Just Do It!

Lately I have been trying to get my family out for more caching together. Although we always enjoy our caching adventures, it is still hard to motivate them to just get out the door. So a couple weeks ago I asked my daughter if we could try to do one cache a day for a week. And it worked. As long as she knew there was no pressure to get a long list of caches checked off, she was willing to jump up and go. And I made sure to choose cache locations that included a park with swings, or an easy drive-up find, or one we could bring a friend to. So we completed the week with eight caches found and a new outlook on caching. If you are trying to motivate others to go along with you or you are trying to motivate yourself off the couch or away from the computer, just set small goals and have fun on the way. As they say, its not the destination that is important but the journey.

Today the skies were dark grey with thunder and rain about to spill down any minute. But knowing that in Calgary, the clouds could just as easily blow away altogether, I rallied the family out of the basement and into the car for a quick drive to Nosehill Park. There were three caches fairly close to a parking lot (within 600m) and I thought we would start with the easiest one and if it went well try another. I gave my daughter our Oregon 200 GPS and I used the iPhone app from Geocaching.com to navigate our way to Bushdee (GC21RWH). Our chocolate lab Scooby Doo was thrilled to be along on this adventure and she bounced along the trail chasing the ball we were throwing for her. The trees and the gully we were walking in gave the iPhone a bit of satellite trouble but the Garmin had no problem and the cache was soon in hand. The littlest cacher was still happy so we continued up the hill to find Beating Around the Bush (GC1B5GZ). We had looked for this one before but were unable to find it due to the snow cover on the ground. So we were very happy when the oldest goat came up with the goods and we checked off another find. The littlest goat got her hair tangled in a tree and ended up with a sappy knot but it didn't dampen her spirits so off we went for a third search. I didn't really think we would be able to find this one, DUCKY TAPE ROCKS!!! (GC3NZ8G) as it was listed as a 5 for difficulty (on a  scale of 1 to 5 with 1 being easiest) and a 3.5 for terrain. We had to do a bit of bushwhacking off the trails and a bit of back-tracking while we looked for a good way down into a gully. The hint indicated that the cache container was going to be a fake rock so we checked a few rocks without success. And then the oldest goat found a rock that rattled and that made three happy faces for the day! And not a drop of rain.

CCARS12 Geocaching Event

Getting excited about the upcoming weekend of geocaching on May 26th and 27th in Calgary! We will be starting with a Cache In Trash Out (CITO) gathering where we find some caches and pick up garbage in a local park at the same time. This is the traditional way to start a CCARS event and we always get a good turnout with lots of enthusiastic hands filling up bags of trash.

CCARS stands for Calgary Cache and Release Spring event. Cachers from Calgary and the surrounding area are madly working on creating new caches to hide for this weekend event. The caches must fall into certain categories and will be judged by those who find them. Awards will be given for the best caches in each category and for over-all favourites. This is a fun event and a great way to meet other cachers and to increase your list of found caches.

For more information on the kick-off event go here. There will also be a midnight gathering on the Saturday night for anyone who is interested in doing some night-caching or just celebrating their successes of the day. Go here for more info. And finally there will be a wrap-up gathering where the awards will be handed out and stories told of amazing finds and amusing searches. Go here for more info on the location and time of the wrap-up.

I'm hoping to cache with a few friends who have just started geocaching and have not yet taken part in any events. If you are interested in joining us please leave a message here in the comment section. Would love to have you along!