Kellett Point Cove - Roche Cove Regional Park CITO - GC4E5VR

On June 30, 2013 sophiavogt hosted a CITO out near Sooke at Kellett Point Cove part of Roche Cove Regional Park.  This was a small part of the park I had not seen before, and I was looking forward to seeing it.

The event was to be an hour long starting at 10:00am.  I was a wee bit late due to being stuck behind someone from Washington State who was clearly having issues with converting to our speed limits, but thankfully when I arrived everyone was still in the parking lot.
Upon arrival sophiavogt had us fill out a few forms, I assume were waivers so that the park takes no responsibility if anything were to happen to us.  Once that was done it was gloves on, garbage bag in hand and off to the site we go.

It was a small beach that was not easily accessible.  When you arrive you are pretty high up on a cliff edge, with a small steep way down on the right and what seemed to be no way down on the left.  But by backtracking a little I was able to find a overgrown path that lead to a cute little grotto in the trees where someone built a simple bench.  From here you could get down to the beach a bit easier, so I called out to the others and down we went.

There was a ton of trash down on this beach, most of it I assume was from the nearby marina.  There was a a lot of rope, boat bumpers, fishnet floats, and Styrofoam.  Sadly the beach was covered in little pebble sized and shaped bits of Styrofoam that could not be picked up, and because it is not biodegradable it will be there forever or just get washed away to another beach.  Even worse it will be eaten by sea life and sea birds, and because their stomachs can't digest the stuff it will sit in their stomachs until they die.

We did a good deed here today, and we removed a lot of trash.  Actually our hero of the day was solo888 who actually went into the water and swam out to retrieve a piece of trash that was floating into the cove.

Returning to the parking lot we ran into Mr. Islandfinders and Paintgirl with her clan, they had arrived late and assumed we went down the Galloping Goose in the other direction.  But they went and picked up a few pieces of trash to say they did their part.

And after all was said and done I headed out with sophiavogt, solo888, neltra, tooniegar and Mr. Islandfinders to find two caches we had previously not found before.

Thank you sophiavogt for arranging everything and hosting the event.  And thank you to everyone who turned out to clean this little beach up.

 

Langford Invasive CITO - GC4DK92

On June 29th, 2013 Cache Crop hosted a CITO (Cache In Trash Out) event at Langford Lake.  Our mission was to assist Langford Parks Dept. in removing invasive plant species from the surrounding area.

Sadly on this particular day Just Leafy could not come with me due to work, but I arrived on scene at 9:15am to eagerly pull these horribly persistent plants.

I met with G-Force in the parking lot and headed to the site when we heard this little voice calling out to us saying "Excuse me".  Turning we saw someone neither of us recognized, but then she asked "Are you here for the event?"... We told her yes and she introduced herself as Dutch Chocolate, a name I remembered because I had just recently done one of her caches.

We arrived at event GZ (ground zero) to find Mrs. Cache Crop hard at work already.  Saying hello and donning our gloves she introduced us to the enemy.  These enemies are known as Daphne Laurel (a plant we have dealt with before), Ivy, Scotch Broom and one other I don't remember the name of.

As we started work more and more people showed up, and shortly we had a small army working away eliminating the enemy.  Sadly I had to stop work because I developed a few hives and a rash from the Daphne Laurel, which if you refer back to the CITO I wrote about back in February actually have some toxic properties. But I hung out until the end and assisted in what way I could without getting into the thick of the plants.

It was a lovely hot day, and Mrs. Cache Crop had refreshments and snacks for us too. 

Which were prefect to keep the energy up and beating the heat

But soon the 2 hours allotted to the event were up, and we had made an amazing dent in the invasive species where we were working.  Looking around we had several heaping piles of the plants for Langford Parks to pick up, which were impressive to see.

Thank you Cache Crop for hosting the event and for supplying the refreshments.  And thank you to everyone who turned up to help.

Bon Voyage Cacheandshoot

June 12, 2013 was a day of mixed emotions for a few people in the GCGV caching community.  One of our military geocachers was posted back out east in Nova Scotia, and this was the evening of his farewell event.

Cacheandshoot came to us a couple of years ago when he took up his posting here at CFB Esquimalt where he worked as a military photographer. 
It is said when we arrived here he had little hope in connecting with any of the cachers here in Victoria.  But as time went on he met alyseluvsmike and a few more including us, and forged some fun friendships.

Cacheandshoot was known by us to be competitive in a friendly, and energetic way.  When he became friends with us we were all under 1000 finds, and for some reason the race was on.  It was comical how much competion there was between him and alyseluvsmike. 
If I were to go out caching with him and not have her there, she would chastise me for helping him get his numbers up.  But then she would plan a big day caching and take me, and rub it in to him after!  It was a fun time; however while being caught in the middle of them and thier race to 1000 finds, I actually beat them to it. 

Another fond memory of my time caching with Cacheandshoot was hearing about how he also had a friendly compition with his sister back home.  He even concoted a plan to beat her to a specific goal too, and he named it Operation Bucephala.  You see I believe that the word Bucephala is in her caching name somewhere, and it is because it was her favorite subgenus of anatidae (ducks).  I can not remember what this goal he had to beat his sister on was, but it sure was funny to hear about it at the time.

Well onto the event! 

It really was a great time.  We gathered at the location for the alloted time, and had our group photo together and each of us recieved Canadian Forces geocoins.  After that we went for food and drinks at Swans Brew Pub across the street. 
We stayed late into the night telling our caching tales, especially listening to cacheandshoots.  We laughed and talked, and slowly we dwindled to being just me and him left.  After he learnt that I was at nealy 4600 finds (how he didn't know eludes me) he has decalred that it is his next goal to beat my numbers.  I wished him luck in that endevour even though I know he can do it, and I welcome him to try!

We finally called it a night, and after making sure he got home headed for mine.

Thank you to all who turned out to the event, I know it meant a lot to him to have you all there.

And thank you cacheandshoot for the event and geocoins.  You will be missed by us here on the West Coast, and I hope that someday we will cache together in your home caching grounds.

A Quickie CITO in Langford

On June 8th 2013, cache crop hosed a CITO (Cache In Trash Out) event in Langford.  As the trend is these days we were to meet at the specified location at the appointed time, and clean trash for one hour.

The turn out for the event was fantastic, many of our local cachers arrived to clean the area up.  At first glance there didn't seem to me much, but once we headed down this blocked off and unused load we began to see what it was all about.
While there was a large amount of construction garbage everywhere, hiding in the trees that lined both sides of the street were mounds of regular people trash, broken glass, broken an discarded BBQs and much more.

Our geo work-crew dived right in, and cleaned to our heart content, working our way down the road.
In the end I think we hauled out a significant amount of trash, and we proudly gathered around it for victory photo.

Thanks cache crop for hosting the event.  Thank you to all the geocachers that turned out to help out.  And a big thanks to Alpine disposal for coming and picking up the trash we left conveniently piled up for you.

As always just click on the images to view larger versions.

Best Geocaching Day Ever!!!!

As you my readers know, I had a tragic accident with my GPSr on June 1st while out at East Sooke Park.
This event had deeply impacted me, really it was like loosing a friend.  Many of you sent me condolences on Facebook and over text message.  And I thank all of you for your well wishes.

But only some of you know, my grieving period was a short one.  And someone special in my life came to my rescue!   Thanks to my Dad (Postie Bear), I am now the proud owner of a Garmin Oregon 450.
He was very upset that I had broken my 550, so he went out of his way to give me just one more Birthday present.  And I am sooooo thankful for this most gracious gift!



I was so happy that I rushed to The Source and bought two new Micro SD cards for it, and a new Invisible Shield screen protector from Landsharkz.  Helen at Landsharkz was awesome and gave me a new Making Tracks neck lanyard for the unit so that I don't drop it again, thanks Helen!!

I rushed home and set it up, but installing the new screen protector means no use for 24hrs so you don't get fluffys and dust under it!

But like I said in the title, this is a geocaching day.  So this is not all about me getting my new unit!
Today I also teamed up with a pair of cachers I had not really done any caching with before.  This was cameracowgirl and the Mrs. from The Incredibles.  We headed to a location in behind Thetis Lake, one that I had been to before with Magicman65 and his wife Angelcheeks.

We had a fantastic time going through here.  There is a ton of variable terrain, and the cache hides for the most part were quality.  On this day I got only 2 finds to their 8~9 finds, but it isn't about the numbers so much as it is about the adventure and how it is shared with friends.  And I count my lucky stars for having such wonderful people in my life to share in the adventure of geocaching.

Thank you cameracowgirl and The Incredibles for such a nice day out.

And a SUPER HUGE THANK YOU to my dad Postie Bear for putting a new GPSr into my hands, you are the BEST!

Saddest Geocaching Day Ever!

Well what was to be a great day caching after my birthday turned out to be a sad sad day.  Creyke Point - GCMY34 was to be the first of many finds today, but it did not happen that way. 

We arrived in ESP at the parking lot and began our walk out.  As we approached GZ we originally arrived up too high, so we came back a different way and were too low. 
Trying one more way got to within 4 meters and I got the beep telling me my GPS need new batteries. Taking a second to change them I fumbled the GPS, then dropped it and watched in horror as the events unfold. 

The GPS fell glass screen side down right onto the rocks and shattered the screen. And to add insult to injury, because the battery door was open and batteries out the memory card door and memory card went flying out.... No where to be found.

We searched for the memory card, but in the end only ended up finding the cache. So signed that and looked a bit longer... Still could not find it.

Eventually admitting defeat we moved on back to the parking lot, and began a long quiet drive home.

Goodbye my friend!