Table of Contents

Cover Page

Cache Across Utah

What the Heck is an Earthcache?

Geocaching in the 6th Grade

Magnet Safety

Regular Features

Chuckles

Credits

Our GeoCaching adventures began on May 24, 2003 with the Hometown Playground (GC8E87) cache in Wellington. This was a fun find for us since we didn’t own a GPSr, yet. After finding this cache mom told dad to find a GPSr that fit the bill for geocaching and it would be a Father’s Day gift. The family was hooked, so the next day we ventured over the hill to Utah County and bagged Wearin’ O’ the Green (GCDD58) in Highland. During the course of the next year we traveled to family reunions and other gatherings and always included geocaching on our trips. These varied and sundry travels took us through 12 of the 29 counties in the state.

In May 2004 we met JeeperDad and family in Price for a picnic lunch and tale swap. He mentioned the Cache Across Utah, in what I later discovered was a ploy to get more people to join his insanity party. Well, since we were already headed to the party anyway we decided this would be a great way to spend some of our summer vacation time. Little did we know what was in store.

The adventure begins one month later. We took a 12 hour trip from Price to St. George along Highway 89 through Sanpete, Piute, Garfield, Kane, and Washington counties. After an overnight stay in St. George we returned home through our old Hurricane stomping grounds, stopping long enough to watch grandma skydive. Final tally for this leg of the adventure: 30 caches in 30 hours.

The in-laws no longer ask what time we plan to arrive, they just wait. The first question when we do arrive is, “How many?” as in how many caches did you get this time?

The next two counties to fall were Morgan and Summit following the May 2004 UTAG event. The Mormon Pioneer Historic Trail (GC13F3) cache is almost a mile up the trail from the parking area. Well, our 12 year old son had been working out with the junior high school track team and thought he was getting pretty good. So he challenged dad to a race down the trail to the van. It was a pretty close race but dad still understands a little more about pacing yourself, and pulled ahead for a victory at the tape.

Memorial Day found us touring the extreme southeastern corner of the state. This was a very new experience for the entire family, since none of us had traveled to this area before. Unfortunately due to poor planning and some technical difficulties we only managed to knock off one county, San Juan, during the trip. The frustration came because we knew we were driving past more than one cache along the route, but they weren’t set in the GPSr so we couldn’t be sure where to stop and look. Overall the trip was not unfruitful; we did locate seven caches and visited several state and national parks over the weekend. We camped in the church parking lot next to the Monticello temple along side a Boy Scout troop.

In June mom and the kids made the annual summer school field trip to the Uintah Basin to visit the dinosaur museum in Vernal. During the trip they recruited their cousins to join in a geocache adventure to Daggett county. Luckily, mom wasn’t driving as they entered the Ashley National Forest in search of Grizzly Ridge Camping Fun (GC8CC5), or it would still be unfound by the Hyper Cache team. They drove down a four wheel drive trail until it appeared impassable due to a mud bog. The kids got out and hiked the final half a mile to the cache location. Uncle decided maybe the mud wasn’t that deep after all and the van had enough clearance to make it, so he forged ahead and they continued on down the trail to the main road.

The next week dad and our scout age boys had a doctor appointment in Emery county for their summer camp physical exams. Dad said, “Since we’re going that far we might as well go on down to Wayne county and get a cache or two there.” Besides we might not be this close again for awhile. At this point the end was in sight for us. We had a trip planned for the July 4th weekend to finish the quest. So following the visit to the doctor we drove to Loa and collected two virtual caches in the rain. On the way home as we passed through Freemont dad spotted an old church that had to be at least 100 years old, which would qualify for the locationless cache, Sacred Structures (GC566B). Sure enough the church was exactly 100 years old so we took some pictures and got back on the road home.

The final dash for the Cache Across Utah began on July 2nd as we drove north on I-15 then took a detour along I-80 to the Tooele border, and we just barely crossed the border to get the Black Rock – Stinky Flats (GCDBEF) cache. From Tooele we journeyed to Weber county for a picnic lunch and two more caches. As we boarded to leave the Apex of Society cache (GCG1KR) we noticed another cacher searching for the stash, so we quickly greeted him and continued on toward Pineview View Cache (GCG899).

The kids were more interested in the Pine View reservoir than the geocache, so as they tried to throw rocks in the lake, mom and dad examined the cache. Suddenly there was a crash and a scream, as our 4 year old took a tumble in the gravel and cut his lip open. Mom thought he might need stitches; dad said “we’ve got a quest to finish!” So we bandaged the lip, gave him some ice to slow the bleeding and took off for parts north.

Monte Cristo’s Hideout (GC112A) in Cache county was one of the most spectacular views we have ever seen. We took out all of our travel bug companions and took pictures to post on the bug pages. There was another truck leaving the area as we approached, they rolled down the window and said “we left it for you” and drove off, we didn’t get a name or any more information about them. The log book didn’t contain any recent entries so we’re still not sure if they were geocachers.

We took the road on through Woodruff, Rich county and then around to Bear Lake. We had been given advance notice that Limber Pine (GC14A9) was a must see cache as we drove through Logan canyon. Dad and some of the kids hiked the trail to Limber Pine, made some trades and then dad decided to take the ‘crows trail’ to Cache-Cache (GC1371). The little boys decided half way down that they weren’t going to make it in shorts and sandals. So our 12 year old volunteered to take them back to the van, while dad and the other two went for the cache. Dad got in a big hurry here and made a serious error in judgment sending these boys back without a GPS or two-way radio. After finding the Cache-Cache and looping back on the road to the van, we discovered that the other part of our team had not returned. Mom was getting nervous as dad climbed back up the trail to Limber Pine in search or our three boys. Near the top dad met up with the oldest carrying the youngest on his back, we later found out that they had found the trail earlier but were disoriented and had taken the trail in the wrong direction. At that point the smaller boys were getting tired and the oldest had taken turns carrying them on his back.

All together again we finished the drive through Logan canyon and stopped on the Utah State University campus for dinner on the lawn near the Black Rock (GCGKRG) cache. The final cache find in our quest was Feeding Time (GCH1KM) in Box Elder county, a virtual drive-by in the dark at 10:00pm.

Despite the two months of $500+ gas bills and the many squabbles in the van along the way the accomplishment of completing the Cache Across Utah will carry memories for us for many years to come. As our 4th grade daughter studies the counties this year, she will be able to say, “I have been to every county is the state, and found something unique in each of them”.

So where do we go from here? DeLorme Utah Challenge? Utah Hipoints? Cache Across America? Who knows, but we’ll be sure to have fun along the way.