Beeley Wood - Rant and Tidy

Sunday morning, bright and early after my work's Christmas do the evening before, Patrick picked me up and we went down to Beeley Wood to do a clean up. Beeley Wood is located between Hillsborough and Oughtibridge and was the location of a very badly maintained series that I originally completed in June.

I say 'completed' but I mean 'tried to complete' and I alluded to this rather subtly in my very first blog as I was still sore about the neglect afforded to this series.

Before I rant I will first say that several of the caches (the 5th, 6th and 7th in particular) had several comments by finders about how inaccurate the coordinates were - sometimes as far off as 50-60 feet. That's a major bugbear of mine and only serves to hurt a potentially lovely day's walk by slowing it down and 'spoiling the game'.


[wibbly wobbly lines as the present fades and we go into the past...]


The first two caches were on a road leading through an industrial estate and were nothing special but the third cache, called 'Beeley Wood - Dumpit Site' was hidden under a stone at the topside of a huge pile of trash which people had flytipped over the side of the lane into the woods over the years. I had found this on a hot summer's day (25th June) and after digging around trying to find this cache I then spent the rest of the day smelling and feeling as though I had slept in a wheelie bin. It was disgusting. Why on Earth anyone would hide a cache here simply beggars belief.

I found the next cache easily and then spend almost an hour, including being on the phone to someone who had already found it, before giving up on the 5th cache. (Terrible coords and eventually presumed muggled.)

The 6th was another easy find (albeit again with terrible coords) and then I had to do some calculating for the 7th as it was a mystery one and I was missing the number from cache 5. It was pretty obvious what the number was as it was a significant digit and anything else would have me a long distance away so off I set, in a bad mood, to attempt the last one.

Arriving roughly on location I could see two huge fallen trees which were part of the clue. I only spent 5 minutes looking before giving up; even though it was a red hot day they were laying in mud, I still stank of wheelie bins, the actual coords did not point to a fallen tree and basically I was fed up.

I walked back to the car and went off to do a lovely series a few miles away before going home. I reported the did-not-finds (DNFs) on the logs and added a polite-but-constructive comment about the dumpit site.

Over the next few months the number of DNFs on number 5 added up and also complaints about the location of number 4. Additionally DNFs also started accumulating for number 6 which I do recall was hidden quite blatently in a muggle-able spot right on the public footpath. Comments were also made about a trackable item which had been stuck in the final cache for over 6 months.

The cache owner (CO) ignored all maintenance requests and complaints until a reviewer stepped in during October saying something should be done. False promises were made, more complaints were made and then the reviewer finally placed the missing caches on 'disabled'. At this the CO closed down the entire series saying he'd left the area, and promised to pick up the caches as essentially they were now just litter, in November.

So the series disappeared and nothing more was heard. However I liked the area and I mentioned this to Patrick who had never done the series. My reasoning was that once you had passed the industrial estate, and all the fly-tipping, the woods themselves were a lovely walk and it was a shame there was no series there. So we hatched a plan; we'd go and check-out a circular walk and pick up the caches which we presumed the cache owner would actually have left there.


[wibbly wobbly effect and we're back to 15th December...]


So Sunday morning... we did a drive-by on the first three caches - yes they were still there despite the CO pretending to go and remove them, then parked up and set off into the woods.

What a difference 6 months make! (Obviously, but I thought the sentence had impact.) I'd been here in the height of summer and now it was the depths of winter; the ground was either hard ice or mud, and there were rotting leaves everywhere. The river was easily 18 inches higher than before and I was surprised to see that the weir was almost invisible - in fact if you did not know it was there you really wouldn't have known, the water flowing over it was so high it was almost level from the top side to the bottom side. Also riverside areas I had walked along looking for missing cache 5 were now several feet inside the river.

We struggled a little with number 5 as I'd forgotten where it was hidden and then went to number 7, the final.

Grr. We spent, and I kid you not, 70 minutes looking here. We unearthed every single tree that had fallen, or looked about to fall, within 150 feet. We might not be super-experts but we've got 18 months and 1500 finds experience between us and we tried and tried and tried to find this one. It was a beautifully cold day, we had a flask of hot tea, and we were in no rush. Plus we didn't want to be beaten. We looked online at the log and tried to work out who to ring and there was only one finder for whom we had a number and calls to him were going direct to his voicemail.

So like I say after 70 minutes we gave up and trudged back dejectedly. We'd just got to the car and Ron rang back giving us exact location of the cache. It was a tree I had definitely searched and Patrick had actually been to twice. We're pretty sure it has been muggled - but just to be sure we will go back and check again when we actually scope out the area for our new series. We didn't do it this weekend because there was too much mud and ice.

Overall we did 2.4 miles and Patrick got 4 finds (and 4 physical caches). None for me but I did get a nice clear head from the Sunday morning walk and hunt.

** Notice to cache owners - if you can't commit to maintainenance then don't place a series! **

Christmas Corroboree VIII

I'm not sure why the organisers have used an aboriginal word (for ceremonial meeting) but on Saturday afternoon we attended, for the first time as we've only cached for 6 months, the annual Christmas Corroboree VIII in Elsecar. This year it was run by MikeG and involved a HUGE puzzle cache hidden up in the woods full of presents and sweets for the children, a raffle for charity, pie and peas and of course lots of chatting to friends old and new.

Having some time constraints I decided we wouldn't do any caching on the day except for the related puzzle cache "A Gift from St. Nicholas" which now takes the credit as being our largest find to date, it being about 36" long, 18" wide and 24" deep. A hearty and merry thanks must go to MikeG for the effort (and cost!) in arranging and positioning such a festive treat for everyone.

I had a lovely chat with Mr Truffles about my planned walk along the Yorkshire Dalesway next year, met up with The Black Sheep (Rob and Jen and their super-energetic 20 month old son), chatted to MikeG and Penfolio, and teased Bleaklow about him not being able to find Not a Bit Sticky - with an invite around for a cup of tea next time he looks for it.

Patrick and family were all there and also YorkyPudding and AgingHippy, many more I don't know and no doubt a few I do know but I've forgotten to mention... sorry!

We bought a fiver's worth of tickets and ended up winning the donation YorkyPudding brought (a string/wood puzzle) and in return she won the ready-to-place cache container I'd donated. Such a small world, she only lives a few doors away so we could have just popped around, done a swap and saved ourselves a few quid :) [I know that's not in the spirit of a raffle, I was joking!]

Big thanks again to MikeG - well done Sir.

Snow and Puzzles

Apologies for not blogging about last Sunday's Team PADs run out to Dodworth. It was beset with work problems and phone calls, which spoilt the day for me, so we postponed plans to do one or two more series in the area for another day. In a very brief summary we did 3.7 miles and got 8 caches.

-

This Sunday, despite the settled snow, we decided to venture down south by 20 minutes into the warmer climes of Harthill situated between Kiveton and Woodall. This was for yet another series of Ron's who I've blogged about several times.

The series involves parking at Harthill Reservoir, solving a simple on-site puzzle for the first cache and then walking around the reservoir to pick up a total of 7 caches over 2.2 miles. As usual Ron has found a lovely area to walk but this time it was very different for us as this was the first time we'd been out caching in snow.

Initially we were somewhat reluctant as we thought we would be leaving obvious tracks where we were looking for caches, but these worries soon faded; with 9 people and a dog doing the walk we were leaving such a large area of disturbed snow that there were no actual clues to lead Muggles to our treasures.

A quick and simple walk round, with only one cache causing us any troubles (triumphantly found by Patrick) we decided to stop off on the way home to do two nearby puzzle caches we'd recently solved.

I should add at this point that on the previous night my son had a sleepover with a couple of his friends to celebrate his imminent 15th birthday. He had stayed up all night and as a consequence was like a zombie today. This, coupled with my daughter and others grumbling about the cold, caused severe apathy amongst the children and as a result of this the adults won the finds by a whopping total of nine caches to nil! We've now agreed we like caching in the snow because it is cheaper for us!

Anyway... Ron had published two puzzle caches the previous week. One of these I had assisted him with, so I couldn't go and grab it immediately because that would spoil it for everyone, but the second was a devil of a puzzle. Last Sunday I had been talking to Patrick and Donna about my interest and fascination with the mathematical number PI (3.1415...) which had started when I had memorised it to 120 decimal places at about the age of 18 to win a bet. (Even now I can still remember 50 places or so). In an amazing coincidence Ron published a puzzle called "...with Peas? And Gravy?" that same evening and it didn't take long to figure out the obvious connection.

I set to work on it rightaway but simply could not get started. A couple of emails to Patrick and back the following day and he showed me the first stage of the puzzle. Again, as usual, I was disappointed with myself for not getting it but I have to confess I don't think I ever would have. So the first stage led me to a couple of sets of numbers but these still weren't coordinates, what to do now? I worked and re-worked them any which way I could think of but still nothing until the next day when it hit me. I can't say much here for risk of spoiling it for anyone but I have to salute Ron for a great puzzle.

So back to Sunday, after doing the Harthill series we stopped to pick both of these up. Lots of snowball fights and snow-angels ensued as we walked past lots of sledging Muggles. A tough walk up a hill rewarded us and in total we had done another 1.2 miles for 2 more caches. More importantly we'd had fun, seen some great views and got some exercise to boot.

(Total for the day was 3.5 miles & 9 caches.)

Guilty Postscript: In early celebration of Adam's birthday we all then went to the Centretainment Centre in Sheffield, to an all-you-can-eat Chinese buffet and undid all the good work of the day!

Ron's last one (or not)

On Saturday we met up again with Patrick, Donna and their kids, along with my two pests newly returned from a long holiday in Orlando, to do Easiron's series entitled TTTWHSFTCP - a humorous acronym of his That's The Third Walk He's Started From This Car Park.

Starting from the same small car park in Ridgeway we used for a walk I blogged only two weeks ago, we set off on what *was* Ron's last series and was the only caches of his we hadn't yet done. This is another spectacular walk of 11 hides (the last being a calculated bonus) taking in over 6 miles of woodland, farmland, hedgerows and paths. I commented in my logs at the time that Ron had excelled himself with this walk and I think all agreed.

The kids were all quite excitable, as usual, but I do think Christmas is already creeping up. Aside from this we had been to see Paramore at the Sheffield Arena two days before so Jade and Christianna had lots to gossip about.

We stopped at the pub, like last time, when back at the car park but this time we only had coffee and biscuits to help us thaw out - once the sun had set it turned very cold.

The sun was disappearing behind us as we walked down this field.

I don't know whether it was because we've cut back on the walking over the last couple of weeks (bad weather and bad diaries), or whether it was because this walk took in a couple of hills, but the next morning my legs and even my arms(!) were aching quite badly.

Roll on the spring when we can get out more often!

As for Ron, the sneaky chap, he published another series of 8 whilst I was logging these so it looks like we've got another good walk to look forward to!

(Total for the day: 11 of Ron's plus a random nearby cache so the total for the day was 12 caches over 6.6 miles.)

Thurcroft Colliery

The last week has been a quiet one Geocaching wise. We can handle the dark nights and we can handle the rain but when both are put together it starts to make us think why bother?

We didn't get out at all until Saturday afternoon where we had arranged to do a new series by n.e.a.r. over in Thurcroft with Patrick and Donna. This is reclamation ground on the site of the old colliery.

n.e.a.r. have excelled themselves with this 3 mile walk through nice open spaces and woodland and which includes 12 hides, many of which have had some good effort taken to disguise them. I was pleased with their efforts and grateful for their time.

Once back at the car we were all chatting and I realised that Hannah was very probably on 399 caches so with a nudge of an idea from Patrick we popped over to Dinnington, after saying our goodbyes, to pick up a standalone urban cache to round Hannah's day off on 400 finds. Following Patrick's description, as we didn't have this cache logged in our GPSr, we actually found it quite easily and it wasn't until later that night when logging the find online that we realised we must have found the old cache. It transpires that after several did-not-finds the cache owner had replaced it several tens of metres away with new coordinates. As Patrick had found it several months before he wasn't aware of this and had directed us to the old spot where, fortunately for us, the original container still existed despite the previous DNFs.

It's quite amusing, to me at least, to think of finding a cache several searchers had missed and that the cache owner had then looked for, abandoned and republished.

I just hope she let's us count it as a valid find!

Ford Walking

On Sunday we set off in the morning to do another of Easiron's series - Ford Walk. This is in Ridgeway, an area of Sheffield that's relatively near to us as the crow flies yet awkward to drive to,

This walk starts from the same car park as a previous walk of Ron's called Plumbley Walk (which I completed two weeks before I started my blog) and is a series of 8 hides, the eighth being found using coordinates taken from 6 of the first 7 hides.

I have a lot of respect for Ron's walks as he takes you through areas that are very changeable. For example they can go from woodland into farmland onto a short stretch of road and back into woodland, up hill and down dale as they say. Couple this with good hides you always seem to enjoy Ron's walks and this was no exception.

We made a few wrong turns (missing footpath signposts), and had a bit of a panic when we realised at find #3 that we'd forgotten to take the coordinates out of #2, but we soldiered on figuring we would be able to calculate this missing coordinate when we'd found #7 and had to get back to the car park - they're almost always on or very near the obvious route back.

And find it we did. The actual single digit missing meant we had to check a spot roughly every 30 feet heading in a particular direction and based on where that trail was going it was pretty much a given that it was the third number we tried. After hunting around in the area we were soon rewarded with a Geoclunk when my walking pole hit plastic hidden deep in dead leaves.

Not so much a lucky find but certainly a fortunate one.

After this it was a quick mile hike back to the car park and the adjacent pub for a lovely Sunday lunch and a couple of drinkies to reward ourselves.

Total walk was 3.6 miles and included 8 finds - the first of which I had completely forgotten was my 400th.

Ghosties and Geocachers

Hannah's parents Julie and Martin (Geocaching name Fat Bloke) came down for the weekend to do a spot of local Geocaching and also to attend a Halloween Geocaching event with us.

After catching up on our geo-gossip we set off to Barnburgh, near Doncaster, about 11am on Saturday, arriving a little early for the Noon meet but not early enough to do any nearby series although we did pop off to do a single find just up the road.

There are quite a few series around this area almost all placed by Mr Truffles. He has a local Barnburgh 1-12 series, plus two small series (each with 4) placed specifically for last year's Halloween event and another series of 8 placed for this year's event. He also has two random single ones locally too.

It was really nice to meet so many Geocachers and to have a proper chat with Ea51ron and Mr Truffles, both of whom I have a lot of respect for. Ron has done several well planned series with nice hides and always manages to make really interesting walks. Mr Truffles has found over 9000 caches and has about 200 of his own hides; he almost single-handedly keeps Rotherham Geocachers busy. He kindly complemented me on my recent puzzle cache and container and pointed me towards two other infamous puzzles that I've since started work on solving.

I must thank Angellica for organising this event, the travel bug swap box and for scattering lots of horrid creatures around the tables, but I must also make a mental note to myself so that next time I do not do as many or even any caches and to invest the time in meeting and greeting and exchanging stories and tips with fellow Geocachers.

Anyway I had planned two routes to take in most of the local caches but by the time everyone had arrived and we'd met many familiar names (and put faces to them) and then eaten, time was pushing on so we decided to just do one of the circuits.

We set off with Patrick and family and planned to meet up with Yorkypudding & AgeingHippy later.

A few easy caches later we came across one of Mr Truffles epic hides. This was an off-set cache where the coordinates point to a location that has the coordinates to the actual cache. Nine of us spent 40 minutes hunting high and low for these coordinates all to no avail. It was one of those occasions where you've invested so much time it makes you less likely to quit but eventually we had to tear ourselves away and get on with the day.

We completed the part circuit and arrived back at the carpark far too late to meet YorkyPudding and AgeingHippy who I correctly presumed had gone on without us. We left Patrick at this stage and Hannah, myself and her parents decided to quickly do another nearby series of 4 before retiring for the day.

In total we did 5.4 miles and picked up another 11 caches - I ended the day (without realising at the time) on 399 finds.