A Duck in the Desert

 "A duck in the desert?  Oh, but this is no ordinary duck.  This is a cschooner duck.  Now, for those of you that don’t already know, cschooner was our friend, our mentor, our LEAD DUCK!  He always maintained his humor and honed his creativity.  You couldn’t leave a conversation with cschooner without a smile..."

Last Sunday was supposed to be one of the days with cooler temperatures, making a 3.7 mile loop looking for duck geocaches a trek I was certain I could accomplish. We invited friends, Jon & Sherry, to join us on the duck hunt. We started at 9:00ish AM, prepared for a 5.5 mile or longer hike in the desert. 

cows watching us move through their territory

something has gnawed the bottom half of this barrel cactus

the cache owner was doing some maintenance at duck #16

just watching and waiting

about 7 miles of walking

about 5 hours

34 geocaches for us

more for Jon & Sherry

WE WERE TIRED!

Duck geo art done ✔️

the grande margarita tasted wonderful

chicken fajita salad

Thank you Jon & Sherry for spending the day on a duck hunt!

A Week's Worth of Geocaching Adventures

On Valentine's Day we headed back to our little casa in Gold Canyon after making a stop in Arizona City to attend a parking lot geocaching event and grab a few area geocaches.

We joined a small group of cachers to find a 'difficult' hide. They had found it by when we arrived.

an interesting angle of the abandoned house

* * * * * * * * * * 

Wednesday was Covid vaccine shot day for me. We drove to the western side of The Valley to Goodyear to a very organized drive-thru vaccine location in a hospital parking lot. From the initial check-in to the required 10 minute wait for any reaction was a total 25 minutes. Since we had driven that far and there wasn't anything else on the agenda, we did some geocaching in that area.

a hobo statue

some local art work at the ball park for the 

Cincinnati Reds and the Cleveland Indians

a desert cemetery in a field

a Hindu temple/monastery only 2 years old

in the middle of NOWHERE

* * * * * * * * * * 

On Thursday geocaching friends joined us at a recently placed field puzzle geocache. Field puzzle means read carefully. (We don't always do that.) This cache hider LOVES combination locks. We figured 4 heads were better than two.

the 3 of them tried, but I was successful

reading instructions for the next step

SUCCESS!

look at all the ducks

* * * * * * * * * *

Hubby received his vaccine shot at the Gilbert VA on Saturday morning. It was also a drive through in their parking lot. Not nearly as busy as the hospital location on Wednesday. His total time was also about 25 minutes. Again, there wasn't anything on the schedule so we headed south to another outdoor geocaching event and some geocaching.

Call Home!

a favorite geocache for sure!

February's Tucson Trip - 2

 We spent the next two days in the desert looking for the Minion.

This is a geo art. The geocaches are not in these locations when we start looking for them. The locations have moved and are usually along desert roads or trails. The best locations are along the roads under or next to the high line or electrical poles. 

A prickly pear cactus has started growing the the V of the tree trunk. Amazing!

desolate landscape, in this area

Lil' Red got a workout on this geo-art

one of the better roads

notice the high line poles

and more dense vegetation

do you see the geocache?

the creator of this geo art placed special golf balls for each cache

a road runner

standing still long enough for a photo op

Mojave Yucca

(I think)

a really TALL Mojave Yucca

along one of the better roads

and after two days of desert geocaching...

the Minion is done!

about 142 geocaches, golf balls, hanging in desert bushes

February's TucsonTrip - 1

On a Tuesday morning after a much needed haircut, we hooked up the travel trailer, brought it to our tiny house and loaded it for another trip to Tucson. We spent the first day doing roadside geocaching, meaning the geocaches were located near the side of the road. 

military tribute

Shark Teeth

On this trip, many of the roadside caches were hanging in trees, tall trees, way up high. We were prepared as we had a new Tool of the Trade (TOTT) with us and were ready to put it to the test.

reading instructions as we had forgotten how to use it

notice how small it is in Hubby's hand

a long reach, needing some coordination

he has the container

now we can open it and sign the piece of paper

and hang it back in the tree, up high for the next cacher

certainly better than climbing a ladder!

Santa Cruz River

a rare sight...moving water in the river

Hubby looking for a cache

and using the new TOTT to push a magnetic cache up high

on the sign post

we were in farming country part of the time

and we did some trash clean up to earn a special

geocaching souvenir

Another Desert Hike, with a Much Better Outcome

 Hubby and I decided we needed to go back to the area we hiked and geocached on Wednesday. Our legs appreciated the stretch as we both still had some sore muscles on Saturday. We were gone for just over an hour and successfully found the geocaches and the trails.

the base/trunk of this saguaro has certainly been attacked

by some hungry animals

such a pretty view of the mountains and saguaros

was this a concrete base for a bridge?

another view of Stegosaurus Mountain

 

a stone corral, four sides of rock walls about 6' high

another view through the trees

another saguaro that caught my eye...

...because of all the 'bark' missing on the one arm

a sandy trail in a wash

and a rocky trail in the wash

Another beautiful but much shorter day in the desert! Love those blue skies!