Leakage from a Cluttered Mind

Dan and I decided to go to Garin Regional Park–north part–this afternoon, even though it was the hottest part of the day. Luckily it wasn’t really hot, and it was a bit cooler in Hayward. We started from the Zeile Creek trailhead.

Our first hunt was for Trail View Cache. We had to climb up some steep, dry grass covered slopes, and it seemed more slippery than mud in the winter. Footing felt treacherous. We found it at 2:46 PM.

Zeile Creek #1 was close, so we took a trail that appeared to be blocked off. Had a tough creek crossing, not because of water, but because of vertical sides that were hard to climb. We needed to find the coords for stage 2. Not sure what we were looking for. Finally used the only thing we could find that had numbers on it. A round disk with the numbers 772 and 725 on it. We plugged the numbers in, and that took us to an area requiring serious bushwhacking through a jungle of over our heads weeds, a thicket of thistles, and a steep hill. Dan wasn’t wearing bushwhacking clothes so elected not to go, and I chickened out when the going got very steep. I just wasn’t very confident of the numbers. I should go back and really check it out. Other find logs could correspond to the area.

Our next stop was for Fungus Humungus, a pretty quick find at 3:29 PM. Then we had to do a bit of hill climbing to Top of the World. This one had us searching around for a while, but we finally located it at 4:04 PM.

Bay Tree Bay View was a little confusing. The cache description was incorrect, but it made so little sense that I just decided to ignore it and look for it. Found it at 4:26 PM. The next closest cache was Kansas City A’s, and we made a poor choice on how to approach it. It was right off a trail, but we bushwhacked down to it. Dan especially chose a tough route. Hope the PO doesn’t get him. We found this one at 4:44 PM.

We hunted for Rock Jungle for a long time. I’m not sure we were hunting in the right place. Not all the conditions of the description were met where we were hunting.

We also couldn’t find Oak Tree Cache. I wonder if we were on the wrong trail and wrong gate. Our GPS may have led us slightly astray. After these 2 DNFs, it was after 6 PM, and we were tired and hungry, so called it a day.

This was another day that I could completely give to caching, so I headed for Fremont through Niles Canyon. My first stop was Koopers Kaper, which was an easy find at 9:19 AM.

Next stop was to look for Ailurophobia. I had gained the coodinates for this cache back when I completed Star Puzzle. It’s along the creek in Niles Canyon. I cut my search short because I was followed by a guy (clearly purposefully following me) who was too friendly and just wanted to hang around. Even after talking for a while, and then saying I was going on, he followed. So… I got out of there, but he followed me back to the parking area. Because of this experience, I won’t be going back there alone again.

Back on the 23rd, Karen and I had done a few caches in Garin Dry Creek and started on Nefertiti’s Pyramid series (found two). Today I returned to complete the series.

Nefertiti’s Pyramid: Royal Gates was the first find at 10:30 AM at a lightly used trail gate.

Going through the gates leads to Nefertiti’s Pyramid: Offerings, even though it seems like it’s outside the park. This one was very hard for me to find, I think because the coords put about 30 ft too far south. As I was signing the log at 10:54 AM, another cacher surprised me—I hadn’t seen or heard him coming. It was geowal701—a friendly guy with 1400 finds.

After we talked for a while, I thought I could bushwhack over to the next one and geowal701 headed north for the caches I had already found. After I climbed a hill I realized the other side was too steep and brushy to try to descend. So, after backtracking I continued on south to find Nefertiti’s Pyramid: King Tut at 11:48 AM.

Next up was Nefertiti’s Pyramid: Viper which I found at 12:04 PM in a likely snake pit—down in a gully around some rocks and fallen trees.

Totally Toys was close by, but was really off in the brush so I had to watch carefully for poison oak. The weeds were over my head—nice tick territory. Found this old cache at 12:22 PM. As I walked out of the brush I surprised a pair of skunks—a mama and baby. Luckily, they weren’t too close, but they immediately flagged their tail and walked away. My camera was in the backpack, and I decided not to try to fumble around getting it in this situation.

I looked for Nefertiti’s Pyramid: Throne briefly, but it was at a corral that was in use. Two saddled horses were in the corral. A truck and horse trailer were parked just 6 feet from where I needed to look. I didn’t think clearly enough about this one and got frustrated and decided I might have enough info to find the final cache, so I went on to the coordinates I had and found the pyramid pieces and the location to build the pyramid. This gave me multiple options about where the final cache might be. Clearly Throne had a hint to narrow the possibilities. In retrospect, I should have found the final, but again, just didn’t think it through well enough. So, I went back for Throne, and as I approached realized where it must be hidden and found it immediately at 1:25 PM.

I went back, figured out the use of the pyramid better, and found the final cache, Nefertiti’s Pyramid, at 1:48 PM. For my efforts, I took an “I found Nefertiti’s Pyramid” token. This was a very nice series. Even though I did not like every cache location, overall it was one of my favorites.

After this, I trekked back out of the park and drove south on Mission, noting that Happy Birthday JoeSpaz #28 was just a couple of blocks away in a park. Found this micro tucked into a palm tree at 2:52 PM.

I had hunted for Golden Spike (a multi-cache) before. I double checked the coordinates and they turned out the same. This time there weren’t so many people around, so I could search a bit more thouroughly, and found it at 3:26 PM.

BRIDGE TO SCHOOL is a bit north of 680 and just off Mission near a high school. Found it at 4:19 PM in some bushes by the sign.

In Mission San Jose I looked unsuccessfully for Mission M&M cache and YOU’VE GOT MAIL. I’m not sure why someone hides a cache right outside a post office. I couldn’t find Mission M&M and didn’t try on YOU’VE GOT MAIL.

RED TAIL POWER is right under a high voltage tower that contains a red tailed hawk nest. Found it at 5:26 PM. The nest was not in use.

Last time I was in this area I could never figure out how to get access to Saint Joseph’s 36th Birthday Cake. This time I found a parking spot, gathered the data for this multi-cache (it’s in a cemetery) and easily found the cache at 5:47 PM.

For my 600th find, I scored on IT AIN’T MAIL at 5:56 PM. I had DNF’d on this one previously. I’m quite sure the cache was not as accessible before. There was nothing memorable about this cache—it’s just in some landscaping beside Mission Blvd.

Curtner Coppice was an easy find at 6:16 PM off Paseo Padre. Then I found Happy Birthday JoeSpaz #34 at 6:34 PM.

By this time I was pretty hungry, so I headed for home and stopped at MacDonald’s at Mission and 680. Lo and behold, there were two micros there. I found Waiting for WalruZ at 6:56 PM. Presumeably, this was the hardest of the two. It’s a blinker nano-cache. After eating something, I looked for McPark&Ride, but couldn’t find it.

And thus, at the end of two long days of caching, I was beat.