Tahoe May Be Geocaching Heaven...
So last weekend (the weekend before last maybe?) the May 7 took a trip up to Tahoe for a last hurrah of sorts with Ryan and Ashley at their parents' cabin... they aren't leaving for another few weeks, and we're having a REAL last hurrah next week when we're roasting a pig Hawaiian style, but whatever...
Anyway, the weekend was awesome, the cabin - including the black Italian marble bathroom in the middle of a picturesque log cabin - was amazing and I, of course, being the single, got to sleep on the airmattress in the living room... (Sidenote: I'm okay with it and everything, but seriously, in the last four major trips I've taken, including home for the holidays, Mexico, reunion in Tennessee and now Tahoe, I've had to sleep in the living room - two futons (home for the holidays and Tennessee, one mattress taken out of a room and plopped on the floor (Mexico) and one airmattress (Tahoe) - I'm not sayin', I'm just sayin'...)
The trip was short, just two days, but it was really fun to introduce the group to geocaching - I took the three guys on a cross-country adventure and then introduced the rest of the muggle group (read: geocaching virgins) to it around town after we had dinner Saturday night - for all those out there who don't know what this is, look it up at www.geocaching.com and join in the fun... now on to the picture essay!!
So here we are at Emerald Bay, a cove on the Lake that's just gorgeous - literally, there are a ton of gorges... and we started geocaching... you can't tell in this picture, but the water is just to the left of Cool Moe Joe and me...
Before we got started on out cross-country (again, in the literal sense, if you take it to mean across the rocks and waterfalls and countryside) we found this cool tree... and Ryan and I decided to see what it would be like if we were twins...
And I just want to say to my dear sister who chastised me for making a picture goofy... well, rest assured that it's not only family pictures I do that in... This will also be a good time to give props where props are due, to Tiffany, who was behind the camera for a lot of these pictures and therefor doesn't show up - there are a few more pictures than these, but I didn't want to duplicate what she already had on her blog, so I encourage everyone who can't get enough Mag 7 adventure to check hers out... you can find it under "TallTiff" on my blog listing to the right...
But back to the geocaching - this is one of the many obstacles we had on our way - this is a picture from the underside after climbing down it. You see, the cache was located about .3 miles away, and we could take a trail there that we found out later would have taken more than 1.5 miles, or we could head there over rocks, quarries, dales, valleys, deserts, mountains, rivers, and tourists to get there directly... we chose the direct route because in our hearts we're adventurers... in real life we're a soon-to-be business student, an accountant, a risk management specialist and a non-official lobbyist... but that doesn't matter when you're in the wild...
And these are the intrepid explorers from above after traversing the waterfall... Tiff and Ashley stayed above with Kellie who for some reason didn't want to climb down after us...
Oh yeah this is why...
And so off we went again, in search of more treasure! This time we were taken through a flood plain meadow where the snow in the winter can get high, so we knew the cache wasn't going to be on the ground, especially since it said you can "Ski or snowshoe" there in winter... right...
So we got the coordinates down and decided that it must be in this gnarly tree... the clue was "Old Gray Hag" or maybe "Old Gray Stag" I can't remember... but we searched all around this thing, Joe climbed and couldn't find it, then Matt climbed and fell from 10 feet when the branches broke... I did not climb, but rather supervised... see, I'm learning something from working with the construction industry...
We finally found it - Ryan spotted it in the middle of all the gnarled branches... a white film canister suspended with fishing line... not the easiest thing to spot and I can't imagine finding the thing in the winter when everything is covered in snow... sheesh...
I suppose I should also mention, in keeping with the timeline, that on the way back from this particular cache, we decided it would be a good idea to climb through a stormdrain from one side of the street to the other - about 150 feet... I can't remember how it started, and I'm sad that we don't have pictures of it (Tiff left us, as she sometimes does when we're being juvenile) but I think it started when Matt said that he needed to get over his fear of small spaces, at which point Ryan spotted the drain and told him to climb in and that would help - I then jokingly said that whoever climbed through I would pay for their dinner (really... who climbs through 150 feet of stormdrain??) Well that was all the motivation Joe needed to get down in there... so Joe went, Matt followed, and then after that Ryan and I couldn't get shown up so I went and Ryan went... I don't know if it helped Matt get over his fear (snake pit next?) but it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be, and not as dirty either, causing all of us to call Andy Dufresne a wimp for making such a big deal of it... even though there was no sewage in our pipe... details, though, right??
Anyway, the next cache we found was after dinner around town - we got to a cool viewing spot of the lake around town and we couldn't find this one cache to save our lives... "Hole in One" - what kind of clue is that? Well, after about 20 minutes, Kellie decided to pull out the screws in the holes and came up with this... a false screw... complete with tiny log inside. I had been warned by all-knowing Geocaching Guru Jamus that this happened, and I even told the group about it, but I never thought we'd actually run into one... pretty cool...
The we found another simple one under this sign about 50 yards away before calling it a night on account of darkness...
So that was out Tahoe trip in a nutshell... maybe the last time for a while that this group is going to be together in the wilderness... Good times, good times...
5 comments:
Love the air mattress part, probably because I can relate. Also I heart geocaching, I am creating one next week. WOOT!
Love the tree pic. hahha
Geocaching is pretty fantastic. So glad you converted us!
Wow! I've gotta come visit you and see that area. It's beautiful. And, to set the record straight, I didn't chastise you. But I do wonder what the underlying motivation for you to goof up so many pictures is. I may have to get back to you...
A - YES - I know that happens to us singles, but really - married people can be uncomfortable just as much as we can...
L - natch
T - yes it was... now we must continue the legacy...
B - It is amazingly beautiful... why do you think I stayed? And there is no underlying motivation... that would mean there actual rhyme or reason to it... there is none... it's just what it is... don't hate...
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