Mother's Day Geo-Event

It seems our geocaching friends put together a surprise Mother's Day and Graduation Party for Luann and fellow cacher, Jodster. It seems both girls achieved their degrees for their studies and had the graduation ceremony yesterday. So, the event was titled; "Don't Throw Mama From The Train". So, what does that have to do with graduating from college? Well, the event was held at Crews Lake Wilderness Park up in Pasco county where there just happens to be a seven and a half inch gauge railroad running there (see http://www.cpgrr.org/). Since Jodster's husband also donates his time to the train system, he was able to help set up the trains in order to give everybody rides. The neat part was that the girls had no idea that this event was planned in their honor.

It didn't go off without some problems though, as Captain Biggins called me and said he was at the store near the park to pick up the cake and some goodies, when he found out that he didn't have his wallet on him. Since it was real close to my cousin Karen's house, I called her up and asked if she could 'throw the Captain a rope' and rescue him. She quickly drove over to the store and helped out with the 'Captain's Dilemma'.

With all of that going on in the background, I had Luann, her mother and Katrina with me and we stopped at the entrance of the park, under the guise of looking for a geocache there, when lo and behold, Jodster and her husband, Montu Rider show up on their way to give her a Mother's Day train ride and here we were! Montu Rider invited us to go along on the train ride and we gleefully accepted. So, we drove over to the building where the trains are stored and Montu rolled out one of the cutest little trains we have ever seen. We hopped aboard and started off. As we made our way down the track, Montu asked if we would like to look for a geocache next to the tracks and when we said yes, he stopped the train so we could look for the container. After we finished up with processing the cache, we climbed aboard and headed on down the track. We motored for a couple of minutes and when we rounded a bend, we could see a station house up ahead and it was loaded with cheering people and a there was a banner that instantly indicated what all 3 of us guys were up to.

After we pulled into the train station and stopped, Jodi and Luann were escorted to their seats positioned front and center for all to see. Soon after we were situated, Karen showed up with the rescued cake and gooodies and the party was under way. We had some great fun, riding the trains, holding a raffle of the geocaching books Luann used as reference materials for her speech class and swapping stories. Well, enough of the story, now it's time for the pictures...

The event was held at Crews Lake Park.

Here is Montu Rider, setting up the trains to go for a ride.

As he hooks up the train, the unsuspecting girls watch him at work, having no idea what is in store for them.

Yeah, work fascinates them, they could watch it all day...

As Montu was working on the #799 engine and cars, this freight train came around the bend. The detail of these trains is amazing. This one belongs to the gentleman driving it.

And we're on our way.

As we got near the train station, you could see that it was less than deserted.

As a matter of fact, everybody shouted surprise and started taking pictures.

Well, what do you know? This Mother's Day geo-event is also a graduation party for Montu Rider's wife Jodster and Luann.

Captain Biggins escorted them to their seats and gave them their mortorboard graduation hats to wear...

Awww, don't they just look cute? All the while, Jodster was telling Montu that she was "going to get him", because she didn't want him to put on any kind of celebration for her graduation. Well he didn't. We can place this squarely on the shoulders of our good friend, Captain Biggins, the man with the plan (if not with the wallet). It seems that Biggins forgot his wallet when it was time to pick up the cake and the goodies at the store, and thankfully, Karen lived nearby and was able to help out. It's a good thing she was coming out to the surprise party and was a little bit late.

Montu Rider's idea of including the trains in this was awesome.

And, even though it was Mother's Day, quite a few of our geocaching friends showed up.

Will ya look at that? An up and coming engineer, he is!

Next, we had a raffle, where the door prizes were books about geocaching that Luann used for her speech class. Talk about serendipity...

And here was our littlest winner.

After the raffle, it was off for some rides on the train.

A quick stop by the train barn to see all the different kinds of trains they have...

...and it looks like a few of Montu's passengers were simply amazed by it all.

On the way back, Montu stopped the train so the geocachers could look for a cache or two. Caching by train, that's different...

Well, it looks like they found it. Time to sign the log and move along.

Remember, look both ways before crossing...

And here they are, arriving at the station. Jodster, Luann and Karen are leading the way.

Yep, it was a family affair on Mother's Day.

Ok, the train has come to a complete stop, time to disembark.

And how about some geocaching too? Captain Biggins and Palmetto went with us for a couple of them along with Karen and her boys too.

As we got to this 'boat ramp', we saw Old Bass Cacher and his wife, Smiling Little Perch, 'swimming' their way across the 'pond'. Looks like the drought we are having really is that bad because this is supposed to be a spot where people put their boats in the water...

Well, all good things must come to an end, so we leave you with a picture of this sign at the entrance of the park, so if you are interested in riding the trains throughout the wilderness, you can take a look for yourself on their website.