Muskeegon event was a success!

2 messages in this thread | Started on 2002-11-12

Muskeegon event was a success!

From: Dog Scouts Troop (DogScouts@hotmail.com) | Date: 2002-11-12 18:33:07 UTC-05:00

The gathering we had in Muskegon Michigan for Letterboxing & Geocaching was a big success! There were 9 or 10 people in attendance (depending on the day) & all brought at least one furry, four-legged companion. Most arrived on Friday and we settled into the hotel. Several people had a long drive (including 2 people from Florida!), but we still ended up staying up late chatting. :-) On Saturday, Sheila ("Puppy Love") gave an extensive & very informative lecture about Geocaching, then we played a game to test our skill with a GPS. After lunch, everyone (but me) went to look for geocaches. I stayed behind at the hotel to hide some 'hitch hikers' as practice finds for everyone the following day. I also took a nap so I wouldn't be a total zombie the next day. :-). That evening, we went back to the meeting room & ate a wonderful casserole provided by Diane ("MommaDi") and a 7 layer salad provided by Kat ("Potak") & some pizza. Then we played more games. On Sunday, I (SCOUTDOGS) did a presentation on Letterboxing that was cut a bit short because they had another group coming in to use the room at 11am. During lunch, everyone searched for the hitch hikers I placed the day before at the hotel. All were found & will be traveling to many new places. I'll list them & their cities of destination in another email. Then it was off to Letterbox! Lonnie & Saikou ("Dog is my co-pirate"), Kat & Chelsea("potak") & myself with Coyote went to Hofma park to attempt to conquer the "Words in the woods" series. We started with Beautiful Things. It had rained the night before & the clues mentioned the area was boggy, but we didn't have any trouble. After the tricky water crossing, and a brief search, we found the box in good condition. Very nice stamp & log book! Then we picked up the clues from the asterisk to find 'A Kind of Summer'. We thought we had followed them to the conclusion, but then found the 'bench' that was mentioned. So we started over & think we found the spot the box was supposed to be, but no box :-( We then went to find Beauty of Dreams. Thanks to my "Shortcut" which ended up fruitless, causing more mileage & putting us on the trail backwards, we did end up finding this one :-) After Lonnie razzed me a bit about my choice of routes, my new nickname is "Shortcut"! (Just kidding) :-) We decided to drive up to Sleeper St. & look for the "New Lands" box. This was Lonnie's first find (done without me saying "I found it! There it is!" LOL) From here, we looked for the floating bridge geocache & just as we were ready to give up, Lonnie found it! It was getting late & we had dinner plans, so we left this really beautiful park. Not bad for Lonnie & Kat's first day letterboxing! We went to a spaghetti dinner that was a fund raiser for the lung transplant needed for the husband of one of our troop members. We were all tired, so we got to bed fairly early. On Monday, some of our group had to leave, but others stayed to letterbox. I went boxing with Diana ("MommaDi"). She wasn't able to make it to the event on Sat or Sun (except to deliver dinner), so I gave her a crash course in boxing & off we went! For her first box, we went to "Ghosts Below". She squealed with delight when she found it with very little help (if any) from me & was rewarded with not only her first ever find, but also being 'first finder' for this box (since it was only placed last weekend). It's a mystery box & Diana said solving the clues was fun! From there, we went to the Grand Haven Lighthouse. When we got to the parking lot, we met up with Lonnie, Joanne ("Wet Dog Willie"), Kat & Ginger ("Jax n' Ginge"). They had just found the lighthouse & Chinook Pier, so we went our separate ways & found the boxes on our own. "MommaDi" lives in Muskegon, and hadn't carved her signature stamps yet, so she said she would do that first before she signed in to these boxes.

I do believe we have several new letterboxing junkies as a result of this weekend. :-)

I will post more on the boxes others in our group found, as soon as they let me know which boxes they found (or didn't find) & their condition.

Spread the fever!

SCOUTDOGS (a.k.a. "Shortcut")

F-65 P-13 X-17 E-2 A-8

Re: Muskeegon event was a success!

From: Brian, Ryan & Lori (bconnoll@marksonrosenthal.com) | Date: 2002-11-13 15:56:47 UTC

--- In letterbox-usa@y..., "Dog Scouts Troop" wrote:
> The gathering we had in Muskegon Michigan for Letterboxing &
Geocaching was a big success!

Hello,

Sounds like you had a great time !

We are so looking forward to our first gathering.

TeamGreenDragon