I completed another terracache this weekend. (If you don't want a spoiler, don't go check to see which ones I've found recently) The location was one that was blocked off to vehicles, with two directions you could approach from on foot. We hiked in and attempted to reach it via the west, because it appeared to be the closest to the coordinates. Unfortunately, the shortest route is not always the best route!
The short, west side approach, was about an 1/8 of a mile walk down a paved, yet overgrown road. The cache was located on the other side of a river/stream/creek (I'm not really sure which, but it was a wide enough body of water that you couldn't cross it easily and you couldn't go around it). There was a bridge there, but there was a good 4 foot or so gap between where the road ended and where the bridge began. Accessing the bridge would have required climbing up onto a guard rail fencing, and walking across a beam. Losing your grip or balance would have meant a 50 foot drop to the creekbed below. Considering we had our two kids with us, one of whom is 6 yrs old, we decided the chance of falling wasn't worth it.
So.. we drove around and approached from the East. From this direction, you had to walk down a paved, yet VERY overgrown road for a little over a 3/4 of a mile. The hike out there was nice. We did get rained on a little, bit it helped to keep us cool. As we were walking along we noticed a big drain pipe off to the side and Redoggy and Katiefrog went to investigate. Our noses soon told us what it was.. sewage. We hiked a little further and I saw on the GPS that we needed to turn left somewhere along the tree line, but I didn't see a good path. I did make note of a few possible paths, but we continued on in search of an easier approach.
Eventually, we came to the other side of the bridge we had been at earlier. I got Blue Squirrel to take some pictures of me with the GPS for a locationless cache called "Bridges to Nowhere". After a few pictures, we realized we were at the end of the trail, and we hadn't seen a better approach path, so we made our way back to the possibles and chose one.
Redoggy, Katiefrog and Blue Squirrel at "Screaming Bridge"
It was pretty bad terrain. Briars, trees, logs, and vines crossed the "trail". We could hear the rumble of thunder in the distance. We all knew it wasn't the best place to be during a storm, but it was too long of a hike to go back empty handed now! Besides, we were only about 200 ft from the cache!(See the strange logic that too much caching will cause?)We shoved Redoggy up front as snake bait, and made our way through to the elusive, 20 foot "GPS Bermuda Triangle" you always find near ground zero.
The clues said it should be fairly obvious, but it still took us quite a while to find it. When Redoggy saw it and showed it to me.. we both just thought it was trash or something. This is a rather ummm strange "container". I won't give away the so called "surprise" at the end, but I will tell you, that if you take your kid with you, and they are looking forward to having a chance to trade items, they will be disappointed. There are no trade items, even though the "container" is... I guess technically... medium sized.
The container is also a little creepy. We actually wondered if maybe it had been muggled/vandolized. When I got home and put in the confirmation code, it worked. So, although it's kind of a strange thing, I guess this is what the planter had intended.
*Bonus: I managed to squeeze an EXTRA locationless cache out of this one. The bridge we went to turned out to also be known to be haunted. In fact, there's a company called DFW Paranormal who conducts tours of it. It is one of the many locations in that area that people claim is the "Screaming Bridge".
The Tale of "Screaming Bridge"
According to the stories, and the newspaper article located here, there were six Arlington High School girls who went off the bridge in the 1960's. Many of them died, either at the scene or at the hospital. There was also a second accident with a train or something. Here's a link to some pictures and other information, if you are into this kind of thing:
http://www.angelfire.com/ak5/carl_paranormal/index.html
I couldn't tell you if any of the claims are true or not. I had heard the stories, but didn't make the association of it being the "screaming bridge", I had heard about, until after we were back home. I was doing some research as to what had happened to cause the road and bridge to be abandoned. Instead, I found information on it's fame as the "Screaming Bridge". I know that while we were there, we did not hear or see anything unusual(I can't same the same for smelling, though.. ewww).
The short, west side approach, was about an 1/8 of a mile walk down a paved, yet overgrown road. The cache was located on the other side of a river/stream/creek (I'm not really sure which, but it was a wide enough body of water that you couldn't cross it easily and you couldn't go around it). There was a bridge there, but there was a good 4 foot or so gap between where the road ended and where the bridge began. Accessing the bridge would have required climbing up onto a guard rail fencing, and walking across a beam. Losing your grip or balance would have meant a 50 foot drop to the creekbed below. Considering we had our two kids with us, one of whom is 6 yrs old, we decided the chance of falling wasn't worth it.
So.. we drove around and approached from the East. From this direction, you had to walk down a paved, yet VERY overgrown road for a little over a 3/4 of a mile. The hike out there was nice. We did get rained on a little, bit it helped to keep us cool. As we were walking along we noticed a big drain pipe off to the side and Redoggy and Katiefrog went to investigate. Our noses soon told us what it was.. sewage. We hiked a little further and I saw on the GPS that we needed to turn left somewhere along the tree line, but I didn't see a good path. I did make note of a few possible paths, but we continued on in search of an easier approach.
Eventually, we came to the other side of the bridge we had been at earlier. I got Blue Squirrel to take some pictures of me with the GPS for a locationless cache called "Bridges to Nowhere". After a few pictures, we realized we were at the end of the trail, and we hadn't seen a better approach path, so we made our way back to the possibles and chose one.
Redoggy, Katiefrog and Blue Squirrel at "Screaming Bridge"
It was pretty bad terrain. Briars, trees, logs, and vines crossed the "trail". We could hear the rumble of thunder in the distance. We all knew it wasn't the best place to be during a storm, but it was too long of a hike to go back empty handed now! Besides, we were only about 200 ft from the cache!(See the strange logic that too much caching will cause?)We shoved Redoggy up front as snake bait, and made our way through to the elusive, 20 foot "GPS Bermuda Triangle" you always find near ground zero.
The clues said it should be fairly obvious, but it still took us quite a while to find it. When Redoggy saw it and showed it to me.. we both just thought it was trash or something. This is a rather ummm strange "container". I won't give away the so called "surprise" at the end, but I will tell you, that if you take your kid with you, and they are looking forward to having a chance to trade items, they will be disappointed. There are no trade items, even though the "container" is... I guess technically... medium sized.
The container is also a little creepy. We actually wondered if maybe it had been muggled/vandolized. When I got home and put in the confirmation code, it worked. So, although it's kind of a strange thing, I guess this is what the planter had intended.
*Bonus: I managed to squeeze an EXTRA locationless cache out of this one. The bridge we went to turned out to also be known to be haunted. In fact, there's a company called DFW Paranormal who conducts tours of it. It is one of the many locations in that area that people claim is the "Screaming Bridge".
The Tale of "Screaming Bridge"
According to the stories, and the newspaper article located here, there were six Arlington High School girls who went off the bridge in the 1960's. Many of them died, either at the scene or at the hospital. There was also a second accident with a train or something. Here's a link to some pictures and other information, if you are into this kind of thing:
http://www.angelfire.com/ak5/carl_paranormal/index.html
I couldn't tell you if any of the claims are true or not. I had heard the stories, but didn't make the association of it being the "screaming bridge", I had heard about, until after we were back home. I was doing some research as to what had happened to cause the road and bridge to be abandoned. Instead, I found information on it's fame as the "Screaming Bridge". I know that while we were there, we did not hear or see anything unusual(I can't same the same for smelling, though.. ewww).
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