GeoWoodstock 2018

I must say I am impressed!!!

  

Yesterday, at our local Canada Day event, our local GeoWoodstock

Ambassador gave a short presentation that covered the preparations,

plans and activities that have already started for next year's GeoWoodstock.

GC5AX15

Main Registration Page

After meeting and talking with Lynne, our local Ambassador,

and hearing about all the things that are planned for next year - I

will admit - I am already talking with Nana about the possibility

of us making the trip to Cincinnati!!!

Here is just some of the information I received and can share:

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1)  Here is a list of the Night Caches all within 35 miles of GZ
(most within 20)

2)  A new, Official, Greater Cincinnati GeoTour is currently being built!

3)  The OCB, Original Can of Beans will be at the event.

It will be it's last showing, EVER in the U.S. and Canada

because the guy who owns it is retiring it!!!

This is the only remaining artifact from the original

hide, that inspired Geocaching.

4)  Camping with a Friday night bash is coming.

5)  Saturday night will have "Midnight Madness" INSIDE the
 amusement park,  after closes!

 It is a massive buy/sell/trade exchange of geocoins.

6)  The VIP registration will have MORE THAN 20 minted pieces.

 (6 of them are pathtags.)

7)  First 5000 people get a free trackable.

8)  We are expecting to go Giga!

This is an event that expects to bring 5,000+ people.

9)  It's the same weekend as Taste of Cincinnati,
one of the nation's largest food festival. (Maybe the largest.)

10)  There is already an established DONUT GeoTour and
several GeoTrails with coins in the area.

11)  Registration and hotel bookings can be found on the website.

12)  The venue does have free WiFi.

13)  They are still planning all the camping sites

 and will announce it soon - it will be within 25 miles.

14) Also, while the main event will be at the Amusement Park. The majority of
 the other events will  be other events most likely at the fairgrounds.

I will publish more info here as I receive it.

If you have any specific questions - leave them as feedback

 or a comment and I will forward them to our ambassador

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Don't forget our local GCHR Picnic - GC6WW8C

more info on that event in my next blog!

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 Till next time...

Stay Safe & Keep Caching!!!

Suffolk Nana & Papa - - - or just plain ol' - - - -  SNAP!!!  

On Twitter at: @SNAPgeocaching

On Instagram at: snap_geocaching

Day 4 of SNAP!!!'s "Geowoodstock13 and more" trip.

Day 4 was supposed to start with rising from our slumber about 6 and maybe hitting the road by 7 or 7:30.  I guess it was the anticipation of the Day 4 "TARGET" cache that awoke us early, but as it ended up we were packed up and headed towards McD's for morning coffee just a few minutes after 6AM.

A mini version of the Vietnam Memorial

We grabbed a few roadside caches heading west out of Hagerstown and then proceeded slowly to the TARGET area grabbing a few caches here and there.  I had set up this trip planning to hit one main target cache each day.  While traveling between targets we mainly concentrated on 1) Virtuals, 2) Earthcaches, Memorials, and of course Nana's favorites: cemetery caches.

Circle of Soldiers Memorial

We made it up to Altoona, PA and grabbed our first Virtual of the day along with 2 cemetery caches before heading onward.  As we continued on grabbing caches here and there I managed to surprise Nana with a stop in DuBois, PA.  The city was renamed DuBois and was established as a lumber town by a relative of mine back in the 1800's.  A monument stands near the site of his grave and the view of the city from there is amazing.

Nana & Papa at the DuBois Memorial

Shortly after leaving DuBois we arrived near our TARGET cache for the day.  It must have been almost 3 years ago, while scrolling through some videos on You Tube, or maybe it was on Facebook, anyway, I happened upon this video of a cache near an old abandoned railroad tunnel and bridge.  Amazed at what the video showed, I immediately added Train Trestle Falls [GCT397] to our watch list and always planned on dropping by the next time we were in the area.

The entrance

After leaving the four lane highway, the leaving the two lane highway, then the country road, the gravel road and driving down the dirt road we turned around and found the parking spot.  We took several minutes to load up some water, apply the bug spray, grab the hiking sticks, the flashlight and change into the boots before eventually making our way down the trail.

At the entrance

Minutes later as we rounded a corner, the temperature dropped and we saw gaping before us the entrance to what must have been an awesome railroad tunnel.  There were some friendly muggles standing near their ATVs who quickly assured Nana that there were "no critters" of any sort anywhere inside the tunnel.  Ever so slowly we made our way through the tunnel (which we now know was about 0.45 miles) and slowly made our way towards the light, literally, at the end of the tunnel!

The view was fantastic, the walk out on the old trestle (which is NOT required for this cache) tested my intestinal fortitude just a little but in the end I was glad I went out as far as I did.  No, Nana did not venture out onto the bridge, in fact, she did not even make me leave the SNAP!!!-mobile keys with her before I ventured out!!!

The other side!

Would you venture out there?

All that was left from this point on, was a half mile walk down a really nice path to get to within 170 feet of the cache.  From there I will simply tell you your adventure has not ended.  I do not want to spoil all of your fun but I will tell you this:  Once we were back through the tunnel nestled snuggly in the SNAP!!!-mobile, waiting for the AC to cool us down, Both of us agreed, this cache was definitely in our top 3 caches of all time!  A real must do cache!

Part of the view

Can you see Nana?

Papa on the way back!

The cache is down this path

We finished off the day with a quick trip down the road and spent the night near Meadville, PA.  Can you guess which cache will be our TARGET for day 5??  It is really close by!

The Day 4 totals added another 18 finds for us.  1 Puzzle/Challenge, 1 Virtual and 16 Traditionals.

Our next blog will cover Day 5, the Target Cache for that day and , of course, the others we managed to squeeze in.

As Always - - Stay Safe & Keep Caching!!!

Suffolk Nana & Papa - - - or - - - SNAP!!!

The start of the long awaited trip 9 day trip

Almost a year ago we started planning our trip to GeoWoodstock13.  Once the hotel reservations were made we slowly started the planning.  Which caches or series would we attempt and so forth.

Slowly the trip evolved from a long weekend trip and it eventually topped out at 11 days.  Eventually that 11 days would be trimmed to 9 due to family tradition but we, Nana & I, planned to have one heck of a week enjoying this tremendous hobby called geocaching.

Log for the main event

Slowly the list of major targets caches filled up until we were sure we had more than we could actually accomplish.

Log for the Early Arrival Event

The plan was simple:
1) One day travel to Hagerstown, caching along the way.
2) One day before GeoWoodstock to cache around the area and attend pre-events.
3) GeoWoodstock13 on day 3
4) Days 4 through 9 for 6 main targets caching to each target, around, and then to the next target.

Muggles at a cache

DAY 1
As luck would have it, it was a steady rain the morning we left Suffolk but by noon the rain had decreased to a drizzle and shortly thereafter the sun slowly peeked through the clouds.  The rain had slowed us down but we eventually made in the Berkeley County West Virginia.  WVTim and his friends, both cachers and county officials, had created another great caching series in Berkeley County.

Nana and I spent the spent the rest of the daylight hours finding cache after cache but failed to complete the series before it was time to check in at the hotel for the weekend and then find us a nice place for dinner.

At the end of Day 1 we had 15 finds including 1 event, 1 earthcache, 2 puzzle caches and 11 traditional caches.  Not bad for a day with almost 7 hours of rain!

DAY 2
We started early and our first stop was one of the many events on the day.  We then headed back towards West Virginia to attempt to get the rest of the series and we did accomplish all but the final - that we were saving for tomorrow!

Through the day we completed two other nice series, The Road to GWS which obviously was near the upcoming party sight and Strolling down the Pike which was a little west of the same road.

Finishing off the day with the Early Arrivals Meet n Greet before heading back to find a nice place to eat before turning in for the night.

The Day 2 totals gave us another 41 finds including 3 events, a Multi, an earthcache, a puzzle cache and 35 traditional caches.

DAY 3
After grabbing a quick bite of breakfast it was off to the event site.  GeoWoodstock13!!!  Our first GeoWoodstock.  What can I say other than WOW!!!

Vendors, speakers, games, historical information, more vendors, more speakers, food and last but not least... more vendors!!!

We finished up the Lab Caches, visited all the vendors one more time, listened to just one more speaker then decided to head out of the event area and grab some more caches including the final to the Villages of Berkeley County series.

GCHR group pic

GeoWoodstock13 was a great event with more than enough to do to keep you busy most of the day.  The volunteers and planners for this event did a fantastic job.

Another muggle at a cache

 The Day 3 totals added another 32 finds including a CITO, an event, a Multi, 10 Lab Caches, an earthcache, 4 puzzle caches, 9 traditional caches and of course the Mega Event.

Our next blog will cover DAY 4, the target cache and the other caches that made up the day!

As Always - Stay Safe & Keep Caching!!!

Suffolk Nana & Papa - - - or - - - SNAP!!!