Sat, Oct 13 2012 - Introduction to Geocaching Hike (View Original Event Details)
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This event took place on the heels of the first Intro To Geocaching lecture the TOC has ever presented. Having just learned all about tradeables, cache types and sizes, cache radar, not to mention a mini geography lesson, nine of us set out for a local hike in the area with hopes finding lots of caches, but no DNFs or muggle detection!
We took turns holding onto the GPS and following that crazy red arrow. Esther bravely volunteered to be the first to try it out. We quickly realized that we were about 20 or more meters below the trail that the cache must be closer to. Luckily we found a set of stairs which led to a bridge of sorts. The terrain was quite steep and the description told us we didn't need to go more than 8' off the trail. I won't put the details here in case anyone else is reading this that will be coming on a repeat hike (no cheating!). But Elizabeth made the find, and we all signed the log and cheered at everyone's first ever found cache! The cache was replaced, and we set off again.
Michael was the second to try, but he used his smartphone to test it out. We walked a little way to find the bridge under construction! Now what? Well, after some inspection and discussion, we decided to give it a go and used it anyway. That worked out well as we saved ourselves a lot of backtracking time! We followed the trail once more and as we got closer to GZ, signal on the GPS started to weaken as we were under a huge concrete and steel bridge. But still… Another find!
Kelly's turn next. This time we had a longer hike, almost a full km to the next cache. We enjoyed the beautiful trail scenery and each other's company as we made our journey there. This took a little longer, as Kelly followed and followed that red arrow, stepping almost right over the cache without noticing it! But that's all part of the learning process…. You have to keep your eyes on the surroundings too, not just the GPS! The find was made and again we all signed the log.
Joslyn's up next, and we headed out closer to the Brick works, and into a slightly wooded area. And nine of us searched and searched, we checked the hint, and searched some more. But this was simply to be our DNF for the day.
Elizabeth's turn! Once again, we realized that we were on the wrong path, this time way too high! We found a set of stairs and made our way down and then backtracked a little to the general area. I'd say the coordinates were slightly off on this one, as everyone spread out, the cache was found farther than where I would have been looking for it! This was the crazy fun cache, and we opened a bag of small stickers and everyone got one. The rest of the package went back in, but also a couple of princess rings from my bag of tradeables.
Now onto David. The trails here wind around a lot, and for sure the red arrow was pointing directly across a pond, but David led us around along the path, to where the numbers were finally small enough. He noticed something unusual about the terrain (again, no spoilers) and following instinct, he very quickly found the cache. We thought for a minute we might not get the log book out, but Elizabeth managed to knock it out so we could all sign it.
Finally Saran got a turn, and we followed crazy small trails up. And up. To a nice little park. By now it was just starting to rain a little, but we stuck around and found the cache… no where near GZ, imo. It is getting rusty, and it's not well maintained, but when I looked it up later on the site, it seems the CO has stopped playing, so it's likely to only get worse as this winter rolls around. Too bad when that happens. But we all signed the book again, and decided to start heading straight back. We'd been out for about 4 hours by this point, and I was worried the rain would pick up, so we took the roads back.
Seven of us decided to go to the local pub after, where we warmed up and recounted the fun day we'd all had.
Here’s a list of the caches, in order, for the day.
http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?wp=GCTQ7M (found)
http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?wp=GC3TY2R (found)
http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?wp=GCPKJB (found)
http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?wp=GC33MP8 (DNF)
http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?wp=GC3RT9Z (found)
http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?wp=GC317VT (found)
http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?wp=GC2337K (found)
Have some photos from this event that you'd like to share in our photo album? Please forward them to Erik Sonstenes at photos@torontooutdoorclub.com. Please note that we prefer to receive the photos in approximately 640x480 or 750x500 pixels - do NOT send original high-res photos. If you have a LOT of photos, please submit up to twenty of your favorites (only) for a day event, or up to forty of your favourites for a multi-day event. Thank you.