aka
The Route 66 Cache Run Reportage
825 caches in 13 hours
along the historic and largely abandoned Route 66
between Barstow and Needles
Feb. 13. 2011
5:15 My iPhone alarm wakes me, and I blearily get dressed and head to the hotel lobby.
5:30 The rest of the gang arrives: f0t0m0m, Foomanjoo, & 1/2 of the VKs. I grab a cheese omelet & some sausage, fill my coffee mug, and load my day’s supplies in to the Xterra, and we’re off to the first cache.
6:15 We find the first cache – 001-Route 66
7:15 @ 080-Route 66 = 81 finds for the hour since we interpolated this extra cache: Excuse
7:29 We have found 100 caches.
8:04 @ 153-Route 66, Steve of the Ventura Kids celebrates his 26,000th find
8:15 Our find count for hour 2 is 83.
8:58 We have found 200 caches for the day so far.
9:00 We encounter a… well… curious individual walking a decorated and heavily-laden bicycle and 5 very active dogs. It was a challenge to avoid the dogs with the car, but Steve managed. He’s the only other person we encounter, other than maybe a dozen cars and trucks passing us until we get past Amboy.
9:15 Our find count for hour 3 is 69.
10:15 Our find count for hour 4 is 71.
10:26 At 316-Route 66 we celebrate another milestone as f0t0m0m bags his 28,000th find.
11:15 We only nabbed 67 caches in hour 5.
11:39 @ 400-Route 66, we are halfway through the series, and pretty much on track for finishing just after dark
12:15 Our system is now streamlined, and we maintain the same positions for the entire run: Steve drives, I’m in charge of stickering logs, Jim and Josh jump in and out to grab the caches. Our find count for hour 6 is 70.
12:30 we break for lunch and photos and gas in Amboy
1:15 Our find count for hour 7 is 45.
2:15 Back in full swing for hour 8, we find 67.
2:30 We find a very old cache up a hill near the road: lRoute 66 Pit Stop #1 It was placed in June of 2002, a year before I started caching!
3:00 Time for another celebration for yet another milestone, as I find my 25,000th cache!
Where is it?
Here it is!
587-Route 66
3:15 hour 9 = 65 finds
4:15 hour 10 = 54 finds, and yes, we are all pretty weary, but in a great rhythm. The scenery keeps us inspired:
5:15 hour 11 = 71 finds, and this is when we start losing our daylight
6:15 hour 12 = 63 finds, and Steve actually seems to have run out of specious and silly stories to ramble on about. You know it’s a long day when that happens.
6:22 Success! We find the 800th cache in the series!! The next hour and a half are spent on the way to the freeway and back to Barstow picking up another 9 caches to get a FOURTH milestone in, this one for Josh – #10,000!
Prize!
This type of adventure is exhausting and crazy and silly and exciting and boring and inspiring and relaxing… and most of all… a ton of fun! What a team and what a day!
Well done Elin, looks like a fun day. I will be heading to the US in April and hope to spend a day on Route 66 grabbing as many caches as I can on the day.
Wow! Looks like you guys had a blast! Thanks for sharing