wasn't expecting this in the middle of nowhere. I quickly found the cache, wrote down the riddle, left a riddle* and left quickly. Every snap of twig had me turning 360 degrees! As I left the woods I met a very strange, eclectic group of walkers who did not greet me. A very bizarre cache!

After we finished the circuit we headed up to the Cotswold shop. We picked up 2 more caches here to round our total up to 900!

*The riddle we left was one Big QC made up when she was 3.5yrs old:

Q- why do French people wear cabbages on their feet?

A- because cabbages are choux!

Caching around Ashdown

This morning, Little QC and I headed out to the National Trust Property of Ashdown House. There are 4 caches around here, one of which being an EarthCache that we'd completed a few months ago.
Our first cache was a multi, this involved a climb up Weathercock Hill. Once upon a time, a huge weather cock was placed on top of the hill so that hunters could determine the wind direction. However, when Little QC and I finally reached the top, we discovered the weather vane had been sawn off! We found the cache and then descended the hill.

Our next cache involved a lovely walk around Ashdown House and woods. We enjoyed the walk down to this cache. Ashdown house is a 17th Century building that looks very 'dollshouse' like. It resembles a traditional Dutch building.

We had a small amount of time before we had to be home, so we took a walk up to the Ashdown Traditional Cache. This was a very well hidden cache, but worth the search after another great walk.

Even though it was absolutely freezing this morning, we had a really good, long walk. My legs are still tired from the climb!

Our new caches

Tonight, we had two new caches published. One of which is a Puzzle Cache that Big QC set, the other is a short 'cache and dash multi'.

Big QC is very proud of her puzzle cache- you can see it here. It isn't overly difficult seeing as she is only 5 years old but she thought of the idea herself, knew where she wanted to hide the cache and found her container. It was found 30 minutes after the cache was published!

The multi is a cache I set. The area has been crying out for a cache or two for ages, so I made a multi to show off the area. There are spectacular views at both ends, plus a bonus trig point for those who collect them.

This now takes our caches to 14 - a series of 9 traditional caches, a short dinosaur series of 3 trads, plus these two new caches.

Dreaming of caching

Not me, but Big QC!

She was calling out in her sleep and crying so I went in to see her. In her half dozed state she says "Percy isn't letting me get to the cache, he keeps blocking my way...I want to get to the ammo can but Percy is there".

Percy is our cat!

Week round up!

This week has been a very good week for caching with 53 finds! After hitting the 800 mark, I had a quiet day on Wednesday. Thursday, however was a great day. I had met, via Facebook a cacher who lives quite near by. I had seem her name in logs and found a few of her caches. We decided to meet up and go round the Hampstead Norreys series. This is a series of about 4 miles with 10 caches. We walked past most of the caches as we were too busy chatting! We finished the walk and decided to go and find a puzzle cache that we'd both recently solved. We found the 5 star difficulty rated cache and then went for lunch to celebrate! It was a fab day and we've already planned our next meet.

Friday was a local day so I picked up a few caches along the canal whilst Little QC slept off his music class! That evening we added a new cache in Swindon to our list. Joining us for that cache was a friend's daughter (also a cacher).

Saturday we met with an old friend of mine. We have known each other (via online and then in person) for about 6 years now. She and her husband have recently become a cachers so we headed over to a series near Winchester. This was 4 miles with 12 caches. The series was set by the top cacher I met last week. We had a great walk round and then we headed for one puzzle cache near Marwell Zoo.

Today, we were meant to spend the day at Paultons Park, but Big QC was not at all well. We left our hotel and did a few local caches around Southampton. Every small green space/park in Southampton appears to have a cache placed in it. We found a few and then headed home.

800!

It hasn't taken long to go from 700 to 800 caches, perhaps 2 weeks. Yesterday we started the day on 787. I was determined to make it to 799. I headed over to a Wellie Walk series on the pretence of a Tescos trip. This was meant to be a circular walk; my circle however, resembled a spirograph drawing! I had written the co-ordinates down in the wrong order, taken a wrong path and just generally got lost. I ended up dog-legging 4 of the caches as I was that lost. This wasn't the fault of the CO (cache owner), more just a bad day for me! This route gave me 7 caches, so I knew I had to find another 5. I did a few drive bys for the numbers. I do not like drive bys, preferring to walk a route or circuit, but needs must etc etc!

I hit 799 easily...and then finally went to Tescos!

That evening I headed out to another Cachers Meet Up. This was my 800th smiley face. I celebrated with a beer!

My September challenge is still ongoing, I can't quite stop now! There are some days where time is an issue or the weather is bad or I just feel tired, but something says 'get out, you'll love it once out walking'. We are hitting upon a small problem now though. There is only one cache left in our 5 mile radius to find and 40 within 7.5miles. My caching streak will come to an end in a few weeks when we head to France. There is a real dearth of caches in our area (less than 40 in an entire county) so I can see us missing a few days here and there.

10 caches for 10-10-10?

Nah, why find 10 caches on 10-10-10 day when you can add the numbers together and find 30...well, 32 in fact!
We left both kids with Granny today. This was our first attempt at leaving them both for a day. Daddy QC and I headed over for a 'Sloshed Walk'- named because there are 3 or 4 pubs on the route. We had a great walk and a nice lunch. We then headed back to pick the kids up grabbing a few extra caches on the way over. We'd given Big QC the task of finding a cache with Granny. We had previously DNF'd a local cache because it had been muggled. Big QC knew exactly where it was from our last attempt, but was still very proud of herself for finding it with techno-phobe Granny!

Coffee dreams

For years, both Daddy QC and myself, have had a dream of owning a camper van and touring round the UK and Europe in it. My more recent dream is to cache my way round various countries in a mobile home.

Today I met someone who is living that dream! Little QC and I headed over to Cirencester today to complete the Driffield Ring- a short series of 11 caches. As I approached cache #8 I saw a person in the distance. Not wanting to draw attention to the cache that might have been hidden in the bushes, I checked my email and pretended to look busy. The speed of which the person approached was very very quick, a cheerful "so, shall we look for this together" was said and then introductions were made. I haven't met many other cachers out caching so it is always nice to stop and chat. It turns out the person I met is one of the top 5 cache finders in the UK with a staggering 12,500 caches! My paltry 745 pales in comparison. We hunted for the cache but could not find it, it transpired later than it had been 'muggled'.

As we returned to our car we spotted the motorhome of the cacher and I wistfully sighed...one day!

September Caching

Big QC set me a challenge for September: to cache every single day in the month. If she can succeed at her challenges, then I can fulfill mine....and I did! I found at least one cache every day for the entire month.

September naturally has been our best caching month so far with 164 finds.

This weekend we walked round a series near Basingstoke. Of the 16 caches, 15 were micros which wasn't ideal for Big QC; she enjoys rifling through the goodies and swapping things. However, we really enjoyed the walk.