Media Noche Sandwich Geocache

Is it true that Cubans really like to eat? I know they like a strong tiny cup of coffee. I have a Cuban American friend and geocacher who recently hid several food-related caches in the Metropolitano Park overlooking Quito. I really liked Media Noche (GC24HP0) because it was well hidden and the prize was a recipe for a Cuban sandwich of the same name. I brought it home and that very day, twelve hours off the mark, my wife prepared the sandwich. It was great. I recommend you find the cache and that you fix up a Media Noche for yourself. If you can't travel to Ecuador, google it for the recipe and make your own. Imagine: cheese, pork, ham and a special mustard sauce. Good eating!

The Sacred Valley Tour

When I came to Cusco several years ago I thought there were some geocaches out in the Sacred Valley. I guess they've been muggled and removed. I was disappointed. We traveled from the high plains (altiplano) town of Juliaca by bus one evening, arriving in the rainy city of Cuzco. We spent the next day visiting with friends. On Monday we had a day to ourselves. We hired a tour and went out to the Sacred Valley. What an experience. Our first stop was Chinchero village, a small town with many Inca ruins and artisan shops. It was fun but the real fun for me were the ruins we'd see later. We saw the Inca ruins at Ollantaytambo with the many terraces climbing up the side of a mountain. We had a good meal at noon in one of the towns. Upon leaving town we got word that there had been a landslide that killed some people in Pisac. We had hoped to see the ruins there but could not get through. Recent floods had washed out one of the bridges as well. We back tracked to Moray, where the guide said the Inca had established an agricultural experimental center. There we found the amphitheater-like location. We climbed down into it and were amazed at the construction. We had a great day. I wish there had been some caches in the area!

Earthcache: Lago San Pablo - Ecuador

We recently returned to Ecuador from a time in the US. It was nice to find that there are a few new earthcaches here now. One is San Pablo + Imbabura (GC20FQZ), located along the scenic Panamerican Highway 1.5 hours north of Quito just after you enter into the province of Imbabura. The site of the earthcache is a large lake formed thousands of years ago at the base of the Imbabura volcano. Be sure to visit the shops at the location. Fresh cheese and all kinds of items are on sale here. Get you photo made with the lake behind you too! This fine couple did. Further down the road you come to the Indian market city of Otavalo. There you can purchase all types of Indian artisan items. You are in the heart of the Otavalo Quichua people, one of the most productive and progressive Quichua peoples in the country. All around you are places to see and things to do. There are waterfalls, volcanos to climb, volcano lakes, hiking trails, woodworking and sales, leather works and more.

Caching Visit from MTMAN2

Recently I had a wonderful visit from MTMAN2, a physician who came as a volunteer on a medical team to work with one of the local churches ministering in the poorer communities. MTMAN2 had come to Quito several times before and had even found one or two of my caches. He wrote me and arranged for us to meet. We were able to arrange a day of geocaching. All in all MTMAN2 was able to rack up 20 caches that day, most in Parque Metropolitano. We began in the valley far below the park where he was staying. I drove out to Cumbaya (no singing please, that is the real name) and met him. We went down the street less than half a kilometer where he became the first one to find and sign the log on a micro hidden in the Cumbaya Reservoir. Someone had indicated a find some months back but they must not have had a pen in the moment. We then climbed up several thousand feet in elevation in the car to the Metropolitan Park on a mountain ridgeline overlooking the Cumbaya Valley to the east and the city of Quito to the west. From here on I pretty much served as a guide with the exception of one find which we did together. It was a fun day off caching and visiting. Several days before hand I hid a cache in honor of my new friend. It is called MTMAN2 surveys his work (GC23Z9P), because MTMAN2 has been working in the Cumbaya Valley with medical teams. It was a fun hide, one that resulted in me spending a little time in my shop preparing this cache. I won't go into the make up of this micro cache, I'll just say that it is a little tricky and completely different from anything we've seen so far in Ecuador. I guess it pays to cache some in the US where you can pick up some tricks. I look forward to when my geocaching friend returns to Quito for some more caching. He comes every two years to Quito and goes to other places the odd years. Thanks MTMAN2 for a great day of caching fun!

Quito's Parque Metropolitano Geocaching

We had just arrived back in Ecuador with a handful of Travel Bugs and Geocoins that we brought from our furlough in the US. It took us about a week to get the house in order and get to the point we could give some time to geocaching. Finally on Saturday we decided to go up to the park overlooking the city of Quito and do some cache maintenance, hide a few caches and even find one. In spite of the drought Ecuador is experiencing (power outages from the lack of hydro-electric production, etc.) we had a beautiful, sunny day. The grass was dry and we saw sign that some of the area had been burned by forest fire. We headed out with our hiking poles to find the one and only cache here we'd never found. It was Ropa Vieja (GC). We hiked across two small, rolling hills and down a trail to make an easy find of this one. Thanks FreeCuba for the cache. It means "Old Clothes". It wasn't until two days later while reading Facebook that I noticed that FreeCuba was keeping the kids and playing batchelor. He posted a picture of a steaming plate of rice with a delicious looking thick meat stew on top. It was called Ropa Vieja. The story in Cuba is that a poor man didn't have enough food for his family so he cooked some of his clothes and it was turned into food to feed his family. I wrote and found out that the cache is named after this favorite dish of his. From Ropa Vieja we checked on a few more of our caches, two being TB Hotels where we dropped all the travelers we had. Then it was time to check on some caches that we'd temporarily archived. While we were gone all this time a few had gone missing. Don't you hate it when one of your favorite cache containers goes missing! Near the big yellow alien figure was a really nice blue lock n lock container that is now gone. My wife had three caches to hide. That ought to give the few cachers we have here and the tourist who come through something to do. It will seem that we are preoccupied with old clothes when your read about this next one. Close to the place where she hide her last cache we found a pair of blue jeans on the ground. Just recently a YouTube song had gone viral called "Pants on the Ground". It was from an America Idol audition and it was funny. Paula couldn't resist naming the cache by the same name. We wrapped up a four-hour outing at a small snack bar in the park. This the way I like to spend an afternoon with my Paula!

Earthcache: Lima Coastline

I've never been much of geology enthusiast but this earthcache in Lima has peaked my interest. There aren't many caches of any kind in Lima so when any kind of cache pops up, I'm going to go after it on one of my frequent trips to Lima. Earthcache Lima Coastline (GC20EQP) was educational and just plain good exercise too. I headed out to do some running along the coastal parks that sit high above the beach. I ran several miles from my hotel and found that my GPSr was indicating that I would have to somehow work my way down the embankment to the beach. There were two choices. One was to return to a set of steps about a mile back or to go on to where I could see cars getting on to the beach along some high speed road. I ran on. When I got to the beach I found all kinds of surfers. I remembered that the Beach Boys mention surfing in Peru in one of their songs. It's true. Many were wearing wet suits. Others weren't as today was a clear, sunny day up in the 80's. The interesting think about the beach is that it wasn't very sandy at the location where the earthcache had me go. It was made up of large cobble stones. They weren't laid out as though a mason had been at work. They were simply strown everywhere. People had their beach towels laying on the stones. That had to hurt. What a beach! Where did these come from? I've always thought of Lima as a rock pile, a sort of desolate place with a gardened and irrigated wealthy residential and business districts called Miraflores and San Isidro. The truth is that it is all a big rock pile, particularly the area around the Larco Mar Mall that overlooks the Pacific Ocean. The above mentioned earthcache explained that years of river deposits left a 190 ft deep sedimentary build up called the Lima Conglomerate. "Conglomerate" is a big word that geologist use to say that rocks, in this case smooth and rounded rocks anywhere from half an inch in diameter to 10 inches, washed down to the coast and stacked up. They cemented together with the grainy mix and became a compound rock. The whole coastline at the point of the most manicured part of the city of Lima is built on a pile of rocks! After this sedimentary build up the land was gradually raised as the Nasca Plate continued to slide under the South America plate. This diverted the River that produced this sedimentary build up to the north. It is today's Rimac River. I wonder if these rocks would hold up well in an earthquake? Makes you wonder since this area is prone to earthquakes. I guess I'll sleep well tonight. I doubt I'll worry about earthquakes much since the run has worn me out. If you get a chance to check out this earthcache it is well worth the time. Yes, I climbed down to the beach and then I had to find a way to climb back up and get back to my hotel. That was a workout!

Caching along Reedy Fork Creek

Recently I attended my 36th high school reunion in Greensboro, NC. Actually it was one of those reunions were several classes got together. While there I caught up with an old friend I hadn't seen for years. Dan lives in Greensboro. I'm the one who went far away. Somewhere in the ensuing conversation we ended up talking about geocaching. Dan was intrigued and we agreed to go out and find a few caches. Just about 10 days later we managed to link up at a lake just north of the Greensboro. I had picked out a route that went from the road around the lake and up to where the Reedy Fork Creek's several branches emptied into the lake. I'd already read that once I'd gotten the caches along the north side of the creek that it was better to back track and come around the lake and get the others. The previous cacher was emphatic that you didn't want to try to cross the several branches of the creek. That's what we did. It was a beautiful fall day and the leaves were colorful. It was a great time to catch up on all that had gone on in our lives for 30 plus years. On the last cache I on the south side of the lake I somehow entered in bad coordinates. Due to my bad coordinates we ended up doing just what had been advised against; and we had a great time doing it! We were like to boys exploring the woods. We forded three creeks and did it going and coming. We walked across fallen trees, built a bridge on another and got a little wet getting across yet another. I don't think I've seen as many briers as I saw this day. We had a blast. One of the caches was called Stonehenge (GC1TW2T). Everyone that found it was asked to add a stone to the structure. This was a pretty easy GZ to find as the structure keeps growing. This one is stuck way out in the woods far from anything. Top the day off with the fact that my college freshman daughter drove home to be with us this long weekend.