Cache Report: Return to the Wetlands

Saturday dawned sunny and clear, with temps forecast into the 60s. The only problem? 20 MPH winds.... Regardless, Mo and I decided that our Saturday caching date was still a go. The wind was supposed to die down in the afternoon (it didn't), plus there was some tree cover in our planned route.

I had picked a return voyage to the Slavin conservation area. We had only picked up a fraction of the caches the first time we went. The area is also just remote enough to have quite a few larger ammo cans, a welcome change from micros and smalls.

Trip Report

I prepared for the day by putting all the remaining caches in the park on a list. Mainly traditionals with a couple of multis. Remembering the tick issue from the previous visit, I also packed the Deet!

Cache #0: We didn't actually search for this cache on this visit. It's a two part multi-cache, but the first waypoint was near the parking area. Since we weren't sure if the first part would hold the coordinates or a puzzle to figure them out, we figured we'd pick up the first part today and save the rest of the multi for a future visit. A quick bison tube in a tree find.

Cache #1: I had looked over the trail maps before heading out and had planned a rough loop. This was our first stop, a decent sized cache off the main trail and near the park boundary. I was a bit worried at first that it would actually take us onto private land, but it was just shy. The find was easy, since the brightly colored container stood out against the dead prairie grass. I was rewarded with a cache full of swag -- including a sig item to trade for. Love adding sig items to my collection!

Cache #2: The next stop was placed by a cub scout pack near the main lake in the park. Scout caches make me nervous, since they seem to be in disrepair more often than not unless they are new. There were no recent logs indicating a problem though, so we made our way through the boggy trails to the cache. It was high and dry. The container itself was a tape-wrapped water bottle, but it had a second container inside holding a dry log and some swag. Mo made a swap here, I believe.

Cache #3: We had to rethink our plan. The other multi we were planning was inaccessible, since the spring wetlands had the trails leading to it completely underwater. We reworked our route to take us to an ammo can cache hid by one of our (thus far) favorite COs. This cacher always has well maintained caches -- big ones in the woods and clever ones in the city. We weren't disappointed! After a brief hike along a high and dry trail, we made the find. I was able to swap for a beautiful polished shell.

Cache #4: This took as further into the woods, which wasn't bad since this meant we didn't really have to deal with the wind. We did have to deal with quite a few detours thanks to the vernal ponds that spring up this time of year. The trail took us to the backside of the lake. We walked around GZ for a bit, but the geobounce made the coordinates useless. I reread the hint and turned around to tell Mo, when my eyes just happened to pick out a bit of plastic under a rock. Yep, the cache!

Cache #5: Due to high water, our path across the lake was blocked. This area used to be a ranch, and this end of the lake is split into several smaller ponds by man-made earth berms. Normally, the trail leads across one of these berms, but high water made it impassable. We followed a game trail to the next berm, though, and were able to pick our way across and back to the main trail. We paused for our picnic dinner before surveying the caches on this side of the lake. Since it was getting late and we kept being thwarted by high water, we made this last find in a bolder field and called it a day. I was able to swap for one more sig item, bringing my total to three more sig items for my collection from this trip!

Wrap Up

 When we got back to the car, we did a thorough tick check. Yep, I had three hitchhikers again. This time they were hiding out under the collar of my jacket. Mo was clean. I'm not sure if the Deet helped, but I'm going to assume so since the only ticks found were on the one area I didn't really spray. Glad to have found them this time before we were back in town and at the pub for a post-expedition beer!

We will be back to Slavin. There are six more traditionals, two multis, and a night cache to be found. We probably won't go back until late summer or fall, though, when the wetlands will be much drier.

Now it's time to begin next week's expedition plan. With sunny weather and temps in the 70s predicted, I'm thinking it's time to head a bit further afield for adventure!