Geocaching Panhandle Power Trail I

We took advantage of the long weekend with very few plans and not much work on tap and planned to go out geocaching. The original plan was to go do some cleanup at South Park. However, last weekend I had gone for a walk on the Panhandle Trail with my friend Laura. I was looking it up online since it was my first visit and noticed that there were a ton and a half of caches there. Clicking on Cache 0 I noticed that they are archiving the power trail of 80 caches in November of this year, so we decided to start working on it to try to capture it before the grand disappearance.  

A long and sometimes winding (rail)road. 

We walked well into Washington county. 

While in McDonald we heard a strange Noise. Nope. Not gang violence, but some sort of historical reinactment with old fashioned shots being fired on the other side of the trail. 

Resting while waiting for fellow walkers to pass us by before the last find of trail for the day. 

Warning: recent flooding has been damaging. 

Took a little longer than this to find some caches and take a short sheetz picnic lunch. 

Success:  5 miles walked, 4 miles cached, 26 total caches!

We grabbed one last cache at dinner to give us a PR of 27 in one day. Go us!

Geocaching on the Montour

The last few weekends we've headed over to the Montour Trail for some geocaching fun.  The Montour is part of the rails to trails program.  I really dig this program - and the plethora of trails in the area as a result.  The Montour will eventually be about 50 miles long.  I think one of my new goals is going to be to eventually have walked every mile of the trail.  That doesn't seem too difficult does it?  We've hit probably got about 8 or 9 down over the last 3 weekends.

The trail makes for a nice Saturday afternoon diversion.  Some of the caches are right on the trail and others have had us out bushwacking and exploring side trails.  Yesterday we met our friend JoAnn and took out a 3.75 mile section of the trail (and back) and grabbed a few caches out near Robinson.  Here are a few of my photos of the 'pretties' I saw during my death march.  I hit magical number 150 during this trip, although that was a silly little micro that was in the mall instead of out in the woods. 

There was also a less than pretty along the trail...

 

ETA:  biking, running, and other random forms of personal transportation count too :)

Grant Park

Friday morning  we headed out to Grant park to pick up a few geocaches.  It was a little foggy, which made for some great views and pictures.... and there was plenty of art to poke around in!

 I loved the Metra sign that reminded me of the Parisian Metro signs :)

I decided to stop and smell the roses (and other flowers) for a while.

Right around here I was hitting 100 caches.  Up to 122 as of now.

Cheesesteak et al.

Last weekend we headed to the Jersey side of Philly to see my Jersey family who aren't named Jersey :)  We took advantage of the beautiful springy-summer weather and went into Philly for the day on Saturday.

Would you believe that until last Saturday I had never actually had a cheese steak in Philly?  We headed down to the south side and chose to give Geno our business.  Next time we venture that way, I want to try Pat's so I can make an accurate comparison. 

From Cheese Steak Corner we headed out to pick up a few geocaches in the neighborhood, which brought us to the Italian Market.  I had no idea that this awesome neighborhood existed!   There was lots of amazing looking food and the atmosphere was really cool.  It reminded me of some of my favorite parts of the Strip District here in PGH.

 From there we headed over towards the river to make a stop at Yard's Brewing.  We had seen Yards on the Philly episode of "Drinking Made Easy" so we wanted to stop by.  They make a handful of beers, including several that are based on recipes brewed by the founding fathers -- including Thomas Jefferson's Spruce Ale.  We got a taster of that one -- gross.  No need for a full pint.  We did enjoy a pint of the Love Stout and took the tour of the brewery.

100 Finds

David made his 100th Geocache find in OBX.  I'm trying to catch up.  Its a slow process.

Wondering what a geocache is?  Learn all about geocaching.