Sunday 27 March 2016

March caching

Bike Caching


A friend of ours from the Island(paulboy) sent us a message and said he was planning to come over and bike the Seymour Valley Trail and grab a bunch of caches. He asked if we wanted to join him. We (angelcheeks and I) met up with him at the parking lot at the start of the trail at 8:30am to head out on what would become an adventure. We were just heading to the 6th cache of the day when Paulboy jumped off his bike and broke his foot. We said we should head back, but he wanted to continue on. Well as much as I thought we should head back, we headed further up the trail. The trail in was mostly paved and there was a series of 50 caches called LSCR-SVT which stands for "Lower Seymour Conservation Reserve- Seymour Valley Trail." There was a few other caches mixed in the series that were there before the series was placed.

Lower Seymour Conservation Reserve is a 5,668-hectare forest located just minutes from downtown Vancouver. It is a popular destination for outdoor activities such as cycling, hiking, and in-line skating. This spectacular and diverse landscape contains alpine meadows, forested slopes and river flood plains.
NOTE: The highlighted words in my blog can be clicked on as they are links to other cool stuff!!Also if you click on any of the pictures they become bigger!!!
PS: On the right hand side of this webpage is where you can find my YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, and Google Plus links. Please feel free to check them out and follow or subscribe!!!

At the top end of the trail was the "Pot of Gold". Ok, it was just a cache called "Pot of Gold" lol
We crossed the bridge to get to the other side of Seymour river. We also grabbed a challenge cache called BC Milestone Challenge-1000 finds



After getting to the top end of the trails it was time to head back down toward the parking lot.
On the way back we would be able to do a couple different series of caches, the first was called ESSR which was a series of 11 caches on a logging road. At about the 4th one of these we came across a baby bear. We eventually scared it off so we could get past it before momma bear came along. We got a few other caches as well through here such as "Bigfoot the Tree" which is a massive red cedar located close to Seymour Falls Dam in North Vancouver.
We also found Lost Lake cache which had many DNF's on it and previous cachers thought it should be archived.


Cool spotted rock


We then crossed back over the river to do the last series called "Fishermans Trail" which had 17 in the series. We then completed it up with a few more caches to get us back to the parking lot.
By 5pm, 8 and a half hours later of biking and pushing bikes up hills, about 29.5 Km, 88 caches, 1 bear encounter, 1 cacher with a broken foot, and some stories, and fun, we were all finished what we set out to do. Off to the hospital to get Paul's foot looked at and then home for a well deserved supper and a beer!!!

Cool Caches

I was part of a group FTF last week on an awesome cache called Midvale Meanies Mundy Micro. I want to post a picture but that would just spoil the cache. My recommendation would be if you have not found this cache already, you should go get it!!!

I am continuing to gather caches to complete the Puzzle Masters Challenge: Alphabet soup Challenge cache that I started in early February. I am just letting it happen so not sure when I will complete it. I just need 5 more puzzle caches starting with the right letters to complete it.

More Magic Competitions
Also this month I competed in the Vancouver Magic Circle's Comedy Magic competition, with an act that I created several years ago but do not use in my regular act. As you can see by the photo, I won and am the Comedy Magician of the year!!
Comedy Magician of the Year

Blender and Lime routine

Well that's it for this month
Keep on caching
Chris Yuill
Magicman65




Tuesday 1 March 2016

Leap year!!!

Leap day Caching and Events

From the Geocaching.com Blog: Once every four years, Leap Day gives us one extra day of geocaching. We think that’s worth celebrating! Of course, we are marking the occasion with a new souvenir. Heck, there will even be two souvenirs. Souvenirs are digital awards you can earn by completing a specific geocaching achievement, like finding a geocache in a new country or finding a geocache on Leap Day.




Groundspeak has 2 new Souvenir's to celebrate the Leap Year. The first one is for getting a traditional cache anytime between Feb 27 and Feb 29(Leap day), and The second one is for attending
 
any event on Feb 29th. I attended Leap day Open Mic Night, which was held by cachers 6NoisyHikers. It was set up so cachers could come out and do any talent they wanted to do. There was music, stories, poetry, and even Magic!!! (lol, you can guess who did the magic)
It was a smaller gathering of cachers but a great time was had by all in attendance!!


NOTE: The highlighted words in my blog can be clicked on as they are links to other cool stuff!!Also if you click on any of the pictures they become bigger!!!
PS: On the right hand side of this webpage is where you can find my YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, and Google Plus links. Please feel free to check them out and follow or subscribe!!!

Geocacher of the month

Each month, geocachers around the world nominate members of their community for the prestigious title of Geocacher of the Month. The people who earn this title are not superheroes in the traditional sense: instead of the power of flight, they possess the power to transform a park bench into a treasure chest; instead of teaching the baddies how to be good, they teach newbies good geocaching etiquette; instead of stopping monsters from tearing down the city, they stop decaying geocaches from being archived. Three geocachers each month from around the world are recognized for their extraordinary contributions to Geocaching and are recognized as the official Geocaching.com's Geocacher of the Month.
Although all the nominees will receive prizes, the featured Geocacher of the Month will receive the exclusive special edition Geocacher of the Month Geocoin, a Geocacher of the Month hat and a profile icon. They’ll also receive a certificate that recognizes their contributions, signed by Bryan Roth and Jeremy Irish, two of the founders of Geocaching.com.
Read the profiles of this month’s three nominees, and write a supportive comment below this post describing why you think this person should be recognized. A panel from Geocaching HQ will then use your comments to help guide the decision of which geocacher is awarded the Geocacher of the Month honor.

Geocacher of the month Feb 2012  (Flashback)

Back in 2012 on this month(February) I became Geocaching.com's "Geocacher of the Month"
I was nominated twice for this, once in August 2011 and again in February 2012. What an honor, to have won this prestigious award!! ( I had started writing my blog page after winning this, so never really got a chance to write about it, click on the link to read more about it)

Editor Note:
Facebook has a feature called "On this Day" and it tells you what you posted or was posted about you for several years back. Today(March 2) this popped up as a memory from 2012.

From Rory Brown(Fellow Geocacher)
Magicman65 is one of those persons that gets a passion for a hobby and not only pursues the hobby for personal enjoyment but also decides that there is merit in contributing to the hobby to promote and make it enjoyable for others.

Forever the showman, which undoubtedly helps with his ability to help the newbie and experienced geocacher alike, he continues to help with the growth of geocaching on Vancouver Island and throughout the Province of BC.  He has my vote. 
Thank you Rory for those awesome words!!!





Challenge caches

I started a new challenge called "Puzzle Masters Challenge : Alphabet Soup"
I stated my intent to start this cache on Feb 6th/16 on the cache page as it requires.
To complete this challenge, you have to find and log 13 puzzle caches and 13 traditional caches.....each one beginning with a different letter of the alphabet. You can only use each letter once , for either a puzzle or traditional cache, in other words 26 caches, one for each letter of the alphabet. Check back soon in one of my upcoming blogs to see how long it takes me. (I am sure I could do it in a short time or even one day if I wanted to, but I will just let it happen)

I also grabbed these challenge caches in this past month:
BC Chart Challenge: 365(6) DAYS OF CACHING
BC Chart Challenge: FINDS BY PLACED DATES


Archiving a cache
Sadly just days before Jenna(Angelcheeks) and My anniversary(5 years) I had to archive the cache we placed just down the road from where we got married in Panama , it was called Oot'n Aboot at the crab shack!! We had a great time in Panama and even did some caching with 3 other cachers that live there. It was a great experience to cache in a different country.


Grabbed an FTF recently called Shedding some light on burnaby mountain, it was a multi cache, which is a good thing as right now I am trying to get more multi's so I can complete a challenge cache that I am working on. (yup, it's a sickness. lol) Another cache came out close to my house about noon one day called Forest Fun, I was at work when this one came out so thought I would have no chance at the FTF, but on the way home I noticed it had not been logged yet, so I stopped by and was happy to find an empty log book. YAY!!! A few days later I was able to grab another FTF called "A Sharpe Cache"



While in Harrison Hot springs with Angelcheeks(AKA Jenna) for our 5th Anniversary we grabbed a few caches while there and on the way out of town, and we came across a couple of really cool tree's.








This Wild Oak tree was planted by Clarke Gable in August 1933. Pretty cool to see something like this.


I was also recognized for my creativity in Magic this month when I was presented the
Murray Sawchuck Creativity award from the Vancouver Magic Circle at their annual Installation and awards Banquet.
V.M.C. President Graham Kita presenting me the Award


Well that's it for this month
Keep on caching
Chris Yuill
Magicman65

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