Geocache Milestone

I often write about our geocache adventures - a fun game that is played by participants world-wide.

We went on our very first geocache adventure on Thanksgiving Day, 2004.  We met two of our daughters in Albuquerque for the holiday, and Celeste, the one we're visiting as I write, told us about this new thing she was doing.  She got out her handheld GPS and took us on a ghost tour of Old Town, in ABQ.  

We learned a little history, walked around the historic district, and had a lot of fun finding the final site where the cache was hidden.

Nothing would do but I had to do that!  We bought our own GPS as soon as we got settled at Cameron Prairie NWR, and found our first geocache in Lake Charles, Louisiana in February, 2005.

Since that time we've found caches in 49 of our 50 states, 7 Canadian Provinces, several states in Mexico, and in a total of 16 different countries.  Those finds were in everyplace from very public places like the Oklahoma Federal Building site to very remote places like that rocky beach in Mexico or on top of Strawberry Mountain in New Mexico.

The website with our personal profile keeps track of all our finds.  Another thing it keeps track of is the milestones you reach.  

Our 1,000th find was in the Visitor Center in Salt Lake City, Utah.  That's been a while ago.  I'm kind of an opportunist when it comes to my caching...  if they're around, I'd love to find them.  If they're not, we go a while between finds.

When we were in Maine this summer, I realized that we could probably reach our 2,000th find before the end of the year.  Especially since I knew we'd be coming back to this part of Texas where there are quite a few within an hour's drive of where we're staying.

As of last weekend we were within 12 caches of reaching my goal.  After we finally got our license plates and our driver's license transfer done on Tuesday, Bill & I headed off on a little geocaching trip.  I had my map in my hot little hands...  my GPS turned on and ready to go.  

I drove...  Bill navigated.  We stopped at the first cache...found it!  and the 2nd...  Oh Boy!  Only 10 more!  And we were on a roll.  I had my camera ready (as usual), and with each cache I'd ask Bill (again)... "how many more?"

Finally...  the 2,000 cache is coming up.  

 Well, of course it has to be hidden in some prickly cedar tree.... (and yes, I always check for snakes, or any other problem that may await me)...  Here it was just cactus and cedar ...

But I've been known to crawl around on my belly, attempt to climb trees, and a lot of other rather undignified ways to nab that cache!

 WoooHoooo!

Found the little rascal!  This cache is fairly good size...  some are a tiny as my little fingernail.  

I extricate myself from all those briers and emerge victorious!

Here I am...  signing the logbook for Cache 2,000

Actually, 2,000 finds isn't really a high number...  I noticed when I was logging in one of my finds that the previous cacher was logging in find number 21,342!

Now, THAT'S a LOT of caches!

(For any cachers out there, our geocache name is:  RVers)

For folks like us who move around a lot, it's a great way to spend some spare time and see some of those out of the way places.

It will take quite a while before we reach our next milestone.... 3,000 finds.

But, we'll have fun getting there!

That's All For Today!