I spent this past weekend in the state capitol of Raleigh, North Carolina. Raleigh is 3 hours away from my house, and is home to a lot of great caches.On Saturday I loaded up some of the highest favourited caches in the area and hit the road. I ended up doing some funky caches, and seeing some interesting sights, which I present to you know, in no particular order.
On North Carolina State University (Go Wolfpack!) I did a cache that involved this statue of a professor. This is one of the most detailed statues I have ever seen. Some of the notable details include a watch where you can clearly tell the time, and you can clearly see the page numbers on the book he is reading.
I ended up doing a pair of caches, an earth cache and a virtual, near a rocky outcrop that contains a bunch of almandine garnets. While there I got to hang out with a bunch of eastern fence lizards. I even managed to get a picture of these fast moving creatures.
As it turned out there was a traditional cache across the road, so it ended up being a 3-fer - 3 caches within 90ft - not bad.
Somewhere along the way I did a cache beside this rather cool homemade tin man.
One of the more unique cache experiences involve caches hidden in libraries. One of the several multi-caches I did that day involved a final in a library, in this case a cache hidden in a book.
When I posted I was coming to Raleigh online, a cache owner suggested a new cache she placed, and another cacher expressed interest in hunting it with me. So for about an hour I met up with NittanyDave and together we did a field puzzle named Snake Eyes. It is a hard cache to describe without giving away spoilers, but let me say that it is a very challenging field puzzle, and the final is very thematic. It is a well done cache all around. Highly recommended.
The last cache I did that day is called Milo's Garden, located at the JC Raulston Arboretum. The cache had a unique twist to the field puzzle. To solve it, one has to follow directions (example: "look to the north, you should see a brick building. Walk towards it until the paved path ends, then turn left"). Following these directions draws numbers on a GPS. Very cool.
I followed the directions, and got to ground zero, but I ran out of time before I could find the cache. So I left without a smiley that day. However while walking around I kept thinking how cool the various paths and plants where, and how much my kids would like it, especially this dragon (named Sir Walter Snarleigh).
I followed the directions, and got to ground zero, but I ran out of time before I could find the cache. So I left without a smiley that day. However while walking around I kept thinking how cool the various paths and plants where, and how much my kids would like it, especially this dragon (named Sir Walter Snarleigh).
I mentioned it to my wife, and we ended up returning to the Arboretum the next morning We spent a couple hours walking around and checking things out. We eventually wandered back to ground zero, so I looked for the cache again. This time I found it almost right away, and was able to redeem a DNF before heading back home (Its nice to tie up loose threads). It was a great way to finish what turned out to be an excellent adventure in geocaching.
