Giving Thanks

Today I wrapped up my road trip to Nom nirvana (aka my parents’ house), starting with a quick easy micro:
"The Lighter Side Of Retail"

Over

Through

La Moine Pop N Squat

To

Yes, to…

… and wishing you all a wonderful Christmas season!

The Antonym of Scenery

It was a nice, flat 4-mile hike in ideal temperate sunny weather, and f0t0m0m and I found 31 caches with no DNFs. The bike trail is new, and wanders through a quiet, safe neighborhood of industrial buildings and suburban backyards. What’s the downside?

CCC: Steel Sunflower

We did walk right by this relic: a drive-in movie theater still showing movies! (It’s way back there past the RV dealer…)

No matter how much cement there is, nature will always prevail with its verdant offering of fruits and flowers:

Later, we found one of the nicely enhanced light pole hides. The creator of these, IWillFindIt!!, was featured in the “official” geocaching blog recently. Do check out that post for more photos of Julie’s surprise art work!

Monster Mash

… but the piece de resistance of the day was BUNNIES! These guys were happily frolicking in a garden adjacent to a park:

More Big Numbers

This is the month for giving thanks, today for those who have given their all for my freedom. Every time I go geocaching, I am grateful that I have the freedom to go out and play. What a blessing it is to be alive now, at this point in history! There’s so much to look back on and look forward to.

I chose to take a solo hike for my 24,000th find, so I could get out in the scenery and commune with nature, with God, and with my lazy bones. It was a glorious, cool, and breezy day, affording big vistas and striking colors.

I did the first 15 in this series, with quite a few left over for another day:
Just Around the Bend #1

East: abandoned golf course

South: civilization and its water supply

West: the cascades angle down next to the freeway

Brilliant Color

Fun with Mirrors

Cart Path

Driven ’Round the Bend #1

Creepy Wind Whistle

Electric View

Power Trail

Towering Towers

The foliage demonstrates the circle of life, looking down on the fire road I just hiked up:

North: overlooking the next valley of Santa Clarita

Tenacity

Not to be outdone, the next day I celebrated with the VKs as they found cache #25,000! They are certainly legends in their own minds, but can they walk on water?

Fountains are cool LA

Conquering the Aliens!

Our original team +2 returned to The Alien Highway to finish the run, and a van with 6 people turned out to be the ideal setup. We left the side door open for easy jumping in and out, and took turns at all of the positions. Our technique of switching caches and stickering while in between was suggested by the cache owner, and many teams have chosen that method here. About 1/3 were placed at the 1/10th of a mile markers, as in the video, but the rest were 10-70′ from the road in rock piles that did require a bit of searching. Our best hour was 105!
E.T. 1021

Here’s some of the video I shot, condensing 8 hours and over 660 caches into THREE minutes. Enjoy!

music: “Journey in Time” composed by Dean Barrett & Judy Whittaker, Freeplaymusic.com
a couple of the photos were taken by deeznutz®
this is the first movie I’ve created on my Mac laptop with iMovie

For more stories on this run: E.T. 001