The Cache-keteers Ugly Cachemas Sweater Event

Hi everyone, sorry for the long delay since the last entry.  Sadly we haven't been doing much in the caching department lately, and that makes us sad.  But what can you do when you are terrible at mystery caches and have cleared your immediate location of traditionals!?  You wait for events, well that is what we do!  So when this one popped up on the radar for the beginning of December we were all over it.
It actually worked out for us further, as my father Postie Bear from Comox would be in town to drop off presents to us for Christmas.  So this was shaping up to be a family thing for us.


When the day arrived I woke up early to the sound of my alarm, but can you guess who didn't??  That's right, Mrs. GO! Team was not having any of it and kept asking for "5 more minuets please"!  As the morning progressed and many more attempts to get her up failed, I eventually ended up having to tell her to stay in bed as there were no more "5 minuets" left.  So off I went to meet up with Postie Bear for the drive up to Cobble Hill.

This event was being held by the Cache-keteers, an amazing collective of ladies from the Southern Island.  They love to cache together, and generally have fun.  And one thing they do so well is host a great event.
I would like to think I hold a decent event, but mine could never hold a flame to the events these awesome ladies hold.  They always take fun into consideration, so they plan out games that everyone plays for great prizes.  Their Cachemas events are always highly anticipated by the local cachers, and the gift exchange is always epic!

We arrived to find the Cache-keteers hard at work setting up, and after some hellos and hugs dad and I chose our table and had a seat.

Slowly yet quickly the other attendees started to trickle in.  First Islandfinders, followed by Totemtabou, Paulboy and princess, Cougar Kid, Juruu, bcrockcrwaler and xstitcher... The pub started to fill up with all my favourite people in the world, my fellow geocachers.  And the festivities had begun!

The Cache-keteers first handed out a fun little game where we looked at a sheet of paper covered in cryptic pictures that had to do with carols.  You would have to study them and get your mind in the right place to figure them out.
Postie Bear and I did a pretty good job considering there were only two in the end that had us stumped.  After a time the Cache-keteers then called time on the game and lead us through the answers.  It is fun to listen to everyone groan when they realize what they got wrong, or what they missed.  There definitely was ones that came from dad and I when we realized what our two missing ones were.  There was no prize for this game as it was more of a warm up and icebreaker for those sitting with others.

As time moved forward and peoples food arrived at their tables, the activities continued along.  Next up the Cache-keteers did the prizes for those who dressed up in a silly or ugly holiday sweater.
For this one they handed out numbered tickets to those wearing those horrible offences to fashion. And when the time came they drew the twin tickets (like a 50/50 draw) for the amount of prizes they had.  Since dad and I didn't dress up in ugly sweaters we didn't get to participate, but I do remember that the manager of the pub had donated a very nice Lucky Beer sweater valued at $70 to be one of the prizes.  I am not sure who won it though, as I wasn't paying attention.  My bad!!

Next up was the Secret Santa gift exchange. The way this one was done was via a story where the throughout the narrator reads a series of commands of Left and Right, while all the people participating stand in a large circle passing the gifts along in the direction said.  It can get very wacky and confusing, but that is the fun of it.  Here is where the Cache-keteers asked me to help since I have a voice that carries well, so I got to read the story for the group.  Even the narrator can screw up the process a bit, but again that just adds to the hilarity of the activity.  Sheesh695 stood in for me so that my gift would be passed around, and so that I would also end up with one at the end.  And when all was said and done and I could open what was to be mine, I got a set of firetacks... This means I could maybe plan a Night Cache sometime!!

And this pretty much marked the end of the festivities.  Slowly people tricked back out into the outdoors to head home or grab a few local caches, while a few of us lingered to talk for a while.
Dad and I however did leave much earlier than Mrs. GO! Team and I would normally, this was because we had some plans to attend to. So with saying our farewells and wishing everyone a happy holidays, dad and I slipped out.

Now that we were out the doors I remembered a cache right across the street from the venue, so I helped dad make a quick find.  Then it was off to the north end of Shawnigan Lake.  The plan was for me to be able to do maintenance checks on my two adopted Island Spirit Legacy Caches, and for dad to make a few finds for himself (including those caches).  Also so that he could visit the Kinsol
Trestle for the first time.

We parked the car at the mid way parking lot and got to work, and it was nice to see that my caches were in good standing order.  Dad had fun with finding the few caches on route to the trestle, and was blown away by the views and such from the trestle when we arrived.
And on they way home we grabbed one more at the top of a hill with a fantastic view!

Thanks for taking the time to read my blog, it is a pleasure to share my stories with you all. And Happy Holidays to everyone, I wish for you a fun and safe time!

Stay tuned for another blog entry to come soon, as there is another event this weekend too!!