One Thousand and Two

Yep, 1002 is the number of caches that I have done in 2009. Not bad for my second full year of caching. I started mid December in 2007 and got 14 and in 2008 357 caches in 38 caching days. So last year saw me cache for 114 days. My best month was in March with 195 finds which is when I was doing the LEGEND series a lot. It also saw me get 17 first to finds that month, all on one day with a new series not far from home.

I have also got addicted to one cachers caches. The Sparrowboys have a number of cache around the Partington, Carrington and Durham Massey area. There 2 and 3 stage multi's are some of the the best cache I have done and I believe it will take a lot to beat them. I also got my one and only 5/5 rated cache thanks to Muttoneer and his Werewolf cache. Which I combined with finding Whitespace at the same time. January saw me attend my first geocaching event and I now have a total of 16 under my belt and hope to beat that number this year but I don't think it will be by too many more.

So here is to 2010 and many more caches.

Wait Until Dark 2

Well the day (Thursday 19th) didn't start out has planned. Had arranged to do the Wacky Races Series with The Syllogiser in the afternoon but on arriving in Shevington I could find my wallet in the car and after a couple of phone calls home it was looking that I might of lost it. So had to drive home only to locate it in a place that I never leave it. Back to Wigan and the time had passed so plan B was put into plan for a quick cache. We headed upto, well that would be telling as its a puzzle cache we went for. GC1VB4J - NYZN SVRYQ GC 0825. After following the instructions on the cache page the tub was found and the log signed. I was able to grab another micro in the area before we had to return ready for the main cache of the night. So leaving Shevington with Mrs Syllogiser driving we picked up Steve of Team SLuG in Standish and continued onto Brinscall via Chorley to pick up Ferreter38. Once at Brinscall we meet up with GamesRmeLife, ChannelFadge and JHewitt15. It was then the start of GCMW16 - Wait Until Dark 2. Heading up the lane to the start of the path and then onto the first firefly. It was then into the woods in the darkness of a November night. After about 3 fireflies the woods disappeared and so did the fireflies due to logging in the middle of it all. This was the hardest part of the terrain, making sure you stayed upright. On the other side when the trees started again there was no signs of any fireflies so it was upto the GPSr to find the way to the cache. The cache was homed in on and the final location was found by the final fireflies being spotted. Unfortunately the cache had been taken and the contents left buried under the rocks. It was now time to head back to the car via GC19MWT - Top o' th' wodds Stables and then onto Brindle for the Monthly Meet of the North West Cachers.

Cache Maintenance

Back in May I was asked by Mongoose39UK if I wanted to adopt the main trail of the Oldham Way Cache from him as he was moving out of the area. I accepted the offer and became the owner of 39 caches. I have found all of the caches I was adopting and didn't think it would be that hard to maintain them. Well, that was a mistake to think that. Since finding them, some over 18 months ago they have grown legs and wondered off from where I returned them after signing the log. My first big maintenance run was when I got DNF reports on 6 caches in a run. Off I set with replacement caches, logs and pencils and the dog in tow. I came home some time later with all cache I had left with having found them all. A couple of weeks ago I headed up towards Hartshead Pike to replace some damp logs on the furthest caches from home. Today it was a trip out fro more damp logs and a coordinates check. After a 3 mile stroll with the dog covered in mud I had replaced 2 logs, repositioned 1 cache to try and keep it dryer and got some new coordinates for another one. So the main trail of the Oldham Way from Medlock Vale to Harthead Pike is all OK, hopefully for the winter. The log in the picture is the one I replaced in Oldham Way - What's Next

A Quick Test

Just a quick test to see how good Androidblog is on my phone. I can't believe that seeing Google have come up with this operating system for mobile phones their isn't a native Blogger application built in.

Underground Manchester

Well it's been some time since I last wrote a blog but i'm hoping to get back into it.

So last night was Halloween and I ventured into Manchester for a Halloween and tunnels tour by Manchester Confidential. The tour started outside Bar 38 and headed straight into the Great Northern Warehouse. We headed down a steel staircase which lead to the old canal basin of the Manchester and Salford Junction Canal. This area was lit by uplights but the following sections were in total darkness. The photo here was taken on a long exposure of about 30 seconds and picked up light from another camera flash. Not to sure if that is a ghost in the middle of it or not. After about 30 minutes of being in the tunnels it was on with the rest of the tour.

Manchester Ship Canal Cruise

On Thursday (27th August) I went on a cruise on the Manchester Ship Canal from Salford Quays to Liverpool Pier Head. Setting of from outside the Lowry Centre at 10am on the Mersey ferry Snowdrop. The cruise took 6 hours, passing throught 5 sets of locks, under 2 motorways and having 6 swing bridges and 1 swing aquaduct opened to allow us to pass. Throughout the cruise there was a guide telling you the history of the canal and also the future plans for it. You can view all my photos from the day here.

Piratemania 2009

Well this was my first geocaching event and what a cracker. The weather was hit and miss on the Thursday and Friday but for the main event on the Saturday it was sun sun sun. For the Saturday they had been two new cache series set. One with eight caches and around 3 miles walk and the other with 18 caches and a 8 mile walk. There was also some earth cache to take on.

I arrived on the Thursday afternoon and after throwing up the tent and unloading the car it was a the time to get it off the camping field and to the car park. This was not as straight forward as it should of been as due to heavy rain in the days before the track up the small hill and off the field was a mud bath. It was a matter of going for it and keeping the power on. As i hit the top of the hill the car just swung round and lined itself up with the track and off I went and stuck it in the main car park. Time for a brew and a wonder round to see who else had arrived.

Not much later the crowd started to turn up with the first being Betty Boo and Gruffty. Then it was the entrance of Nandad who slid there jag gracefully down the field. The corner of the field later that night with the arrival of Geotrotter and Carlos and the Birdie Crew and there Mansion. The rest of the night was spent chatting and having a few drinks.

On the Friday some people headed off caching but I decided to stay on site for the morning. I was able to nip across the road to grab In a Tiss, which was a nice ammo box just of The Tissington Trail. In the afternoon in between thunder storms I headed out on the bike for a 16 mile ride along the Tissington Trail. The evening was spent again chatting and drinking while taking in the great view of the night sky's.

Saturday was the main event day and it started off with a bacon roll and a cup of tea. It was then onto the marquee to submit the order for the mass Chinese takeaway order before 10am when the new cache listings would be given out. Due to technology problems with the garmin Colorado and Oregon it was a number crunching exercise to get the coordinates into the devices but that didn't take to long thanks to the touch screen. I set off on the series close to camp with Richardson6 and Muttoneer and after a nice 3 mile walk we had picked up 8 caches and the clues to the first part of the final cache. It was then a short stop to grab some more drinks and then into the car for a short drive down to mill dale for the second series. Here it was just Muttoneer and myself. We decided to work our way around it in reverse which worked out better as we kept meeting other cachers who were telling us of the difficulty along the path between caches 1 and 4 which were to be our last caches. After a nice walk we decided to miss out the last few caches a stay on the path on the other side of the river from the caches and head back to the car and camp ready for the arrival of the Chinese pirates and food.

Saturday evening was spent sampling more apple juice and watching the games being played by the children to win doubloons for there team. In the end the blue team won which was the team I was on. Sunday morning came the the drink was still flowing but in the end all the pirates headed off to bed. What a great weekend.