On the 15th of October, I saw the Ranger Rick cache series being published. The Ranger Rick series is a set of caches on the Pin Oak Trail of the Natchez Trace State Park. I had caught wind of the series when the series was mentioned on the Facebook page of JAG (Jackson Area Geocachers). After the publication, I joined in on the conversation and mentioned that I would go after the caches on Saturday the 22nd if the weather was going to be pleasant.
On the 22nd, I awoke at 5:30 am and was on the road to the state park a little after 6 am. Picked up some breakfast, water and gas along the way. Arrived at the state park before 8 am and there was fog near the lake areas. Began a day with a DNF, which was a park and grab cache. Thankfully, it would be my only DNF of the day. Drove up towards the lodge and grabbed Big Cedar in the fog. By the time I reached the lodge, the fog had lifted. Went to the front desk and inquired about the 'passport' required for the cache series. Immediately, I got the deer in the headlights look from the person behind the counter. I waited patiently so as she made a phone call and I could smell the breakfast buffet. I had thought about eating breakfast at the lodge before the cache run, however, my body is not inclined to skip or delay breakfast more than an hour after waking up. She caught on to what I was seeking and pulled an envelope from under the counter; with passport in my possession I was on my way.
First stop was Decontaminate, which is located in a camping section of the park. Made the quick find even with the morning sun in my eyes. Then another quick grab at Out on the Range. After that cache at the archery range, I hit the Ranger Rick series. I intentionally began on the south end of the trail, I assume the cache owner wanted cachers to begin at the lodge end. However, since I wanted the two caches on the south end of the park, starting at the south end was more convenient for me. I did notice the high difficulty and terrain ratings of the caches on the south end verses the north end of the trail. I suppose the cache owner wants cachers to find all the caches in one setting and be rewarded with high ratings. I have noticed from my power trail in Wingo, Kentucky that cachers who pass by, only get the one in the parking lot and maybe one or two on the trail, instead of getting all of them. Maybe this theory of the higher ratings will work? For me, the ratings were of none issue since I have already completed the 81 terrain/difficulty grid. While I am impressed with my 1.76 difficulty and 1.71 terrain average, I don't have intentions of bring those averages up since I hit many park and grabs. Thus the higher than normal average won't stay. I do focus on the high number of regular cache finds, which is 851 finds, just over 26% of all finds.
I had fun with the series and will keep an eye out for other series at Natchez Trace State Park or other state parks. Maybe with enough series like these, state parks can host events during off seasons and cachers stay at the parks overnight?
Upon reaching the lodge office at the conclusion of the trail, the worker behind the counter had the bonus cache ready for me. I then re-walked the 1.5 mile trail in 22 minutes to get my truck, returned to the lodge for a great lunch buffet.
Caches found were:
Ranger Rick Pin Oak Trail 1
Ranger Rick Pin Oak Trail 2
Ranger Rick Pin Oak Trail 3
Ranger Rick Pin Oak Trail 4
Ranger Rick Pin Oak Trail 5
Ranger Rick Pin Oak Trail 6
Ranger Rick Pin Oak Trail 7
Ranger Rick Pin Oak Trail 8
Ranger Rick Pin Oak Bonus Cache
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