Saga of the Frozen One

Over the past three years, each Martin Luther King Holiday weekend in January there have been organized cachepeditions led by bitbrain and Tiger130 and called themselves the Frozen Dozen. The 2009 adventure was at Walls of Jericho in Alabama, 2010 was Virgin Falls in Tennessee and this past year the hike were near Stone Island State Park in Tennessee. I have been invited to these cachepedition but for one reason or another I have been unable to attend. Unlike the group effort, I went about this cachepedition finding three category grids, solo.



This past weekend I had a long trip while not intended to be in Arctic conditions, my caching was in the snow and ice. My first significant find was Stumpy's Path, which was near the end of a 1/3 mile long paved trail. Normally, this is just a walk in the park, but the snow and ice made this a little more difficult. I found the cache and went to the end of the trail to view the spectacular water fall. Later in the day, seeking more difficult terrain cache, I sought and found Ensor Shower. This was a major accomplishment since it was rated a four difficulty. Thankfully, with the frozen conditions, I found the cache with ease. Had it been a recent hard rain, this cache would nearly be impossible to retrieve. I kept on hiking and found No Ships or Loose Lips Here. I had been to this park in 2006 and didn't go after this cache even though I was just about 600 feet away. I recall when I found the nearby earthcache, it was pouring down rain.



The next day the roads were in better shape however, there was still plenty of snow and ice on the ground. I made my way to the one of three caches I wanted, Love/Hate Relationship Redo. While deployed to Kuwait in 2010, I spent much of my idle time looking for caches to complete the Well Rounded Cacher category grid. The original Love/Hate Relationship was missing and became archived. The redo cache was placed in November and made my plans to find it. Arrived at the parking location, took some pictures and found a nearby cache. While my walk was only about 400 feet, I was freezing. Being I had a little less than a mile hike with elevation changes, I put on another layer of clothes. The temps were below 20. Made my way to cache location taking my time and with small steps due to the icy conditions. After doing some crawling around, I spotted the hiding location and was elated to find this cache. Signed the log and took a long time getting back up to the parking location, a change in nearly 300 feet of elevation. I figured this would be the most difficult and exhausting cache of the day, I would be correct.

Later in the morning, I made my way to Basket Case. I studied the satellite photos of this area and the weekend prior I made a light recon of it from the nearby 4-lane. I got an idea of what I needed to grab this cache by calling the cache owner and took his advise word for word. I must have looked strange carrying so many objects from the parking lot and across the bridge. I spotted the cache right away. Completed setting up my gear and retrieved the cache without incident. Signed the log and then went after Down Below. This one turned out to be the most hazardous since I fell on the icy rocks and nearly smashed my GPS. Thankfully, I was uninjured and GPS only suffered a small scratch. I was going to give up on the cache but after looking from a distance, I spotted what I thought was a hiding place, regrouped and found the cache.

Left that location feeling tired and worn out and elected not go after anymore in this area, I went after the last find for category grid, Protector of the Great War. I had solved this mystery while in Kuwait, studied photos too to figure how I would retrieve the cache. A few days before I was set to return to the United States, the cache was archived. It seemed like a punch in the gut to see this one archived since the nearest 4.5 terrain/4.5 difficult was almost 200 miles from home. After conference with the cache owner, he explained why he archived it and told me I could still find the log the find. I parked nearby and quickly made the find.

The next two days, I paid for the adventure with a sore knee and strained calf muscle.

It was an awesome day, knocking out three caches of the 81 category grid and now my magic number is at five.

Caches on target are:

Flip Dizzy Loves Jelly Beans, a mystery that is about 95% solved, close enough to that I think I can find it.

Over the Deer V2 located in Jackson, TN.

Peace and Tranquility I, located in Clarksville, TN.

Hi Ho Silver, located near Franklin, TN.

Legal Only by Boat Nashville Secrets #1, located in Nashville, the only cache left for the category grid that requires a kayak.

Upgrades to Groundspeak

I've been using GSAK stats on my geo-profile for many months and still plan to keep using the feature. Recently, Groundspeak updated their website to install, a Favorites, Statistics and Souvenirs sections. I really like what the folks at Groundspeak have done and will be watching when more information are installed in the Statistics and Souvenirs sections.

Been paying a lot of attention of the statistics section saw where my 1.74 difficulty average is at or very near the norm while browsing the profiles of many cachers that I know or have passed through TF territory. My terrain average, I find to be a disappointing 1.67. While it's ahead of a few who have completed the Well Rounded Cacher requirements and also tops a reported runner. Heck, I've completed the West Tennessee Mega Multi, kayaked to several caches and no stranger to the trails at Bartlett Park, Shelby Farms, Natchez Trace State Park and Land Between the Lakes. This year, I am going to strive to reach a 1.7 average, which may mean less park & grab and more hikes in the Land Between the Lakes. Also plan to get the kayak out far more this coming summer.

When the Favorites sections was introduced, I went through my completed caches and favorite'd 146 caches. I am going to exclude events and CITO's and most that are archived. Bridge, No Bridge, thus far is the only cache favorite'd that has been archived. Currently, I own one cache that has been favorite'd four times, that being Cache Raider. However, I adopted that cache, the original owner Canoe Guy deserves the honor of having the high rating among peers.

Received many emails from Groundspeak where I received Souvenirs, all of which are from the many states that I have cached. I did noticed that Groundspeak is awarding the state souvenirs in the order the US states were admitted to the Union. Have noticed the art work on the souvenirs is great. I am only awaiting the state of New Mexico. I figure Groundspeak will produce souvenirs for the countries I have cached, which are Canada, Kuwait and Iraq. Time will tell.

Hiking in the New Year

The day of New Years Eve, I pondered where I wanted to go cachin' and selected the southern part of the Land Between the Lakes, a hiking trail near Piney Campground. I got up around 6 am and left just before 7 am heading for Kentucky Lake. First stop was at Wave at Hank, a geocache near the lake, where the cacher has to pass by the home of Hank Williams Jr. This was before 8 am, I had doubts that Mr. Williams would be up, I chose to go after the cache and not make a visit.

Arrived at the parking coordinates and headed for the hike. I had hiked this trail about 10 years ago and knew where to enter the woods. I turned my tracks on the GPS to record my travel where I would later upload the trip on EveryTrail.com. There was much rain the night before and I would later find that many intermittent streams were flowing at a large and fast pace. This made crossing the streams a delicate operation. My first find on the trail was Murray's Cache; took some time to find the cache since the coordinates were off by more than 30 feet. Since I was tracking myself, I elected to set down the GPS and not track all the circling, back and forth, ei cache dance that comes with the game. Found the cache and had just as much a difficult time to finding the trail. I would have another difficult time finding the trail and then began marking where I left the trail to find the right spot to resume the tracking.

Next find was Where's the Door, a cache at a small burial plot marked with stones. Very interesting location. Next cache was Sadee want to cache, too, that one took some hill climbing. Staying on the trail I sought 20th Anniversary then found Volunteer, followed by Micro in the Tennessee Woods. Micros in the woods are not my favorite caches but this one was spotted very quickly and coordinates were dead on.

After returning home, I uploaded the tracks and can be found here.

Returning home, I drove through Puryear, TN grabbing Audrey's Cache, Is anybody home? and ended the day with State Line Evil Micro. I will have to return to Puryear and avenge a DNF at Is anybody home yet?, I DNF'd the cache even through I could see the container. About two feet of water prevented me from retrieving the cache.

Shelby Farms re-visited

Hooked up with pcsenn for two days of caching in the Memphis area. Pcsenn was in a warpath to complete the West Tennessee Mega Multi series. We arrived at Shelby Farms and first picked up Ode to Spencersb. Had to beat down the briers to get to that one. We found The Mystery of the Lost Treasure of Beale and then pcsenn found the Up the Creek Up the Wolf cache of the WTMM. We did a lot of work on Cache Obscura, a very evil and ingenious hide. Then finalized with cache finds near the new greenway, The Frank Stockton Cache, The Lady, or the Tiger, Blue Trail???, Greenline- #1 and had some fun with The 385 Cache where pscenn knocked out another grid category.

After nine miles of hiking in Shelby Farms we headed to the nearby Osprey Park where pscenn found another WTMM, Osprey Nest Platforms. We also found West Lake, Lake or Pond? and walked across the new footbridge over the Wolf River to find Rusty's Trail.

The next day, pscenn completed the West Tennessee Mega Multi and I picked up a few park and grabs on the way home.

Overall, successful two days of caching, hiking over 12 miles and thankfully my knee didn't give me any trouble.

2010

The year 2010 is coming to an end in a couple of weeks. While my geocaching numbers way down due to a deployment to the Middle East, I did accomplish some goals. Managed to work off a few category grid finds, added the state of New York, countries of Kuwait and Iraq to my geo-profile. One noted stat is that I increased my cache to cache miles by 36,000 miles; know I have over 95,000 cache to cache miles. Since my return home, I have only gone after simple park & grabs due to the weather and lack of time.

Next year I should reach 3,000 finds and hope to complete the requirements for the Well Rounded Cacher.

Destination Afghanistan II Travel Bug

While attending the 1st Annual Jackson Area GeoRace/Challenge, Tiger130 handed me a travel bug, Destination Afghanistan II since everyone knew I would be deploying to the Middle East in a few months. I informed the travel bug owner of my pending deployment and asked me to hold onto the bug and take it to Kuwait. Generally, travel bugs should only be held for about 2 weeks. While in Texas, I dropped and picked up the bug in a cache to give the bug 1.047 miles and another state. A few days before I was scheduled to depart, I was held back for a medical condition and I handed the bug to soldiermama and she took it to Kuwait and once I arrived in theater, I grabbed the bug from her. I dropped the bug in Mr. Mister, probably the safest cache in regard to muggle raiding. Airroster took the bug to a cache at Ali Al Salem for a better chance of reaching the final destination. Ali Al Salem in the entry and exit point for many service members that rotate to Iraq, Kuwait, Afghanistan and other countries in the region.

I am happy to report that on June 8, 2010, the travel bug made it to it's destination, a cache called Dragon Village in Afghanistan. Since then the bug has been bouncing from cache to cache in the war zone.

WRC & Bingo

In 2008, I begun to work on caches for the Well Rounded Tennessee Cacher and needed around 17 finds for all the category grid. Two years later, I have knocked that number down to nine. With four of those finds during this year 2010, even though I have been busy with military matters. I have plans to complete the requirements for Tennessee and Missouri WRC sometime in the year 2011. I think one of the most difficult parts, in regard to the Missouri WRC, will be finding a cache that was hidden in the year 2000. I do have a bookmark of caches on my target list.

Came across an interesting challenge using the game of Bingo, a cache by jeffbouldin. I already see I have completed the vertical and horizontal cards for this cache and debating, do I want to go after all three cards? The last being the diagonal. I do need a 4.5 Difficulty and 4.5 Terrain to master this and I only need Protector of the Great War cache by JoGPS.