A friend of mine, who moved to Australia about 18 months ago, came back for a visit, and I told him I’d take him up to the Cleveland National Forest to get some caches, including my Dream State cache.

Here’s an image showing the locations of the caches we’d hoped to hit.

Unfortunately, with all my planning, I didn’t plan on a gate…

…with a lock.

So we ended up not getting as many caches as we’d hoped. But we got some, and sometimes some is enough.

A multi-cache in Balboa Park, this one requires you to find Dangerous Dingo, Krazy Koala, Pathetic Platypus, and Worthless Wallaby, each of which contain part of the coordinates to the final cache.

It’s a nice cache, but the hunt and find were made all the sweeter by the fact that I was with my two best friends from high school, Frank and Rick. If you’re feeling exceptionally masochistic, you can click on any picture of the Treacherous Trio for a larger image.

Regular readers of this blog have seen Rick on numerous occasions. The reason you haven’t seen Frank here is that it’s been about 25 years since I’ve seen him. In fact, the above picture marks the first time the three of us have been together in 34 years.

We started by going out to lunch.

Then it was off to the cache! One of the first things we saw was two guys playing a strange form of tennis.

We also noted the strawberry tree that was just beginning to bear fruit.

And finally, after much hiking, we snagged the cache.

Caching is always fun, but this day was among the best!

Another crazytacular cache from The DAK Girls, the brilliantly twisted minds behind caches such as Tomb Raider, Mad-Eye Moody, and Black Beard’s Grotto (click the links to see my blog posts for those caches).

It was a beautiful spring morning as we approached the coordinates specified on the cache page.

Then we saw the starting point for our adventure.

Fortunately, having done our research, we were prepared. We donned our waders and old shoes and made entry.

Note the delightful example of the haberdasher’s art, replete with stylish neck covering. This becomes important later.

What you are unable to appreciate is the olfactory assault waged by the muck we were walking through. I believe it was a combination of decomposing vegetation and the guano of ducks and bats (yes, bats). There was also a dead rat just up the way, and that couldn’t have helped.

Rick has training and work experience with storm drains, and he told me OSHA considers an area like this a ‘hazardous environment’. By law, workers can only spend a limited time in an enclosed space with noxious fumes. Of course, he told me this after we had come out. Thanks, Rick.

The storm drain was on a slight incline, so after a few hundred feet, the muck was replaced by a small amount of clear running water, so we were spared the stench from that point on.

Turns out we traded the muck under our feet for these little fellers hanging a foot above our heads.

Most of them were resting quietly, but a couple decided to show off their flying prowess and disappear into the darkness.

A few thousand feet later, we had reached our goal: a message from the cache owner, with a code word that we had to email as proof that we had found the “secret passage”.

On the way out, things became a little more interesting.

I walked under a bat just as he decided it was time to drop off the ceiling and go for a little trip. Needless to say, I was a bit startled. By ’startled’, of course, I mean ducking and jerking like a victim of St Vitus Dance being electrocuted.

We came to the next bat, and I specifically said, “Now don’t be dropping down like that last guy did.” Did he listen? No. Again with the dancing.

The last couple of hundred feet consisted of six bats flying around between us and the exit, taking turns playing chicken. They would fly straight at us, turning at the last minute to rejoin their mates. There were probably some sort of bat ‘high-fives’ occuring, but I coudn’t see them.

The last 40 or so feet, I was crouched down to the point where my knees were touching my chest as I walked, watching the bats in the reflection of the water as they continued to buzz us. This is where I was grateful I had worn my hat with the neck covering. Not that I thought they were vampires or anything, but, you know.

Finally, the bats flew over us and back into their home. I stood up, five feet from the entrance, relieved to have survived the onslaught. Only to have one last bat fly in from outside the storm drain to give my formerly manly ego one last twist.

Then we were out, and all that was left was to take off our ruined shoes and waders, put them in garbage bags for later disposal, and make the short hike back to the Jeep.

Chalk up another wild adventure to Geocaching.

I found this cache on the way home from the San Diego Wild Animal Park. The cache, while better than some, paled in comparison to the park.

Of course, there were animals (some pics are biggerable).

But the reason I went to the park was to ride Flightline. The brand-spankin’ new zipline that let’s you ‘fly’ over the park.

FLIGHTLINE STATISTICS
Training flight: 450 feet long, 31-foot drop in elevation
Flightline: 3,677 feet long, 421-foot drop in elevation
Average speed: 31 to 56 miles per hour; the Flightline ride lasts between one and two minutes

Here’s a picture of me on the training flight before we hopped on the truck to head up the mountain. Standing next to me is the guide, Elissa. She did a great job of training me on how to properly ride the zipline, educating me about different areas of the park, and not letting me fall to my death.

Click here to see a little video of the practice run.

Oh, and I was the only customer on that run, so I was treated like royalty.  ;-)

(5/9/09) Here’s a link to a UT video segment that will give you a better idea of what I experienced.

OK, this entry is a little different. Yes, there was a cache, and yes, I found it and signed the log. But this is a cache that you can find, too, and from the comfort of your own chair.

Click on the picture and enjoy the hunt!

If you find it in less than six tries, you’re a better cacher than I.

Wednesday night, I received notification of a couple of new caches on Otay Mountain. Rick and I got a First-to-Find up there last year, so I was familiar with the territory – a long dirt road, one car wide, with a cliff on either side.

I was already planning on going to work a few hours late on Thursday, so I figured if the caches were still unfound when I got up, I’d make a run for them. They were, so I did.

Just as I reached the peak, Mr. Sun decided it was time to get up.

A thousand feet away (and 100 feet up), this cache provided a great view of the Sweetwater Reservoir.

I love San Diego!

I had to go to the airport to pick up a friend. The flight was delayed, but I just ‘happened’ to have my GPS handy. I looked up the nearest caches and thought this would be a good one to grab

As I parked and started walking toward GZ, a feeling came over me. Kind of like deja vu, but stronger. Probably because I found this cache about two years ago. Argh.

On the bright side, though, sitting at the end of the Lindbergh Field runway has its own appeal.

A fun little multi-cache on Harbor Island. It was a beautiful day, and there was a great view of the city from the cache site.