Geocaching In The Rain

While hiking 6.47 miles in the Serenova Tract Wilderness Preserve.

Karen and I took a hike in the Serenova Tract, the northern section of 6500 acre, nature area called the Jay B. Starkey Wilderness Preserve. The journey started out with a nice hike through this wooded section (it kinda reminded us of a Harry Potter or Lord of the Rings scene), but when made a left-hand turn, we were met by...

A rain storm rolling down on us from the north. Karen put on a poncho and I packed all of my electrical gear into a waterproof bag in my geo-backpack. There wasn't any lightning and the rain was steady, but wasn't pounding down on us, so we kept on marching.

After a while, the storm blew over us and the scenery was looking better.

At one point, we saw this burnt-out field with the remnants of this lone tree in the center. Kinda makes you wonder if lightning struck the tree and everything caught fire around it...

So, why did we go hiking into the Serenova Tract? To find one of those contest GeoGems in a hidden geocache deep in the middle of nowhere. So here I am, wandering around with a GPS in my hand, knowing that it's around here somewhere...

Taa-Daa! We have captured our prey. And you know it just had to be in the middle of a cypress dome, which is a bunch of tall cypress trees bunched together and the whole thing was surrounded by water that was 2 feet deep. It might have been slow, 'squishy' going, but I got it anyway...

Then, we had to drop off the Geo-Gem into another geocache on th eway out of the preserve. You can see the simple jubilation on Karen's face. Ok, so at about this point, we were tired and our feet hurt.

Ok, the funny thing about this picture is that I tried real hard to keep Karen from having to trudge through the swampy water. When we started our trek, came across a creek crossing that was a bit deep (more then 2 feet), so we back-tracked in order to find a way across. Then, a had her wait at the edge of the cypress dome while I 'slogged' through the swamp to go get the cache container, then after we pulled out the gem and signed the logbook, I trudged back through the swamp to hang the ammo box in the tree. So, I had been trying to keep her from shifting into '4-wheel drive', so to speak. That is, until we came across this section of the trail on our way out where the swamp simpley swept across the trail and there was no way to get around it. Well, after getting wet up to our thighs, i looked at the GPs and realized we still has over a mile to go... soaking wet...

Oh, and as we made our way through the preserve, I was quite mindful of the fact that the geocachers that had placed the GeoGem all the way out here had posted a picture of what looks to be a footprint from a black bear. Well, I didn't find any evidence of a black bear, but we did come across track from wild boar, deer, a couple of very large dogs and this one, which looks quite similar to the front footprint of a Florida Panther...

Yeah, I 'm looking forward to my next visit to this area...