Z Terminus

31/03/2012 By Kabutroid
Two for two today! Much like all the caches down the #3, I've passed by this spot at least 18 kajillion times, but either never got a chance to find the caches down here, or they otherwise didn't yet exist since I last looked. With my sister's family living in Carman, and now my mom staying there, trips from Winnipeg to Carman tend to be rather frequent. And so what better way to break up the drive than by going after a cache or two inbetween BigSmile .

My wife and I were on the way back to Winnipeg when I decided to make a few extra geocache stops along the way. For some reason, I had a pseudo-goal in my head of finding at least one more cache in March. Not entirely sure why that was lodged firmly in my head, but I was determined to accomplish it nonetheless. So, with most of the day being spent in Carman where all of the caches there have long since been found by me already, snagging some on the drive would be the plan. I had just finished finding the cache in Sperling to the South, but still had some urge to cache left in me. The light was starting to go however, so I decided it would probably be best to avoid any caches directly in the towns. Thus, I passed over Brunkild, and found this cache just waiting for me. Swinging onto the side of the road, I hopped out and headed towards the coordinates.

At first, I was completely mistaken as to where I thought the cache would be, and proceeded to pass by that area towards ground zero. Although, on that note... the whole layout of the area... I honestly didn't have even the slightest clue that this was the Z-dike. Like... zero. I knew the Z-dike involved St. Agathe, and Brunkild is involved somehow, but it never actually clicked that it ran all the way out to here. Even the name of the cache didn't tip me off... I distinctly recall thinking when I saw the name on my GPS that it somehow had something to do with the power lines themselves ToungeOut . Clearly, I may have been a touch mistaken on that front. But huh... learn something new every day it seems. At least this year said dike wasn't needed for any flooding... bout freakin' time we didn't have to crank open the floodway for spring. And a damn good thing for me at that moment too... the ground was still a little bit sticky, but I can only fathom how messy it would have been if the area were completely soaked through. I'd have probably lost a shoe in the mud ToungeOut . But I digress.

Gotta say... I did not expect these power lines to hum nearly that much. I mean, I've lived in the country as a kid, but we only had tiny, back-country-road style power lines. I can't recall too many times I've had the occasion to walk underneath one of these, that was this low to the ground (I've walked under others, but on far higher towers). The fact that there was very little traffic strangely also made for it being nice and quiet in the area. Made me a bit nervous, to be honest. I mean, I know that the pole is made of wood... but I still didn't want to get too close to it ToungeOut . But I quickly disregarded that pseudo-fear, and continued towards the cache.

Actually locating the cache was quite easy. Then again, it's not like there's a whole ton of places it could have been located. With the cache in hand, I contemplated for a moment that the relatively few cars passing by would probably see me, but given they're going 100+ and likely trying to keep their eyes at least partly on the road, they'd only see me for a few seconds, after which I'm sure I'd be entirely forgotten in a matter of seconds. So a quick signing of the logbook later, a dropping in of a chainmail ball, and I replaced the cache as found. Back to the car! I decided to make this the last cache of the day since the light was waning, and we were tired from being out in Carman all day.

Thanks for giving us something to break up the drive though!

Took: Nothing
Left: Logbook entry and chainmail ball