A Visit To The Cypress Creek Wellfields

After hunting for geocaches with Karen yesterday, we went on a bicycle ride around the Cypress Creek Wellfields, a place where water is drawn for the local municipalities. We were joined by fellow cacher 'Rainbow Girlz' and a friend of hers for our jaunt and we found a bunch of nature all over the place. Remember, you can click on the pictures to see a larger version of the image.



The sun was shining off of this spider's web in such a way that I just had to get a picture of it.



Here we are, inspecting the remains of a burned -out oak tree that was struck by lightning. It took alittle bit of bushwhacking to get to the site, but we were able to get some neat pictures.



For example, this yellow garden spider. It was neat to see the web with its zig-zag sticky track and the spider's nose-down attitude.



There were lots of butterflies fluttering all over the place. This one paused just long enough for me to snap a picture.



Even the moths were cute. This one landed on Luann's hat to rest for a minute or two.



Here is one of the caches we found. Katrina decided to place a Winnie The Pooh keychain fob from Mom's collection in the container.



Now, this ferocious-looking beast is a golden orb weaver, also commonly called a banana spider, due to its long, yellow thorax. Yeah, I wouldn't want to come face-to-face with one of these guys!



Looks like we found another geocache, and this time Rainbowgirlz is processing it as we watched.



This squirrel thought we didn't see him as he remained curled up and motionless on the knot of this oak tree.



And how about a quick-pic of a grasshopper? He stayed quite still while I took this shot.



Then we came across this pygmy rattlesnake. It's so hard to believe that we stepped right over him and only after 4 of us had gone over this guy on the log, that Katrina had spotted him sleeping there. Looks like we should be a bit more vigilent in a explorations.



Well, it's been fun, but it's high noon and we need to pack it up and get out of the heat. This was a bunch of fun. We got about 5 miles of bike riding done, photographed a bunch of critters and had fun hanging out with Rainbow Girlz and her friend. Until the next time...

Caching With Karen & David

We dedided to meet up with Karen and her possible husband-to-be, David, at the Saint Pete Pier to do a little geocaching and just hang out for a while. Here they are on the observation deck, waiting for us to show up.



Ah yes, it looks like it's a nice day for sailing...



Nothing like the 'Captain' and the 'First Mate' standing at the rail and getting a bad case of "Remember Whens".



Hey! That's a Zoltar machine just like in the movie "BIG"! I wonder if we made a wish, would it come true? Probably not...



Katrina just had to try out the hurricane booth. For 2 dollars you get to stand in the middle of a 78 MPH windstorm. Looks like it might be a little loud in there.



Ok, it's about time we did some geocaching. So, the GPS took us to this spot and now what? Something about 13, I think...



Well, if you turn the coin-operated binoculars to position 13 on the base ring, you will get a picture of this. So, what does that mean? Oh well, guess we need to look for other caches instead.



So, here we are, over by Tony Jannus' monument, and David picked this one up. Nothing like a 35mm container in a palm tree. A spot like that is called a "Florida Hide". Nice backdrop.



Here is the monument and the reason why this geocache was placed here. Something of a, "Hey guys, look at this!"



The next set of coordinates took us to a park with a fountain nearby. Karen was certain that the container had to be hidden somewhere on one of these park benches. You can see she is operating in full stealth mode and not making any moves or committing any actions that might make the public suspicious of her activities...



Taa-Daa! Katrina found it attached to a different park bench. We all signed the log sheet, Karen dropped off the cool coin and we dropped the Gecko pendant in the tin.



And this is why the geocache (which had been here for some time) was placed here. Apparently, the fountain (which wasn't running when we got there) was commissioned in 1976. Remember, you can click on most of the images in this blog to see a larger version of them, and to read what the plaques and monumants say.



After checking the GPS and not finding anything nearby, Karen wanted to continue pursuing the one we started to hunt on The Pier. It seems that the picture we took at the coin-operated binoculars gave us a pretty good idea where to go (yeah, about a mile away). When we arrived, there was this Great Blue Heron, fishing for his dinner.



The gecocache we were looking for said something about reflectors, so we figured this must be the spot. Besides, the heron was kinda pointing the way for us...



So I walked out on the seawall... and found nothing.



Then I climbed on this concrete drain-thingy... and found nothing. No matter where we looked, we just couldn't seem to spot the thing. Oh well, we tried...



So we called it quits for the day. After checking on the internet, it looks like we were right on the spot for the geocache, but since we weren't willing to get our feet wet, we didn't find the container. We know where it is, now we have to go back out and get it... some day.

We Found Excalibur!

What does that mean?

Excalibur is a geocache that is unlike any we have come across before. It mixes regular geocaching with orienteering (working with a compass) and some serious math. This is a marker post that gives you coordinates to follow the trail using a plate-type compass to guide you.

Yeah, it was a hot and 'sun-shiney' day. We teamed up with fellow geocachers, Embargo and Captain Biggins to take on the challenge.

Sometimes, Nature made it tough on us, as can be seen here. It's hard to find a marker when a fallen tree branch is partly obscuring it.

We're still going, but the going is getting tough. The sun is out in full force, and we are sweating mightily.

We came across gopher tortoises all over the place.

You can see how tough it is to navigate for 600 yards when all of this is between you and the next marker. Thank goodness we did some research to help make things a little easier. And the weird thing was that there were prickly pear cactus plants everywhere. Everybody in our party ended up having to stop and pick cactus spines out of a foot or leg.

You see this wood pile? If you choose to take on Excalibur, you had better be ready to pass this thing at least 4 times. We decided to do a group shot by standing a piece of wood on end and placing the camera on it.

After we found all of the markers, we did some quick math and the GPS units said we had to walk 3 miles on a bike path to get to the final container.

Yeah, we walked, and walked, and walked. Man, it was hot!

We came across this doe and a faun by the side of the trail. Nice pose...

Eventually, the coordinates took us to a swamp. We started looking for some way to get to the spot where we think the container should be with out walking through the muck. Unfortunately, after walking around the swamp, we were forced to trudge into the quagmire looking for the Excalibur final container.

After getting as close as 50 feet and getting stuck in deep mud, Embargo and I agreed that this isn't the right place. Time to get out of this mess...

On the way back, we came across this alligator. We sure were glad he wasn't in the swamp where we were slogging around just a couple of minutes ago.

Ah, finally! The legendary Excalibur geocache final container has been located! Ok guys, stop fighting over the container, we will all get a chance to sign our names to the logbook. Also located inside the box was a 10-coin challenge geocoin that both Bigigns and Embargo were competing for. I took our giant geocoin and tossed into the air to see who would be leaving the park with the challenge coin. Up it went, then right back down to Earth...

...And it stabbed end-on into the ground! Can you believe that? It has been weird all day long during this quest, and then this has to happen... Well, let's yank it out of the ground and try again. This time, it landed flat and Biggins won the toss. Now that we finally found all 15 ammo cans and conquered the legendary Excalibur geocache (the toughest one in Tampa Bay) we were ready to go home and just sleep.
We won! Didn't we?

House On Fire

A police car and a fire truck went blazing by the front of the house. Come to find out, a neighbor's house was on fire. We drove down real quick to see if it was somebody we knew personally, but we couldn't get close to the area.

You can see the smoke above the police car. It looks like the whole neighborhood came out to see the 'barn-burner'.

The whole block was locked down by the fire trucks and police cars.

And the smoke can still be seen rising above the van in the carport. We hope everyone is ok...

A Tour Of The Local Boat Show

Welcome to the boat show. All 3 of us where joined by Katrina's friend, Melissa. This is a view of the outdoor display.

There were quite a few boats at the docks. Many were well above our price range.

And even more boats... Imagine that!

Inside, Miss Geico the racing boat was on display. Looks like she runs on turbine power to reach around 190 MPH.

Betcha didn't know there was a female version of the gecko lizard for Geico Insurance, I didn't.

Here's the back view of the trailer holding Miss Geico. It's so big, it has 2 little 'pit-bikes' mounted on it.

That's a massive hydraulic system used to move the boat into position.

And here's the end of the trailer. While we were trying to get this shot, we had to wait until several grown men stopped 'fondling' the rudder blade. What's up with that?

We saw this 3-wheeled motorcycle by the jet skis. Yeah, Luann would like to have one of these.

We registered earlier for a boat ride in a Master Craft ski-boat, so here we are, suited up and ready for the run.

Take a look at these monsters! And they aren't even part of the show. We passed them by as we took our test drive.

Time to lay into the throttle.

It looks like the girls are having fun.

I don't know what the story is about this little lighthouse on such a small waterway. I'll need to check into that later.

This cruiser put up such a huge wake that the pilot of the boat took the opportunity to jump the Mastercraft completely out of the water. Yee-haw!

After the boat ride, the Hillstrand brothers from the TV series "Dangerous Catch" appeared to sign autographs. It was weird how everybody mobbed these guys.

It was like these guys were some superstars from Hollywood, rather than simple crab fishermen trying to eke out a living on the Bering Sea.

Excuse me, I want a picture! Who cares if somebody might be behind you, already taking a picture? Bee-Otch, I hope your picture comes out blurry!

Another pose for the crew members of the Time Bandit.

Peekaboo, we see you!

And finally, why would a Shelby GT500 Mustang be at a boat show? I don't know either, but we took a picture of it.