320 Legs

29/02/2012 By Kabutroid
AHA! Victory is mine at last! After a crushing defeat at a nearby less-than-winter-friendly cache (clearly stated as such, but that’ll teach me to not read the cache descriptions when I’m in a rush), I managed to pull a find out of my hat before work today.

So here I am, a few hundred meters East, dragging myself back into the car, semi-frantic to get a cache find on the elusive February 29th. Well, I’ve just finished getting a DNF on Feb. 29th, so at least I don’t have to worry about needing one of THOSE if someone decides to make a ‘post a DNF on every day of the year’ type puzzle (which in actuality would be a pretty awesome idea... if only I could make it and log my own cache ToungeOut ). Course, if they make it a ‘puzzle’ cache on every day of the year I’ll be out of luck, but I digress.

At least on THIS one, I checked the cache attributes in my palm pilot and it listed it as winter friendly. At least I thought to check that unlike the previous cache which very boldly indicating that it was NOT. Hopping out of the car with a scant 15 minutes before I had to be back in the car again to book it for work, I quickly found a clearing through which I could access the trees. I imagine I was following a path of some sort... likely that of the previous cachers having found this about a week ago, but which was covered in a new layer of fresh snow. In a display of brilliance, I didn’t think to bring my winter boots and switch to them quickly before getting out of the car. Nnnnope, I’ve been tramping around in the snowy trees in my work shoes. And 5 pound ankle weights I’ve been wearing to up my stamina, because y’know... I wasn’t sinking into the snow deep enough for my liking without them ToungeOut .

Following the pseudo-paths zigzagging here and there, I soon worked my way closer to ground zero. Once at ground zero, I began a frantic search while the minutes ticked down. Running my hand over anything vaguely winter accessible, I kept coming up empty. I expanded my search a little bit, looking high and low, but after about 5 minutes just found myself standing in the area relatively dumbfounded, completely clueless as to where a cache could even conceivably be hidden. With the fresh layer of snow over the ground, I didn’t have any reliable tracks to look for that I hadn’t already trampled away with my aforementioned frantic searching. I began to think that the fates were conspiring against me, and all I would be able to get was DNF’s today, and somehow be unable to make the event tonight.

And then I had a sudden glimpse of insight. I had pondered a vaguely potential thought earlier, but had discarded it while keeping my mind on more winter-friendly locations. But a quick tap and a quick swipe of the hand, and the cache was instantly visible and clenched in my gloves (at least I was smart enough to bring THOSE ToungeOut ). Probably would have defined this one as 'winter friendly' though. Moments later, I had the cache opened, and the logbook in hand. I can see where the cache gets its name (as well as the request not to remove the namesake from the container, assumingly for total count purposes... although it kinda severely limits the remaining space inside there). When I was pondering the name, I was picturing a millipede, of which at least a few species can reach that number. But with the logbook signed and a chainmail ball dropped in, I also placed a travelbug in to move it along and closed it up. Replacing it as found, I quickly ran back to the car (shoveling even more snow into my shoes ToungeOut ), and ended up at work with a scant 2 minutes to spare BigSmile .

Thanks for the Feb. 29 cache find! When in doubt, I can always rely on the millions of parks in every residential zone for geocaches Smile .

Took: Nothing (didn't see Clyde's Coin in there at all, unless it's buried)
Left: Logbook entry, Icebox the Penguin Travel Tag travelbug, and chainmail ball