It was on the way!

We were heading over to visit Christy's mom this afternoon. I knew there was a cache on the way.

I put the GPSr in the car and it officially made this our first "family" cache.

It was really easy. Christy looked at the GPS and told me where it was. I got out, grabbed it, and hopped back into the car. I signed the log, showed everyone, then put it back.

Then we were back on track to Nee Nee's house.

The 5th of July

David and I started out a little after eleven this morning. I wanted to try 2 caches we missed on a previous outings.

First stop, the San Marcos Nature Center. This was the second cache we looked for in San Marcos, and the first one we didn't find. I don't know why we didn't see it the first time, but today it was pretty easy to find.

David was excited that we found it, but more excited that he was able to trade items. He left a plastic army man and took a little yellow parachuting ninja. We put the cache back, loaded ourselves back into the truck, and we were on our way to the next cache. It was one we had missed before on a cloudy day.

A few days ago on our 2nd outing, David and I tried to find this one. It was a little overcast that morning and we had a hard time finding it. I thought that the cloudy sky may have caused the GPSr to be a little off on its location.

Turns out, I was wrong. We just couldn't see it very well. We ended up in the spot we had ended up on June 30th, but today we were able to see it! Must be the time of day and the light. Or maybe we're just getting to be better cachers.

There was a small paper umbrella in this one. David wanted it, so he traded it for one die. I prefer to put the die in pairs, but there's no way that two dice would have fit into the container. I think next time I'm out, I'll bring a trash bag, because this area was a little trashy - not a lot, but a few cans and things here really detract from the view.

We tried to find that benchmark again, but to no avail. I've seen pictures of it, so I thought I had a good idea where it was. The GPSr was still pointing to a place I knew it wasn't. David and I looked for it where I was pretty sure it was, but couldn't find it. I assume that the recent rebuild of the train bridge may have knocked this one off the playing field. I'll go looking for it again sometime, hopefully.

We trekked it back to the truck, hopped in, loaded the next cache and we were on our way.


Our next stop was a cache in the front yard of a fellow geocacher's home. The name of it is "Heartless," and in the picture, I'm sure you can see why.

Unfortunately, we didn't see the actual cache here, and I was unsure if there was one. Sometimes the caches are just "get a picture and post it" types. So I snapped a quick picture after we searched for a few minutes, and we moved on.

This one was near the Shipley's Donut Shop, and David then informed me how hungry he was for donuts. Nope, son. No donuts. I sure could have used some coffee at this point, but I was willing to forego just to avoid donuts. Don't get me wrong, I enjoy donuts, but it was hot, and they would have just been... nasty.

The next cache was on the west side of the Texas State campus. I had never been over to this part of campus, but I knew that there was a Frisbee Golf Course over here.

There were some people over here when we unloaded, so I talked to them. They were familiar with Geocaching, but hadn't done it themselves. They did, however, do letterboxing, which is not unlike Geocaching. My cousin said she has done it as well. After a brief conversation, David and I continued on.

We went the wrong way at first, staying close to the building that was there. I realized that we had to double back and go on the lower grass path to get to the actual cache. Once we got close, it was fairly evident where the cache was.




I didn't realize that there were thorny vines near the cache, but luckily neither David nor I got hurt by them. There was a little plastic spider in this one, and David wanted to trade again. We put a sparkly, fuzzy bracelet in the cache for trade. We put it back and we were on our way.

We climbed into the truck - literally, because the passenger door doesn't work, so David climbs into it, over the console, and into the passenger seat. Loaded up the coordinates to the next cache, and headed out. The bad thing about this cache was exiting. The street you get on to get back onto RR12 is at an odd angle, and because the traffic isn't consistent, it was tough to get onto RR12. But we did. And we were on our way to WONDER WORLD.

If you haven't been to Wonder World, you should probably go. I went once when I was about 13 or 14 with my parents. The thing with the place is that when you leave, you "wonder" why you went. I guess it's a bit of a tourist trap, but it's not so bad. David went this year with his class, so I suppose it has some value.

When we pulled in, David looked around and asked, "Have I been here before?" I sort of chuckled, and told him yes. "Oh, I was here with my mommy. And my class." Yup. You got it right. I eyeballed the place and had a pretty good idea where the cache was. I had parked under a tree for the shade, and when I opened the door a branch slapped me in the head. OUCH. Just glad it was my head and not my eye.

We headed over to where I thought the cache was, and walked a little bit. David likes to just scope out the area, it seems. And of course, the GPS coordinates aren't always so accurate. I think my GPS4 has gotten down to about 14ft accuracy, but even at 14ft, that leaves a fair amount of options when you're out and about. But, my hunch was right. We found the cache and it had stuff in it.

This time David found another parachutist. It think this guy was just your normal jumper, not a ninja or a pirate or a zombie. I forget what he traded, but I think it was another army man. Seemed about right.

There was an added bonus to this cache. It gave us coordinates to another spot near the cache and said if we took a picture, we'd get a bonus. So we found the spot and snapped some pictures:


After that, we were on our way to the last cache of the day.

The name of this cache was, "Hey! It's Over Here!" and the point of the cache is to introduce people to Prospect Park. I had never been out here, so I wasn't sure what to expect. It was getting hot, because it was after noon by this point. But we trekked on, undeterred by the blistering sun.

Prospect park is really neat. There is a maintained trail, and a 'natural' trail. We opted for the natural trail, because I felt that if we were going to find a cache, it wouldn't be on the more popular route. After we had gotten into the park, I started to think that I should have 'marked' our parking spot. I didn't think we'd get lost, but that idea was in my head. Being out in the hot sun and lost - plus we left the water in the truck - wasn't a very nice thought.

We walked on, and when we were close, I paused. I looked around, but didn't really see an easy path to the cache - and the directions in the posting said it was an easy cache. We walked a little more and made a turn. We went through some tall grass, avoided the plentiful cactus, and found the spot where it was close. I spotted it immediately, but it was up high, so David didn't see it. And again, there were things for trade in this cache.

David wanted this little red thing. I have no idea what it is. But he wanted it, and we traded. We traded blue sidewalk chalk. The chalk is sort of big, so we've had a hard time finding caches big enough to hold it. We put the cache back and headed back to the truck. Fortunately, it wasn't as difficult as I had feard. After getting back to the park entrance, we sat on the benches and cooled off for a couple of seconds. Then we got back into the truck and headed out.

We made a quick pit stop at a coffee shop - I for my headache medicine, and David for his 2nd round of chocolate milk of the day. We got back to the house and were feeling pretty accomplished for the day!