2 July 2010 Caching Near Home


This old bridge has been home to two geocaches and has its own historical marker. I guess when you are almost 130 years old and look this good, you should have a marker. The bridge also offers a nice view of the Chagrin River. There used to be a large nursery on the other side of the bridge. When the nursery's owners retired, the local land conservancy was able to acquire the land and turn it over to Lake Metroparks. Now it serves as shoreline access mainly for fishing.

29 June 2010 Fort Wayne


Sometimes it isn't easy to locate a big park when you are visiting a town. I found a nice nature preserve at the back of baseball fields.





This very large climbing tower in the middle of a nature preserve in Fort Wayne.

28 June 2010 Columbia City

27 June 2010 Strange Sky


Old Stannard Quarry Chapin Forest (intermittent from 1836 - 1910)





Drill marks from quarry operations in the Berea Sandstone




I had spent the day on yard work before we took a walk at Chapin Forest to get the last coordinates for a new multi we are hiding. When we got home, we were preparing dinner when Ali glanced out the window and commented on the strange sky. Strange indeed...





The images were about four minutes apart.

26 June 2010 Medina County Parks


We used to cache often with our friend Kathy. With Ali working for a good part of this year and me traveling much of the last two years, those fun days in the woods together have become quite infrequent. Today, everything worked out. Medina has a 12 cache County Park challenge with a final challenge cache available once the other twelve are completed. It was a perfect day to visit some amazing parks and spend a day.

25 June 2010 Chapin Forest


Chapin Forest is an old State of Ohio Forest. It was transferred to Lake Metroparks before we moved to the area. It used to be a favorite spot for me. I would come here to run Murray and Becky through the hilly area. Afterwards we would go to a nearby farm market where I would get a donut and Cherries and Cream Soda. The farm market was torn down years ago.

24 June 2010 Sunnywood Lake

23 June 2010 Returning Home


I got home around sunset and wanted to go for a walk. This small lake is now part of the Geauga Park District and is called Headwaters Park. Years ago when I used to fish, this was called East Branch and managed by the City of Akron. This was the first place I took my boat Gangbusters on a cold spring day. I remember we got lucky with a few bass. It was always known as a good lake for northern pike. It was once a popular place, but never allowed gas motors so it has slowly lost visitors. Tonight we enjoyed a quiet walk to a multi cache that has been hidden here.

22 June 2010 Wild Raspberries

20 June 2010 Anders Run
It was another day of chores on the property with time only for a quiet walk through Anders Run with the dogs. They enjoyed splashing in what little water remains in the stream while we enjoyed the woods and looked to see if the orchids were going to bloom.

19 June 2010 More EMGT


We were back on our quest to visit the 35 towns of Cattauraugus County as part of the Enchanted Mountains Geotrail. After the first find in a hunting area near an old schoolhouse, Ali suggested a stop at a non-EMGT cache. When we got to the parking area, it looked like a walk across a wet land (or a wet meadow). Our journey started with a great blue heron taking off from a spot very near to us. Then as we walked across the field, Ali spotted these different birds. After a better look she realized these were bobolinks. Not rare, but a new bird spotting for us.





We moved on to an EMGT cache along an old rail trail. The rail train was quiet except for four or five cedar waxwings spead out among a few trees.







We finally got a chance to start our hunt for the Bear Creek Madness multi. I've wanted to do this cache since a visit to Olean a few years ago. There are nine stages hidden in Bear Creek State Forest. Eight of the nine stages has three coordinates. The ninth stage is the final. You find a stage go to one of the other sets of coordinates which may or may not be the final. We found four of the nine stages with no final, but we'll hopefully be back.






Our last stop brought us to an outstanding little fishing spot in Ashford. We knew there were supposed to be coordinate issues with stage one and really out-thought the cache owner. We had pretty much given up when we were joined by another couple. She spotted the hide very quickly and had us both smacking our heads for missing a simple yet very effective hide.






Between our arrival and locating stage 1 about 30 minutes later, the blue skies and light clouds of the day had turned to a deep grey. We decided to call it a day when the skies opened.

18 June 2010 Thomas the Tank Engine

I was heading back home to Warren from Carlisle and planned to cache my way home. Since I am a lousy navigator when I am not driving, things get really interesting when left to my own devices. I started my afternoon by hunting and not finding a cache on this nice covered bridge. I had started to look for the cache when I realized that ground zero was home to more than one yellow jacket. I decided to enjoy the covered bridge and move on.





The snake was not the cache guardian.





I was actually able to find the virtual at East Broad Top. ;-) We've been through the town a few times, but never had time to stop. This afternoon, I had the time and a Thomas the Tank Engine Travel Bug that wanted to visit other trains. There were enough trains and train equipment on this trip to make Sir Topham Hatt jealous, including a roundhouse, a turntable, and an engine shed.






The Turntable






The Orbisonia Station at East Broad Top





Just down the road from the East Broad Top, I stopped to see this steam switcher. It's in need of TLC, but the boiler and most of the drive unit looks good.





I ended my big train day with a stop at Roaring Spring to see their train depot and a nice Pennsy Caboose. Chief (my Dad) would have enjoyed the ride home.






My last stop was to visit the Riddlesburg Coke Ovens. These and the Leetonia (Ohio) Ovens are amazing. There's a great bit of technical history here.






There wasn't much caching today, but the journey was great.