Back in June, I posted about this geocaching hobby I had picked up. Since then, I've been continuing the sport on and off. I slowed down during the summer months, but with the beautiful fall weather, I've been out in full force after work and on weekend mornings hunting down these caches. This past Saturday was a major milestone for me, as I managed to make my 100th find.
Some of the highlights from these past few months, in no particular order:
- A.P.E. Night Cache - APE cache in Washington @ 2am.
- Groundspeak HQ Visit - Giant Google Earth TV, Treasure chest, lackey geocoin.
- Stehekin - River Trail - Most remote cache.
- Bavarian Village - First Webcam with TheDragonFruitS support.
- ToGPSr - Thanks to MrMonk and Kungfucius for the discount and courier service. Makes life so much easier.
- German Mills - My first attempt at caching was this set of caches in a park close to home - took me 4 months to clear the caches in there.
- 5km - Cleared all caches within 5km of home.
- Bouncy Bunny Calls - Telephone in forest!
- Puzzles, Puzzles, Puzzles - Solved many individually, and Team MM, BO, TH (+ kung) solved a bunch together.
- DHARMA caches - Provided satellite coverage to field agent MrMonk
- 7-7-7 Pub Night + Determination - How much do you want it?
Of course, the best part of geocaching is still all the cool places around town that I would not have visited otherwise - got to learn about its history, its architecture, its people and most importantly, its parks.
I had reached 99 cache finds the previous weekend. Given the bad weather last week and with the sun setting at 5pm, I decided to save my 100th find for this weekend and mark it with a special cache. Coincidentally, Saturday was a big geocaching day in Ontario, with two high-profile events planned close together - World Wide Flash Mob and BFL II:Boot Camp. I decided to attempt my 100th find early in the morning, then travel an hour west of Toronto to attend these two events for the rest of the day. Made preparations the previous night and packed lunch, water, hiking gear, TochiCam and tripod.
My 100th cache is a special milestone, so I wanted a challenge. I settled on Birds Eye View. The cache is about 20-25 ft up in a tree. One has to scale the tree to sign the log.
I got up at 6 am, ate breakfast and headed out at 7am. This particular tree lies in the middle of a forested area with really nice mountain biking trails. I've been on these trails before, so I know the general layout. Riding a bike with all the gear on the hilly terrain would be difficult, so I decided to hike the 700m to ground zero.
I was a little worried about this cache, since tree climbing isn't my thing. I cannot even remember the last time I climbed a tree. The tree didn't look too tough, the hardest part being that the first branch is about 8 to 10 ft off the ground. Someone had previous set up a little teepee of tree trunks, so you would be able to jump and cling onto the first branch. From then, it's a big heave to get yourself onto that branch. The rest of the climb is pretty straight forward, with sturdy branches every 2-3 feet or so until the cache. Got up, signed the log, and came back down slowly and carefully. The jump down from the first branch is quite unnerving for the unskilled like me. Check this out if you want to know what could have happened: Swifteroo's log.
That was it. Mission accomplished. The sun just peaked above the tree line in the hills. The sight was very pretty. Took a few celebratory photos with Signal. Headed back to TochiMobile. Kudos to KL for waking up early to make sure I didn't break my foot, ankle, back, face, etc.
With 100 caches under my belt, I started heading out west. Stopped in Maple for a couple simple finds. Got into Georgetown at 11:45am for the first event.
Worldwide Flash Mob is a 15 minute event planned for 12:00pm EST. The gist of the activity is everyone gathers at noon, socialize for 15 minutes, then disperses. A true "flash mob". The interesting thing is that the same event is being held at about 80 other locations around the world concurrently. MrMonk attended the one under the Space Needle. About 100 people gathered at this location to sign the log, eat girl scout cookies and take a group photo. The highlight of the event was that I picked up my very own GC10000 Version B Geocoin from res2100. I just love the front design of the coin.
Afterwards, met up with Homer to attempt The Light at the End of the Tunnel. Along the way, we found this letterbox cache, inside was a card giving the coordinates to Bouncy Bunny's Secret Stash. For those of you who don't know, Bouncy Bunny is a series of caches in Ontario, all revolving around a rabbit and her adventures. These are all pretty tough puzzle caches, and have become quite famous in the area.
It's funny if you read the cache description:
This is another unique Bouncy Bunny cache.
Cache is not at the posted coordinates but within 4km.
There is no reason to even go to the posted coordinates as there is nothing there.
It's up to you to figure out what you need in order to find and log this cache.
You'll know where the cache is when you have the coordinates in hand.
All instructions must be followed.
Luck and timing are the key.
Now stop sitting in front of the computer and go out and find some caches.HINT: Did I ever say you had to solve a puzzle to find this cache?
To actually get the coordinates, you had to find these cards in other caches in the area, take the card, sign it, and drop it off at the final coordinates provided. I could have totally imagined myself scratching my head at the puzzle, without realizing it's unsolvable.
Back to the Light at the End of the Tunnel, it's actually a mini cave in the rock outcrop just off the Bruce Trail. How res2100 found this cave I'll never know. The entrance of the cave is down a 1m depression into the rocks. There are two rocks sticking out near the waist. I could barely squeeze through, given my small Asian build. My partner was a bigger man, and somehow managed to squeeze in too. On the way out, he couldn't get past the waist-high rocks. Ended up crawling out on his belly. His log entry reads: "AS for my exit, I had visions of Winnie the Pooh eating too much honey and getting stuck in Rabbit's entrance. Eventually tried a less glamorous exit and made it out."
Merged up with the Central Ontario Geocachers (COG) mob there, as Homer and I got to BB's Secret Stash final location. A small peanut butter jar in a tree stump. Headed off to do a multi-cache (a multi-location cache, where one location gives u clues to the next location or the final). This particular one, we had to look for metal tags in cedar trees. Everyone was looking for silver metal tags tacked onto tree trunks until I spotted some black wire with a small tag hanging right in front of me. My first COG find. All in all, we had to find three tags and I found two of them. :)
Our mob continued on to do many caches in the area before the second event of the day at 7pm - BFL Boot Camp II: Extra Classes. Since there were twelve of us + 2 dogs in the mob, we decided that whoever finds the cache is required to log all our names. At one location, I found the 35mm film canister and was forced to learn all the secret aliases of everyone in the mob. >_<
At 7pm, our mob convoy descended upon the restaurant of the BFL Boot Camp II. The first "BFL" event from last year was called "Back to Night Caching". Everyone referred to that event as BFL for the "big flashlights" required, so this year, they officially renamed the event to BFL II. In short, this event is a dinner / pub gathering, followed by a series of specially designed night time caches.
Dinner was really great. People were showing off their big flashlights, some of which were pretty impressive. I never knew people actually mod their flashlights to improve their power. Hardcore.
After the dinner, the night caches packages were handed out. There were ten caches in total, with all the teams starting off at a different cache. You were required to find 5 of the 9 initial caches to determine the location of the final cache.
Soon afterwards, the COG mob loaded into two mini-vans and made our way to the first location. I was part of the second minivan. We did not get the GPS coordinates of our first cache, so we radio'd the lead car. "Hey guys, give us the coordinates of the first cache!" The reply came back as: "Is this a secure channel?" ARGH. They were worried people might "spy" on us. After that, we tried to scan the other channels to see if we could catch any other group's conversations... so wrong... so wrong.
This was the first time I've done a true night cache. Night cache typically involves reflector plates or fire tacks, which are barely visible during the day. However, these reflectors really stand out at night when you shine light on them (think bicycle light).
Our first night cache was titled Nevermore. We got to our given coordinates and followed a trail of tacks until we came upon a tree with a mirror hanging inside. We used the mirror to look up into the trunk and found the numbers we needed. Moved onto the second location and spotted a stationary "Nevermore" raven at the top of the tree. At first, we thought we needed to climb up to the raven. However, shining our BFL at the raven, we saw that we could make out the coordinates etched onto it. With the required data in hand, we made our way to the final location, which was an ammunition canister hidden under some roots. My first ever FIRST TO FIND to a cache - even though it was a group find. :)
As we headed back to parking, we ran into another group of cachers. We saw their headlamps first and noticed that they were moving rather quickly. We thought they were on bikes. As they got closer, we saw that they were in a light jog/speed walking. I knew immediately which group this was.... Tequila. The hardcore group who wanted the FTF on the final. Tequila had his fireman Search and Rescue suit on too, so he was like a light beacon as the light from our headlamps reflected off him.
Moving along to our next cache, which we determined was 3km away. We spent probably 30-40 minutes searching for reflectors at the location, but couldn't find any. Decided to call mission control to get confirmation on our coordinates. We found out we had done the math wrong for our coordinates, and was searching in the wrong neck of the woods! After the correction, we finally moved onto the second cache.
This second cache is called Teamwork. Two birdhouses were set up in trees about 20m apart. Each birdhouse had a fishing line attached to the base. As you pulled down on it, the birdhouse would open up. The other team shining their lights to the birdhouse would be able to make out a certain colour code from inside the birdhouse. This is the "teamwork" aspect. What a cool concept.
Now, Murphy's law was in full force for this cache. I was responsible for pulling on the fishing wire at one of the birdhouses. I was pulling very gently on the line and the birdhouse slowly opened up. "A little more! A little more!" So I continued pulling, then all of a sudden, SNAP!!!! The fishing line broke!!! Poor Telly had to climb the tree to retrieve the fishing line and fix the cache.
After we determined the colour codes, we used them to calculate the location of the final. We were led to this rocky section of the forest. We searched for 10 minutes and couldn't come up with the cache. We revisited our math and came up with an alternate set of coordinates. It was 200m away and we decided to check there too. We came to this slightly swampy area and immediately knew the cache wasn't hidden here. As we went back to the first site, we ran into another group of cachers who were just going to the birdhouses! We hurried back to the rocks. After another 5 minutes of searching, I dug my hand into a pile of leaves and felt something flat and solid. Lo and behold, as I removed the leaves, there was the ammo can! The freaking cache was hidden under a foot of leaves. Tequila's group was the previous finders... damn them for hiding it so well. Our entire group was quite relieved with the find. We immediately extinguished our headlamps, to prevent the next group of cachers from spotting us. We used only a red light, so I could sign the log. :)
Our third cache was Interstellar Navigation. The organizers set up tiny reflectors in various constellations patterns. From the cache description, you had to find a certain set of constellations in order, to get to the final location. The first constellation was Lepus, in honour of Bouncy Bunny. These reflectors were so cool - little white stars formations twinkling in the trees. After following the star path, we arrived at the ground zero site. The description said the cache was sucked into a "black hole". We had quite a bit of trouble finding the actual cache. HF Reign was actually using the Phone a Friend option when Team Woods made the find.
We easily found the fourth cache in our BFL series, which was at a tree decorated with red reflectors. Aside from being only mere meters away from base camp, it stood out like a Christmas tree. The cache was called "Lamer than the Last One", just because it was so obvious and lame!
The fifth cache was found early on by the other half of my group, while the rest of us were searching for the constellations. With secret codes from all 5 caches, we were able to decode the location of the BFL II Final cache. By now, it was 2 AM. Good thing the final cache was straightforward. The large ammo box was secured at the top of a tree by this elaborate pulley system. You had to find the other end of the rope and release it to lower the cache. At 2:12AM, we were the 6th group to log the final cache. Wow. Finally. Done.
We made a stop at Tim Horton's at 3AM for some late night drinks and food. I drove back home at 4AM. All in all, 35 caches in the past 24 hours. Love the outdoors. Love the caching. Love the people. An awesome night.
A couple weeks ago, we had a night of really dense fog in Toronto. I was persuaded to attempt a STF at 10:30pm, so I headed out into the field. After seeing the fog, I couldn't resist setting up my camera and tripod (part of the standard gear in the field nowadays) to snap a few photos (ended up being a lot).
A short while later, I noticed a challenge on the Nikon Cafe forums titled "Slow Shutter Speed". Since all my pictures were taken in the dark, I had to use slow shutter speeds to get the proper exposure anyway. For the heck of it, I decided to submit my favourite photo - entitled Illuminati.
There weren't too many submissions to the challenge, but a few of them were really great photos. As the votes starting rolling in, lo and behold, my photo was getting votes. I would have been happy with just one vote. The results were released today, and Illuminati came in third!!! :):):)
Last week, I had the rare honour of being invited to a dinner celebration for a colleague who serviced our company for 25 years. I've worked closely with this colleague, and he is like a mentor to me. The company has already showered him with various corporate awards and a very nice bonus. This dinner was just icing on the cake - an opportunity for him to thank his closest friends from these past years.
Venue was Diamond Banquet Hall at First Markham Place. A very popular place for weddings, though I haven't been there myself. The food was a traditional 10-12 course Chinese banquet - cold platters, mix of seafood, steamed fish, chicken, rice, noodles, and dessert. Food was quite delicious overall, though I was expecting something a little bit better.
It was a little awkward being the youngest in the group, especially since I have not even lived for a quarter century. The rest of the table was mainly comprised of folks with gray hair already (or hair at all). Hearing them talk about stories of their past experiences is quite interesting. Obviously, many of them have lived through quite a transition in the company and industry. Things were totally different back when they started. Also interesting is the insight they bring forth in current affairs. I was impressed by how well informed everyone was about the affairs that plague the world today. For example, some of them have lived with the dollar being so high back in the early 70's. They had some strong opinions about whether the strong dollar is a good thing or not.
The thing that really hit home was the praise that everyone had for this colleague. So dependable, so responsible, so visionary. He would also be the one who comes to save the day. I want to emphasize, ALL of the praise was totally well-deserved. I would even venture to say that the praise were an understatement to how important this colleague's work and contributions were to the company. Of course, we were careful to also congratulate his wife, since behind every man is a great woman. :-)
Which got me thinking.... if 25 years down the road, I was to have such a celebration with colleagues I've worked with in the past, would I be able to get such recognition and praise?
To finish off, the colleague sent out the group photos from the dinner with the following statement. "It's a very memorable night to share good food and good memory with colleagues. Attached are the photos and one day we can show them to our grand children the wonderful colleagues we worked with." I'm definitely looking forward to that day! XD
Just a fun little post to spice things up. Tonight, after I got home, I checked my answering machine and found the following message waiting for me.
When I started playing it, I was wondering why a baby was leaving me a message. Obviously, this person called the wrong number. As I heard more of the message, I thought I can recognized parts of the recording. The beginning something like 爸! 爸! 爸! 我係你啊哥! (Obviously, this makes no sense) I cannot decipher what language this message is in. Any ideas on who I need to call back?
One of the most harrowing experiences in my life unfolded this morning. One of my coworkers was presenting at a conference. Two-thirds of the way through the presentation, he fielded some questions.
As he resumed the talk, all of a sudden, he hunched over the podium, his speech and movement became really really slow. It felt like when your computer lags so much that it takes seconds to respond to individual keystrokes or mouse cursor movements, only this was happening to a person, which was totally unsettling. After another few seconds, I knew something was seriously wrong. I was worried he might collapse, so I rushed up to the stage with another colleague. The room was eerily silent. We tried to get my coworker to sit down and take a break. He was in a slow zombie-like state; he kept on iterating that he was okay and could finish the presentation. His arms and hands were like ice, but he was sweating profusely. I asked the conference organizer that we needed to get a medic or EMS here. It's not pleasant at all to say that when you really mean it. The organizer broke the session and got some water for my coworker. We pulled a chair onto the stage for him to rest. After a little while, he started recovering. His speech was more coherent, but you can tell he was very shaken up. He couldn't remember anything from the last couple minutes on the stage. It was relieving to see that he was feeling better.
After that episode, the show must go on. I ended up giving the rest of the presentation. Got a few minutes to skim through the remaining slides beforehand. Definitely the biggest impromptu presentation to a large audience of my life. Given the circumstances, I surprisingly did not feel nervous. I covered everything that needed to be covered. Took a few questions from the audience to cap it off.
Fortunately, everything turned out okay. I am still a bit unnerved by the whole ordeal. At least it's over and we'll be laughing about it soon enough.