Wow, Scott, thanks for the geo-story....I enjoy "caching vicariously" and hearing of other's triumphs and travails. (sp?) You really had quite a day! peace, ~~trisha ----- Original Message ----- From: "Scott Nicol" To: Sent: Monday, March 11, 2002 10:13 AM Subject: [Az-Geocaching] Sunday Geocaching > > > What a day it was! I awoke at 4:00am for business (balloon flight). My crew > cheif (and geocaching teammate), Brent, met me at my place at 5am and we > headed out the door for a wonderful morning flight over the Gold Canyon > area. We launched from our usual launch site out near El Camino Viejo Rd/Hwy > 60. As I was setting up the equiptment and was flipping my GPS on, I noticed > the new Rennessiance Cache was only 527 feet away! Oh well. Cant go for it > now. Even thought it was only 500 feet away! We took off (kinda hoping I > could find a wind to take me to the cache site!) and headed away from the > cache. Oh well. Get it another day! > > Arrived home from the flight and got everything unloaded and we headed out > the door caching at around 11:30am. We were planning on heading up to get > the long standing 'not found' cache Verde Hot Springs Cache. This is really > a day trip that we were going to do in a half day! We left at 11:30am and > arrived at the turnoff from Hwy. 87 at around 1:30pm or so. The road in was > awsome with some really spectacular scenery. The road follows the edge of a > canyon wall and drops very steeply into the canyon. Then, at the bottom near > Fossil Creek, it climbs once again and over another ridge before decending > into the Verde River valley. We parked near the campground and made the one > mile hike to the cache site. We got as close as about 100 feet before > finding the Verde River seperating us and the cache! Well, the cache > description states that you can cross where the river narrows and it is only > knee deep. Well, we walked up and down the river a bit and couldnt find > anywhere that looked any better. Did see a crossing with alot of rock and > probably not more than getting wet knee deep, however, it was very swift > flowing water. I stepped into it and could feel the current! So, we walked > up river a bit and found a calmer area of water that wasnt too bad. It > required crossing twice, as there was an island in the middle. No problem. > The first crossing there was alot of small rocks, and didnt barely get knee > deep. The second crossing... Well, fairly swift flowing water and soaked > from our hips down! That is freakin' cold water too!!!!!!!! But, we were > determined to get to that cache come 'hell or HIGH WATER!! :) > > Once soaked and on the other side... we made the very short trek to the > cache site. It is no fun hiking in soaking wet Wrangler jeans and sneakers! > Fortunately, it was warm enough out that it wasnt too bad. However, the > cache side of the river was all shadows now and it felt a bit cool out! It > was around 2:30pm or later upon arrival at the cache location. We quickly > found the '0' spot and made our search. Nothing. Not a whole lot of places > to look. A couple really obvious spots. But, still no cache. One place that > was really obvious was right near the trail, but, I suspect it may be gone. > Also, right where the GPS '0'ed out, there was a rock slide. I also suspect > the cache may be under all that rock! After searching well within a 100' > radius of the 0 spot, still no dice. We even searched below and slightly > above the ridge area we were on. Nothing. After nearly 2 hours of searching, > we finally decided to take a stab at the rock slide and removed a good bit > of rocks and still couldnt get to the bottom of it to see if a cache > container was in there. The description doesnt even tell what kind of a > cache container we were looking for. So, really didnt have a clue. Just > searched. > > After well over 2 hours, we called it quites. It was now nearly 5:00pm and > we needed to be getting back as it would be getting dark soon. We made the > short hike to the Hot Springs to check them out. Interesting. Lots of > hippies and well... other people there. Kinda cool though. There are a > couple of caves with springs in them. Neat little piece of AZ history. Didnt > look like a place this redneck should be hanging around.. unless, we were to > join them! Nope. This was a long ways to come without a find. So, we were > gonna try to find another cache before heading home! This was a long day and > a long ways to come to not make a find. We also had to make a 2 mile hike > and cross hip deep in the cold Verde River, only to not make a find. Oh > well. All was not lost. This was our first time in this very secluded and > hidden spot of Arizona. An area we were very glad to have visited. Very > scenic. Absolutely beautiful. > > There is a new cache about 2 miles on the other side of the river, but, our > vehicle probably wouldnt make it across the river.. didnt even try though > and took the steep and rocky road back out to Hwy. 87 to Strawberry. > > We made it back out to the highway well after dark and proceeded to the > first cache along the way. There are about 5 or 6 caches along Hwy. 87 form > Pine south to around Rye or so. We checked them all out. Most were a few > tenths of a mile or more off the road and didnt sound like anything we could > hike in the dark. It is pitch black dark in the pine forests at night! There > were a couple of Multi-caches as well and didnt even consider them. > > We first stopped at the Pioneer's Remembered Cache outside of Pine, AZ. We > parked in a pull out along the highway about 295 feet from the cache. We > made the very dark and very eerie trek down to the cache site. My teammate > has a high powered flashlight that really aided in lighting the dark forest > up at night. I was just amazed at how many stars were in the sky. The light > pollution of PHX just doesnt allow for this kind of sky viewing. Very cool. > We quickly arrived at the cache location and made a quick scan with the > bright flashlight and found the clue and thus the cache. We logged in at > 7:42pm and made our trade and headed back to the truck. Fortunately, we > marked the truck, as well as a spot half way, as a waypoint on our GPS just > in case! Of course, the highway was right there and didnt even need the GPS > to get back to the truck. > > Headed to Payson for dinner at Macey's Grill/Restraunt. This is a really > nice little cowboy cafe on the south side of Payson (really cute waitress > too!). We downed some mighty fine BBQ burgers (read: some durn good > vittles!) and headed back toward PHX. > > We check out a few more caches along the way. Most seemed too far off the > highway to attempt at night. Also, it was getting late and nearly 9:00pm. > But, we pulled off the highway at the Trailhead for Deer Creek and decided > to make a run at the Deer Creek cache. We have read many no find logs on > this one and the thinking that this cache may be gone. However, as of > late... there are several find logs, so, we felt confident we could get this > one in the dark of night. Parked at the trailhead and hiked the .5 miles to > the cache site via the trail. The high powered flashlight really lit up the > trail and we were able to make out the trail rather easily. However, the > flashlight's batteries were fading quickly and no more fresh ones to put in > there! We posted the truck as a waypoint as well as the spot were we left > the trail for the cache. We arrived at the cache location and found the > cache very quickly after a quick scan with the flashlight (which was just > about dead by now!). We found the cache and logged our visit and traded out > a soldering tool kit for a .. wouldnt ya' know it (!)... a FLASHLIGHT! It > was a small flashlight and not very bright... but, it was a flashlight! Just > when we thought we were going to have to hike back in the dark. I cannot > tell you how pitch black dark it was out there without a light. Seeing the > trail would have been a chore in itself (probably not too bad on a moon lit > night, but, no moon tonight!). It was so quite and peaceful out there and > only the occasional sound of a passing car on the hwy about a .25 mile away > or so. > > Found the trail back and made it back to the truck. Lots of cactus along the > route, but, no scratches! Came out unscathed. What an awsome caching > experience. Certainly ups the degree of difficulty. I think we are hooked on > night wilderness caches! > > This was it for the night. We logged our visit at around 9:42pm or so and > made it back to the truck around 10:00pm and was on the road for home. > > We made one more stop on the way home... the Snow on the Highway cache. This > was nearly impossible. We had only a cheap little flashlight that would only > lite the ground directly in front of you. But, gave it a shot anyways. We > had to look for an ADOT marker to start our search, as per the cache clues. > We found it. However, walking a straight line on the heading indicated was > impossible as it would take us thru trees and such. Also, we didnt have much > of any light. So, if we were off with our paces and heading.. we would not > be able to scan far enough around to have a good look at the cache. We > quickly said "forget this one" and headed for home. Try that one again > someday. Got home around midnight. What a long day. A fun day though. A > beautiful morning ballooning and then off to do some caching. Great views of > Arizona we had never seen before and.. what can I say.. nighttime caching in > the wilderness is an awsome experience. Could this be the future of Extreme > Geocaching!? :) > > Although we didnt come up with a find on the Verde Hot Springs Cache.. it > was a day well spent and enjoyed. We cant wait to get up to the high country > and do some caching again sometime soon! > > Scott > Team Ropingthewind > > > > > > > > _________________________________________________________________ > MSN Photos is the easiest way to share and print your photos: > http://photos.msn.com/support/worldwide.aspx > > _______________________________________________ > Az-Geocaching mailing list > Az-Geocaching@listserv.snaptek.com > http://listserv.snaptek.com/mailman/listinfo/az-geocaching >