Pirates+of+the+Creek

Pirates of the Creek Emily Senter, Tiffany Foster and Wade Hodges

Emily and I woke up last Thursday morning with anticipation of going geocaching later that day. When we started the day it was chilly outside, but as the day went on it warmed up considerably. It was a beautiful day for geocaching, and it was all we could think about during our classes! To start our geocaching adventure we headed over to the bell tower to see what we could find. After a few minutes of searching near the way points we had in our GPS, we were starting to get a little confused. "Could it be in the water?", we wondered. Very carefully we looked around the water, but had no luck. Then we noticed there were some spaces in-between the walls so we jumped across the stream of water next to Butler Chapel to look in those spaces. I found a plastic container and started jumping for joy! We thought we had found our first geocache, and we had, but it was labeled for another class. It said it was for educational technology, but when we looked at the log inside some of our classmates had signed it so we signed it too. It wasn't until later that we discovered we had found a different geocache than the one that was on the website.

Next we decided to try to find the cache at Kivett, which was just a few yards away from the bell tower. Emily and I started looking at the trees around the building since the clue on the website said, "The cache is a film canister in a tree hole." When we didn't have much luck directly beside the building we tried to get closer to our way points. Not long after we started walking in the right direction we saw a couple of trees that had some holes in them. Finally, we had something to hope for! With some careful searching we were able to locate the canister, but we had to find a way to get it out of the hole because it was lodged in there pretty tightly. We took out a pen and picked it out so that we could sign the log inside.

Finding two caches had excited us so we joyfully went to the next destination, the well behind Rumley Center. There were some maintenance workers doing landscaping so we had to be careful not to get in their way as we searched for our treasure. The clue on the website indicated that the cache was in a high place, so we climbed up the well to see in the pockets of the ceiling. Neither Emily or I were tall enough to see completely so we used our phones to take pictures of the spaces. Several minutes passed of us searching and we still didn't find anything but pine straw and dirt! A little dismayed we decided to move on and come back to try to find this cache later.

Saylor Park was the next cache on our list so we walked the short distance to our new destination. The way points were leading us all the way across the park and at first we stopped to check our GPS in case we had missed it. The clue given on the website said "EGGE412". That didn't make any sense to either of us, but as we got closer to a light pole Emily spotted some letters on the bottom of it that said exactly that! We both squealed with excitement and ran to the compartment on the light pole and tested it cautiously. With a little effort it opened and we ecstatically pulled out the cache! While we were searching for it we saw some of our classmates looking too, so we all signed the log inside the cache and headed on our separate ways.



Since we were unable to find the cache at the well we decided to move on to the Camel Cache. This one was an incredible challenge! Emily and I had heard a lot of people talk about how hard it was to find or that they couldn't find it at all so we were extremely motivated to find it. Some of our classmates were already at this cache as well so we teamed up to make it a little easier. The clue for this cache said "Magnetic, but not on the camel!", which was not very helpful. By this time Emily and I had been searching for all the caches for almost two hours and we were getting frustrated. Some of the people who had found the cache posted on the geocaching website that it was small, black, and magnetic. Another person also said it was located exactly where the way points led to. Keeping this in mind we found the exact way points and just stood there in awe because it was a metal bench but all of us had just about turned it upside down looking for the mini cache! With one last effort I crawled on my back and looked up at the bottom of the bench. I started feeling around the edges and suddenly a piece fell off of the bench that looked like a black screw. It didn't register to me at first but after a few seconds I realized that I had found the cache! "Is this it? I think I found it! Look, Emily!", I yelled with disbelief.

I was so happy and so were my classmates. We couldn't believe there was a log inside the tiny container but we unscrewed it and wrote our names proudly on the small piece of paper. It was the perfect end to a day of geocaching with my roommate. At the end of the day we had found four caches and had a blast doing it! Who knew there were so many adventures to be had on our very own campus?!