Adventuring in Chiniak

Went in search of 3 caches today, and guess what??? We found all 3!

The first is called, "Thing 1"

It was a road trip day. We packed a lunch and headed down the road, past the base. This one was just past Mayflower Beach and before the stop sign. Easy parking, super short hike, and a great hide! Accessible in the winter. If you can drive there, you can find the cache. Supposedly there's a great view there, but it's so incredibly foggy today that we can't see far at all. The flights into Kodiak have been canceled today due to the fog.

We took a wounded warriors keychain and a wooden lady bug. In its place, we left a butterfly pin and some "@" symbol paperclips.

Big day ahead...time to find the next cache. "Pony Express."

Who knew Chiniak had its own post office? Tiny as it is, it's still cool.

After not too long of searching, Jeremy found it!

We took a CG whistle, and left a toy car and a Windows keyboard button.

Last cache of the day led us deep into Chiniak. We parked along the road and had a half mile hike to the war bunkers which we never knew were there. I so wish it wasn't foggy out. I'm sure the view would be spectacular. This cache, "St. Peter's Head, Battery #1" is a rather new cache placed only a couple of months ago. We're the third party to find it. It's a terriffic cache!

Very well hidden, very great condition, with awesome stuff hidden inside! We took a tiny knife and an official geocaching keychain, and left a toy car, a rock from Massacre Bay on Attu Island, a Wounded Warriors keychain, and a pinecone from the Willamette National Forest in Oregon.

It was a wonderful day geocaching, and now I want to come back to see what kind of views we missed because of the fog.

Until next time...Happy Geocaching!

Retrying "Horny Bird," Then "Welcome to Kodiak" "Garbage, Deers, and Trucks, Oh My!" & "Captain's Family Fun"

Another Day, Another Caching Adventure:

Our first stop of the day is back to the Buskin Beach to attempt to find "Horny Bird" again. It's a wonderful day outside so the views were gorgeous, but still no cache after much search. I think we're calling this one expired. It's a shame because it's such a wonderful area for a cache. Well, off to the next ones...

"Welcome to Kodiak"
Very close to our house, we pulled in a little gravel drive and parked. It's a bit mucky back in the trees where the GPS led us, and we didn't see anything after a few minutes of searching. I feared it was going to be another epic fail day. As I was heading back out of the trees back to the car, I spotted it...

SPOILER AHEAD...INCLUDING A PICTURE:

I must comment on how I found it. I was looking at the ground for it, and I shouldn't have been. I looked up just to scout out my path out of the trees and I saw a camo thermos hanging from the backside of a tree stabilized by bungee cords. It was such an awesome find I was giddy with glee that a geocacher could hide a cache so nicely to where it's not easily muggled, it would be hard for the elements to carry it away, and it's sturdy and not impossible to find.

END SPOILER

We took a tiny blue car that looked like Max (Jeremy's car), and we left a beanie baby alsong with a new logbook because the other one was full.

Off to the next location, "Garbage, Deers, and Trucks, Oh My!" It's somewhere on Sergent Creek Rd. It's a busy street, but we were pleasantly surprised to find that the cache was nicely hidden off the road enough that muggles wouldn't think to get to it.

We took a little bag of beads and left a truck shaped cookie cutter.

We're on a roll today!!!

Next and last on the list for the day is "Captain's Family Fun" off of Russian Creek Rd just a tiny ways down the main road.

Again, luck came with us and we found the cache near a public park. As other cachers have commented on the website, it's surprising it hasn't been muggled because it really isn't hidden.

SPOILER PICTURE AHEAD:

END SPOILER

We didn't take or leave anything because the inside is really mucky. Everything has mold on it and a couple of the items weren't even recognizable because they were COVERED in mold.

It was a great caching day. 3 out of 4, I think it's safe to say, "We're Baaaaaaack."

Retrying :"The Pill Box." Trying: "Sometimes" & "KOC - Kodiak College"

It's back to Ft. Abercrombie, back down the trail, and back through the bushwhack bushes to the cliff. We came prepared with spoiler hints this time and we found the cache within a minute. It was a great hide! The wind wasn't blowing today, either, so that made the find that much nicer. It is a bright and sunny day, however, the water has an eerie layer of fog on it...

SPOILER AHEAD:

We had searched high and low, but we didn't search underground. To the left, there's a hole near the ledge of the cliff. Didn't think to look there before because we didn't see it before. Have to be either on your hands and knees to get it or on your stomach to get it. Awesome hide.

END SPOILER

Anyway, it's rejuvenating to finally find a cache again. Yay! It's a nice little ammo box filled with a bunch of goodies. We ended up taking "Luke's Blue Earth Geocoin" and a little army man. In its place we left a beanie baby, and a bottle of hand sanitizer.

Next on the list is "KOC - Kodiak College" Thinking this may be another Too-Urban-For-Comfort heartbreak, we tried anyway. We parked at the College and walked down a path that led to a trail head and into off into some trees. Sounds very promising, however, after extensive search, we found nothing. There were too many good hiding spots and the GPS wouldn't give us a clear enough reading because of the tree cover. We'll have to try it again. Off to the next one...


The final cache on the list for today is on Sometimes Island. We didn't know our tide table offhand, so we were hoping that we'd hit it right. Sure enough we did, and we crossed over to the island. Us and the 2 Geodogs. We thought we had the coordinates in the GPS, but we didn't. Luckily, I knew a hint of where it is located, so we decided to try to find it without the help of a GPS. Sure enough, we found it! It was nicely hidden near an awesome historical area.

We took a CG personalized wooden coin from a captphil and we left a beanie baby, a pine cone from Oregon, and we also dropped off Luke's Blue Earth Geocoin. Very close to the cache is a spot you can view the path leading back to the main part of Kodiak. At a glance, it looked like the path was significantly smaller than it was when we crossed, and we really weren't on the island for very long, maybe a half an hour.

Anyway, Jeremy agreed we should make our way back to the car. We rehid the cache, and ran back to the beach. The tide must have been coming in quite fast. What had been room enough for two cars to drive over, now was close to being covered in water. Jeremy crossed the rising tide and I stopped to take a picture...I got it just as the two sides of water touched, making Sometimes Island an island again.

It was a good day Geocaching, and we now feel a bit more confident in our skills as cachers having found 2 of 3 today.

Beautiful Views, Still NO Caches

After yesterday's Epic Fail, as I regretfully like to call it, we went in search of two more today. One is at the end of a beautiful drive up Pillar Mountain, which is also the name of the cache. It's a beautiful day in Kodiak and a nice day for a drive if nothing else.

I had read the hints and other people's responses before we left and I knew it could be tricky to find. The coordinates were in a tree and it seemed to be the perfect hiding spot. I bet we spent over a half an hour looking through that tree and found nothing. We looked on the ground, under rocks, in the branches, in the surrounding bushes, under rocks near the surrounding bushes, and not a thing. It was just recently found, too. 0 for 1 today and 0 for 5 in the past two days. Are we as geocachers just bad at the game??? It's very disheartening. 

Tails tucked, we went in search of another one. "Lifesavers." Dedicated to animals and heroes. So we thought it may be next to Lily Lake behind the animal shelter.

SPOILER AHEAD:

We were close, but it is actually in the flower beds next to the vet clinic.

END SPOILER:

When we saw where the GPS pointed for us to go, we didn't even want to try and look for it. So 0 for 2 today, however we may have found it if we actually searched. Again, we just don't feel comfortable searching or "snooping" around a business. Too many people around, right on one of the only main roads here in Kodiak, REALLY??? Out of all the Rural and Suburban locations on the island that are prime areas for caches, they have to be placed in the MOST urban of areas?

So again, we go home not having found anything. Geo Morale low.

Until next time...

4 Fails = Epic Fail

After Jeremy's arrival home from a week in Attu, we optimistically went out in search of more caches today. We logged the coordinates for 4 that we wanted to try.

The first, is called "Horny Bird" located at the Buskin River about a mile from our front door. Convenient, no? The GPS led us to a little creek washout near the mouth of the Buskin. I love how this activity can lead us to places on the island that we would have never experienced. If we were to just have been walking down the beach, I would have never thought twice about where the water was coming from as you have to hunch over and step up a few rocks to enter the separate world of this washout. It's like going from the beach to a forest in a couple of steps. There are plenty of GREAT hiding spots for a geocache, but after extensive search, we came up with nothing. It's really a shame because it's such a clever area to hide one, and to come out not having found it is disappointing. On top of that, most of the pictures I took of the area got encrypted because our memory card is wigging out. I got a GREAT picture of a C130 coming straight towards us after just having taken off, and it turned out awesome, but when I transferred it to my computer, it didn't want to show up for anything. :(

Off to the next geocache. We went out to Ft. Abercrombie in search of "The Pill Box." The coordinates led us down the Wildflower Trail which we had been down on our own before. It's a beautiful hike. After a little while, it appeared we had gone too far, so we back tracked all the way to a little "animal trail" through a meadow towards the ocean. It's a bit of a bushwhack to get through the poky vines, but we made it. To our right there was a lone tree which we searched extensively through. We are right at cliff's edge and searching everywhere we can think of, but you guessed it from the title...no luck. It's also pretty windy out and it's getting annoying looking for it when we're on a cliff-side trying not to get gusted off to our death by the wind.

Disappointed, we left and went in search of number 3 of the day, "Walk This Way." Not knowing this was amongst many muggles, we were led to a public walking/bike path on one of the two main roads here in Kodiak. Feeling optimistic, however, we found a place to park and went in search. As you can clearly guess, we found nothing but litter. There were some decent hiding spots, though.

At a score of 0 for 3, we started doubting our skills as cachers, and we thought surely we can't not find another one. So we went in search of our 4th cache. "I see a buoy" is it's name and we were led to the marina along another public walkway between businesses and houses. A few park benches and some bushes later, we found nothing and decided that the urban caches are too risky to find because of numerous factors. First of all, the bushes we searched in are upkept by either the houses in the area or the city itself. Meaning, it's someone's property that shouldn't be messed with in the first place. Kids play in the area so a kid may have found and kept it, or a maintenance person may have thrown in out thinking it's litter, or the wind...or the tide water may have displaced it. All I know is that 0 for 4 is disheartening and these urban ones are no fun. It seems like a sport that means getting back to nature, not snooping around people's property lines. I, for one, don't really want to be approached by a police officer asking what I'm doing snooping around some bushes. The only thing we did see was the buoy.