Sunday, July 13, 2008

GEOJACKSON IN ACTION



I had been saving some remote geocaches located in the Umatilla National Forest for a long time. In preparation for Jackson’s visit a couple of weeks ago I spent quite a bit of time placing strategic waypoints on a map along with the geocaches to help and find the caches and not get lost. There is a labyrinth of forest roads in the Blue Mountains where the caches are located.

Saturday morning bright and early we embarked with the 4 wheeler loaded on the trailer. A short distance west of Anatone we parked the truck and hopped on the 4 wheeler. I had built a seat and grab handles for Jackson and we both had our crash helmets (not that we’d be likely to need them except for wind protection).

Our first cache was Big Butte Lookout and although we could get close we tried 3 or 4 roads before hitting the right one. The coords were off which we knew from previous comments but it wasn’t too long before Jack snagged it.

Next was Rattlesnake Overlook. We found the site easily enough but finding the cache was another matter. After almost an hour of searching we gave up and started to leave. On the way out we reread the hints and thought we’d try some more. After another 15 minutes of fruitless searching (all on a cliff of sorts) we gave up again when suddenly Jack found it. It was in a hole under a rock where I had previously looked but missed it because it was so dark in the little cave and so bright out.

By the time our day ended 10 geocaches were logged and over 60 miles were on the 4 wheeler. We also saw lots of wildlife including one big bull elk up close and personal. We didn’t get back to the house until after 7:00 pm. It was one fantastic day of geocaching and adventure.
M/W

2 comments:

Hallie said...

Sounds like it was a good time! I like Jackson's shirt--looks familiar. ;-P

Jackson Warnock said...

Nice retell of what happened.