Update: Italian Flag Micro Geocoin

I got an email today stating that our Italian Flag Micro Geocoin was just dropped off in a geocache called Eiszeitpark Harsefeld located in Niedersachsen, Germany.

This little coin has officially traveled 5,340.7 miles! It has been moved from Florida to New York to Massachusetts and finally Germany. Hopefully one day it will eventually make it to Italy and spend some time there.

The Phantom Zone

The second geocache that Gino and I found today was The Phantom Zone, hidden in the same wooded park as the other cache.

The GPS signal was weak under all the trees, and I couldn't get an accurate position to help find the container. After looking for ten or fifteen minutes, Gino suddenly jumped up and said, "Dad, I bet it's under that broken tree!" Of course, I swear I looked there, and we had climbed over and around that tree a few times already, but I never saw it. Once Gino started looking in that area, he found the container in amount a minute.

Inside the cache container was an Evil Micro geocoin. We'll look for a truly nasty evil micro cache to put this in sometime soon!

Backpacker Travel Bug

I recently got this Backpacker Travel Bug from the Groundspeak Shop. It's a pretty neat little trackable that actually attaches to the lid of a standard 35mm film container. The idea expands on ordinary traveling coins and bugs by allowing you to make a small container trackable. Now I just have to figure out where to drop it off and what to put in the film canister!

The top of the Backpacker TB

The bottom of the Backpacker TB

The Backpacker TB fitted onto a 35mm film container

Coins of the World

I decided to try and be more creative with the Cache Movers travel bug that I got last month. Instead of just attaching it to a toy or one of Gino's army men (like I did with the Recon Soldier), I wanted to do something more interesting. This time, I named it Coins of the World and put it on a big key ring, then I attached three different coins from around the world. One coin was from the Bahamas, one from Hong Kong, and one from Italy. I explained that the goal of this bug is to travel to many countries and pick up a new coin from each one. I'm hoping that this will be more interesting than just moving it from one place to another, and we'll be able to watch it grow in size as more coins are added.

Goofy Cacher

I found this Goofy Cacher coin inside the Shhh... Don't Tell Winlesspete geocache. It's a nice looking coin, but I didn't realize it's not trackable. Still, I will probably stick it in another cache somewhere down the line, or let Gino decide what to do with it.

Shhh ... Don't Tell Winnlesspete

In Deptford, not too far from Off The Beaten Path, was a geocache called Shhh... Don't Tell Winlesspete. This one was in another wooded area just off Route 41. It was easy to find and full of decent swag. I took the Goofy Cacher coin (not realizing it wasn't trackable) and left my Flip For It geocoin.

Off the Beaten Path

I stopped by Timber Creek Park in Deptford and found Off The Beaten Path. It was a beautiful little park in the middle of an otherwise sprawling area. The park was well maintained and the trails were easy. The cache container was simple to find, just off the main trail. I left the Pilsen geocoin from the Czec Republic that I picked up last month.

Cache Movers Geocoin

I also just received another Cache Movers Geocoin, and just like with the first one, I have yet to decide what to attach to this coin. I'll probably ask the kids what they think would be fun to send out into the world and see how far it goes, which means I'll probably be hooking this tag to another army man, or some other kind of toy.

Sailboat Suncatcher

I've been planning to put a geocache near the boat club, but have yet to find or make a suitable container, and I'm also having a hard time choosing a good location. Whenever I actually create and place a cache at the boat club, I plan to put this coin, called the Sailboat Suncatcher, inside it so its journey can begin from a relevant place.

Flip For It

I just got this neat little geocoin called Flip For It. The coin is almost exactly the same size as a real quarter, with some slightly different words and markings...

Chris' Cache

Angie, Celeste, and I took the kids and Abby the Geopug out for some easy hunting. The first cache we found was Chris' Cache, which was a little tupperware container hidden inside a hollow tree. The kids found it without trouble (or did Abby find it?). Unfortunately, the container was too small for any good swag, so we left the Red Carpet travel bug and took a pretty cool geocoin from the Czec Republic.

Team Canda, Abby the Geopug, and the kids.

Gino & Abby heading for the obvious hiding spot.

Giuli, Abby, & Gino pulling out the container.

Giuli refusing to share the treasure box with Abby.

The front side of the Pilsen geocoin. Very nice piece.

The back of the geocoin, showing Radyne Castle in the Czec Republic.

Maryland House

On our way from NJ to the Baltimore Aquarium, we stopped at the Maryland House rest stop on I-95 to stretch our legs, grab a snack, and look for a few geocaches. Just as Gino and I were heading into the woods, a couple was walking to the same spot with a GPS in hand, and we searched the woods beside the parking lot until we found both caches hidden there. The first one, Maryland House (Version 2.0), was pretty easy to find. It was a big tupperware container glued to an old car tire rim. Since we were in the woods beside a major rest stop, it wasn't really out of the ordinary to see something like that lying around back there, and Gino was the one who turned it over and made the find. We left our Tough Cache Geocoin inside this one.

The second cache in the same woods, Maryland House III - Bushwhacker's Delight, was another 500 feet deeper, and we had to cross 2 little streams and avoid getting poked in the eye by low branches and scratched by thorns. I actually made the find this time because Gino was too busy throwing sticks into the stream to really look. It wasn't that hard to find once we got to the area, and we left our Pennsylvania Geocoin inside this container.

On the way back to the car, we found the third one at the same rest stop. This one, Maryland House IV - Finally a Micro, was a larger red bison tube hidden in the crook of a tree. Even though the tree was right beside one of the buildings, it was easy to search without being noticed because the area was surrounded by large bushes and we were out of sight. Gino was too small to find this one by himself, but sitting on my shoulders helped him make the grab!

Stop for a Minute

We attached our t-shirt travel bug coin to a little sand timer and named it Stop for a Minute. Our intention is to remind people of the importance of taking a moment every day to relax and also to appreciate something beautiful...

New Geocoins

My new geocoins arrived in the mail today. They were a gift for my birthday. Thanks Angie & Celeste!

The first one is a Tough Cache geocoin. I'll try to drop this one off in a difficult cache deep in the woods...

The second one is a Pennsylvania Railroad geocoin commemorating PA as the birthplace of the railroad 180 years ago.

The last one is a T-Shirt geocoin, but it's actually more of a travel bug than a geocoin. I'll let Gino decide what to hook the t-shirt onto, just like we did with the Recon Soldier.

PA Turnpike - Harrisburg East

On my drive home from Harrisburg, I got gas at a rest stop on I-76 and grabbed the cache PA Turnpike - Harrisburg East while I was there. The cache was located inside the end of a guardrail by the parking lot. The container was an ordinary blue water bottle with a long bolt attached to the bottom. There was nothing of interest inside the container, so I left the GeoSheriff geocoin that I picked up in North Carolina last week.

Travel Turtle Geocoin

On my way toward Harrisburg for work, I took a quick break from the long boring drive across the state on I-76 and stopped at a rest stop to pick up the Bucket of Balls, Bugs and Coins geocache. I left the Anthus Laptop geocoin and took the Travel Turtle geocoin.

Recon Soldier

Gino finally decided he wanted to hook our Cache Movers Geocoin tag onto one of his army soldiers. He liked the idea of the soldier travelling from one geocache to another and fighting off bad guys and protecting the cache containers. So, we hooked the tag onto the soldier and he's now ready to go out into the forest.


Hopefully, we'll get some good geocaching weather soon so Gino and I can hunt down a good cache location for our Recon Soldier.

GeoSheriff Geocoin

On our drive back from Florida to New Jersey after Thanksgiving vacation, we took a quick break and stopped at the I-95 Coin Drop geocache. It was an easy find, and a decent sized container, the idea of which is to exclusively exchange coins and travel bugs. We left our DNF geocoin and took the GeoSheriff geocoin.

Anthus Laptop Geocoin in Pedro's Bridge

While travelling home from Florida, we stopped at the infamous South of the Border and found the geocache called Pedro's Bridge. It was a magnetic key holder hidden on the pedestrian bridge crossing the main road inside the rest stop. It was pretty cold and very dark, and I was surprised to see this place as empty as it was.



I was also surprised to find the Anthus Laptop Geocoin in the cache since there was no record of it being in there. The geocoin's logs also state that it's been in the hands of another geocacher for over a year, so I'm guessing that the other guy never logged it when he dropped the coin off...

It's a pretty neat little coin. It looks like a silver laptop and even has a working hinge. This particular geocoin has already travelled over 16,500 miles, and I'll be helping it continue its jouney very soon.

KP-What???

While visiting the grandparents in Florida for Thanksgiving, we had a few hours to kill before the big dinner so Dad and I took Gino out to find the geocache KP-What???. He found it pretty quickly (he's getting very good at this now!) and was surprised that it was a pretty large container. He decided to take a water gun, and we left our Italian Flag Micro geocoin.