Bothell and Edmonton Trips

Quick trip to Bothell, Washington

Booked a show down in the states in Bothell, Washington. Headed down early so I could grab some caches along the way.

Stopped at a rest area and grabbed an Adventure Lab to begin with. I thought I had all the caches and adventure labs at all these rest areas on the way down here, but obviously I did not see this one until this trip. 
Headed further down the road and swung into Mount Vernon to grab a virtual and a library cache. 

Didn't have to look to hard as this book was in plain view when I got to the right section of the library.

Just remember if you are looking for a cache in a library, the Dewey Decimal for Geocaching is 796.587

This is the fake book opened, lots of swag!!

Right across the road from the Library was the virtual cache, so I got that as well.

Did a super cool Gadget cache in Arlington called "The Switchboard" 

This was such a cool cache, with over 250 Favorite Points, check out my video I did of it on Youtube, at:

"The Switchboard"

PS: On the right hand side of this webpage is where you can find my YouTube, and Instagram links. Please feel free to check them out and follow or subscribe!!!

Once you got all five plugs in the right spot, the cache door would open. (Check out the pic above)

Found a total of 9 Traditional's, 1 Multicache, 1 Adventure Lab, and 1 Virtual cache while across the border.

Caching in Edmonton

Went to Edmonton, Alberta for 5 days to visit some family. Decided to grab a few caches while here. I like looking for a different cache type other than a traditional cache when I travel.

Did a cool AL while there called "Canada Packers Chimney Stack"

It is now all thats left standing from the packing plant that has quite a history here in Edmonton including :

The Gainers Strike (1986): One of the longest and most infamous strikes in Alberta history. Over 1,000 workers at the Gainers meatpacking plant (located on Yellowhead Trail and 66th Street) walked out on June 1, 1986, protesting wage rollbacks and pension cuts. The six-and-a-half-month standoff included massive picketing and clashes with replacement workers.

June 9, 1986 a battle rages on the Gainers picket line:Thirty years ago, one of the most violent labour disputes in Edmonton's history occured. It was sparked in the summer of 1986 when the unionized workers of the Gainers meat-packing plant in Edmonton walked off the job. Plant managers hired replacement workers to keep the operation going, but were met with violent opposition. As tensions mounted Edmonton police, in full riot gear, acted as security guards trying to keep the peace but failed. Steve Andrusiak captured graphic footage of the clash in this Newsday report from June 9, 1986. It remains in the minds of many long-time Edmontonians as they drive by what was then the Gainers meatpacking plant on 66th street.

After doing the five stages of the Adventure Lab, you got coordinates to search for the bonus cache.

Check out the wall of rocks where there was a hidden Fake Rock which held the caches. I am glad I found it quite quick.

Ended up finding 1 Traditional Cache, 5 Wherigo caches, 8 stages of Adventure Labs, and 3 Puzzle caches, and one of them was a challenge cache. I also found my "8888th Cache" during this trip!! It was "#6-pigpen cipher puzzle geocache" which I solved before coming on the trip.

NOTE: The highlighted or underlined 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!!!

Next month, I have shows and trips all over, Including heading to Harrison Lake for a magical picnic, Whistler and down to Edmonds Washington for shows, so will be grabbing some select caches.....But more about that in Next months Blog....

Well that's it for this month!!

Keep on Caching

Chris Yuill

Magicman65

Day trips and Magic

Bellingham April 15/18

Today I went to Bellingham, Washington with another caching friend to do some caching.
We got a total of only 21 caches although I only logged 19 as I had gotten 2 of them already, but the main goal today was not to get a ton of caches but it was to get 7 or 8 different Icons.
We first got a traditional cache (we would get a few more of these as well) then we went to a virtual cache that I had already got a few years back on a trip thru town. We then hit up a cool puzzle called "sushi.glue.sides" I had no idea on this puzzle when I looked at it originally but my caching partner knew exactly what to do and I am now armed with the app for this kind of technology.

We then did a very cool Wherigo called State of the Solar System
It was a nice walk as the sun was out and the cool thing was this week groundspeak was giving out souvenir's for the solar system, so this was the perfect cache to get.

The Sun on a sunny day!!

After the nice walk and stopping in a shop or two along the way, we headed over to the University of Christi where there is a webcam cache. I have already done this cache a few months back on a trip down to Seattle, with a magician friend. But it was the first webcam cache for her.

At the fountain

Next we grabbed a multicache, followed by a very cool letterbox cache called "Geo Post Office and TB Transfer Station"
It was a locked cabinet on the side of a garage and was very well organized as you can see by the pics.

Awesome cache and definitely a reason why it has 245 favorite points.
Next we did another puzzle but this one was also a challenge cache called "An Uber Icon Day Challenge Washington State"
I have done 7 icons in a day already here in Washington state on October 14/17 but I also completed another 7 icon day during this trip. We also found a couple of benchmarks while here also which gave us bonus points.
We then headed east of town to grab another Virtual since I had already found the previous one. It was called "Triplin' the Rock Fantastic"

It was in a park and had a ton of very cool sculptures. We spent a good 30 mins just wandering thru looking at all the artwork, and sculptures. Check out the map and some other pics at this "Link"

We then went nearby to grab an earthcache with some waterfalls. Very cool stone bridge.

We then headed back into town where we found a couple of benchmarks to complete our Icon finding day and then stopped by a local pub for some food and refreshment to celebrate our finds. Then we headed toward home and grabbed several traditional caches and another letterbox on route. All in all an awesome day of caching and fun!!! Look forward to doing it again soon.

FVMC Bombs Away Magic Competition

I performed last night in the Fraser Valley Magic Circle "Bombs Away" competition
This is where the Fraser Valley Magic Circle members dig out a routine / prop / trick that they own but have NEVER PERFORMED it before for any audience!

The person that does the best job - based on a panel of experts AND the audience will be crowned the winner! And guess who brought home the trophy!!

Bombs away trophy

Well, that's it for this month,

Keep on caching!!

Chris Yuill

Magicman65

"Man your Battleships"

Caching in White Rock

Went out caching one morning with Close up Matt.
We started working on "Battleships in Whiterock" a few weeks back, we went to 9 of the 25 possible spots to visit for clues. Today we only had to visit 4 more to come up with enough info to work out the co-ords while sitting near the HUGE White Rock!!!

Earth Cache in Whiterock

After putting it into the geo-checker it came up as incorrect. We decided to go for it anyway and upon finding a huge tree down at the location we assumed it to be, I climbed over and made the find!!(see pic below)

There's a tree in the way!!

We also grabbed a few more caches in-between all the waypoints for the Battleship cache.

This one was at the pier in Whiterock and attached to fishing line so while they were fishing in the background I was fishing for the cache.

Another Free Library cache.

Then after we had finished the Battleship cache in Whiterock we headed to Langley to do the new Wherigo cache. It took us to all of the cool new statues in town for a bit of a history lesson.

Kelowna trip

I had a show in Kelowna so and I went a day early and went to an event called "Participaction 150: Learn to geocache 101". Now obviously I did not go to learn how to cache, in fact I have taught caching to several organizations in the past including the Cub scouts, Church groups, and the B.O.W. Organization.
I went because I was headed to Kelowna for a show the following morning but their was a new souvenir for attending an event cache that weekend. So I decided to go to an event in Kelowna at Jack Seaton park.

While there a fire started nearby as you can see by the following picture, and we had to leave the event early.

It became a large forest fire in Lake Country just North of Kelowna that grew to 40 Hectares and 8 homes were destroyed. Very sad!!

In total I found only 15 caches and one event while on my trip to Kelowna.

Fraser Street caches

I have been working on the series of Fraser Street caches, getting one or two every morning on my way to work. They are some pretty sneaky hides and clever containers. I need to find a couple more to get the "FSS Final- Connection"
I will let you know in my next blog how I make out.

Well that's it for this month

Keep on caching

Chris Yuill

Magicman65

Kelowna bound and EarthCache Day!!!

Gold Country caching

Headed off to Kelowna for a show with another magician friend. I decided to grab some caches on the way there and on the way back. I was able to grab some Gold Country caches as well. If you collect the stickers from within each Gold Country cache and get 24 different ones, you can send them in and you get a gold bar geocoin. I received one some time back for getting 24 of the caches(See pic)
Now I am starting to collect more towards another prize. If you can read the number on it, please feel free to discover it....

 

Gold bar Geocoin

   I love the gold country caches as they are all either ammo cans or large blocks of cement and they are easy to find, as you can see by the pics.

 

 

Can you see it??

 

I think I can see it!!!

Kelowna whereigo's

I finally got to do a wherigo cache while I was in Kelowna(actually got 2 of them)

 

Wherigo™ Cache

Wherigo is a toolset for creating and playing GPS-enabled adventures in the real world. By integrating a Wherigo experience, called a cartridge, with finding a geocache, the geocaching hunt can be an even richer experience. Among other uses, Wherigo allows geocachers to interact with physical and virtual elements such as objects or characters while still finding a physical geocache container. A Wherigo-enabled GPS device is required to play a cartridge. Learn more at Wherigo.com.

Cool art around Kelowna

Also did a couple of challenge caches while there. One, I know I completed the challenge as I did another one that was similar in Vancouver near UBC. The other one I was not sure if I completed the challenge until a quick look thru my caches found on G.S.A.K.(Geocaching Swiss Army Knife) told me I had easily completed it.

Total caches on the Kelowna trip:

5 Traditional Gold Country caches

2 other Traditional caches

                                               2 Challenge caches

2 Whereigo Caches

The second Whereigo I did took me to this statue of a Bear, and one of the last times I was here years ago, I got an FTF at this location.

Yup its a sickness. lol

Art Studio

Ogopogo

 

 

The trip home was fairly quick, as we did not stop for any caches, as I was up early grabbing some caches and checking out some of the cool art, in Kelowna before leaving.

 

 

International Earthcache day 2015

 

Went caching for a few hours today(October 11th/15) with Close up Matt to grab an earthcache as well as 5 other caches along the trail in Burns Bog

 

Got a souvenir for completing this task, as today was International Earthcache day.

 

 

It was a pretty cool walk along a boardwalk thru the forested Peat Bog. I also had my little guy Oliver with us and he was a trooper as we walked at least 3km's round trip



History of Burns Bog

 

 

"Big Horn Sheep Burl" and Close Up Matt

Look at me dadda!!

It was a nice walk while chatting about magic and caching, and just enjoying the weather and the scenery. Thanx again Matt for coming along.




 

 

Well that's it for this month

Keep on caching

Chris Yuill

Magicman65