Caching Tales

I got off to a swimming start to the caching week after finding myself by and on the river in Cambridge.  A work team building away day concluded with a bit of punting on the river Camb in the glorious July sunshine.  Whilst not like any of my previous punting expeditions - which usually involved being completely drunk, loud music, getting very wet and stuck numerous times as either I or one of my similarly drunk friends tried to show off how brilliant our punting skills were-not - this was a much more civilised affair.  Three punts, managed by three young lads, who knew exactly what they were doing, so much so that there was barely a bump or a scrape and we actually got to see a decent stretch of the river.  Afterwards, I decided to make the most of a rare visit (these days) to the city centre and pick up some unfound caches, starting with Babel Fish, just a short walk away on the banks of the Camb.    I’d like to say it was an...

This week saw the rise and fall of England’s young footballers in their bid to bring home the prestigious World Cup trophy more than 50 years since our last win. It was so exciting I actually abandoned my caching activities for an afternoon and an evening.  The entire nation was gripped as they defeated the rather laid back Sweden, and as we all rushed home from work a few days later, with the sound of ‘Three Lions’ ringing out on every radio station to watch their Semi-final game, high hopes that we might go all the way soon faded as Croatia swept to a 2:1 victory over our boys.  Nevermind...whilst we might have lost out on the World Cup again, it was a winning week in other ways.  We started by grabbing three new Challenge caches, by EcoPuffinParents. As I’ve said before we usually don’t meet the high requirements of Challenge caches, but out of the four new publications, we qualified for three so it was fantastic to head out and grab them along with a ...

The popularity of Harry Potter more than 20 year’s on never ceases to amaze me. On a visit to the big smoke this week, I saw first hand how the craze of the little orphan wizard and his magical world of Hogwarts and such like, still has fans across the world firmly in its grasp.  Whilst waiting for my rather delayed train home at Kings Cross Railway Station I noticed a large crowd gathered in the corner of the concourse, near platform 9 and wandered over to take a better look.  What was once a fairly innocuous sign on a brick wall, saying “Platform 9 3/4”, as a little homage to the magical platform in the books/films, has now become one of London’s most popular tourist spots!  I honestly couldn’t believe my eyes. A long queue of Harry Potter fans from all over the world, were eagerly awaiting their moment in front of the sign where they could be snapped wearing or grasping a variety of Harry Potter styled props! I had to chuckle, I’ve lost count of the many times...

So we finally saw the much anticipated arrival of geocaching HQs new souvenir challenge Hidden creatures. Just a meagre 100 cache finds required in 4 weeks to grab all the mystical creatures and the 13 souvenirs! Normally, not a problem, but with temperatures now verging on 30 degrees, getting out caching, even after work, has been a challenge in itself!  I’ve had to swap space in my rucksack, usually set aside for packets of crisps and chocolate bars, for additional bottles of water. And even then I’ve struggled to do much walking in the sweltering heat. As a result I got off to a slow start in the challenge. It was day three before I managed to drag myself out after work and grab just six caches around the Abingtons and Hildersham. That said they were in some lovely locations, almost hard to believe that just outside Cambridge there are several villages almost untouched by the mass new house building schemes that seems to be going on in so many other places at th...

With 180 finds this month it has proved to be our best month of the year so far! And that was in spite of the searing high 20s temperatures and a little game with a ball that the whole world seems to be going crazy over!  We’ve visited around 30 different places this month in pursuit of caches, grabbing 13 village signs and 10 church micros along the way. From Great Buckingham in Norfolk, to Saxon Street in Suffolk, Needingworth in Cambs, to Saffron Walden in Essex, and Sandon in Herts. Plus we’ve bagged another 3 Sidetracked caches - Brandon,  Newport and Shelford, as  well as three more Fine Pairs and three Little Bridges. We’ve been freaked out by black panther like beasts in Brandon, and jumped at two toads that have taken up residence in caches at Sandon and Kirtling. We were followed by a strange suited and booted man also in Kirtling and got completely lost trying to find a cache in Saffron Walden Town Hall that wasn’t actually there!   ...