All Home

Hello my friends, well this has been an interesting trip to say the least.
We returned our cars to the rental shop, caught the shuttle to the airport about 0800 hours for our 11:11 flight on ALLEGIANT AIR, and it was just after 1700 hours before we got on the plane. We were told by a customer service agent that this is very common and that it is to do with pilots having to rest between trips and they are short staffed. We did save a few dollars with this trip but never again will I fly this airline.

It was a long, hard and rewarding trip. The days were long, sometimes up by 3am, off to breakfast and then drive for as long as 4.5 hours or an hour or so to get to GZ for the day. After  6 or 7 hours we would stop for a quick lunch on the side of the trail/road then carry on. Three of the nights we had events, so getting back to the hotels were sometimes later than we wanted. Hiking in the desert is certainly different that hiking in the hills on Vancouver Island.
Met a lot of interesting cachers along the route from all over the place, cachers travel far and wide to end up in Vegas to do the ET HWY. We stayed one night in Racheal so that those that were not with us last year could experience the ET  hype down there.
Our events were well attended and the spots I had picked turned out to be great with some awsome food and great service. A couple from Ontario that attended last years CIA event, were back this year. We brought a few prizes along and it seemed like this is not the norm in this part of the states.

In total we managed to find 3242 caches in 8 days and our biggest day was 1044 caches.
Would I do this again, I certainly would but a few changes would certainly be in order. These type of trips take a lot of planning and lack of sleep is the norm.
It is a good time of year to go to this area, hot and sunny but still a little chilly in the mornings and no snakes or small critters or none that we saw. We did encounter a bit of flash flooding, it can be kind of scary and dangerous at the same time.
I think the most interesting place had to be Belmont near the end of the ET HWY. This is a Ghost town with a very old cemetery from the early 1800. There are about 10 people that live here and the bar is out of this world. We were so lucky as it was open and we got to meet the owners.
I took a week off  to get some much needed sleep and spend time with Princess! I got out last weekend with the Sunday Caching Group and did two new caches in Nanaimo this week and looking forward to getting out this weekend on the off road motorcycles with Cougar Kid on the logging roads if the rains hold off. Then on Sunday, out with the Sunday Caching Group in Port Alberni.  On the trails again.

My next big adventure is a trip this August to New Brunswick to celebrate my OAP year with my parents and do some caching in my home town area. My sister, Indynb, has placed over 80 caches in the area.

I will be holding an event in late August in Ladysmith called "Paulboy's OAP Event". It will be my 65th birthday and hopefully it will attract a lot of cachers, a mega would be nice, LOL. Look for the listing sometime in late May.

I would like to thank the team, 8-IC, JuRuu, crkayaker, Cougar Kid, Sheesh695, Losthiker123 & Bornwild62, for being part of the team. Classictwo had to bow out at the last moment and her husband was serious ill and she was missed big time by all of us. I am happy to say, Doug is now home and doing great. and will be on the trails soon.

Hope to see you all on the trails, happy caching and be careful. Cachers are some of the greatest people in the world!

Paulboy