Trying Out Mobile Blogging

I just got my new phone and thought I'd try out mobile blogging. With a little effort, I think Ruth and I figured it out... We'll see in just a few minutes.

I'm still working on a 100 day challenge. It's getting harder and harder to keep up at least 1 cache a day but I have only 16 days to go!

One last thing, our next stop on our itinerary:

It's Itinerary Time!

Philadelphia, PA! 

We will stay 4 nights in Philly visiting Independence Hall, Valley Forge, and then a full day we'll travel out to Gettysburg, spending another night there!

In between now and when we leave, on July 8th, Ellen, our 14 yr old, is with one of her best friends in New Orleans, my wife is taking her Girl Scout troop on their summer camping trip, and then she's going to Chicago for a teacher's association convention... Oh, did I mention, my son had a bunch of boys over for his 12th birthday party and they were up until 3:00 AM!?

So far it's been a busy summer... The best part is just around the corner!

Continuing the Trek

Since my last post, we attended another event. This time it was a WWFM (World-Wide Flash Mob). The coordinator, a local cacher that goes by the name "Goat", planned this event (basically a QUICK picture-taking time) prior to a kayaking event. Although he doesn't know this, he became our "temporary nemesis" during the 100 Year Indy Parks event, where the park service planted 100 caches to commemorate the years. As we searched for these caches, it seemed as though "Goat" was the FTF (First to Find) on most that we found. Anyway, we changed our opinion of him at the event...he's a pretty nice guy!


I'm still keeping my 100-day challenge going, although it has gotten more difficult for a couple of reasons. First, I'm starting to run out of nearby caches that I can get to quickly and secondly, when I go caching I like to do more than one per day, but if I do that I'll run out of area caches even more quickly. This would mean that I would have to start driving longer and longer distances to get just one.


And now...

It's Itinerary Time!

Our next stop is...The Big Apple...

New York, New York

We will plan to visit Ellis Island, the Statue of Liberty, Times Square, Grant's Tomb, and hopefully see a Broadway show! Ellen would really like to visit Rockefeller Plaza and see all the flags (she's a bit obsessed with foreign countries)!

While continuing to plan this trip, I am currently taking a summer class, my wife is teaching a class, and our daughter, Ellen, is doing schoolwork for THREE classes (online PE, reading for Honors English, and reading for AP World History). My wife's oldest daughter, Jennifer, just got married this past Saturday! It was a beautiful event and now Jennifer and Justin are honeymooning in Cabo San Lucas. So as you can see, even prior to our month-long trip, it's going to be and already is a very busy summer!!!

Hid My First Cache!

Sorry it's been so long...with finals, track, and the end of the year stuff, I've been extremely busy. Now that school is over I should be able to do a little bit more blogging. Despite being extremely busy, I was still able to hide my first cache! I didn't want my FIRST cache to be any ol' cache, so I started my Famous Scientists series with Galileo. It's a three-part mystery cache that is hidden on the property of my church. I think it was pretty darn creative. I won't go into any of the details, but you do have to do something that Galileo discovered in order to figure out where the final cache is hidden. Check it out (if you're a Premium Member of geocaching.com) - Famous Scientists Series - Galileo! Hopefully within the next week or two I'll have a few more Famous Scientists caches hidden. I had 3Snipe Hunters help me prepare one of my future ones. What I can tell you is that it contains a laser pointer!


It appears that we are easily going to hit the goal of 500 caches before we leave for our trip on July 9th. We are already at 456, which includes three additional events since my last post. One was the Spring Picnic at Prophetstown State Park (one of the newest parks in Indiana). We had a great time at this event (which included a clean-up time that was a CITO event at the end of the picnic). We also met for a breakfast with area cachers that have completed or are completing the Epic State Park Challenge. This cache is the final step after finding at least one cache in each of the 22 active geocaching state parks in Indiana). Starting to really get to know some fellow cachers and they are all good people!!

It's Itinerary Time!

And now what you've been waiting for...our next stop on our itinerary after Fort Stanwix & Saratoga National Park (both in New York) is...

Boston, MA

We'll be there for 5 or 6 days hiking the Freedom Trail, discovering the Salem Witch Trials, and possibly visiting MIT...the list goes on. 

On our "things to do" list to prepare for the trip, we've done the following so far:

1. Booked all of the hotels (wooh, this was harder than it sounds)
2. Ordered and placed 4 travel bugs with the Meridians & Parallels patches attached
3. Ordered PathTags (check out this site...these are cool!)
4. Purchased another GPSr for Ruth
5. Begun planning out which caches to visit

Until next time...