![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
Portland Cache Machine II foillowup
Ok, I've got the final figures and toll.
I was teamed up with a guy from BC (geocaching handle: Fuzzywhip) who needed a navigator. I got us turned around a couple of times (In one case by not checking to see what street we'd parked on before starting out to the next cache).
He's about my age and late on the run, I found out that he's a diabetic too. Being a couple of old codgers working together helped. Especially towards the end of the run when the repeated getting in and out of the car, searching thru scrathy bushes and bending and stretching were taking their toll.
Semi-confirmed results: 65 caches overall (though we couldn't count the last one, the dinner, because we got there too early and he had to leave before it'd start). I got 55 caches I could claim.
Most of a day later, I'm in fair shape, just some aches, pains and minor sunburn and a few blisters (all in places where the flip-flops I wear around the house don't irritate them.
Oh yeah, this brings my total to 183. I think I'll try to make 200 by the next GEO meet & greet. Doing it by bus and bikle, should work out.
I tried to go to bed early to be ready for the start. But as usual, it didn't work so well for me. I did get hours of laying quietly in bed, but not much sleep. Fortunately this wasn't as much of an issue as I'd been afraid. It probably made my a bit slower during the day, but other than some yawns, I was doing ok until near the end.
Finally got up to use the bathroom about 2:30 and since the alarm was set for 3 am, I turned it off and started fixing breakfast and double checking that I had everything set up.
Had some bad moments when something disagreed with my digestion but it sort of solved itself and a dose of immodium made it unlikely to return during the day (it didn't, thankfully).
I made two mistakes while getting ready. First, I decided against making some sandwiches to take with my, figuring the granola bar type stuff I'd gotten from freecycle a while back and a couple of large kippered beef strips would do. They did, I actually ate only one granola bar and most of a beef strip. And those were in small chunks as we went thru the day.
But the sandwiches would have been better at convincing my stomach I had food in it.
The second mistake was a lot more critical. I considered taking a second bottle of water, but because the weather has been cool so far I didn't. I was able to refill the bottle once at a park, and would have been in trouble if Fuzzywhip hadn't been using pop bottles filled with water and frozen to keep stuff cool in his cooler.
Of course, while we'd been on city streets and passed by or near a lot of stores earlier, by the time the water got critical, we were in "rural"-ish areas.
I should have taken at least three bottles, with one of them holding the diluted gatorade that's appropriate for diabetics.
I'd been worried about how to get to the starting point (IKEA) because while the Max runswithin a few blocks and is running that early, none of the buses *remotely* near here are ruinning. I didn't fancy walking 4 miles to IKEA of 2 miles to the Max station. And I didn't want to leave my bike locked up there all day.
A couple days before, it dawned on my ythat now that I have a semi-reasonable income again, I could actually afford to take a cab this once.
So about 20 after 4, I called a cab. I got to Ikea around quarter to 5. A fair number of folks were there already, looking for the muti-cache in the parking lot (with no luck).
Fuzzywhip pulled in a bit before 5 and I recognized him from his picture. A bit after that the run started. Everybody took off for the other two nearby caches, I'd already been to the next one on the list, but if pointed Fuzzywhip towards it. When he got back to the car, we started around the back of the store for the next, which was one I hadn't gotten.
We were getting close when some of ythe crowd that was there already warned us that the manager had told them to leave and called the police. So we turned around and headed off to the one by the Max stop. Alas, as we were parking a police car came by and the officer politely suggested that we move on as it was private property. Oh well, I can get that one easily enough later.
We got another one I hadn't gotten in the area, tthen headed off to the PDX Airport Travel Bug Embassy because I had a travel bug to drop off.
By then we'd agreed to only go for caches I hadn't gotten, though I told him there were a few unusual ones I'd show him. This let us skip potions of the list so we stayed fairly well up in the groupings (cache machine tend to break up into clusters of folks as they go because of different times taken to find the caches and folks skipping some).
I won't go into boring details on most of the run. But a few highlights were showing him the cache described as a "square, one gallon container" (a ziplock bag stapled to the side of a telephone pole facing a fence less than three feet away).
Then there was the one that was a strip of the magnetic stuff they use to stick removable signs to cars with. It'd been cut to a length that'd just fit around a large post on a cyclone fence, and the outside had a strip of duct tape applied that matched the post pretty well. A group of us must have spent 20 minutes looking before someone spotted it.
The "log" was the back of the strip, which was white. No wonder the cache owner specified "initials only".
Fuzzywhip hadn't seen the local style of water meters and shutoffs which are rectangular concrete boxes set into the parking strips with a rectangular iron cover set in the middle. Since there's usually a lot of space inside, some folks use them for placing caches.
At one stop the clue was "Bull Run". My being a local and knowing that Portland gets its water. Given the large number of folks not just from out of town, but out of *state*, that was a decided advantage. Though when I clued in the others who were also searching, turned out that even some folks from Beaverton hadn't known that.
Then there was the guy who had two caches on the list making a reference to a common condiment. Turned out the cache containers were plastic bottles that'd formerely contained the condiment.
Or the one that I thought was a piece of trash until I poked it and the badly weathered plastic bag went "clunk". And when I picked it up, turned out that the bag and the container inside were for something that connected to the cache name.
Alas as the day went on, and I sweated, I wasn't wearing my hat that much and it was a *very* sunny day. I think some of my discomfort late in the run was a combo of insufficient hydration and over-exposure to the sun.
I'll also note that I've developed a positive *loathing* for caches hidden inside bushes, especially the short, scratchy evergreen type.
Even the "nicer" bushes were becoming a problem as my eyes weren't dealing well with the shadows and varying light levels. I was having trouble making out the branches, much less any camo'ed containers.
We finally got to a section where I only had one or two (out of 4-7) caches unfound per page of the route directions. And it was getting near 6pm which was when Fuzzywhip needed to take off. So we skipped a bunch of pages and hit my cache (he found it without any hints).
We hit a convenience store along the way (a bit of a detour, but needed) and I got bottled water, gatorade, and a Diet Dr. Pepper. Mixed the water and gatorade 50/50 in my water bottle, and the first drink made a major difference. Also gave me an icecream headache as they'd kept those drinks *cold*.
Sipping more slowly after that worked well.
We hit one more cache in my neighborhood before heading off the the final "cache" (the dinner). He'd figured there'd be some folks there, even that early and we could sign the log and he could drop ,me back home on the way (the route we took there let me tell him the *easy* way to get onto I-205 afterwards).
Alas, he was wrong and couldn't wait around. And the way I was feeling, I wasn't going to go back out after getting home. So he droove me home and I repeated the directions to I-205 one last time.
I actually stayed up quite a bit later than I thought I would and was able to get most of my caches entered at geocaching.com
I admit I was nodding off as I got the last few entered.
I crashed and slept like a log for about 4 hours, then got up to use the bathroom and was awake enough to do things for a couple of hours (like recheck the caches and fix a couple I'd missed).
Crashed for *another* 8 hours and when I got up I was feeling much more human. Still popping ibuprofen for the aches and pains, but that's gonna continue for a few days regardless.
Lessons learned:
More water
some gatorade (maybe carry some of the individual pouches)
Wear the hat! (and get a new bike helmet with a visor)
New shoes (the old "tennis shoes" I was using are actually a bit small)
Get another one of the grabbers like Fay got me. It'll save a bunch of bending and stooping
Sunscreen (I have some, just didn't think I'd need it)
I was teamed up with a guy from BC (geocaching handle: Fuzzywhip) who needed a navigator. I got us turned around a couple of times (In one case by not checking to see what street we'd parked on before starting out to the next cache).
He's about my age and late on the run, I found out that he's a diabetic too. Being a couple of old codgers working together helped. Especially towards the end of the run when the repeated getting in and out of the car, searching thru scrathy bushes and bending and stretching were taking their toll.
Semi-confirmed results: 65 caches overall (though we couldn't count the last one, the dinner, because we got there too early and he had to leave before it'd start). I got 55 caches I could claim.
Most of a day later, I'm in fair shape, just some aches, pains and minor sunburn and a few blisters (all in places where the flip-flops I wear around the house don't irritate them.
Oh yeah, this brings my total to 183. I think I'll try to make 200 by the next GEO meet & greet. Doing it by bus and bikle, should work out.
I tried to go to bed early to be ready for the start. But as usual, it didn't work so well for me. I did get hours of laying quietly in bed, but not much sleep. Fortunately this wasn't as much of an issue as I'd been afraid. It probably made my a bit slower during the day, but other than some yawns, I was doing ok until near the end.
Finally got up to use the bathroom about 2:30 and since the alarm was set for 3 am, I turned it off and started fixing breakfast and double checking that I had everything set up.
Had some bad moments when something disagreed with my digestion but it sort of solved itself and a dose of immodium made it unlikely to return during the day (it didn't, thankfully).
I made two mistakes while getting ready. First, I decided against making some sandwiches to take with my, figuring the granola bar type stuff I'd gotten from freecycle a while back and a couple of large kippered beef strips would do. They did, I actually ate only one granola bar and most of a beef strip. And those were in small chunks as we went thru the day.
But the sandwiches would have been better at convincing my stomach I had food in it.
The second mistake was a lot more critical. I considered taking a second bottle of water, but because the weather has been cool so far I didn't. I was able to refill the bottle once at a park, and would have been in trouble if Fuzzywhip hadn't been using pop bottles filled with water and frozen to keep stuff cool in his cooler.
Of course, while we'd been on city streets and passed by or near a lot of stores earlier, by the time the water got critical, we were in "rural"-ish areas.
I should have taken at least three bottles, with one of them holding the diluted gatorade that's appropriate for diabetics.
I'd been worried about how to get to the starting point (IKEA) because while the Max runswithin a few blocks and is running that early, none of the buses *remotely* near here are ruinning. I didn't fancy walking 4 miles to IKEA of 2 miles to the Max station. And I didn't want to leave my bike locked up there all day.
A couple days before, it dawned on my ythat now that I have a semi-reasonable income again, I could actually afford to take a cab this once.
So about 20 after 4, I called a cab. I got to Ikea around quarter to 5. A fair number of folks were there already, looking for the muti-cache in the parking lot (with no luck).
Fuzzywhip pulled in a bit before 5 and I recognized him from his picture. A bit after that the run started. Everybody took off for the other two nearby caches, I'd already been to the next one on the list, but if pointed Fuzzywhip towards it. When he got back to the car, we started around the back of the store for the next, which was one I hadn't gotten.
We were getting close when some of ythe crowd that was there already warned us that the manager had told them to leave and called the police. So we turned around and headed off to the one by the Max stop. Alas, as we were parking a police car came by and the officer politely suggested that we move on as it was private property. Oh well, I can get that one easily enough later.
We got another one I hadn't gotten in the area, tthen headed off to the PDX Airport Travel Bug Embassy because I had a travel bug to drop off.
By then we'd agreed to only go for caches I hadn't gotten, though I told him there were a few unusual ones I'd show him. This let us skip potions of the list so we stayed fairly well up in the groupings (cache machine tend to break up into clusters of folks as they go because of different times taken to find the caches and folks skipping some).
I won't go into boring details on most of the run. But a few highlights were showing him the cache described as a "square, one gallon container" (a ziplock bag stapled to the side of a telephone pole facing a fence less than three feet away).
Then there was the one that was a strip of the magnetic stuff they use to stick removable signs to cars with. It'd been cut to a length that'd just fit around a large post on a cyclone fence, and the outside had a strip of duct tape applied that matched the post pretty well. A group of us must have spent 20 minutes looking before someone spotted it.
The "log" was the back of the strip, which was white. No wonder the cache owner specified "initials only".
Fuzzywhip hadn't seen the local style of water meters and shutoffs which are rectangular concrete boxes set into the parking strips with a rectangular iron cover set in the middle. Since there's usually a lot of space inside, some folks use them for placing caches.
At one stop the clue was "Bull Run". My being a local and knowing that Portland gets its water. Given the large number of folks not just from out of town, but out of *state*, that was a decided advantage. Though when I clued in the others who were also searching, turned out that even some folks from Beaverton hadn't known that.
Then there was the guy who had two caches on the list making a reference to a common condiment. Turned out the cache containers were plastic bottles that'd formerely contained the condiment.
Or the one that I thought was a piece of trash until I poked it and the badly weathered plastic bag went "clunk". And when I picked it up, turned out that the bag and the container inside were for something that connected to the cache name.
Alas as the day went on, and I sweated, I wasn't wearing my hat that much and it was a *very* sunny day. I think some of my discomfort late in the run was a combo of insufficient hydration and over-exposure to the sun.
I'll also note that I've developed a positive *loathing* for caches hidden inside bushes, especially the short, scratchy evergreen type.
Even the "nicer" bushes were becoming a problem as my eyes weren't dealing well with the shadows and varying light levels. I was having trouble making out the branches, much less any camo'ed containers.
We finally got to a section where I only had one or two (out of 4-7) caches unfound per page of the route directions. And it was getting near 6pm which was when Fuzzywhip needed to take off. So we skipped a bunch of pages and hit my cache (he found it without any hints).
We hit a convenience store along the way (a bit of a detour, but needed) and I got bottled water, gatorade, and a Diet Dr. Pepper. Mixed the water and gatorade 50/50 in my water bottle, and the first drink made a major difference. Also gave me an icecream headache as they'd kept those drinks *cold*.
Sipping more slowly after that worked well.
We hit one more cache in my neighborhood before heading off the the final "cache" (the dinner). He'd figured there'd be some folks there, even that early and we could sign the log and he could drop ,me back home on the way (the route we took there let me tell him the *easy* way to get onto I-205 afterwards).
Alas, he was wrong and couldn't wait around. And the way I was feeling, I wasn't going to go back out after getting home. So he droove me home and I repeated the directions to I-205 one last time.
I actually stayed up quite a bit later than I thought I would and was able to get most of my caches entered at geocaching.com
I admit I was nodding off as I got the last few entered.
I crashed and slept like a log for about 4 hours, then got up to use the bathroom and was awake enough to do things for a couple of hours (like recheck the caches and fix a couple I'd missed).
Crashed for *another* 8 hours and when I got up I was feeling much more human. Still popping ibuprofen for the aches and pains, but that's gonna continue for a few days regardless.
Lessons learned:
More water
some gatorade (maybe carry some of the individual pouches)
Wear the hat! (and get a new bike helmet with a visor)
New shoes (the old "tennis shoes" I was using are actually a bit small)
Get another one of the grabbers like Fay got me. It'll save a bunch of bending and stooping
Sunscreen (I have some, just didn't think I'd need it)
no subject
I don't understand that "Bull Run" thing.
You think THAT was cold? The other day I got a bottle of water from Subway that was pretty much frozen solid.
no subject
no subject