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.