IED training

My unit, the 1171st Transportation Co. arrived at Ft. Bliss, TX and after in processing we moved to Camp McGregor (apart of Ft. Bliss, but just across the border in New Mexico). Being that most of unit completed mobilization training in Tennessee there has not been a lot to do until this past week. Beginning on Tuesday the entire company participated in IED training that lasted 3 long days. We had classroom training in the morning and then moved out to the range for field training. All the time wearing the new helmet, body armor that includes plates designed to stop 7.62mm rounds and our individual weapon. We learned the types of IED's to include command and victim detonated types of IED's. Those include radio controlled, cell phone, infrared and pressure plate. We saw the indicators of IED's to look for something different and trails "ant hills" that hide the command wires. Also, we learned the types of electronic countermeasures to defeat the remote controlled IED devices.

The third day was the day of our battle drills which was broke apart into dismounted and mounted. Being that my squad leader was sick in quarters I took over the squad and during the dismounted section, I was the troop leader. This was a challenge for me in that I have not been in charge of that many people (19 total) and didn't have a lot of infantry experience. We used the wedge formation, which included point people to scout for IED's and other trouble and a stagger-two formation in the rear for support. I was fortunate to have outstanding people in the point where most of the IED's and UXO (unexploded ordnance) were found. We did run into trouble with a sniper and the observer-controller intended to take me out, but I stayed low to the ground low crawling to the radio. It was a learning experience and we got a "GO". In games such as Medal of Honor, I and my squad get killed more often than complete the missions.

The second part of the course was the mounted version where we drove gun trucks on a presence patrol. I played the part of the (TC) Truck Commander of an individual Humvee, thankfully not the convoy commander. My truck was the third of eight. My job was to man the radio relay messages to the gunner and passengers that would dismount. We did succeed in our mission, the lead truck had an experienced TC who served in the Fallujah and Ramadi areas during the height of the Iraq War. The TC and gunner spotted all the IED's before they drove up on them.

Back on active duty

On December 1, my National Guard company, the 1171st Transportation was placed on active duty in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. The first three days were spent at the armory in Dresden, TN working on packing several items. On the 4th we flew to Fort Bliss which is near El Paso, Texas. Prior to leaving Tennessee, we were provided an escort by the local and state police and the Patriot Guard.

We arrived to see snow capped mountians and some snow on the ground. Training will intensify in the coming days.

On vacation

Since my return from Annual Training with the National Guard, I remained on vacation from DCS since there was little I could do in the department with 8 working days and my caseload needed to be transferred prior to going on active duty on December 1.

Been spending time with family with a great Thanksgiving, putting up the Christmas decorations and geocaching. Since the end of Annual Training I have amassed 77 finds to include 35 in one day with pscenn on a run through Arkansas and returning home on Hwy 51. Day was very long leaving home at 5:30 am and returning after 7 pm and accused of being online as Moderator 4 on the GOWT forums on that day. Moderator 4 is someone other than Titansfan.

At the end of 2008, I decided not to have any major geocaching goals for 2009 since deployment to Iraq was upcoming. Dates were pushed back and I was not selected to go on 10% in June, thus giving me more time for caching. But, I did have many home projects I wanted completed and all those were accomplished. Prior to Annual Training I picked up my pace with a far reaching goal of hitting number 2,500 by December 1. That goal will not be reached but I have had fun regardless.

My first run was through Union City and to Tiptonville, sweeping all of Lake and Obion Counties. My next run began in Murray, KY and went into the Land Between the Lakes. I really wanted a cache run in the LBL since it's one of my favorite places since it's remote and forest. Will miss the forest and see a lot of desert in Texas, New Mexico and Kuwait soon. My favorite find of that day was Geocache by Imperitus which is maintained by GEO.JOE. It's one of the oldest geocaches in Kentucky. I pretty much stuck to staying on the Trace in the LBL since I am in need of new back tires for my Dakota.

The next run was for numbers through Dyersburg to Alamo. Best cache of that day was Cemetery Walk by Bashful. Chores at home kept me close for the next days but did manage to find the new caches on the Brian Brown Greenway in Martin; a greenway that had just opened to the public. I have made three trips on the greenway, two for caching. On the last trip, I took my daughter minnie mouse and she rode her bike about 2.5 miles.

A numbers run was made with pscenn and cached around Blythville to Marion, Arkansas. We crossed the Tennessee River at Memphis, delivered Girl Scout peanuts to a fellow Guard member and proceeded up Highway 51. The most fascinating find was Three Monkey's #3 - The Stacks. This place was weird and odd, being it was once a foundry where the high smoke stacks are still intact. How this cache never made my radar I can't figure out but I am glad to have found this cache and see pscenn's attempt to hurdle a gate.

What's Shaking? Series

A cache series called What's Shaking? has caught my interest. The first cache I found of series was in Memphis near the armory of the 1174th Transportation Company at Holmes Road. I have discovered after finding four caches of the eight, the caches are extremely easy to find, however, the cache owner is the Central U.S. Earthquake Consortium and the geocaches are there to education people of the earthquake danger presented by the New Madrid Fault. Reading some of the logs, the cache pages are brought along awareness.

Thus far, I have found four of the eight. Memphis, Hickman, KY, Metropolis, IL, and most recent at Reelfoot Lake in Tennessee. Metropolis was the most interesting, the cache being on the courthouse lawn and within sight of the Superman statue. I found that cache on a busy Labor Day weekend and not being seen by many muggles in the area. The cache at Reelfoot is located at the Discovery Museum one of my favorite places to visit.

Other locations and I have yet to visit are: New Madrid, MO, Tunica, MS, Blytheville, AR and New Harmony, IN

Edit: I found the What's Shaking cache in Blytheville, AR on 11/24/09.

Preparation for next deployment

Currently, my Tennessee Army National Guard unit, the 1171st Transportation Co. is preparing for another deployment to Iraq. This will make my third combat deployment in my 22 year military career. Unlike the other two deployments, we have known of the mobilization for several months and there has been time to prepare.

I completed many of the yard/home projects in the past few months and still have a couple left to do such as cleaning out the gutters. I also want to cut down a dead tree, but I fear my lack of professional experience with a chainsaw, the tree won't go down were I want it and do more harm than good.

Also have completed much of what I wanted at my civilian job (DCS) with my caseload down, touching up files and letting clients know of my military status.

Some of my preparation as been in what will keep my busy while deployed. In the 1991 deployment, I brought along a few books and a Walkman. Read the books the Walkman, a device that I owned since high school didn't to the end, sand took it's toll on the cassette player. During that deployment we moved often and the best of accommodations was having plywood floors in the tent and electric lights. As for communicating home, there were several phone centers. The toughest part was relying on a compass to find the company area in blackout drive.

My second deployment in 2003, I did purchase a portable DVD player and already owned a Garmin GPS receiver and felt the GPS would help in navigation to and from the phone centers. However, during the 2003 deployment the phone centers were not as numerous. We did have a digital telephone in the TOC, a phone that I despised even though I was the communications person for the company. Placing a call to the United States was a painstaking ordeal of calling an operator in Europe to connect one to a center in the US and then use the AT&T phone card. Thus my phone calls home rare. But, we did have one computer in the company that was hooked to the Internet and I was able to email home just about everyday. When I found myself in Kuwait (Arifjan, Udari and Victory), there were pay-as-you-go Cyberzone computer centers where I was able to email and begin to use MSN Messenger with the web cam to communicate. Some people used pre-paid cellphones while in Kuwait. Later a cell tower was built at Cedar II, using cell phones did not come cheap.

This deployment I feel I am better prepared. Will be taking my laptop where I have installed Skype. I elected to purchase my own phone number where I can make and receive calls once I have an internet connection. Have also begin using Facebook, which may be my primary communication and using email for private use. I do plan to upgrade my outdated MP3 player to something a little more modern. I do like the iPod Touch, but with the unlikely event that Wi-Fi's being available at the base, it's took expensive in my opinion just to store song. A 19" HD TV at Wal-Mart with a built in DVD player has caught my eye, but I might wait until I arrive in Iraq and visit the PX and yard sale.

Visit to Nashville

When the Titans moved to Tennessee, it will suited me since I have been a Houston Oilers fan since the 1970's. I have managed to see a few games from time to time. On September 10, my sister-in-law called me and asked if I wanted tickets for the Titans-Packers preseason game which was that night. I told her yes and made arrangements to pick up the tickets.

Unable to find anyone who wanted to make the trip on such short notice and during the work week, but when I got home I showed my daughter, Kailee the tickets and she got ready quickly for the 2 1/2 hour trip to Nashville.

Since I had taken up geocaching, I have rarely not made an effort to select some caches to go after. On game day I had no time and really didn't want to fool around carrying a $500 GPS to the football game and explain to security why it's in my possession. We parked on 3rd Avenue and began walking towards the stadium. Showed Kailee some of the tourist sights along 2nd Avenue to include the Hard Rock Cafe. We walked to the river and turned towards bridge that would take use across the Cumberland River and ran across Fort Nashborough, a replica of the first fort in Nashville to guard against Indian attack. I knew of the Battle of the Bluff virtual but didn't have the cache information. I took mental notes of everything and looked around the fort. I had visited this fort during a high school trip to Nashville. The following day, I looked at the cache page and had the information required to log the find.

Was a good day, logged a find, increased my cache to cache miles and saw the Titans defeat the Packers.

My Glob grows

My recent cache run into Missouri during the Labor Day weekend netted another county, Dunklin to my overall glob of 116 counties. A glob is where I have found geocaches and colored in the county using the itsnotaboutthenumbers stat website. With Dunklin County, I have colored in the boot heel of Missouri and made my first visit to that county.

Thunderbolt of the Confederacy

I have been an avid Civil War buff since grade school and have studied the stories, tactics and movements of such leaders as: Generals Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, William Sherman and most notably Nathan Bedford Forrest. Gen. Forrest caught my attention since his forces operated near my hometown in 1862 and 1864. Of late, my geocaching has taken me to another charismatic leader, Confederate General John Hunt Morgan. In 2007 while attending a NCO school at Ft. Knox, KY a beginning geocacher went with me and we found two caches on the north side of the Ohio River in Indiana. The caches were in reference to where Gen. Morgan crossed the Ohio River on a long raid of Kentucky, Indiana and captured in Ohio. At the time there were 24 caches on this 1,000 mile raid. We found Morgan's Raid Part 01 of 24 and Morgan Raid Part 02 of 24. I didn't realize until we were reading the markers that we were at a location of such historical significance.

Working more on the Tennessee County Challenge I have run across more geocaches in reference to the "Thunderbolt of the Confederacy". The most interesting was Battle of Hartville Remembered where Confederate force outnumbered but with the element of surprise defeated a Union unit. A neat monument (pictured above) is located in the cemetery along with Confederate dead from the battle. Also found December 7, 1862 a geocache that took me onto the battlefield.

Later in the Nashville area, I stopped to visit a friend of mine in Gallatin, TN whom retired from the National Guard. I had time to kill and had to be at the airport in Nashville at midnight to pick up my daughter who visited the Grand Canyon. We went geocaching in his home town and we found A Circle with Corners. I marveled at the sight in the cemetery, a Confederate garden and when I saw the units the men were assigned too, I commented to my friend, "These were Morgan's men".

I hope that I work more on the Tennessee County Challenge I run across interesting locations as ones I just described.

SRP

With deployment to Iraq not being too far away (dates will be withheld for obvious security reasons), my company the 1171st Transportation completed the state SRP (Soldier Readiness Program). I completed a pre-SRP in April and wasn't really thrilled to endure another ordeal. Being that our company strength is at about 200 personnel; that makes for a lot of people going through the many stations. The company has grown in strength recently with many command directed people, with many of them young privates.

Being this is my 3rd combat deployment, I am finding SRP to be more difficult each time. More family information is needed, not like it was in 1990 when I was single. Required information is for the files, finance and life insurance. One aspect that is making it more difficult is medical. I am 42 today, while in 1990, I was 23 years old with no medical problems and weighing around 135 pounds. Currently, my weight hovers around 185, a no-running profile for a knee problem, back pain from a wreck in 2002. Fallen arches on my feet are no benefit either. The medics did point out that I need to get my cholesterol down or I am a heart attack waiting to happen.

I managed to complete SRP in one day, knocking out the quick stations and taking advantage of long stations when lines were shorter. Another advantage is that not being a smoker, I don't need the smoke breaks.

First Phase Pre-Deployment Training 2009

The training that has been conducted for deployment to Iraq is much different than what occurred in 1990/1991 for me in preparation for Operation Desert Shield/Storm and in 2003 for Operation Iraqi Freedom. In 1990 and later in 2003, I received a call to report to the armory and within a few days, we ended up at Ft. Campbell to train for several weeks. For Desert Storm, training took place from November 1990 to January 1991 and later in 2003, we trained from January into April. This time, much of our training is being conducted closer to home either at the Armory (Dresden or Tiptonville) and at the Milan Training Center.

Three weeks of training was recently completed where a number of tasks were performed and tested during battle drills during the last week. Generally, the tasks were centered around infantry skills to include 3 & 5 second rushes, urban warfare, dismounted operations and some mounted operations. Tactics were practiced to deal with direct and indirect artillery fire, ambush, suicide bombers and IED's. There were also classes on combat lifesavor, dealing with chemical/nuclear/radiation/biological threats.

The training did take a toll on me and was difficult. In 1991, I was 22 years old, 36 years old in 2003 and now running around in a field with body armor at age 42 is not as fun as it once was. I do keep in mind that I am at the same age as Elvis Presley when he passed away.

I did attempt to make light of the situation when I could, in that after watching the movie American Pie, I would refer to Guard Camp at "Band Camp".

Being older than many in my unit, I was fortunate to pick a bay in the barracks that was much quieter than the others and some in the bay called our bay 'the ranch', in which I re-dubbed the term and called it the Mustang Ranch; again to make light of the situation.

Fall Creek Falls State Park

Working in the Juvenile Justice field of DCS, I have the opportunity to attend a few Juvenile Justice Retreats. Two of those retreats were held at Fall Creek Falls State Park located in East Tennessee and regard this park to be one of my favorites. On my two trips I did manage to conduct some geocaching after seminars. My first trip I was unable to find a 4-star terrain cache due to the poor reception of my Garmin Legend. I did manage to find the virtual Smoke Signals. The memory I have of that visit was dealing with a score of dogs at the bottom of the fire tower and climbing to the top of the tower with the wind whipping around.

My second trip to the park, again I attended seminars and the classes lasted much longer in the day and prevented me from venturing far from the park. During lunch, I transported two other DCS workers to the Fall Creek Falls Earthcache and viewed the waterfall. I obtained information for the earthcache and took a photo.

There was one cache about a quarter mile from the inn called Yogi Bear & Boo Boo's Stash Cache along a walking trail around the lake. While the GPS noted the cache was well under a 1/2 mile, the walk was much longer and due to long classes, I hunted this cache at night. I found the cache with aid of a flashlight and returned after reseting the odometer on the GPS. I returned with a Red Jeep Travel Bug that I showed to some DCS workers interested in the GPS game. One worker was particularly interested and wanted to go find the cache. Since I check the distance the night before, I told the worker that the walk would be .75 of a mile. I had known this worker since the days I transported students to the Memphis Group Home and used to be in the Marine Corps and US Army as an Armored Cavalry Scout. We left the starting pointed and walked around the lake. There was no moon and not much light at all. We chatted much of the way and when I realized we were getting close to the place we would leave the paved trail, he abruptly stopped and said "we are here". I asked what his GPS told him, he replied he was unable to see the GPS due to the night conditions and but knew that we walked exactly .75 of a mile. I checked my GPS and he was correct. We found the cache and headed back to the inn. Being that he was a Scout in the Armored Cavalry, he knew how to tell distance without the aid of electronics and counting steps. I did find that amazing.

Ghost River

Last year I was determined to take geocaching to the next level and work on caches that require special equipment. I tried out an inflatable kayak and succeeded finding once cache with the craft but was not overly impressed with the craft thought about a different approach. This year using gift cards, military discount and tax return, I purchased a 9-foot plastic kayak from Gander Mountain in Jackson, TN. The kayak had it's maiden voyage at Garrett Lake in Weakley County, TN and used it for caching at Lake Graham in Jackson, TN and Kentucky Lake. I had planned to attend the Ghost River Geocaching event on May 2 of this year but was cancelled due to severe weather. The Ghost River is a trail on the Wolf River.

Chimps8mybaby took the bull by the horns and set up a Ghost River cache run. He selected July 3rd to be the date. I set aside that date on the calender. The day prior, pcsenn and I were talking about caching and told him of the Ghost River trip. After some planning, he called me back and finalized transportation plans and that he would share a canoe with Kailuasquid. Pcsenn and I met at McDonald's in Martin, TN just after 5 am and headed towards La Grange, TN to be at the boat ramp at 8 am. We arrived on time and were also joined by chimpsm8.

We put our boats in the water at about 8:45 am and headed west, down stream. Initially, the river calm and no major issues. We paddled a long team on the river admiring the view and getting more experience with my kayak. Chimps8mybaby is far more experienced on the kayak and gave me some pointers. The first cache, Nerodia Sipedon was over 3 miles from the starting location and took some time to get there and would prove to be the most difficult. Having topo maps on my Garmin 60csx and waypoints for channel entrances didn't seem to help. We were unable to find the correct channel to this cache and ended up parking the boats about 360 feet away. The just over 100 yards of overland travel was very difficult dealing with cypress stumps, mud knee high and a lot of water. After much effort and determination, Kailuasquid found an easier route and we waded through swamp water nearly waist high and mud to find the cache.

We moved on along the trail onto Tiger Celebrates and found it with no trouble. At this point, we gathered the boats together for a food and water break. I am thankful we took a break. Chimps8mybaby informed us the trail was going to get rough and will get the feeling of a pinball. We went on downstream and found the Ghost River trail and thought "What have I got myself into?". The entrance was just enough to get a canoe through and we went through a maze of Cypress tress and we constantly banged the trees and limbs. All the time I kept a look out for the water moccasin. We banged around and finally got out into a little more open water and found Legend of Ghost River Howler. I had been in the middle of the pack and saw the canoe with pcsenn and Kailuasquid move away from the cache and appeared to look of the correct channel. Seeing on my GPS the cache was less than 300 feet away, I took a bee-line towards the cache and found it. While signing the log, the rest of the armada showed up.

This being our last cache, I slowed my pace and paddled onto the end of the trail where we gathered to talk about the trip. This has been one of the best adventures I have had geocaching.

Nat's Knob

On Novemeber 11, 2005, I was off from work and cleared the geocaches in Benton County. My favorite was Nat's Knob which is located in Nathan Bedford Forrest State Park located on the west bank of the Tennessee River. The park is named for the famous Confederate Cavalry general and the Battle of Johnsonville. I consider this cache one of the better caches in West Tennessee and it's low number of finds, one of the forgotten.

I had visited the park many years ago while in the Boy Scouts and hiked the trails. My best recollection was hiking a few miles before my trip to Philmont Boy Scout Ranch in New Mexico. I visited the park again when I covered the county for Department of Children's Services.

Parking at the bottom of the hill, I hiked up to the cache, passing the sign, "Highest Point in West Tennessee" and found the cache. Later, I went to the museum to rest and drink some water. It was November, but a somewhat warm day. The staff noticed my hiking gear and we got into the discussion of geocaching, where I left them a printout of the cache page.

Wingo Trail

When I first began geocaching in 2005, there were only a handful of geocaches around and debated if I wanted to continue the game. I found a cache that interested and that was The Cardinal Trail which was at an end of a 1.5 mile rails to trails in Wingo, Kentucky. On April 15, 2005, I loaded the truck with my girl's bicycles and along with my two daughters, we hiked the paved trail. On the way, we had second thoughts about pursuing the cache since we encountered teenagers returning from the creek soaking wet with odd conversations. We ignored them and went on about our business besides, this was minnie mouse's first long bike ride and she was enjoying the early afternoon bike ride. We found the cache and stayed a bit at the end of the trail observing the surroundings.

Later that cache became disabled and later archived. After being archived, I wasted little time and returned to the Wingo Trail and set out a power-trail of cache to include Cardinal Trail-Revisited. The trail has seen a lot of activity since placing the caches. Other caches have also been placed on the trail. I returned on New Year's Day of 2009 to find the new caches, Field Trip, The Lighthouse, Butterfly Ridge, Are you serious....A Nano in the woods???? and Gazebo on the Wingo Rails to Trails II . It does appear that Influence Waterfowl Calls is having the same problem with the Gazebo cache being muggled as I did with mine. I did hope he would have better luck than I.

This past Sunday, I visited the trail once again to work on cache maintenance and saw the trail was cleaned up after the massive ice storm.

GeoWoodstock 7: Bell Buckle, TN

Recently attended GeoWoodstock 7 in Bell Buckle, TN and the experience was far different than any event I have attended. The weekend began with a Meet & Greet in Mufreesboro. Well over 500 cachers were in attendance and I enjoyed the fellowship and put faces to names, including a couple from St. Louis, MO who made a pass through my area a couple of years back. After the event, we retired to dinner at Cracker Barrell and the motel.

The next morning I was excited to be going to my first GeoWoodstock. The pattern of the day would be set early with the first cache find just outside the motel when a cacher from Arizona hunted the cache with us. Later, when we got off the exit for Bell Buckle, we stopped at Road to GeoWoodstock 7, a large amount of people were at the cache and no need to hunt the cache since we we walked up, the log was being passed around. We arrived at Bell Buckle to find small quiet Middle Tennessee town coming alive with outsiders carrying handheld Global Positioning Receivers. Unlike muggle events where directions are printed out, we had coordinates to destinations. We found the town center and attended the opening ceremony with First Lady of Bell Buckle thanking geocachers for their attendance. We walked around the numerous vendors and ended up buying many products to include nifty cache containers. The vendor plaza gave me an opportunity to release several wheresgeorge bills and have had hits in Delaware and Halifax, Nova Scotia in Canada.

We spoke to many more cachers over the day including many cachers from West Tennessee and West Kentucky, whom I knew beforehand. The music was nice and lunch was great. From what I have observed from Internet sources approximately 5,000 cachers from 32 countries were in attendance.

All the geocaches in the surrounding area were also found. We walked up on Louisville & Nashville 3492 cache log being passed around. I did find my first Whereigo cache seeing others retrieve the cache and didn't have it on my Garmin. Would not have mattered anyway, since I need a Garmin Colorado or Oregon GPS to find a Whereigo cache. Later, I walked up the hill to Hazel Cemetery to find a church group from Tullahoma touring the cemetery. I noticed they were at a marker for a US sailor killed in action in the Battle of Midway while serving on the USS Yorktown. Knowing that my regional adminstrator's father served on the aircraft carrier and fought in the battle, I took a picture of the marker for the sailor. Several of the muggle crowd asked about the GeoWoodstock and geocaching. I explained the game and showed them my GPS. Walked onto the cache location to meet a cachers from Long Beach, California. Another cache where the log was being passed around. We talked a bit while walking back to town.

Later in the afternoon, we decided to leave Bell Buckle and travelled to Wartrace, TN. We looked at the town and hunted some of the caches. Locals from the town also asked us about the traffic and all the out of state license plates. We explained the game and what was going on in Bell Buckle. We found the caches with a group of cachers from Utah. We drove onto to Mufreesboro and continued caching. Again, we ran into more cachers, this time from Hawaii and West Virginia. Our caching ended for the day at Midnight Coin Madness Event which was just a quarter mile from our motel. We are not much into the geocoins, but I did enjoy the fellowship.

We left Mufreesboro the following day picking up two park and grabs and headed home.

They Checked Out

My daughter signed up for a job shadow at Wickliffe Mounds State Historical Park in Kentucky and would work there all day. Being that Wickliffe is over an hour from Dresden, TN; I thought it would be best to just take the day off and geocache the Paducah area.

There was one cache I set my sights on and that being They Checked Out. Since it's placement on July 19, 2007, I have wanted to find this cache and see this historic hotel. I would not be disappointed when I arrived at the cache location in Smithland, Kentucky. The hotel has been around since the last 1700's and two US Presidents and other dignitaries visited the hotel that is situated overlooking the Ohio River.

Coordinates were tight and I found the cache quickly. I took some photos of the building, the overlook and historical markers. Afterwards, I went back to Paducah finding several caches downtown and then onto Wickliffe.

Garmin Nuvi vs. laptop

I have been using a Dell laptop with Garmin GPS 18 to navigate on the job and for geocaching purposes. It has everything the Nuvi has but also I have the benefit of a wide screen. Set at one mile, I can see 2.5 miles in front of me and 6 miles to either side. This wide screen gives me a distinct advantage while geocaching. The disadvantages if the laptop is bulky with wire running all over the floor and dash. My Dodge Dakota has an area to place the laptop, my wife Nissan has no such room. Unless one is used to using the nRoute feature, it's difficult to train someone while on the road.

Last Christmas, I gave my wife a Garmin Nuvi and it is very simple to use and I am able to send GPX files to the Nuvi; giving me a map and autoroute capability for geocaching. On our vacation that took us through Georgia, Florida, South Carolina and North Carolina, we used the Nuvi and never set up the laptop for navigation. It's compact size and only one wire was great. It was also very accurate. Driving through Atlanta, Georgia, the Nuvi knew which lane were were in and gave us advance warning to change lanes. However, I did find the Nuvi is not up to the challenge of geocaching. It's map feature is not nearly as detailed at nRoute and the small screen gave me the impression of tunnel vision.

Overall, I do plan to purchase a Nuvi for my own truck and use it for on-the-job purposes and would use it for geocaching in some cases. But for a good cache run, I will go with the laptop.

Vacation 2009

With my upcoming deployment to Iraq, we decided to go on vacation this year during our girls spring break. We debated the destinations and at first looked at visiting our nieces in Ohio. With spring break being the last week of March and weather being unpredictable, we looked at locations further south. We ended up choosing Orlando, Florida.

First day was to be the most eventful. We wanted to reach Lake City, FL and found out that Mapquest travel time and Garmin Nuvi travel time were not the same. Leaving Dresden at 6:30 am, the Nuvi indicated, we would arrive at 7:30 pm. We made very good time and didn't take many breaks. We took a long break at A Peachy Place a nice geocache at an Interstate Rest stop in Georgia. We moved on through Atlanta and into Macon, Georgia. That is when the rain really came down and only got worse. Finally fed up with the weather we stopped in Valdosta, GA for the night. The next morning, I got up early and grabbed a few Park and Grabs in the area. Did find an ammo can in an urban area, that cache at a Boy Scout office, Timeless Values. Being it was an early Sunday morning, I had the area to myself.

We gathered our items and moved onto Tampa, Florida to visit Busch Gardens. We got in free, since I am military. Anheuser-Busch has free admission for military to include National Guard members at their parks. Military and families can visit one park for free, once a year. We found the virtual cache, Typically Floridian . The cache was at the flamingo location. About dusk, we left the park and headed towards Orlando. Got off the Interstate and I found out that I was going to dislike Orlando. At 9 pm on a Sunday night; traffic was horrid. We would face this dilemma every time we went out and I decided to suspend geocaching in the Orlando area.

Monday morning, we endured a time-share presentation in order to receive discount Disney tickets and went onto Sea World. We found the virtual cache, Seaworld Serpent. We didn't stay long at Sea World. The two long days of driving had taken a toll on us and we went back to the hotel.

Tuesday, we visited the Magic Kingdom. This made my third visit, my wife's second and my girls, their first. The park was packed with tourists but we did pick up the virtual at Cinderalla's Castle .

Wednesday, was probably the best day. We visited EPCOT. Back in 1986, while in the Navy and attending schools at NAS Jacksonville, I visited EPCOT but didn't like it. This time knowing what it was about, I enjoyed it and my girls really enjoyed it. We liked touring the other cultures and trying out food from different countries. Picked up two virtuals in the park, EPCOT and a waterfall in Canada. While in EPCOT, I turned my GPS on and saw I didn't have coordinates for the two virtuals. The one in Canada didn't bother me, all I needed to do was find the waterfall. The other required me to call a geocacher whom was near a computer. I contacted Nashville Joe and he saved the day. That evening, we attended a dinner theater at Capone's. The theater was fun and different from what I have seen before.

Thursday we left Orlando for the final destination of Charleston, South Carolina. I decided to take advantage of our situation and see the only ex-Confederate state that I had not visited. First we stopped in St. Augustine, Florida to see the oldest city in the United States. I had been to the beach in the city back in 1986, but this time, we looked at the history. Very nice city and would like to return someday. We found two virtuals, Cathedral Basilica a church with roots back to the 1600's and Hot Shots a fort, reconstructed in the 1700's but roots back in the late 1500's.

We proceeded up I-95 finding an fruit stand and onto Georgia where we met rain again. The rain would torment us through Georgia and into South Carolina. We continued to find a couple fo rest stop caches but the one I was after was H.L Hunley. The rain was coming down on us in buckets and made travel in the city difficult. We arrived at the cache location only to see the custodian closing up for the evening. We did manage to visit the beach in the rain, that being the highlight of the day.

On Friday, we headed back home to Dresden, a very long drive from Charleston, South Carolina. We picked up some caches in South and North Carolina. As we moved into Tennessee, I became more aggressive in my caching finding caches for the Tennessee County Challenge. I picked up Sevier, Cocke and Jefferson counties.

Lake Graham

With a vacation upcoming and more weekends devoted to my military obligation, I took the afternoon of March 26th off, with supervisor approval and went after the Lake Graham geocaches with my new kayak. Spend the evening prior finding the best way to secure the kayak on top of my truck. That was a chore, but in the future it will become easier with more experience.

Being that Lake Graham is a TWRA lake, I had already purchased a fishing license, lake permit and took a pole with me. TWRA rules require a license, lake permit and fishing equipment. I began my journey from the boat landing. A few anglers were around putting their boats into the water or coming out of the water. Most ignored my kayak; I did overhear one comment that my kayak was suicidal. I shook my head in their ignorance and proceeded with my mission.

Took off from the boat landing and struggled to gain my steering under the bridge. Overcame the difficulties and made a beeline towards B&G-Bluff's H2O Micro #2. Found the cache with ease. Signing it was more difficult since my kayak wanted to drift away. After replacing the cache, I remembered that I had a rope and next time I need to secure my craft to the stationary object. The next cache ended up with a DNF (Did not find). JTP #3-Paradise Lost , two attempts to find this one were in vain. I paddled to the furthest cache at the north end of the lake. I came in contact with fisherman but other than some looks, they paid me no attention. JTP #4- Paradise Found gave my valuable experience with steering the kayak in tight areas. Found the cache without any trouble. Thankfully, I came to this lake in March. Waiting another month, this end of the lake would be infested with snakes. Next on the list was JTP #2-North Island . I had to circle around this island to find a good place to beach my kayak. Giving me some trouble was a Canadian Goose. The bird was sitting on the island and my have been ill. I choose to keep my distance from the large bird and kept an eye on it too. Found the cache and left the bird undisturbed. The last cache find was JTP #1-South Island found a place to beach the kayak and had to struggle to get out of the boat to get on the island. Searched a while and unable to find the cache, but did find many beer bottles and cans. I figure this island is a drunk fisherman's getaway. Giving up on the cache and preparing to replace the ammo can, I found what I was seeking. Signed the log and paddled back to the boat dock.

All told, the adventure took about 2 or so hours and did manage a speed of 4 mph. The lake has many hidden stumps and I found several of them. This journey was fun and rewarding.

Paintball

Before I left for Iraq in 2003, I was into the sport of paintball. I got into the game in the summer of 1989, while in the US Navy stationed in Puerto Rico. I played at a field near where I lived in Fajardo and really enjoyed the game. When I returned to the United States and attending college, I took up the game and played in a small field in Gleason, TN. I quickly learned that playing paintball on the college budget and lack of spare time, this hobby would have to wait, even through I purchased a pump rifle. After returning from a combat tour in Saudi Arabia, I played sparingly at a field in Beech Bluff, TN, just outside of Jackson. Didn't play as often as I wanted, spare time and distance were enough to detour me. Thinking it was the end of the game for me, I sold all my gear, it was too expensive and not enough spare time.

After one Christmas, I had several Wal-Mart gift cards. Seeing that the prices of guns, gear and paint had really dropped since the last time I played in the mid-1990's, I bought a semi-automatic Brass Eagle gun. Used the Internet and found two places to play, one in Mercer and another in Humboldt. I started playing again. I played in Mercer several times, and really liked the game of speedball. I took the youth from First Baptist Church of Dresden to the field a few times. Later, I got word that a group played in a backyard field in Martin, TN. Got in contact with the ring leader and I was playing many weekends in Martin. I played up to the point I went on active duty in 2003. I had even upgraded my equipment with a semi-automatic Piranha. Returning from Iraq in 2004, I lost contact with the group in Martin and the field in Mercer closed. My gear gathered dust while I took up the game of geocaching.

Since my return from Iraq, I did get asked my youth on occasion about playing paintball again but the only field I found was in Memphis about 2 hours away. I was informed by a church member that a paintball field opened in Paris, TN. Place is called Adrenaline Paintball.

Yesterday, 26 youth and 2 adults from First Baptist Church of Dresden played at the field and had a great time. The field is most unusual that it is all indoors and simulates urban warfare. I found myself in the 3-dimensional battlefield. Oppose forces were above, side to side, in front and behind. The only aspect of real urban warfare missing was movement through sewers. I had to use a rental gun in that my old Piranha would not fire but enjoyed playing. I refused to play inside the building. During the safety brief and tour, the floor was very slick and I risked being injured if I went into the building.

Today, I debate whether or not to re-enter the paintball game. One of the aspects I enjoy about geocaching, I play when, where, most any weather, daylight or dark, alone or with others, at my choosing.

Maiden voyage of the kayak

With my next three weekends tied up with church activity, National Guard and vacation, I have been itching to get the kayak out on the water. I had studied this site to learn more about kayaking. Today, the temps were good, first day I have been wearing shorts, but very windy with gusts up to 31 mph. Observing the weather on the Internet, the wind advisory mentioned the wind would die down about 6 pm. I headed out to Garrett Lake, about 25 minutes away about 5 pm. The lake is run by TWRA (Tennessee Wildlife Resources Agency) and not meant for pleasure craft. I had my fishing license and a fishing pole to please the game warden. Arrived on the south part of the lake and the wind had changed directions from the southwest to coming in from the northeast. Wind were very gusty and making small white caps. I knew that putting in the water there would not be a good idea.

I drove to the north side of the lake and the woods shielded the wind and put the kayak in the water. I used my new GPS mount to observe my speed. This was my maiden voyage with the Pelican . This is the second time playing around on this type of kayak. Last year, I used an inflatable 2-person kayak. My experience with the inflatable is that I got soaked every time I used it.

This time around, I didn't get wet and didn't touch the water. I spend about 30 minutes of so on the water seeing how fast I could go, which was 3.0 mph. The kayak can turn on the dime and was steady even with the wind kicked up. The above website mentioned never to hand onto the kayak in rough water and it was true. Let the paddle settle the boat down.

Overall, I think it was a good idea to head out today and experience the kayak in a somewhat stressful situation. I have some lessons learned. Such as not using my arms so much, rely more on torso to paddle. Also not to over paddle, this created problems with keeping a good heading. Also need to get my confidence up. Attempted to look behind me and felt the kayak loosing control. Need to overcome this problem for long geocache runs since my water/food/supplies will be in the cargo hatch in the stern.

Geocaching after a Winter Storm

Last night I watched the winter storm roll into the West Tennessee area and viewing the radar; I saw that Madison and Haywood Counties were being slammed. Facebook posts by -boatman- and EverywhereActs1:8 were verifying what I saw on the radar. After hearing a radio announcement that church was cancelled, which was not true, I decided to ready myself for two 4-star terrain geocaches on wondered how difficult they would be in the deep snow. While researching the geocaches, DHCPA29 posted on Facebook that there was little accumulation of snow in Paris, TN.

With the mission a "GO", I went out and crossed the river at Paris Landing to go after the most difficult, The River is Wide. After crossing the river, I turned south on a gravel road. I had been down this way before, summer before last to scout an area to view the 4th of July fireworks. I parked below the cache and looked up the monster of a hill to climb. Just as DHCPA29 reported on Facebook, there was little snow on the ground. I took off after the cache stopping about every 40 feet to catch my breath. Elevation change was just over 150 feet and was very steep. I climbed to the top of the ridge, again for a breather. Looked at my GPS'r and saw I was within 10 feet. Looked to my left and there it was; the ammo can covered in leaves. Signed the log and headed down the hill. My left knee began to give me some problems, thinking I need to take more Glucosamine, but made to the bottom and onto the next geocache.

Next geocache was Lost Creek Cache V2.0. There was a cache on the ridge a long time ago, I found it during my first LBL cache run in October 2005. My military training has benefited me to read a topographical map and I knew where to park to make this cache easy. I parked onto of the ridge line and strolled the .20 mile to the cache. It was a nice and relaxing walking in the woods and enjoyed finding this cache as much as finding the first Lost Creek cache.

I'm ready for Spring!

During the 2008 Geocaching year, I changed my tactic somewhat doing after more difficult terrain caches including caches requiring a watercraft of some type. I purchased a inflatable kayak and did find a cache using the two-person boat. However, I found the kayak is not designed for what I really want; in that I want the caches on Lake Graham, Wolf River and Cumberland River. Last year I missed the Ghost River event due to schedule problems and lack of a boat. The Cumberland River event fit my schedule but didn't want to arrive needing a ride (or float). A recent visit to Gander Mountain in Jackson, TN; I found exactly a kayak that will suit me. It's a one person, Pelican Pursuit 100. I had a few gift cards and the 10% military discount aided me greatly.

Now, I look forward to a warm Saturday and go after the Lake Graham caches. Also on my radar screen are the two 5-star terrain caches on Lake Barkley.

Great Chase

Had a trip to Chattanooga this weekend and while researching the geocaches in the city, I thought that finding the virtual geocache The Great Chase #3, would be the most interesting. I would not be disappointed. The geocache is in reference to the Great Locomotive Chase a daring raid to cut Confederate communications between Atlanta and Chattanooga. The virtual is placed within the Chattanooga National Cemetery. Upon reaching the posted coordinates I saw that some of the Union men were buried near the monument and after later research, couple of the soldiers were the first recipients of the Congressional Medal of Honor. All the men, that included two civilians whom are buried near the monument were executed by the Confederate government as spies, since none were wearing uniforms.

Columbus-Belmont State Park

As a teenager, I visited Columbus-Belmont State Park but didn't really grasp the history at the time. When I took up geocaching in 2005, I wondered if my geocaching adventure will take me to the park again. The Columbus Bluff Earthcache was established and on October 25, 2008, I took my girls to the park before winter set in to see the park and do the earthcache. We had a great time that day and didn't find many caches. My girls took advantage of seeing the bluffs and I explained how the position was good for defensive warfare and why Gen. Grant chose an easier target of Fort Henry on the Tennessee River. Thus with the later capture of Fort Donelson, the position at Columbus has to be abandoned by Confederate forces. We toured the little museum and took a picture with a Confederate Battleflag over looking the Mississippi River. The earthcache was my youngest daughter's 300th geocache find. We spend the reminder of the day, watching my youngest daughter playing.

Now that my blog is reaching a far larger audience with it imported to Facebook, some my notice some geocaching pictures using the CSA battleflag. My personal opinion, the flag does not represent hate or oppression but a symbol of southern heritage. I am a member of the Camp 323 Col. Jeffery Forrest Camp Sons of Confederate Veterans and we are proud of my ancestor, Pvt. John Hudson Goodwyn's service to the Confederate Army.

The Charge

When I developed this blog I didn't have the intentions of writing about my own geocaches. However, in the last couple of months I have become very involved in facebook and found out very recently that I can import my blog notes onto my facebook profile and see that many non-geocachers from my home county are also reading my notes.

On a trip to western Kentucky, I passed through Dukedom, Tennessee and noticed the roadside structure had been rebuilt. I stopped to few the remodeled job and took some pictures and also jotted down contact information. I have wanted to place a geocache here to link Mayfield and Dresden and most of all due to its interesting location. I called one of the phone numbers that I found and spoke to the commander of the Sons of Confederate Veterans camp of Mayfield. I told the commander that I am also a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans Camp 323 (Col. Jeffery Forrest) in Dresden. We spoke about geocaching and that having a geocache at the building will draw visitors. The commander gave me the go-ahead and I immediatly set out for Dukedom to place the geocache.

The geocache (The Charge) is placed and been found by two geocachers. I don't figure to get a lot of hits due to the remote location, but anticipate when western Kentucky digs out of the recent ice storm, the Kentucky geocachers will descend upon it.

Camp Udari, Kuwait

In the Fall of 2003, orders were going out that our company 1174th Transportation and other companies within Camp Cedar II were being relieved by civilian truck drivers from KBR. However, all the companies were required to go through the marksmanship training offered by retired special forces soldiers and we found the training to be very different than what we were used to at a weapon's range.

We spent the first half of the day learning close quarters marksmanship. Previous training involved shooting from a foxhole with targets ranging from 50 to 300 meters. However, our enemies have learned that they can not go toe to toe with American firepower and have evolved their tactics to be close to American forces and negate the use of artillery and air power. The training consisted of shooting at targets within 20 meters, learning to stand, move and shoot on the move. The stance used is similar to a martial arts stance with neither foot ahead of the other. Elbows are in, holding the weapon in closer to the body instead of out. The idea is to be a smaller target to the enemy and if taking an incoming round, the round will hit the frontal body armor and should not be a fatal wound. There is not firing from the hip, the weapon is raised, releasing the safety for aimed and controlled fire. The fire is controlled pairs, also known as double-tap. The training was interesting and an incident where the training was useful will be discussed later in this blog.

The next training was shooting from a truck. Our job in Iraq was to haul fuel from one location to another. However, prior to deployment, we didn't train for engaging an enemy from a moving vehicle. The second half of the first day of training, we simulated being in a convoy and were shooting from a stationary truck. The driver cradled his M-16 and due to Laws of War could only fire in the semi-auto function. Fire was not aimed, fire from the driver's position was for suppression. The passenger could fire from the 3-round burst mode and if using a M-249, the weapon would be used in full-auto mode. Gun truck crew received training to use the M-2 heavy machine gun. The role of a gun truck to go after and engage the enemy with heavy fire, while the freight trucks pass through.

The following day, we actually went on a road march and put the new training into practice shooting pop targets from a moving vehicle. It was interesting to see the .50 caliber machine guns tear up the targets. Training was intense and real, on one occasion I did hear the 'zing' from a passing friendly round.

A few weeks after the training, our unit began redeployment back to the United States and pulled back to Kuwait. Bear in mind, in 2003 the Iraq War was different that what it became. IED's were not as common, insurgents mainly used small arms, RPG's and mortars to attack our convoys.

A couple of months returning home from the war, I would use the tactics learned at Camp Udari. 11:30 pm on a Sunday night, my wife said that someone was in our drive way. Living in a rural area, I figured that they were using the drive way to turn around. I watched the car came up the drive way and shutting off the headlights. We immediately called 911 and I grabbed a semi-automatic rifle and went outside to greet my uninvited guests. I have the opinion that a visitor coming by my house that late at night is someone in trouble, or someone looking for trouble. I stood in the combat stance with the rifle in a ready position, never aiming the weapon; the people in the car must have seen me and decided it would be best to leave. We gave a description of the car and would hear the police looking for the car on the scanner.

Fallen from the Sky

Having missed the Walls of Jericho adventure, I debated what I wanted to do today. Not much I could do around the yard, the goat seems to be taking care of the overgrowth in my yard, I wanted to cache somewhere.

I attended the RVG Birthday event completing a couple of micros on the way. While there, I spoke to RVG member who reminded me about Fallen from the Sky and he said it was a neat location. Since I didn't bring anything for the dirty Santa game, I went out to grab a couple of caches on the way home. I selected Fallen from the Sky as the first. I was not disappointed in the cache and really liked the memorial placed in honor of the deceased B-29 crewmen who perished when the plane crashed near the memorial's location.

Abandon Hope

I have been browsing the discussion on the GOWT forums of the Abandon Hope group cache run, but only just reading. Dalls called me up and asked if I wanted to attend and thought more seriously about it. I saw some advantages. One being it's a 5/5 cache and this opportunity will not present itself very often. Second, being about 10 or so miles, it would be a prelude to test my equipment, conditioning and my knee for the Walls of Jericho cache run that I hope to be apart of this month. I met with with Dalls at the JEA customer service center on Vann Drive, parked my truck there and he left his JEA hat on my dash. We dashed onto the starting point, a Lowes Home Improvement Store and met up with the rest of the crew, endoriders, tinksdad01, Mindless Focus, itcomagic and Hoot Owl. After gathering out gear and group photo; we headed off. We covered just over 9 miles of total hiking, I did reset my GPS as we were headed to the posted coordinates. I had a memorable time and feel like I could write more, but that could give away the number of stages and hide techniques. This was an adventure that I won't forget and the conversations that took place on the trail.

As for the prelude to Walls of Jericho, I found my knee did not give me any pain, taking Motrin (Ranger Candy) prior and during prevented any knee pain. However, Abandon Hope was on soft terrain, Walls of Jericho will be rocky and far more elevation changes. This week I have also begun taking Glucosamine and that should help my knee. I took along 76 oz. of water and had about 16 oz. left at the end of the hike. Temps did reach into the 70's. If temps reach into the 70's at Walls of Jericho, I might be in trouble, maybe I should take water purification tablets with me so I can re-fill on the trail?

This was the only smiley for me on this cache run but that was OK with me. After the hike, Dalls drove on back to Jackson, stopping at Backyard Burger for a pit stop along the way.