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

Back Home

September 2005

Tennis anyone? by beagleboy N 41° 50.506 W 088° 05.191 Difficulty: Terrain: Date Found: 9/2/2005 11:41:00 AM Hunters: Kelly

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is cache.

In my opinion, here are characteristics that make a cache a GOOD experience: A decent hike (>=0.25 miles) in a sparsely populated area Nifty little-known history Great scenery Unusual hide (suspended in a tree, on an island that you have to canoe to) Thought-provoking puzzle Cool camo or really neat container Long history of being at that spot (old cache that's been around for a long while) Good theme (and people are sticking to it) Any one of these characteristics on a cache, and I'll think it's pretty cool. Combine a few, and it scores more points. But if it doesn't have a single one of those characteristics, I'll be asking myself why I was brought here. If I have to ask myself that, I would think the cache was disappointing.

Click on Dash Icon to see the Map GD51-CAAC Terra Server Picture Coordinates: N 41.5387° W 088.4476° State: Illinois Date Found: 9/2/2005 7:14 pm Hunters: Kelly, Sam Temperature: 66°F/19°C Just west of Newark and 47, Far West of Joliet, Illinois 13.38 miles from home

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is dashpoint.

Dashpoint Name: So many stories The point itself is in the middle of the road with a sod farm to the south, and a corn field to the north. The road is Newark Road, just west of Route 47, and about a 2 miles south of Caton Farm Road. Caton Farm Road - so named for the Caton family, whose farm supplied most of the eggs in the area for many years. The sod farm to the south of Newark Road: Central Sod. Plainfield, Illinois is known for its rich sod fields, where agrarians slice thin layers of topsoil from some of the most fertile land in the country, to be laid in 2 foot wide strips 6 feet long on the yards of the thousands of newly built homes in the urban sprawl. My son Sammy was on the trip, and was fascinated by the sprinklers that were basically pipes on wheels, slowly rolling across the young grass moistening it very methodically. These watering devices are about one hundred of meters across with wheels to slowly move them laterally down the farm field, watering acres upon acres as they go. Neat stuff. Thirteen miles from my doorstop. I'm still amazed at how close I live to the boundaries of urban vs. rural life. Thirteen miles to the northeast is a little farther in past where I work. It's Lisle and Downers Grove - homes of physicians and some of the larger upscale outdoor malls in the area (Yorktown). Thirteen miles to the north is Fermilab National Accelerator, where atoms are smashed together to study quarks and their movements. Yet, thirteen miles in the direction of this dashpoint (southwest) of my doorstop, and I came across a farmer's lot that had a strange assortment of pickup trucks entering from the road. It turns out that on the Friday of Labor Day weekend, the small engine repair shop on the corner of Caton Farm Road and Route 47 has its annual S&A Truck Pull. I really still live on the edge of a rural area. But it all boils down to 3 points for a 20 minute drive from my doorstop. 3 points for Markwell and Trailblazers

Click on Dash Icon to see the Map GD51-CADO Terra Server Picture Coordinates: N 42.0040° W 088.0288° State: Illinois Date Found: 9/4/2005 1:35 pm Hunters: Kelly, Drew, Sam, Sherry Temperature: 82°F/28°C Elk Grove Village, Just West of O'Hare Airport, near Chicago, IL 27.00 miles from home

Green Dot is home. Blue Dot is dashpoint.

Dashpoint Name: Inauguration of Cronus Well, kiss one more dashmobile goodbye. My 2001 Oldsmobile Intrigue went for its last dashhunt on GD51-CAAC. Just this past week, the fan on the AC wouldn't work on any setting but HIGH, so it was either OFF or LOUD. The gearshift depression button popped off this week as well, so the gearshift was held together by black duct tape. The car served us well, and was a family car that rode hard on day-to-day driving as well as many trips to and from Tennessee. We had been looking to size up on a vehicle as the boys get bigger (and the dog got bigger) so, Saturday, we bought a new car - a minivan. It's our second minivan, but we bought the last one back in 1994, and it lasted just over 100K. This one we hope to drive into the ground. Our Silver Pearl Saturn Relay has been dubbed "Cronus" (by me -ever the lover of obtuse intellectual references), but it's the Mrs. that gets to drive Cronus around, and I get her (yet-to-be-named) Olds Cutlass ("Captain?") But, Cronus needed a test run on the interstate, so I conned the missus and the two boys into a trip up the interstate tollway system of Illinois: I-355 north (after $1 in tolls - $2 if you don't have the automatic deducter called "IPass"). We were northbound to the southern edge of Busse Woods, the gem of the Cook County Forest Preserve District. The point itself was in a fenced meadow of tall prairie grass, but the magic circle graciously extended itself to the traffic on Beisterfield road to the south. We easily scored from the car. With the on-board DVD entertainment system and my boys watching the newest Lilo and Stitch movie, my wife who had been driving aquiesced to let me take Cronus home, and proceeded to lean to the side and lightly doze for the return trip. With Cronus now broken in, we can safely claim these three points for Markwell and Trailblazers