# 187

I found my 187th hide today, GC1M3RY, Spike's House, with a Difficulty of One Star and Terrain of Two and Half Stars. I have always really liked the easy difficulty but hard terrain. For this one, I climbed a steep embankment, then climbed a tree.


You would probably have laughed at me as I took this picture. Getting my phone out of my sleeve pocket, then figuring out how to hold it -- the camera button is on the right, the strap is on the left. I needed the strap to avoid dropping it into the ice below me, and I needed to hold on to the tree trunk with one hand. A dilemma -- which hand should I use to take the photo? I used my left.

Also, the view of the neighbor's yard behind this tree makes me think that I know who lives there. Hopefully if they notice us geocachers, they don't think we're peeping toms. I might say something next time I see them.

The really interesting thing about this cache was that although it was in the middle of suburbia, signs of wildlife were everywhere. For example, this photo shows an owl pellet and a piece of rabbit scat. I don't know where the rest of the rabbit pile was -- probably uphill. It's steep here. You can also see the really white hot image of the original log book. Since it was rolled up just so, I knew it could not be a cigarette butt. I also knew from the logs at the geocaching site that the log book was missing. Snow and paper look alike. The snow all melted this weekend, so I was able to spot it and put it back where it ought to be. It is much larger than the substitute log placed earlier. This move helps future finders as well as the cache placer with respect to cache maintenance.

Lesson for this cache: be prepared with extra paper. You never know when you'll need it. The log book could be full or you might drop it in the snow. We've found other caches, and sometimes you need to prepare your geocaching bag with extra containers, too. Actually, bring extra everything with you, if you can.