I've been looking at this place for 13 years. I was amazed by it even before I ever heard of geocaching. Recently I got the idea to create an earthcache at this location. I finally did it! We took our daughter to visit one of her favorite places. We went to the Indian Market in Otavalo. While there she got to barter for the things she bought. She loves doing this and is very good at it. We also ate at her favorite place, The Pie Shop. This is a shop that has every flavor of pie you can think of. For $1 you can have a huge slice. Add 50 cents to get a scoop of ice cream. It is good. On our way back from a visit to the Indian market in Otavalo we pulled off on an overlook viewing a dry gulley that divides the eastern side from the western side of the central valley near Tabacundo. From this overlook one can see the earthcache location.For those that aren't familiar with earthcaches, these are locations that are of geological significance. One must arrive at the prescribed coordinates, see the geological feature, from the cache page and sometimes from the location learn about the particular geological feature and prove that you were there by performing some calculation or analysis related to the earthcache.
As we approached the overlook from the north we had to use caution getting off the road and into the overlook parking. The overlook is in a curve in the highway and Ecuadorian drivers fly around the curve, some even passing others while in the curve around the mountain. Once we parked we gazed out into the dry valley before us. The valley leads to the east and points towards the Cayambe volcano. This particular day we couldn't see more than a little bit of snow for the clouds that covered her. At the coordinates the geocacher is standing next to a cross placed in memory of Freddy Sadvedra, a victim of an automobile accident at this spot. I don't know for sure but in all likelihood this man may have run off the road and over the cliff. The date on the cross was April 25, 2009. From this location we could look to the south and see the geological fold in the earth's sedimentary strata. I admit that this will be something of a spoiler. That's alright. To get credit for the cache find the geocacher has to locate and see the fold, identify what type of fold this is, identify the major terrain feature at a bearing of 90 degrees from there and then, if willing, post a photograph of himself and his GPSr but not with the fold in the background. Cochasqui Fold (GC2DHJA) is sure to be a fun cache.
Earthcache.org seems to be pretty strict on only allowing caches where there is proof that the hider has the permission of the land manager. They were requiring a copy of the written permission. In this case it is a public overlook parking so I don't think it will be a problem. At any rate I submitted the cache and a week later it was approved and is up. Happy Earthcaching!
Congratulations to FreeCuba for the FTF. Love the family picture!
2 comments:
awesome! I hope it gets approved.
I've been wanting to place and earth cache but haven't gotten around to it yet ;-)
Congratulations on your first earth cache :) Glad it got approved, I've read before how strict they can be with permission. I'd like to place one just down the road from us at something called a 'Puddingstone' (Called this because they look like Christmas Puddings). These are big boulders that were moved during the ice age, however their location nowadays looks like they had been purposely placed by man a long time ago so that they mark churches, road junctions, river crossings, landmarks, etc. so it's a bit of a mystery as to how something so massive was moved to that spot in ancient times. They're quite unique to our part of the UK and extremely rare elsewhere. The one I'm thinking of is the tallest standing one in the country.
After reading about your earthcache getting approved quite easily I think I will get in gear and try and get this one approved. There are very few earthcaches in our area.
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