GeoCaching!

Have you ever heard of it?



Pronounced: "geo-cashing"

It's kinda like a worldwide scavenger hunt! (I think this is as close to the Amazing Race as I will ever get ...!!!)

You can check out more about it on www.geocaching.com

Basically you look up 'caches' that have been hidden in your area on the website and then you set out with your GPS and find the cache by the coordinates and clues that are listed.

So, tonight, I set out with our oldest kiddo and my nieces for our first hunt.

The clue said is was by a little airport near us and to be careful not to get hit by the plane ... well we almost did ...

No joke.

We were walking along the fence line that borders this 'airport' looking for a "pill bottle wrapped in camo tape" (really?!!!) and we turn around and see a small airplane coming right at us!



Apparently right on the other side of the fence was the landing strip ... who knew??? !!!!

So we ducked and it flew right over our heads.

Then someone pulled out of the airport and stopped along the road to basically ask what we were doing. I explained that we were geocaching but that I couldn't get my GPS to work so that's why we were wondering all over the place. He then pulls his car right off the road where we were and says, "well, I think I can get it to work since I can work the one in my airplane."

So I say, "oh was that you just now flying that plane?"

He says, "no, I haven't flown since my incident."

Ok, now do I ask this guy about his incident?

Well, it all the sudden hits me that I am standing literally in the middle of cornfields outside this little po'dunk airport, next to a car talking to someone that I don't know.

Not good choices. Not good choices at all, especially as examples to those younger ones that were with me.

So I motion to the kids to go away ...

And no, I didn't ask about his 'incident.'

I try to kinda back away from the car, although I didn't really feel like this guy's intent was anything but to help with the GPS ... but can you really be too careful? I don't think so.

I make some small talk with him about how I thought it would work, and then all of the sudden, I hear, "we found it!!"

I look up and the amazingly smart kids that were with me had found the cache without the GPS!!!

I grabbed the GPS from the guy, said "Thanks!" as I ran away from that car!

So we were successful with our first find. Wow!

Then we went for a second find. Of course, right?



After traipsing through someone's yard when we realized later that we were in the totally wrong place, we found the second cache in an old, old, old, really old cemetery in the middle of a huge bush inside a coffee canister.

We had fun, it was good memories and I think (or at least really hope) we will get better at this.

There are even some listed to find in India! How fun.

So, there's all kinds of things hidden in obscure places all over this world ... can you find them?