Where Will I Go?

Wow.  It's been over a month since my last post, which I guess in a way, that's a good thing. Most of my previous posts this year have been about my health, but since I'm feeling really good right now, it's allowed me to get out and about, which means that P.J.'s monthly photo theme of "Where Will You Go" worked really well for me. 

This past month, I was able to get two short road trips in.  One was totally geocaching related and though the wandering was just within the state of California, it gave me an idea of what my stamina might mean in the coming months should I decide to do some longer road trips out of state. The second road trip was a bit longer and it involved the granddaughter, so that's always a good thing. That trip near the end of the month was the first time we'd gone up there since my diagnosis back in December. So here's my monthly installment of the theme for this month.

1. I went where the wild things roam

A lot of my geocaching friends call me a snake whisperer. I take that as a badge of honor, but in reality, as I've noted in the past, I like to think that I'm just a little bit more observant around reptiles, especially snakes. I know of three people in my geocaching world who've been bitten by rattlesnakes and I don't want to become part of the club.

This being said, I found this guy crawling across the road that lead up to an old cemetery where I'd found a geocache. 5 minutes previously, he hadn't been there, but was halfway across the road when I came back down the hill from the cemetery. So naturally, I got out of my car, walked over and took several photos while it continued on its way across the road. I did that for two reasons, one of which was to obviously get some photos, and secondly to make sure that it got across the road without being run over by anyone coming up the road. Once it disappeared into the brush at the side of the road, I hopped back into the car and continued on my way.

2. I went where there are some "interesting" things to see

I've noted this several times in the past, but geocaching has taken me to spots that I would have just ignored previously. I'm not saying that Gum Alley was a prime tourist attraction, but it was quite different and something that I wouldn't have even known about were it not for geocaching, so that in itself is a good reason for me to continue this silly game I play.

I walked back and forth down the alley and was followed by another family of four. The older boy (about 5 or 6) had it right off the bat when I heard him whisper to his mom who was busily trying to keep younger brother from touching anything, "This is disgusting!" And yet people keep coming to sites like this, not only here in Atascadero, CA, but also other places around the world. I guess disgust breeds a kind of fascination.

3. I went into a child's imagination

My granddaughter is walking and talking and has a very vivid imagination. Her breakfast smoothies she makes have quite the list of ingredients and of course she expects you to eat them. This was the first time we were able to see her up there at her house since Christmas time and since there were other geocaching related things happening up in the Bay Area at the same time, I was able to kill two birds with one stone. It was a very fun trip and I wish we'd been able to stay longer, but we had a short window of time sandwiched between optometry appointments and dentist appointments. Fortunately, they're coming down here twice in the next couple of months so I'll still be able to get my Papa fix. We also FaceTime on almost a daily basis at dinner time, so I get to see her a lot. She fills my spirit.

4. I went hiking

This was so good. I like to hike a lot and with my health problems over the past half year, I haven't not been able to do that. But a couple of weeks ago, I went on a full fledged hike in the Claremont Hills Wilderness Park and hiked the loop trail which ended up being over 6 miles round trip from parking spot back to parking spot.

I was able to check up on a couple of my geocaches that were along the trail, four of which I'd noticed had problems since the last time I was up there. As it was, I ended up archiving two of them because they'd been buried by trail crews right before I wanted to get up there, but was able to confirm that two others were right where they were supposed to be. I also helped a couple other cachers out by checking up on their caches. 

When I got home, I was definitely gassed as my body was saying, "WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU DOING TO ME?" Yeah, I know, I haven't done this in a while, but it's going to feel good once we get back into the rhythm of it again. My problem is I need to start getting up earlier in the morning as summer is definitely here and if I wait until 10:00 in the morning it's way too hot to hike the loop. What I need to do is get up at 6:00, hit the trail, then have breakfast, a cup of coffee and a shower afterwards. Yeah that's the ticket.

5. I went geocaching with 300 of my closest friends

Well, that's definitely an exaggeration, but I did attend a geocaching Mega Event up in the Bay Area when we were up visiting the granddaughter. For those of you who aren't geocachers, we have events all over the place. I host a monthly coffee event on the first Saturday of the month in my local area, usually drawing between 10 to 25 people. A Mega Event draws over 300 people! 

This was held in an historical park in San Jose, CA and geocachers from all over the country and possibly other countries as well converged here the last Saturday of June. There were all sorts of gadget caches (caches that are more difficult to open to sign the logbook) that we could work on at the event. The historical park gave us lots of interesting things to explore, plus there was a nice hiking trail that took us around the park to other newer geocaches that published that same day. This was the 6th Mega Event I've attended and it was a very enjoyable event. I look forward to my next event, probably next February in Yuma, AZ. 

When I go out geocaching, I always take my green ball point pen with me to sign the log in the geocache. Looking at the photo, I think I need to invest in a couple of green Sharpies so my name shows up better on the log sheet for Mega Events.

Well, there you have it, my interpretation of the theme "Where Will You Go?" Feel free to check out P.J.'s blog for his interpretation. There are links down at the bottom of that page to other people's interpretations as well. Feel free to leave your comments down below. I try to respond to all of them. Thanks for reading along.