Travel Bugs

Geocaching has sort of taken over our lives right now.... we are having so much fun with it... I love that my parents and my sister and my kids are all involved... We are meeting some good people who geocache and having so much fun. I love that it takes us out into the woods to explore and that with lots of the caches come history lessons that help us to learn about the areas around us and brings up questions and discussions with the kids. I am amazed at how many new and cool places we are finding because of geocaching. This week we wanted a short hike and some quick caches so we headed out for on one the island here... found a 400 acre preserve full of hiking trails and caches. We had known the preserve was there.. just had not thought there would be hiking trails that were open to the public. They would be great for mountain biking on too... hmm can you guess what we are thinking of getting :)

So on to the travel bug part of this post.... travel bugs are things with tags that have track able numbers on them...that people put in caches... the first one we came across was the Joe Funk one...and it was a coin that had started in California and wanted to go to New Mexico in time for a child's first birthday... well it did not make it.. in fact if you go read the logs for it.. somehow it ended up traveling to Canada and hanging out with someone for like 7 months before heading back this way... we found it... moved it south and then someone picked it up that happened to be going to New Mexico... so it is a lot closer.. and only a couple of years late :(

We then picked up a travel bug (in the form of a huge key with a tag) named "The key to every mystery" that is from Belgium and wants to travel the world and have it's photo taken in cool places.. so we have been spending a few weeks taking it everywhere with us... and will put it in a new home this weekend. There will then be a blog post for it :) It is fun to see all the places it has been and we will keep a watch on it so we can see where else it goes. At the same time we picked up a geo coin... which is ( as far as I can tell) sort of the same thing... this one was the skunk'd coin.. that wants to travel around to different parks and pretty places and have its picture taken.. so it has been on a journey with the key. We just left it in cache in the beautiful preserve here on the island and took a different geo coin.. this one is a Fallen Hero Coin in honor of Staff Sgt. Todd E. Nunes.. it wants to travel from cache to cache to honor all those that have fallen.

This post is to share some of the photos of the Skunk'd coin that we have now left in the other cache and to share where it has been. We found it in a cache hidden on Mountain Loop Highway, which was visit often for hiking and caching. It was in a cache called "oh Shoot! I forgot my camera at home" Well we did remember out camera... but it was a very wet overcast day so the view was not what it can be.

We then took it to Sequim on a geocaching/hiking adventure with us.

We stayed at our favorite bed and breakfast where you sleep in your own private caboose.
We also went to the John Wayne Marina and watched the boats coming and going.. found a couple of fun caches there.

Great Hiking in Sequim on the Olympic Discovery Trail and lots of train stuff... saw a couple of really awesome train trestles turned hiking trails.

It needed to visit our beach ( Camano Island ) while it was here.. so we took it down for super low tide and it had it's photo taken here :)
Next we headed up Mountain Loop Highway ... if you follow my blog you will see many posts about this place... as we tend to visit there often... rivers and lakes and woods and trails and mines and caves and views and camping... you can not go wrong.. it is a beautiful place full of interesting caches. This last weekend we headed for a trail to Bear Lake.. Pretty easy hike.. about 3 miles total... and a beautiful mountain lake is the reward :)
Now the coin is hiding in a cache off a trail in here. We look forward to watching it's travels from here on out :)

~ Michelle

Trains, Trails, Loggers, Food, and Caches

That about covers this last week. Woohoooo it has been wonderful in so many ways. We are really getting into this geocaching thing... have a little competition going with my dad.. he has been doing it a bit longer than us.. and he is retired.. so he should be safe...since he has more time to go out.... but I sure hope he is not counting on it *evil grin* We are on a mission... to get more caches than him.... he has about twice as many as us.. so it may take awhile.... not too long if we keep up at this pace.. which will not be possible, but it has been a lot of fun. The last 5 nights we have been out geocaching until around 10 at night.. with our little flashlights.. I am calling it CSI Caching. Mostly we are working on one that is really hard.. we keep visiting it and hoping to find it. Dave and I headed over to Sequim last weekend... I am sure if you have read any of my blog or my twitter you will know I LOVE this place... for me going there is like stepping into another world.. one with no stress.. no worries.. no kids... it is so relaxing... as soon as we get on the ferry.. everything just melts away and it is almost like we are in another land in another time :) So off we went... we wanted to visit the loggers show... our favorite bed and breakfast and do some geocaching and hiking. We did all of that :) We spent two nights at the Red Caboose Getaway and since that is right next to where they hold the loggers show we were able to walk over and explore that.. both on Friday night and on Saturday for a bit. There were also a few caches hidden within walking distance so we checked those out.. found a beautiful little park while exploring... we will need to go back and visit it again too as there was one cache there that we were not able to find. We spent Saturday afternoon and all day Sunday geocaching... we explored Port Angeles and did some exploring of Morse Creak trestle on Saturday.. the Olympic Discovery Trail has a lot of caches on it.. and it is a beautiful trail... planning on getting in better shape and taking a bike ride along it. Saturday night is when we started our CSI caching in Sequim... out until about 9 pm with the flashlights in little parks and on the sides of the road.. when we ended up in a business park waiting for the cops to show up we decided it was time to head back to the cabooseSunday, after a wonderful breakfast, we checked out of the caboose, having had a nice visit with the owners. We then decided we were not ready to leave town. We did some caches right in town... pretty hard to be stealth like when the cache is right in the middle of an intersection...figured out... when you try to be all tricky and sly.. everyone looks....to see what you are doing.. but if you act like you lost something and your looking for it.. no one looks.. no one wants to be asked to help... lol.. so we gave up on the stealth idea.

We still were not ready to leave town so we headed out to the Railroad Bridge park.. which is also connected to the Olympic Discovery Trail.... and had a wonderful time doing some hiking out there and found some amazing caches.. even met some other cachers. By the time we were done there we knew it was time we needed to start home.. so off we head towards Kingston... well... normally this is an hour drive.. or so the GPS said... but.. the dang thing also kept popping up with caches right on the side of the road... so we just had to stop and get a couple of them.. well.. one leads to another and pretty soon we were about 5 miles down some logging road climbing around on a massive stump pile.. looking for a cache about the size of a pencil easer... yes we did find it... woohooo The hour long trip to the ferry took us like 3 hours or so.. but we did rack up the caches :) Loved this Dead End one. We did get on the 9:30 ferry heading home.. made it home by like 11... would have been a bit sooner but we detoured about 30 minutes for food after getting off the ferry.... now that we are home I had thought we would get back on a normal schedule.. had thought the last two nights of CSI geocaching had been an adventure while on vacation... lol... nope... I was wrong... so far there has not been a night this week we have not been out in the dark with out flash lights.. and this.. I am blaming (giving credit?) to a cacher named Rey del Roble, a local.. who I have not met.. but who I already think is amazing.... he has awesome hides.. hard ones... that really make you think... and make you look at things differently... which is the part of caching we enjoy... It is not so much what we find... but the looking.. and the learning of the area and the time spent together... using the brain.. and teaching the eyes to see new things.. to look differently... it is a drug of choice for us right now... we are addicted... hook, line and sinker... In the last week the list of amazing things we have seen all because of geocaching is really long..and the reading we have done about the places we have visited has been great.. all of it making us want to go back and explore more.

Clicking on my Flickr link will take you to more photos of everything.

~Michelle

This That and Nothing

Well it has been awhile since I posted... I seem to either blog a lot or not much at all... that is not totally true.. I have posted a couple of times to my kitchen blog...be sure to check out the cupcakes... and I find when I am downloading photos to flickr that I tend to add little blurbs with most of those... so then.. I am not sure what is left to blog about here. Today I am feeling the need to post something.. so am going to attempt to post a general update on what has been going on.. and I am going to try to do it without too much rambling.

My parents were here for a week.... they did not stay at the house.. but at this beautiful campground they are members are that is not too far... had the cutest little cabins... ( I should have been taking pictures ) and so I had a wonderful chance to spend sometime visiting with them.. they also had some lifetime friends staying with them for a couple of the nights.. they all came over for dinner and it was a wonderful visit. I do miss living closer to my family.. we are not that far really... 4 or so hours.. but with everyones schedules.. it can seem like it is across the world sometimes.

That leads into geocaching ... you can expect to see a lot more posting about this part of our lives... it is proving to be a LOT of fun. We did some with my parents... and we found another travel bug.. this one wants to travel the world and have lots of photos taken... so I am taking it around and taking photos of it... and then we will move it to another cache soon. We went out this weekend with our youngest son.. and had a blast.. even though.. it was pouring rain.. and we even ended up in the snow... it was still so much fun.. and we found 13 caches...and some where in/near old mines....

woohooo.. watch out mom and dad :) (they got us started in this) Heard my sister and her family have started getting into this too... should be fun :) I am also getting to know (online so far) lots of other people who do this.. I love that everyone can do it... old .. young... in shape.. not so in shape... rich.. poor... it is so much fun and gets everyone out from in front of the TV and out of the house. Please if you do not know about it check HERE to read more.. and feel free to ask me anything.. just starting really.. but will answer anything I can :)

I am still working on the weight loss Wednesdays.. just not blogging it.. at least at this time... I am still losing about a pound a week... still walking on the treadmill.. and trying to be careful about what we eat.... it is sort of boring... and just was not sure anyone really wanted to hear about on a weekly basis... but I am in this for a year... so... I will keep going... and... I am noticing changes... muscles where none were before... just small changes though... it goes on a lot quicker.. and easier than it comes off. Shoulders back.. tummy in.... get up and move... and drink that water!!

I am still walking on the beach.. almost every day.... trying not to post about that everyday either.. even though I could.. I love it that much... I reward myself with it.. walk on the treadmill... get to go walk on the beach... I am not sure what it is about it.. lots of things I am sure.. every single day is different there... every few hours it is different... the water comes in and changes everything... sometimes it takes all the rocks and leaves sand.. sometimes it leaves piles of rocks and drift wood... there are shells and agates and glass and odd bits and just so many treasures... and life... it is so alive... star fish... little fishes... crabs... clams.... birds... bugs... people... everything is so calming and exciting all at the same time at the beach. In face.. just saw that the orca network said there was a whale sighting near here.. so I am heading out to go see if I can see a whale... saw one the other day.. WOW... it is a sight... and a sound.. to hear them and see them is amazing. *fingers crossed I come back with photos*

Finding a Local Farmers Market

I did this post last year too.. and I happened across it while switching up my blog and it has not been updated yet.. so I wrote them and asked if it would be and they got right on it.

This is an awesome site and a great way to find some local farmers markets to either sell at or just go spend some time shopping at :) Local being the key word here.. it is for western Washington. you can browse by county and then by day you would like to go. A list of the ones in that area for that day will pop up and you can click on them and learn more about them....We used this and found some fun ones last year.. I was surprised how many there were.

Puget Sound Area Farmers Markets

~Michelle

Mt St Helen's

This last weekend we went for a road trip.... we headed out really early in the morning... going south... why south? Well we had a travel bug we found, while hiking last weekend, in a geocache. It needed to go south.. When we started looking at places to go that are south of us.. we knew it was going to be a long weekend with lots of things to do.
We wanted to explore Mt St Helens (mt that blew up in 1980's) and saw that on the way up the mountain there were so many caches.... we picked a few that we thought might be fun and headed out. So many things to explore... first stop was the Mt St Helens visitor center.. watched the movie and checked out the exhibits.. gave the kids a chance to learn a little history and find out what it was we would be exploring. We walked a little bit around the silver lake wetland haven trail, right there near the visitor center.. also found our first cache of the trip :)

We found a couple more caches as we headed up highway 504 towards Johnston Ridge Observatory (which we learned is still closed for the season)... we found a couple of tricky caches.. or at least we thought there were.. one was an old telephone receiver with a magnet stuck to it... and another was not so cool in what it was.. an old mint box.. but it had been painted and had thing taped to it so it looked like part of what it was stuck to. We also found our first nano cache this weekend.. wow it was tiny... we did our first earth cache...took our photo with a landmark and answered some questions about the area... it was a lot of fun. We did end up finding a nice cache on highway 503 to leave the travel bug in.. now we will watch to see where it goes *fingers crossed it heads to it's destination* Geo caching is a great way to get out as a family and really learn a lot of history and a lot about the area.

The rest of Saturday was full of beautiful views of the mountains.. and small hikes in the woods to explore things like beautiful lakes.. we went as far up the mountain as we can but will have to head back after may to see the view from the top.. still please with our photos.. were able to get some with just a few clouds.. that is pretty good for Washington. It was nice to watch the kids as they saw how even 30 years after the eruption that you can still very clearly tell.. in places it looks like mars or something from star trek.

We then drove to Vancouver Washington, one because we have a hotel that we like to stay in there.. and two because we all wanted Red Robin for dinner.. well the hotel worked out ok.. but the restaurant was FULL..so we drove around and did not really find anything else we loved.. so we tried a burgerville.. it sucked. Will not eat there ever again.. just plan ick.. and over priced.

Sunday we got up and planned on heading up highway 503 to the south side of St Helens. It was warm and sunny and we decided since we were so close that we would slip over the border into Oregon and drive through Portland ... we all love it there. Dave found a parking spot near the Saturday market (yes they have it on Sunday too) so we got out and spent a little over an hour just walking around seeing the sights and smelling the smells... it was so much fun.. watched some break dancers from Portland City Rockers doing their thing. We then headed back to Washington and to Mt St Helens.

Highway 503 up the mountain is abit more laid back and less touristy than 504. The signs of the eruption are not from the 1980 eruption but from ones many of thousands of years ago... had a picnic lunch at yale park... it was so beautiful.. picnic table right on the water. Then up to the ape caves.... we were not all sure if we would like this or not.. you climb underground in some tunnels that were made from the lava flow a long time ago.. it is very very dark and wet in there.... we LOVED it. We did the bottom hike.. you go in and hike down 3/4 of a mile then hike back up... next time we want to go in and go the other way..do the harder hike up 1.5 miles.. it goes over some rock hills and you have to crawl for some of it and you climb out on a ladder...we will be going back to explore that.. we will be a little better prepared.. some extra lights.. and gloves.. and knee pads.

By the time we done and back to I-5 we had a long drive to get home... we arrived home about midnight and quickly everyone went off to get some sleep before the long Monday started. That is the only problem with adventures.. is reality sets in nice and hard come Monday morning.

Click here to view more photos of our weekend.

~Michelle