I went up for a hike today, primarily to take some pictures. All of the geocaches up in Johnson's Pasture, located just north of where I live, have been found. It was a gorgeous day, slightly breezy. It was a crisp day for the second full day of spring.
When I looked into this project, it was in the middle of December. I posted a picture on the 18th following a geocaching trip up in the desert on a day where it rained up there for most of the day. But I didn't take another picture until a week later on Christmas Day. 
I started posting photos in succession on the 30th of December, once again after a geocaching hike. I have yet to miss a day. I've played little tricks with myself that has helped me out tremendously. I have my fall back pictures in case I end up with no inspiration that particular day. My fall back pictures tend to be flowers. Living in Southern California, we have flowers blooming year round, so it's relatively easy to take pictures of flowers. I think I could post a different flower picture ever single day.
However, I didn't want to be known as the "flower" guy. I follow several photographers on the 365 Project, and while their photos are excellent, I also find them rather repetitive. They do certain things very well. I'd like to see them expand into other areas, just to see them stretch themselves a little. This is one of the tacks I'm taking. I'm trying to take a bunch of different photos of different things, just to expand and stretch myself. I know I can take good landscapes and flower and plant pictures. Can I take a good street picture?
I don't think I'm that good with portraits or with black and white photography, so I've been experimenting in that area. My daughter issued me a challenge for the month of March - no flowers. That's been tough, but I've worked other things in. I kind of cheated today, not taking a picture of flowers, but taking pictures of the aftermath - the berries. And now, as I look at my monthly calendar, I've seen March peppered with pictures of birds. My daughter has already said I can't take pictures of birds next month. We'll see how that goes.
I've been lucky to have included a couple of geocaching photos into my 365 project. I actually thought the bulk of my photos would be geocaching photos, but that hasn't turned out to be the case. I haven't been geocaching a lot this month due to other commitments, but with a two week break looming on the horizon, that might change shortly. Either way, I'm glad it hasn't happened that way. 
I've gotten into the habit of taking my camera with me almost every where I go. Sometimes, I go out with a specific goal in mind, other times, I just take pictures and hope for the best. Ironically, that's what I ended up posting today and I've already gotten some very nice comments back on that particular photo.
I guess what I'm really trying to say with this is I'm actually surprised that I'm still doing this. As I posted in an earlier post, I didn't think I would be able to do this. But I can and I'm finding it easier and easier to find good quality subjects to photograph.
Pictures were taken for the following dates:
March 1st, 2011.
March 10th, 2011.
March 13th, 2011.
Last October, I hiked in the North Etiwanda Preserve (NEP) for the first time. It was another instance of geocaching getting me to explore something in my own back yard. On that day I found 12 caches and DNFed five of them, a very high DNF rate in my opinion.
For whatever reason, I kept having difficulty finding some of the caches I was looking for that day. 
It has rained for most of this vacation and I really haven't been able to get out and do any kind of hiking this past couple of weeks. The weather was finally cooperating and I was going to take full advantage of the situation. The NEP provides a 3.25 mile loop trail, but with spur trails you can walk a lot longer. I ended up walking just over 5.6 miles for my morning hike, with an elevation gain of over 2000 feet.
Fortunately, the gain was very gradual, so it didn't seem like I was gaining much in elevation, yet every mile marker post I came upon, it told me I was climbing. Had I gone the other way on the loop, the gain would have been steeper and more intense, but I knew that from the last time I'd hiked the loop.
With the mountains as a backdrop, I was able to get some really good pictures, more than I can probably post here in three different post, so I'll have to post them gradually over the coming weeks. There was a lot of snow on the peaks, which top out at around 8800 feet. I was hiking at 2300 to 2500 feet above sea level so you can see there's quite a bit of snow on the mountains. Last night, the overnight low got down to 29˚, which is quite cold for our area, which also means that the snow will stay there for awhile.
The daytime temperatures were warm enough that I was able to hike in shirt sleeves yesterday. That also means that once again, people back east will watch the Rose Parade out here tomorrow and see people enjoying the wonderful weather and wonder to themselves why they live in the snow. 
Needless to say, I enjoyed the weather yesterday. The setting was perfect for a good hike and for some caching. I was able to find those caches that I couldn't find over a year ago, plus all of the others that I had planned to find. I saw several deer, one that crossed right in front of me on the trail and two others who watched me warily from a good distance away. It was a good day, one that was a fitting end to the old year of 2010.
Tomorrow begins a new year, one that I'm sure everyone hopes will be the best year ever. Resolutions will be made and some will be kept. I resolve to continue to have fun while geocaching. I found more geocaches this year than in any past year. It's quite an achievement, especially since I was out of commission for several months due to personal reasons. I was just lucky the rest of the time I went caching I guess.
I will not resolve to find a certain number of caches. In my opinion, resolutions should be self improving. Finding more caches next year, does nothing to improve myself I believe, although it will probably get me on the trail more so I guess I can resolve to continue to be more physically fit than in the past.
I also resolve to post more often here. As I look back to when this blog was started, I can see my post counts fall every year. 116 in 2008, 100 in 2009 and only 80 this year. I plan to reverse that course this year. And so to all of my readers out there, please enjoy tonight, make it safe and may 2011 truly be the best year ever.
Pictures were taken at or near the following geocaches:
NEP_pd4 - by Ranger Rick
Washed Out Plumbing - by bustindustin
Earlier this month, I mentioned that I was going to attempt the 365 project. I figured that I'd start the project on the first of next month and just end up taking a picture every day for the next year. Already, I now know, I've bitten off more than I can chew.
I uploaded two pictures earlier this month, just to see if this project would be difficult. 
Several years ago I challenged myself to try and find a cache for 33 consecutive days. At that time, I was the main person picking up the Tadpole from his elementary school. Because of when his Spring Break was and my Spring Break, I figured there was going to be a 33 day window where it would be relatively easy to find a cache every day during that period. And so I attempted it.
Once the 33 days went by, I continued finding caches each and every day. Some days were relatively easy, while others were more difficult to accomplish but I persevered up until day 57. That day, I ran into a string of caches that I couldn't find and it became frustrating enough after five DNFs that I just said to myself, enough. I wasn't having fun anymore, so I ended the streak. There is no way I'd ever want to attempt any kind of consecutive streak again. I think the longest streak I've had since that time has been 11 consecutive days.
And so I thought I'd be able to take a picture every day for 365 days. Uh huh. Right. The nice thing about the 365 Project is you can upload pictures to specific days. It doesn't hold you accountable for an every day post. So this project will take several years to achieve fullness, but I can live with that. The quality of the pictures will be much better than if I ended up taking a picture every day and I will also continue to enjoy the project as it develops. 
In the meantime, from time to time, I will post updates of my progress on that project. I've noticed many other bloggers contributing to their own blog by having a Wordless Wednesday every week, which just includes a title and a picture. I may end up doing something like that as well, although the way I like to write, actually having to have a wordless day might be painful to me. But I can always try it and if that doesn't work out, so be it.
The two pictures posted here are the two I've posted thus far this month. One is of an inch and a half long millipede we spotted out in the desert the week before Christmas Day. We actually saw two different ones, but this one was a little bit more cooperative than the other. The second picture is of our California Desert Tortoise (yes, I have a permit for it) that lives in our back yard. It came out of its burrow on Christmas Day and was sunning itself under one of our orange trees. Today is the first day since Christmas where I haven't seen it wandering around in the back yard. I suspect the rain today had something to do with that.
Please enjoy these offerings and others in the future.
Every now and then there are surprises that show up while you're out. Chaosmanor and I, while on our road trip last month, stumbled upon a cache at night. Now, I don't do much night caching and we weren't really going to do any night caching on this trip, but we were on our way back to our hotel room and I spotted this cache just off the freeway, so we thought we'd attempt it.
This leads me to another topic, that of the 365 project. Chaosmanor showed this to me, so I thought I'd look into this as well. I'm going to try and do a literal 365 day project, starting on January 1st, 2011 and work through the year. I probably won't get anything really earth shattering on some days, maybe even just the top of my foot or something along that line, but I do take a lot of photos and I think I'd like to try something like this. I keep seeing the 12 on 12 projects, taking 12 photos on the 12th, but for some reason, I always seem to forget about the day until after the fact. Perhaps with this, since I know I'll need to take at least one photo each day, I'll persevere. We shall see.
Picture was taken at the following geocache:
Worthy Steed - by Original owner gallahad Adopted by Pamelot 7-2007
I came home this afternoon from work to a very nice surprise in my front yard. I'd actually taken a different route home, since I was low on gas. 
It was motionless as I drove by and pulled into the garage. I got out of the car and slowly walked out on the driveway and the bird crouched down as it was getting ready to take flight. I backed off and got a great view of a very large roadrunner. I would guesstimate its length at around 18 inches or so from beak to the end of the tail. It's a pretty distinctive bird, one that I've seen one other time in the Palm Springs area along a fairway of a municipal golf course.
According to the Wikipedia article, I live in its habitat, so I guess I shouldn't be surprised to see it running around, but I'm much more familiar with his "stereotypical" enemy, Wile E. Coyote than the roadrunner. I probably see a coyote in the neighborhood, walking down the street probably once a month, if not more. Raccoons are sometimes common, less so than perhaps skunks, but never a roadrunner before.
I quickly went inside, got my camera and started birdstalking. By the time I was back outside, he was on the curb and then in the middle of the street, heading over to greener pastures. At first I thought I was going to lose it in the neighbor's bushes, but it seemed to have a single minded purpose about it, heading over to another neighbor who has a nicely xeroscaped front yard, one that I have been thinking about creating in my own front yard.
I have to admit, had I known this bird had been living in the neighborhood, I know I wouldn't have been surprised to have seen it. I get into a certain mindset because I live in an urban setting. The mindset includes not seeing much wildlife, outside of the occasional squirrel, or the multitude of birds that inhabit the trees in the neighborhood.
As noted above, coyotes are fairly regular, but they're one of those animals that have increased their range because of human existence. The ready supply of food that we tend to leave out in the form of garbage is tailor made for the coyotes, rats and raccoons of the world. But to see an obviously desert creature, in a fairly urban setting is very surprising and a nice treat. I hope to see it again in the near future.
Well, the tree doesn't really grow in Brooklyn, but actually grows on the top of Devils Postpile. The first time I was at Devils Postpile, we climbed up to the top of the postpile. 
10 years ago, I took all three kids camping in Yosemite National Park. On one of our hikes, we hiked up to the top of Vernal Fall. The hike is strenuous, with lots of stair steps rocks to negotiate. There is a guardrail along that part of the trail, and once you get to the top, the guardrail had a screen wire grate along the bottom portion of the rail to prevent anyone from slipping out and falling over the waterfall. The viewpoint is right on the edge of the waterfall as you can see by the picture.
The Tadpole, at the time was four years old and when we climbed to the top of the fall, he dutifully held my hand, mainly for safety, but also because he wanted to feel the support of Dad as he made his ascent. It was at the top when all hell almost broke loose. In every parent's worst nightmare, he broke free of my hand, just as we crested the trail and the viewpoint. I hadn't seen the wire mesh grate, but even if I had, I probably would have freaked a little bit. Because I didn't see the wire mesh, needless to say I freaked a lot. Suffice to say, nothing happened that day and the Tadpole is still around, as am I.
One of the things I noticed about the Tadpole on this past trip was his willingness to just take over things that I normally did when we camped. He decided to be in charge of the food storage box. In California, most campgrounds in bear country are outfitted with metal storage lockers to prevent bears from raiding your supplies and also to keep bears away from populated areas. Bears that feed on people food, as opposed to what they're supposed to be eating isn't good for either bears or people. 
I think I might have been more nervous on the top of Devils Postpile back then had we gone there. There is no guardrail and not anything to remind people of a steep drop. Everyone knows it's there. I didn't even think twice about walking around up there nor did I worry about the Tadpole. His maturity, at almost 15 now, is showing big time and he's turning into that responsible young man that we all hope our sons turn into when they reach that age.
One of the things that I wanted to show the Tadpole at the top was a small tree. I'd photographed this tree back in 1977. As you may have noticed if you're a regular reader, I enjoy seeing the struggles of like, especially when plants grow where you don't think they should grow. The tree that used to grow on the top of Sentinel Dome is one good example. When I took that photo, I figured this tree might be something along that line and I hoped that someday I might get back to see it. As you can see, the tree hasn't grown much. By comparing the two pictures, I think it's safe to say there's about a foot of growth on the tree.
I guess I was overly optimistic when we came back this summer. I think I was expecting the tree to be several feet higher. After all, it had 33 years in which to grow. I forgot about where it was growing. 
Still, the tree had grown a little and that was promising. It also showed, that it would be a long time before this little tree towered over anything else in the forest. It has its foothold. Now, hopefully, it will continue to send down roots and continue to thrive. The Jeffrey pine tree on the top of Sentinel Dome is no more, but it lived a good long life and never got more than about 12 feet tall at best. The living conditions up there were probably harsher. I have hopes for this little tree.
Pictures were taken at or near the following geocaches:
Mist Trail Cache - by V-man
Devils Postpile Glacial Polish - by TerryDad2
A couple of months ago, I posted about simulacra, the waymark where inanimate objects look like real live things. Earlier this month, I was out in the desert finding a multi-cache. The cache was a simple offset, where you find something, or go to a set of coordinates and then walk a certain direction away from those coordinates to find the cache. 
The original spot, as stated on the cache page, was at a sleeping elephant. OK now. Give me a break. A sleeping elephant out in the desert of California. Maybe in Africa, but not here. Whoa! Yep, that's a sleeping baby elephant all right. Besides finding this cache, it also gave me the opportunity to post a waymark in the simulacra category for a sleeping baby elephant. An added bonus was also posting a waymark in the movie scenes catergory, since the title of the cache is called Kill Bill's Church. The church across the street from the elephant was used in the Kill Bill movies.
I always enjoy stumbling across stuff like this. I was actually surprised that neither spot had previously been waymarked. With the title of the movie as part of the cache description, one would think that some other geocacher would have thought to look on waymarking.com and done a search for it. I did and found the nearest waymark to be 16.1 miles north of the spot, which gave me a pretty good indication that neither had been waymarked.
The problem, as I see it with waymarking, is you really don't know what's out there until start clicking on links on the geocaching site. I have never been able to find an easy way to navigate around on the waymarking site. When I wanted to waymark the piece of the Berlin Wall that's standing at the Reagan Library in Simi Valley, I wasn't sure where to start. I think I started with a search of Berlin Wall. Eventually, I figured that it would best fit in the Preserved Architectural Remnants and Ruins section. 
I'm sure I could probably do a lot more waymarking than I do, but I don't know the criteria for each category. There's almost 1000 different categories of different things, so for the most part, I stick to what interests me and stay there, although the movie category isn't one of the categories I usually end up submitting waymarks to, the Kill Bill Church being the first one. I just happened to get lucky that I had taken a picture and had all the requisite information for the submission.
I sometimes think that since the removal of virtual caches from Geocaching, Waymarking has become the ugly stepsister of Geocaching. They're not really sure what to do with it and so it just sits there, getting bigger, but not really improving in any way. The geocaching site gets makeovers on a regular basis, but I don't see that happening on the Waymarking site. That's a shame, as I think the site could be better utilized if it were better organized. But then again, perhaps that's the best it can be, because of the scope of it.
Pictures were taken at or near the following geocache:
KILL BILL'S CHURCH - by fear it caches
What you see is a picture of a birdhouse. Nothing much really to tell about it, other than the occupants of said birdhouse didn't want their picture taken that day. This birdhouse was quite close to a cache and it worked well as, what I liked to call, a distractor. 
When you think about it, we tend to look like loiterers when we geocache. It's hard not to look like you're loitering when you're hanging around a bush by the side of the road and every now and then you end up putting your head inside the bush. I spent the better part of an hour inside a bush last Saturday and ended up with a DNF on that 4 icon challenge cache. Come to find out it was muggled. The owner has promised to have it replaced by the time I head back up there next weekend.
But, back to the birds. As I said, this birdhouse was in the perfect spot for cache hunters, because it provided a reasonable purpose for cachers to be in a particular area, in this case a parking lot. While we were looking for the cache, we ended up seeing a groundsman drive past us. We weren't questioned because we made it look like we were enjoying the flowers and taking pictures of the birds, which is really what I was doing. Had the birdhouse not been there, it would have been more difficult to justify our presence there.
The Western Bluebirds, that were inhabiting the house, apparently didn't want their picture taken. It seemed like each time I raised my camera to take a picture, either the male would fly off from the perch, or the female would duck her head back inside. And of course we had one of those, "wouldn't you know it" moments, because as soon as we were back in our car and leaving the area after finding the cache, both birds were outside the house. Maybe next time.
Picture was taken near the following geocache:
TOMORROW NEVER KNOWS - by BEATLES CREW
Sometimes, I end up finding lamp post caches. It doesn't happen that often and usually I don't have a lot to say about them, since they seem to be so pervasive in an urban area and usually pretty routine. One lamp post cache find did catch my eye, not because it was different, but because of the experience. Last Saturday was my first full day of vacation, so I figured what better way to spend it than to 
We met over near a park and ride off of the 118 Simi Valley Freeway, otherwise known as the Ronald Reagan Freeway. We've utilized this particular park and ride in the past and we both commented that it was surprising there wasn't a cache hidden in it since it's a large area, with several landscaped areas that could hold a small cache (not a micro as I don't hide micros). I even came up with a clever name for it should we decide to come here again as a base camp.
This particular park and ride is literally under a transition road for the freeway and so the geocache map would be interesting, making it look like the cache could be in the middle of the freeway, depending upon placement. It's probably because of the proximity to the freeway that there hasn't been a cache placed there. It is pretty noisy and not the most scenic spot in the world, but then again, there are quite a few caches that fit that description.
Which leads me to this lamp post cache we found after we'd dropped off Chaosmanor's car at the park and ride. This was our second cache of the day. We weren't sure what the cache was going to be when we first got there. That's often the case when you run a circle PQ for an area. You go out and you find caches. Some are interesting and some are...well, let's just say they're not as interesting as others.
As we pulled into the parking lot both our GPSrs were pointing at this particular lamp post, so I slowly approached it in the car, looking around to see where the 
I'm not sure this time it worked very well, because the muggle just seemed to be interested in me and Chaosmanor for the longest time as she sat in her car. Perhaps she was wondering what two middle aged men were doing walking around in the planter looking at various weeds and other plants, but eventually she got tired of it and got out of her car and went inside the store. However, there were other muggles about as well, so we had to wait them out. I think this was the first time where I had more trouble replacing the cache than in retrieving the cache because of muggles.
We eventually got the cache replaced when I spied some clover growing near another lamp post further down. This particular clover was immense. The bud was at least quarter in diameter if not bigger. Most of the clover I've seen in lawns in this area are usually small white balls of little flowers. This purple bunch really took me by surprise. Couple that with the other pictures I took of the iris and the dandelion and 
I guess I really need to thank the muggles though. Had they not been there in force, we'd probably have been in and out very quickly and we would have missed these little highlights. Eh. It's a weed some people might say. Yeah, it's a weed, but it made for an interesting picture, so I'll take that weed any day of the week. I still don't particularly like to find a lot of lamp post caches, but I'm pretty sure that I'll look at them slightly differently in the future because of this experience I had with them on Saturday. And that's what it's all about really, enjoying the experience.
Pictures were taken at or near the following geocache:
Greens - by shirconn
My photography in geocaching has taken three distinct phases. When I first started, I was still using my Minolta Maxxum, which I loved dearly, but was showing its age 
Sometime in 2002, I purchased a point an Olympus point and shoot, Camedia camera. I liked using that one a lot since it rejuvenated my portrait picture abilities. I would take it to family events and take many pictures. The built in flash was the major bonus with this camera. The Minolta had only an attached flash, that was cumbersome and needed to be remembered, which was not conducive to candid portraits that I preferred to take at family gatherings.
I was, however, still wedded to my beloved Minolta. That summer, the boys and I went camping along the coast of California. I took both cameras along, intending to use the digital camera to record caching adventures and the Maxxum for everything else. At our first stop, my son said, "Dad, why don't you just use the digital camera for everything this time and see what happens afterwards?"
The third phase happened a couple of years ago when I purchased my first SLR Digital, a Sony Alpha. At first I was amazed at the quality of the images. The picture of the leaves is my first picture I took with that camera while on a caching run. This camera has combined the best of both worlds of my first two cameras, built in flash a
Pictures were taken at or near the following geocaches:
A cache for Mike! aka Snake belly! - by BDC
The Redwood Barely There! - by Scott, Becca, Travis, Max
Cache Out - by CARGOLAX
This weekend, I'm taking it easy. It's probably the last weekend that I actually have the entire weekend to go caching and yet I'm staying home. The first couple of weeks of school have done a number on me and I'm tired, so 
This past weekend, I drove up to the mountains near Crestline and Lake Arrowhead with my friend Chaosmanor to do a end of the summer caching run. We did a run right at the beginning of summer and so it seemed rather appropriate to create a bookend on the other end of my summer vacation. One cache we found has already been archived. Apparently, someone was taking issue with the placement of a metal container uphill from a turnout, hidden in a waist high stump of a dead tree. The cache had been destroyed, the owners had come out and replaced it and within three days, the cache had been destroyed again, since that's the state we found it in last Saturday. There's no way the container could have been interpreted as trash; there was nothing else around to indicate that this was a dumping ground. This was just someone's attempt to spoil other people's fun. That's sad in my opinion.
One cache that we did find that was intact made it to my top 5% list. Red Rock Wall is located at a turnout on Hwy 18 which is also called Rim of the World Highway in this area. The turnout is huge and affords at least a 270° view of the Inland Empire located below. We could see the former Norton Air Force Base located in San Bernardino. Had it not been so hazy, we probably could have seen all the way to the Palm Springs area, a distance over 75 miles. We could also see the thunderheads that were building in the mountains to the east of us, mountains where we would eventually be and rain from which we would eventually get wet.
The coordinates for the cache were almost dead on, the hide was well done. It became apparent rather quickly that one of us was going to have to go over the Red Rock Wall in order to retrieve the cache. We couldn't see the cache from our vantage point, but our GPSrs were pointing us about 15 feet beyond the wall. This could be tough since there were a lot of muggles at the overlook, but it appeared to both of us they were more interested in the view than what two middle aged men were doing down on the far side of the lookout. I started thinking how I wanted to do this, so 
Once on the other side I spotted the well hidden ammo can attached to a strap that prevented it from sliding down the hill. There were plenty of bushes so I wasn't in any danger myself, but I could see where it could become a problem for the ammo can due to where it was hidden just beyond the main line of bushes. During a lull in muggle activity, I made the grab and then gave the ammo can to Chaosmanor who placed it in my car where we could make trades and sign the log more easily than trying to do it on the other side of the wall.
It's really interesting watching people at a large turnout such as this. You would think there would be a constant stream of people, making retrieval or replacement of a cache nearly impossible. That didn't seem to be the case here, or at least it wasn't the day we were there. The muggles seemed to come in waves, all coming and then all leaving at the same time. There were times when it seemed quite crowded and other times when we had the entire turnout to ourselves.
The replacement was just a reversal of how we'd made the original grab. Chaosmanor handed me the ammo can, I hooked it up to the strap and then placed it behind the bush where it had been hidden when we first got there. I took a couple more pictures (some of which turned out quite nicely I think), then made my way back over the wall. I wanted to make sure I'd hidden it back as well as when I found it so I walked back and forth along the wall, looking down to see if I could see the can. Nope. It was a good replacement. Afterwards we both commented on the audacity of placing an ammo can in such a busy place. The cache has been there for over 2 and a half years, so I guess the audacity of hostile bob has been rewarded.
My top 5% list is a very subjective list. It's a list of the caches I've found over my 7+ years of geocaching, that I've found particularly rewarding. Sometimes they make the list because of the view. Others make the list because it was a good hike to get to the cache. Some caches make the list because they made me laugh when I finally found them. Caches get added from time to time and they do get deleted from the list as well. It's an evolving list. I try to edit the list on a regular basis, removing the caches that have been archived, while adding new ones to the list that I think merit inclusion. 
Well, my summer has definitely ended. I'm back into the routine of school as our my children. My oldest is away at college. My middle child is starting his last year of public education and will be graduating next June. My youngest has just started his last year of junior high school. It's amazing to think about the fact that next year at this time, he'll be in high school and I'll have two children in college. I look back on the times we've had with a smile on my face. Although the time has seemingly gone quickly, in reality it has been a slow journey to now and there are still many more good years ahead of all of us.
Pictures were taken at or near Red Rock Wall - by hostile bob
When I was looking over the pictures for the Jeep post, it struck me as kind of odd that I didn't have any pictures of any of the green jeeps that 
Sometimes, I think I get so involved in getting caches that I forget about the little things. Almost all of my travel bugs that I've released have something on the order of, "please take pictures of the bug where you take him." And yet, when I've moved bugs, more often than not, I don't take pictures of where the bug or geocoin is going. I've found that during our summer camping trips, I'm much more tempted to take pictures of travel bugs that I've brought along for the ride, trying to get more of a story for each bug. Yet I'm still puzzled by my lack of pictures of all the bugs I've helped move. As of this post, I've helped move along 188 travel bugs and numerous geocoins. I'm leaving the geocoins out of the equation, because I know some of those are just "discoveries" and not actual movements. I don't discover travel bugs, so I know that I've actually had those guys in my inventory.
So with 188 travel bugs, one would expect for me to have at least 188 travel bug pictures, but I know that's not the case. Some bugs I have picked up, only to drop at a later cache on the same caching trip, so a picture really didn't happen. But even that is a pretty lame excuse since I
Now, granted, sometimes the goal of a bug is just to move it along from cache to cache. OK, I can say I've done that. I could have done more though. It wouldn't have required that much extra effort to squeeze off a picture or two of a travel bug near the location where it was. When I've done that in the past with some bugs, I've actually gotten some pretty interesting pictures. I thoroughly enjoyed the time I had with the Billiard Bug #13. I took it to an event cache and got a picture taken of it with 13 event attendees. I also got a picture of it at campsite #13 with an almost 13 year old. The creativity was part of the fun.
I think what I'm trying to say is I need, at least for myself, to step back and slow down a little bit. 
I think that's what I need to do from now on. I picked up two travel bugs on my last cache run up in the high desert this weekend. Lisa the Dinosaur is a five year old girl's first travel bug. I think the least I could do is to make a fun picture of the dinosaur terrorizing the dog, or something along that line. In fact, one of the goals is to post interesting pictures. I'm the 15th person to have Lisa in my hand. No one has taken a picture of her and she's traveled clear across the country from Maine to California. 
The other bug that I got this weekend was Monster Car. 9 cachers have seen Monster Car since it was released and not a single picture has been taken. Monster Car's travel is a lot more modest than Lisa, only a mere 123 miles, but he's been out in the low desert of California. Surely there could have been an opportunity for a off roading kind of picture to have happened. Well, I'm going to come up with something for it before I release it.
Last week, I took a beautiful road and found several caches along that road. I took a much slower pace and enjoyed the trip. I need to remember to do that with all things caching. I think I will appreciate it more, because it's not really a race, but more of a journey. I need to remember that.
Pictures were taken at or near the following caches of the following travel bugs:
Billiard Bug #13 seen near Sunset Crater by wolfb8 (libby)
Team Rainbow Apes - Black seen near The Mystery of Crowder Canyon by Tevis Clan
Storm Trooper seen near Star Wars TB Cantina by jeepnakd
Olaf's Search Party - Sven seen at RESERVOIR VIEW by w6lax
I like to cache, usually with other people because with more than one person, it’s usually easy to make distractions so that the other one can make the grab on a cache that might be in one of those muggle prone areas. But what do I do when I’m caching all alone? Tying your shoe can only work so many times, as does talking on your “GPS cell phone.” That’s one of the reasons why I usually bring my camera along. Photographers can get into some interesting places with a camera, just because they can explain themselves away as trying to get a different angle on a particular subject.
As I was looking over my gallery of photos, I realized that some of my more interesting shots have come because I was using my camera as a distracter. Today, I went out to find a travel bug hotel, but ended up abandoning the hunt because of a couple of muggles across the street from where the cache was hidden. They weren’t going to move away and even when I got out my camera, they kept looking over at me to see what I was doing. I got a very interesting shot of a bee on some wildflowers, but the muggles didn’t want to budge from their spot so I left, found four other caches and came back later. The muggles had moved away and I was able to make the grab quite easily then.
Caches hidden near fountains and sculptures provide excellent photography spots to use your camera as a distracter while you search. The 
Earlier this year, I was driving down from Northern California when I happened to take a break from driving to find a couple of caches in this small town. As luck would have it, I ended up getting to ground zero about fifteen minutes before a church service started across the street from where the cache had been placed. I could see the cache, but there was a very small chance of success in retrieving the cache at that time due to the high amount of muggles in the area. It was then I spotted this beautiful water tower, so I decided to walk the half block down to the water tower and get a couple of pictures, figuring as long as I was here, 
I could probably get a Water Tower Waymark along with the cache. By the time I came back after walking around the block, church was in session and I was able to make the grab quickly, without any muggle interference.
I’ve used two different kinds of cameras when I’ve gone caching in the past. My first digital camera was one of those point and shoot varieties. It took great pictures, and its small size made it easy to carry around. However, it was one more thing that I had to carry around in my hands, because it didn’t have a neck strap like my current camera does. My current camera, a SLR digital, has a neck strap so I don’t have to have it in my hands when I’m out caching, but it is a little bulkier than the point and shoot. Either one worked well as another type of distraction to dissuade muggles that I really wasn’t up to no good, so it’s probably a personal preference as to which one you choose. By taking your camera with you when you cache, you can give yourself another option with which to search for caches. It will also give you some pleasant memories of the place where you cached, that probably won’t fade as quickly if you’d just retained them in your mind.
Pictures were taken at or near the following geocaches:
Kellogg Hill TB Hotel - Just up from "My Town" - by jcworshipper clan
The Plaza - by juniperb
Power Me Up! - by mountain_mmike
