Team Markwell's GPS Adventures
Non omnes vagi perditi sunt
In chronological order

Back Home

September 2004

Click on Dash Icon to see the Map GD39-CAAS Terra Server Picture Coordinates: N 41.7904° W 088.0196° State: Illinois Date Found: 9/2/2004 12:38 pm Hunters: Kelly Downers Grove, IL - West of Chicago 14.86 miles from home

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is dashpoint.

Dashpoint Name: Denburn Woods After my abysmal dashing last month (only 2 attempts, 1 failure and 1 that I got there second), I decided to hit this one and claim my 3 points as early as possible. Downers Grove, IL, is an OLD town, full of history. But as is the way around here, old towns full of history are being eaten by the urban sprawl of people wanting to live near - but not in - the city. Nowadays, the only way you can tell that you are not in Downers Grove anymore, but another suburb is if you catch the “Welcome To X” signs along the roads. However, this neighborhood, known as Denburn Woods is just along Maple Street, and is easily accessible from the I-355 spur around the western suburbs of Chicago. Houses in this area are huge (as the terra server images will show), and old. The entire subdivision gave me difficulties in getting a good satellite lock, as there are as many mature trees here as in some of the Forest Preserves I've visited. I finally reached the turn-around that signalled that I was well within the 100m zone, stopped briefly at about 16 meters (as the zero point is in a driveway of 5324 Turvey Court) and continued on my way into the office.

Virgil’s Stache #1 by Ron Schmars N 41° 43.812 W 088° 18.247 Difficulty: Terrain: Date Originally Found: 11/26/2003 Date Revisited: 9/4/2004 Visitors: Kelly, Drew

Dru's Nuts

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is cache.

A revisit to an already found cache. We were in the area completing a Bear requirement (see Geodashing log below) and we found this cache from memory (no coords in the GPS). Dropped a bug in and out.

Click on Dash Icon to see the Map GD39-CAAB Terra Server Picture Coordinates: N 41.7248° W 088.2965° State: Illinois Date Tried: 9/4/2004 2:19 pm Hunters: Kelly, Drew Farmland South of Montgomery, IL 6.62 miles from home

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is dashpoint.

Dashpoint Name: Achievement 14, Requirement F Cub Scout Handbook, Bear Year: Achievement 14 “Ride Right”, Requirement F: “Ride 1 mile on your bike without stopping for a rest”. This point was a perfect opportunity to take my oldest boy on his bike and grab mine from the back of the garage and head out together. Just north of the dashpoint is the Virgil Gilman Nature Trail, a converted railroad grade that is now a 15 mile bike path. So, I packed up my older son and our two bikes and we headed out. The point is only a little more than 6.5 miles from home, so it's one of the closer ones I've ever had, and 10 minutes later, we were at the trail head. We rode on the bike path - straight and narrow with very little elevation change, and passed the half-mile mark. As we were approaching the point where I knew we would have to leave the trail, my son said that he wanted to finish the mile - his Cub Scout requirement - before stopping for the dashpoint. We got to the next major interchange at 1.2 miles, and had fulfilled what he had set out to do. Now it was Dad's turn. We turned around and visited a cache we had been to before: GCH5A1: Virgil's Stache #1. I needed to log a travel bug in and out of a local cache - so I hit this one on the way, completely from memory as I didn't have the coordinates. The it was off to the dashpoint. My recon had told me that the point would have been about 260m from the trail to the south, so I would only have to go about 160m to score. According to the terra server images there was a ridge in between two farm fields that would work perfectly for my approach. Unfortunately, when we got to the point where the ridge met the trail, there were clear signs of “No Trespassing, Violators Will be Prosecuted.” So, our closest approach was 260 meters, but it was a GREAT day of biking. 0 points today, but pictures of our adventure uploaded.

Movieng right along by Mrs. Spyderuser N 41° 48.228 W 088° 10.068 Difficulty: Terrain: Date Found: 9/9/2004 Hunters: Kelly

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is cache.

Notice the shoe rating. There aren't too many caches I'd be able to mark as being able to visit barefoot. A clever little hide. I usually don't like micros because they're placed in areas where there's too many places to hide stuff. This is the perfect place for a micro, as there's about 5 places to look. Nice that the cache is in Cantera 30 too, as it's convenient for me to get to from work, and plenty of parking since this is a remote part of the lot. I would assume parking would become difficulty if there were a blockbuster movie showing on a Saturday night.

Kiss Across the Nation by GeorgiaGeoDude3 N 41° 39.113 W 088° 12.258 Difficulty: Terrain: Date Tried: 9/11/2004 Hunters: Kelly

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is cache.

I don't log locationless caches as “find” logs. Locationless caches are sometimes known as reverse caches. Normally, in Geocaching, people say "Here are the coordinates, go find something." But in Locationless caches it's "Here's something to find. Tell me the coordinates when you find it." The Hershey Kissmobile is a Locationless Cache called Kiss Across the Nation. I remember reading about it as a bad example of a Locationless Cache because it's a moving target, never in the same spot for more than one day. I found it at N 41° 39.113 W 088° 12.258 just outside the new Walmart today, but it won't be there tomorrow. I logged a note on the cache page, but that's as far as I'll take it. Here's the pictures...

Click on Dash Icon to see the Map GD39-BYYK Terra Server Picture Coordinates: N 41.1445° W 088.4863° State: Illinois Date Tried: 9/22/2004 8:27 am Hunters: Kelly Northwest of Dwight, IL (Far SW of Chicago) 36.93 miles from home

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is dashpoint.

Dashpoint Name: Almost Harvested Every September, I travel to central Illinois for a business trip - usually about 100 miles away. In 2001, we were in Peoria, 2002 - we were in Springfield, and last year Bloomington. This year it was Peoria's turn again. My dashpoints on these trips have all pretty much been plain boring farm fields (GD03-0267, GD15-BYRO, GD27-BYIT) and this was no different. As was the case last year, the harvest is just starting, so some fields are done, while some are just getting the combines in the rows. This dashpoint was in a partially harvested corn field. I could have walked a straight 250 meters to the east from the road, but with combines in the fields and no one within miles to ask permission, I decided to leave this one as unscored. 0 point for Markwell and Trailblazers

Rt.66 Turn Out by COACHMAN12 N 40° 56.636 W 088° 34.885 Difficulty: Terrain: Date Found: 9/22/2004 Hunters: Kelly

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is cache.

What a neat little piece of Route 66 History. I've always fancied travelling this road instead of the cold I-55 parallel to this charming route. This was a great excuse to find a neat little cache.

Blue Dog Cache by COACHMAN12 N 40° 53.890 W 088° 40.503 Difficulty: Terrain: Date Found: 9/22/2004 Hunters: Kelly

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is cache.

Nice quick find in a little park, even if the cache was blending in COMPLETELY with the surrounding area. The only problem I saw was that there were plenty of opportunities for Cache In/Trash Out, but once I collected the trash, there was no garbage can at the picnic area to deposit the trash. On to the next one!

Steps to Sanctuary by htunk N 40° 31.070 W 088° 59.111 Difficulty: Terrain: Date Tried: 9/22/2004 Hunters: Kelly

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is cache.

Found "Hidden By the Creek" (GC30F0) in this park last year, but for some reason this year, I hit ALL the muggles. I counted no less than 30 people on the path as I was looking around. Since I didn't find it right away, I didn't want to arouse suspicions, so I'll take this one as a "Not Found" for now.

Benchmark On A Country, ex-Lost Bridge? by SYamato N 40° 34.085 W 089° 06.278 Difficulty: Terrain: Date Found: 9/22/2004 Hunters: Kelly

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is cache.

Found it on the fourth corner. Nice easy drive up cache.

Bench Mark On A Bridge At A Cross Roads? by SYamato N 40° 34.883 W 089° 10.396 Difficulty: Terrain: Date Found: 9/22/2004 Hunters: Kelly

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is cache.

This time it was on the fourth corner as well. Nice easy drive up with nice parking.

Bridge to Nowhere by TwoEagles N 40° 33.798 W 089° 44.624 Difficulty: Terrain: Date Found: 9/25/2004 Hunters: Kelly

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is cache.

I tried desparately to get out here early on September 24, but a fatal accident stopped me short. Left at 6:15 on Friday morning and caught the cache sometime around 6:35. Easy find after the other "Benchmarks on a Bridge" that I've found earlier this trip.

Click on Dash Icon to see the Map GD39-BYIP Terra Server Picture Coordinates: N 40.4547° W 089.9351° State: Illinois Date Found: 9/24/2004 7:02 am Hunters: Kelly Rice Lake State Park, Southwest of Peoria, IL 121.00 miles from home

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is dashpoint.

Dashpoint Name: Glorious Sunrise at Rice Lake and Duck Island A one-in-a-million placement: a state park, and if you look at the aerial shots from terraserver, you'll see it as a drive-by, but only on a narrow strip of land. Amazing placement by the llamas! So I left my hotel in Peoria at 6:20 a.m. on Thursday, September 23, but about 10 miles from the dashpoint, the road (Route 24) was completely closed due to a fatal accident. I tried going around, but time was pressing for the meeting, so I abandoned my trek for today - hopeful of a Friday morning dash. A late Thursday night (you know these conventions) made it difficult to rise-and-shine on Friday, but I did - and left the hotel at 6:15, fully dressed in my meeting attire. I grabbed a drive-by cache on the way, and finally approached Rice Lake and Duck Island Road about 7:00. As I turned onto the gravel road that was listed on Streets and Trips, I was worried about some "Authorized Vechicles Only" signs, but it was difficult to tell if they were for the gravel road I was on, or for the little side paths next that turned off at each of the signs. Deciding on the latter, I pressed on. Eventually, I came to a pickup truck that was heading out of a sand and gravel quarry right along Duck Island Road (actually IN the state park). I asked the gentleman about the road and he said that indeed it was in the state park, and that it went up to a turn around just shy of an old corn silo and quansit hut. I pulled up to the turn around, and found myself still 150 meters from the point. What happened to the little strip of road from Terra Server? AH! It was another one of those "Authorized Vechicles Only" signs - so I hoofed it on foot. I'll steal a line from one of my fellow cachers: This strip of land divided the two lakes like some obscene giant's thong bikini. But it was still there, so I continued on the loose gravel path. Since I was skirting the edge of the dashpoint's magic circle, it wasn't a quick 50 meter walk to score this waterbound point, but I did finally land the point at 78 meters. I hastily retreated to my car after taking some glorious pictures of the sun breaking through the clouds during sunrise (already posted). The fish were jumping in the lake (I tried unsuccessfully to take pictures of those) as I drove away satisfied in this wonderful find. 3 Hard-Earned and memorable points for Markwell and Trailblazers

Click on Dash Icon to see the Map GD39-BYNI Terra Server Picture Coordinates: N 40.8990° W 089.6268° State: Illinois Date Found: 9/24/2004 1:14 pm Hunters: Kelly North of Peoria, Illinois in Farm Country 88.93 miles from home

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is dashpoint.

Dashpoint Name: Just a Short Walk® As memorable as the last dashpoint was, this one was little more than regular old farmland. The only difference was that the dashpoint was 217 meters south of the road. I got to the area and saw the irrigation ditch that would give me the perfect opportunity to reach the point, and it was nestled between two freshly harvested grain fields. Nothing to see but flat land all around. I didn't want to venture out without first seeking permission. The land holding the dashpoint wasn't posted, but it's always safer to ask. However, I was faced with a predicament. The logical farm house to the north of the dashpoint (and slightly east) had prominent signs posted at the end of the driveway - No Trespassing. I really couldn't go up to ask permission. And since the land opposite the farm house was NOT posted, I took that as a tacit approval and walked the quick 118 meters into scoring range. From there it was home, but a nice set of three dashpoints for the trip. 3 points for Markwell and Trailblazers

2004 Chicago Geocachers Picnic by Fallenfaery N 41° 36.613 W 087° 43.619 Difficulty: Terrain: Date Found: 9/25/2004 Hunters: Kelly, Sam, Wags

BUBBLES Travel Bug

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is cache.

Ever since the first Geocaching get-together in the summer of 2001, I've been the focus of planning the annual event. This year, my summer got too busy and there was no way for me to host this year's event. Enter Fallenfaery (Amy) and Sox Fan (Ed). They came together and hosted a fabulous event. Unfortunately, I had homecoming obligations at Plainfield until about 1:00, which meant that by the time I got home and changed, and loaded Wags and Sam, I wasn't out there until about 2:15. I still had a blast, and helped Sammy find the 3 temporary "kid caches" set up for the event. Wags got to meet Dairy, and all had a great time.

Back to August 2004
On to October 2004

Last Updated:
October 3 2004 15:30 CDT