kengr

Inspired by a post of Ysabet's about beavers, I'm posting some pics I took almost a decade ago. I was geocaching and spotted trees that the beavers had been working on, then tyhe beavers out in the water. This was out by the Columbia slough.

( pics behind cut )

I've been worrying since late last month about the annual inspection of the apartments. Because of the "remodel" back in Sept I've had more stuff than usual in boxes, and since we have a new manager who is a bit of a pain in the ass, I was expecting it to be bad. she was actually pretty good about it.

But while I was (slowly) getting things straightened out, I haven't been riding my bike.

And the WNBR is Saturday. So I'm trying to make up for lost time.

Went out to hit a nearby geocache (GC5T5TA) Found it without too much trouble then tried yet another stab at one that has ben confounding me for years (GC39RJB) . Failed again on that one. Gonna have to ask for a hint.

On the way back, I saw a big bag of beer cans sitting at the curb and swung back. There was a woman just coming out of the door and I asked if they were just there for the taking. She said they were. And that she usually had a bag everuy day or so.

So I snagged it and hit tnhe bottle return at Albertsons before going home (it's literally next door, so no biggie).

Got $3.90. Gonna have to make a point of swinging by here on my rides. It's right on my preferred route home from points west...

Bike stats:

total dstance 6.16 miles (I'd only been planning on 3-5)
max speed: 13.6 mph
avg moving speed 5.7 mph
total moving time 1hour, 5 min.

Not bad at all.

Eeven so, the WNBR is going to be a killer. Suppsed to hit 99 or 100Satyrday. And oit won't have cooled off *that* much by 8 pm.

The folks who tried to do the naked 100 km (riding in all the naked rides that day) are going to *die* unless they are well prepared.

Went out to pay the cable bill, and also go hunting some caches.

They put up 16 new ones yesterday, and six or more the day before. All within 5 miles of me.

First one was a multi-cache at a cemetary next to where my friend Kathy used to live.It was a matter of taking info from gravestones and using that to get the coordinates of the next gravestone.

It was harder than it needed to be because the person who set it up used the usual letters for numbers bit. Fir example the start was the sign for the graveyard and you needed the year it was founds, which gave you "digits" A B C and D.

The problem was that they used the letter O. And it wasn't clear if the later coords were XYoh or XYzero. I guess ed wrong (actually, I got it right, but they had the wrong thing (a zero instead ogf an O) and that had me hunting 100 feet from where the marker was.

Finally managed to find it.

The others weren't too hard. Except for one with a container type of "other", no clues, and ground zero being a *huge* clump of bushes. Bah.

I think I overthought one I didn't get. I'll check it next trip out.

But I hadn't been out on the bike a a few weeks, and the heat started to get me. So I cut things short and headed for a relatively nearby Max station. I texted fayanora from there because I could tell I wasn't firing on all cylinders. Basically, "I'm not in great shape, I'm at *this* station, heading for [other station] and catching a bus for home from there. If you don't get updates, come looking."

I managed to make decent connections and got home ok. Barely. And fay texted me to check on things just as I got in the door. Not that I'd texted here when I was waiting for the bus, so she was keeping close track.

Not sure home many miles I did. Maybe 6 or 7. And I got 6 caches. If I feel up to it, I'll go after more tomorrow.

Don't know if I mentioned it, but I was mildly sick a lot in April. Then in May I got hit with a bad asthma attack. Last for a bit over three weeks only improving the last week.

So, I have not been out doing much of anything, and most especially not gardening or riding the bike.

Today I made a start on clearing the weeds and junk out of my plot. Only did 20 min or so because my back started complaining.

After dinner I used the compressor to get the bik tires back up to pressure (they were almost flat it'd been so long.

Then I geared up and headed out on a bike ride. Did a bit under 4 miles in a bit under 40 minutes. That includes looking for a couple of geocaches (found one, didn't find the other) and walking about six block on the way back because the slope was more than the (really gentle) uphill slopes I'm in shape for right now.

Didn't realize until after I'd started that I'd forgotten the heart rate monitor gizmo. Gotta remember that for future rides.

Also gotta remember to take one of my canes if I'm doing any geocaching. The one I found was hidden under a (slightly) camoflaged boardover a hole in the ground. I got down on one knee to get it out and couldn't get up. I finally managed it, but until I've done a lot more exercising, I'll need a cane to get up unless there's something sturdy to grab onto. *sigh*

Gonna really have to work at this, because I found out that the Portland Naked Bike Ride is on the 8th. Given the sorts of routes they've used in the past, right now I might have to walk parts of it, but hoipefully I['ll be able to ride most of it by then. I just won't *enjoy* it as much as I might otherwise.

My friend Moreach has been trying to get into geocaching for a while (she's rather like fayanora in that she's mostly interested because a friend is).

In Moreach's case, things are complicated in that it's an online friend n Europe.

The triggering event for this was that there was a "pizza meeting" of local cachers tonight, about halfway between us.I'd have gone anyway, and Fay was going to go with me, but it was a good chance to get Moreach started.

Since she was willing to pick me up, I directed us to a rather cute cache a couple miles away that was only a little out of the way. So her first find was a fun & unusual cache.

Then we headed over to check out some caches in the neighborhood near the Pizza parlor. First was a puzzle cache that I was pretty sure I figured out from the description. It said you needed a liter bottle of water. Sure enough, when we got to the location, we found a suspicious plastic pipe fasten to a post. Pour in the water (fast, because there's a small hole at the bottom to let water escape) and the cache container floats to the top of the tube.

Next cache was a bit harder. At first I ignore what I thought was some trash, but Moreach looked closer. It *was* the cache which someone had opened and dumped out. We gathered up everything and signed the log. We also hid it a bit better at a spot that was more likely the proper location.

Didn't have any luck at the next two spots. Then it was time to hit the Pizza place, which gave her her 4th cache. We met Fay there, and talked a fair bit.

Afterwards we were going to try for one a few hundred feet from the Pizza place, but there were too many "muggles" around. So Moreach drove us to the location of a cache near her place she'd had no luck finding. And found it. Then she took us to her place for a bit. She and her SO had moved there a few years back, but I'd not been to it before. And, of course, neither had Fay since this was the first time she'd met Moreach.

When she drove Fay and I home, she insisted on swinging by the first cache because she'd forgotten her camera and hadn't realized my phone had one. She wanted pics for her friend (I'd taken picks at the other caches).

I got home and got the pics off my phone and (after fighting the connection some, got the pics sent to her along with some cache info.

Oh yeah, that cache near her place had the co-ords to another cache near her, so she's got sonething else to look for.

So Moreach got her first 5 caches, I got my total up to 240 (only 10 more for my second milestone!) and fay added 3 to her total.

Moreach enjoyed it so we'll likely do it again sometime.

I decided that if I want to get in shape for the WNBR on the 16th, I need to go out riding, even if the weather isn't so hot.

So I decided to use a route I plotted the other day to do a loop and hit some caches. I forgot to zero the trip info before leaving home, so I can only guess that I did around 7 miles.

Plotting the route had been a pain. When set for bicycle both my Garmin GPS and the Mapping program on the computer totally ignore things like bike paths. It said it'd be 23 miles. Selecting pedestrian *still* gave me some weird detours, but that lowered the route to only 10 miles or so.

Found 5 caches, missed 3, and it was getting late enough that I decided to skip the last three I'd planned.

At least I found a couple I'd been trying for for months. Both turned out to be on the opposite side of the bike path from where the co-ordinates indicated. Oddly, though, one was on the west side instead of the east side and the other was on the east side instead of the west side.

I also remember the heart rate gizmo. Never got over 150 that I noticed, but even 140 is rather draining.

Oh yeah, the weather *threatened* rain, but never actually did rain. It was a bit chilly when I started, but once I'd been biking a while, I was warm enough.

Fay has a pagan meetup thing tonight so we are doing our video night tomorrow. So no biking tomorrow. Hope to do something Wed & Thurs.

Ok, Wednesday Iwas up fairly early for me (around 8:30). After dealing with various things, I took my bike out (first time in *months*) around noon (maybe later. Decided to try hitting some new geocaches and some older ones I'd not had luck with in the past.

Had a nice route planned out, though I didn't expect to do all of it. Quickly discovered I was fairly out of shape (duh) because the slight slop on my usual route to the area of the first cache was hard enough work that I got off and walked for a block.

I also found that the flannel shirt I was using as a jacket was too hot. So it went in one of the panniers. Even walking I was generating enough heat to be comfortable, if a hair cooler than I'd prefer.
( geocaching )
It started raining a bit as I was finishing that search. And between that and my having plans with fayanora for later made me head home. Being that it was less than half a mile, I didn't bother digging out the flannel shirt. I was a bit chilly by the time I got back home, but not that bad. Not very wet either.

I logged the one find and checked to logs on the ones I hadn't found. I also dug out stuff to be ready to head out with fay at the planned time. I texted her at 2pm asking if she was up. She hadn't been and wondered why I'd texted. I pointed out that knowing her, she'd *need* the time to be ready to catch the bus at 3.

We had really good connections with the buss too.

The first step of the plan was a visit to Powells to pick up some books I'd ordered online (I'd been given a e-certifcate, but it had to be used online). Fortunately, one of the shipping options was to pick the books up at one of the stores.

Picking up the two books (I'd ordered 3, but one was out of stock and not expected to be back ordered) was simple, and the I had to run the guantlet of the SF & Fantasy section. I think I wound up with 6 more books.

BTW, I don't know *why* Fay thinks I read so fast? I mean, I only read two of them in a bit over 24 hours from buying them. :-)

After Powells we walked the half-dozen or so blocks down to Hamburger Mary's. That's where the local BDSM & general "kink" much moved in Dec of 20110. I decided that since I was going downtown anyway, and it was close to Powells, I'd check it out again. It'
d been several years *before* the change of location since I'd been to one. In fact, I think it was shortly after Fay moved to Portland.

We were early and had to sit at the bar for a bit until the "room" for the much was ready. I only recognized a few people, but that was ok. Only wound up talking to a few.

The crowding and noise level towards the end was a bit much. It definitely got to Fay

We decided to scratch the idea of visiting Voodoo Donuts on the way home. Between Fay's headache and my discovering that the cold I'd had traces of a day or so back was coming back with a vengeance, we just sort of vegetated on the bus to home.

After I got home, I did a lot of reading, interspersed with laying in bed keeping warm and some futzing on the computer. Still fighting the cold some. So
my "schedule" has been even less regular than normal.

( books )

... but I'm going to bed shortly and then my alarm will wake me in time to get to the starting point of the Portland Cache Machine II by 5 am.

I'll be navigating for someone, and we'll be finishing up around 8 pm. 148 caches, almost 70 road miles.

I've got a stack of "cheat sheets for the caches that's almost an inch thick.

Of course, since I've found over 60 of them and searched at another dozen in the past, that means I know a bit over half the locations. That'll make things a lot easier.

And at any of the ones I've found that we stop at, I'll be able to offer hints to anybody who is stuck.

Until the pre-dinner tonight, I hadn't realized that folks come from all over to participate in these. The guy I'v riding with is from BC, one of the guys I talked to is from Montana, and so on.

Hopefully this'll increase my # of found caches a lot.

I was out looking for a geocache earlier. I was in the woods near a trail and woman walking by asked me if I was looking for a fdead body. I figured she was joking and said "No, I'm looking for a place to hide one." She gave me this weird, startled look.

Fast forward to the news a few minutes ago and I find out that the police are searching the area for the body of a murdered girl.

See title for my reaction.

Probably just as well I decided to follow the trail to the end (it isn't on the maps so I was recording it to submit to NW Trails). Even if it did mean I climbed a couple of hundred feet.

When I checked my email about 1 pm, I saw a notice for a new cache. Less than a mile & a half away.

I checked my phone because I normally get notified about ones that close. I saw that I had gotten a notification. May have been what woke me up about 12:30.

After eating and taking care of a few things, I grabbed my bike which I needed to drop off at the bike shop for a tune-up. Since the cache was less than a block off the #71 bus, I decided to look for it. That meant going past where I'd transfer to get to the bike shop, but what the heck.

The hint said it was in an ammo box near a tree off an alley. Got to the alley and there were two trees near the co-ords. One looked more likely than the other. But I didn't see anything. The other had a bit of a pile of brush next to it. A bit of poking convinced me that it'd been there too long (half buried in thre dirt etc).

So I went back to the other. It had a big trunk and was wedged into the open end of a triangular space between a garage and a fence.

There didn't seem to be anything behind the trunk and just bare ground in front. Then I thought I caught a glimpse of something under some branches at the narrow end of the space.

This led to several minutes of trying to contort myself to get past the tree trunk to get to where I could get to the cache container.

Finally got to the container and got it open. And much to my shock, even though it'd been over two hours since it had been posted, I was the first person to get to the cache!

That was a shock, given that I was the *third* person to a cache half a mile from here that got posted at 11pm on a dark & stormy night. and I got there only 20 minutes after it was posted!\

So I have my first FTF (first to find).

Getting out after signing the log and replacing the cache was even more fun. But I managed.

Walked the bike back to a bus stop and then decided I wasn't *that* far from the bike shop. So I rode it a few blocks, walked a few more up a slope and then rode the rest of the way. Dropped it off and got the estimate.

Besides the money for the tune-up (which I'd had set aside) it looks like it may be another $25-30 for parts like brake pads. I sent fayanora a text and she's willing to loan it to me until my SSI payment at the start of the month.

Since there was another cache on the bus route (12) I'd be taking from the bike shop, I took the bus up there. Couldn't find it (and when I got home, I found that the last 3 folks to try hadn't been able to either). Looks like it fell victim to a landscaping crew.

Oh well, I can try for more later. Walked over to Prescott and caught the bus home.

Definitely out of shape. But between being able to bus around to look for caches and ride the bike with *all* gears available (rather than just the middle 7) I should be getting more exercise.