Local Heroes Travel Bug Hotel

Another quick find on the way home was the Local Heroes Travel Bug Hotel. The GeoTots found this one with no problem! We even met some very nice neighbors who chuckled at the kids as they looked for the container.

We dropped off some swag trinkets of our own, plus left the Le Croissant travel bug. We grabbed two other travel bugs (the Yuengling Bottle Opener and Liberty Island). But as the kids were picking through the swag, my daughter found a beautiful pink gem. When she showed it to me I was impressed at how nice it was. It wasn't until she showed me the little black bag it had been in that I realized what it really was.

That gorgeous pink gem was actually a trackable GeoGem called What a Rock! Until today, I'd only seen pictures of them. It's a nicely shaped plastic gem with the trackable code inscribed on the top. It was only after some grumbling and pouting that my 4-yr-old daughter gave it up (and after a promise from me that I'd get her some different princess jewelry...).

Girl Scouts of Central & Southern NJ

This geocache is called Girl Scouts of Central & Southern NJ. We made a quick pit stop for this cache on the way home. The kids found it with no problem after the GPS settled down. They each took a little trinket, replaced them with a few of their own, and dropped off the Travel Bugs Pierre and Pooh and Friends. We also picked up the Travel Bug Clue - The Weapon.

Update: Stop for a Minute

I just received an email stating that our Stop For A Minute trackable piece was dropped off in Nonek's Knoll. That geocache is in Florida, just south of Fort Lauderdale. According to the Geocaching website, our little sand timer Travel Bug has now traveled 8,958.9 miles!

This trackable moved over 400 times and has been from New Jersey to Maryland, Virginia, New York, Illinois, Iowa, Indiana, California, and Florida.

Le Croissant

The Le Croissant travel bug was inside one of the caches that Gino and I found this afternoon, Walk Around The Walls. This unusual little trinket started its journey in Germany in December of 2006.  Over the past 4 years, this thing has traveled over 12,000 miles! 

The tag on this travel bug has the same basic message in both German and French. 
In German it says:

"Das kleine Croissant möchte die Welt kennen lernen. Gerne würde es seine Heimat Frankreich besuchen. Auf andere Länder mit leckeren Backwaren ist es aber auch neugierig. Bitte macht ein Foto, von den leckeren Backwaren, wenn ihr die Möglichkeit dazu habt." 

In French it says:

"Le petit croissant voudrait faire la connaissance du monde. Volontiers cela visiterait son pays natal la France. Cependant c'est aussi curieux d'autres pays(terres) avec les pâtisseries délicieuses. S'il vous plaît, fait une photo, des pâtisseries délicieuses, si vous avez la possibilité de cela."

11th & 17th Birthday Cache

Gino asked me this afternoon if we could go treasure hunting because it's a beautiful warm day, plus it's been awhile since we last went. So I looked up a few decent geocaches nearby and off we went. We found 11th & 17th Birthday Cache hidden in the woods in Wenonah. It was a nice walk, the temp was just right, and we had fun.

Inside the cache container, Gino found the Jim Jaggers travel bug. It's a little army guy, very similar to our own Recon Soldier. We'll try to find a good place to help him continue his journey.

Rowan's Cache

After a morning meeting nearby, I had some time to kill before my next appointment, so I took a stroll along a beautiful wooded path on the Rowan Universtiy campus and grabbed Rowan's Cache. It was situated in the crook of a large tree in the middle of the wooded area, just slightly off the main pathway. If I were a few inches shorter, I might not have been able to reach this, but as it was I only had to stand on the very tips of my toes to grab the container (a vitamin bottle covered with camouflage tape). Inside the bottle was nothing really special, so I put my Coins Of The World travel bug inside for the next geocacher.

The Big Tree

Can you see the cache hidden in there?

Camo'd Vitamin Bottle

Cache contents (with my Coins Of The World TB)

Vehicle Travel Bug

This is another item I picked up from the Groundspeak Shop. It's a Vehicle Travel Bug decal that sticks to the inside of your window, making your car trackable. I really like this one because it's not a sticker that's permanent, but a decal that you can remove and transfer somewhere else. If I ever buy a new car, this can come with me...

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.

Homewood

My meeting this afternoon was near a cache called Homewood, so I stopped by. The location was in the wooded area beside a Hilton hotel. At the far end of the parking lot was a gravel road that lead a short distance into the woods.
The container was something I'd never seen before. It was a sort of two-piece plastic tube, with one end inserted into the other. The outer part was tied to a post in the woods, and I had to pull out the bottom part.
Inside was a zip lock bag with a log, but nothing else. The tube was pretty skinny and too narrow to hold any of my geocoins. However, it wasn't too small to hold the Miller's Inn travel bug that I've been holding for way too long. I signed the log, dropped in the travel bug, replaced the container, and tried to walk out of the woods by the hotel without looking shady...

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.

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.

Bowling Memories

Like yesterday, I had some time to kill on my way from work to get the kids, so I stopped off at the Laurel Lanes bowling alley to grab the Bowling Memories geocache. It was a quick and easy find. The container was just sitting in the corner of the fence surrounding the parking lot, but on the back side that faces the woods. Since there's really no reason to go back there, other than to find this thing, there's very little chance of someone spotting it.

Inside the little tupperware container was the standard log book, some swag that consisted of a few pins and key chains, and three travel bugs. I took one of the travel bugs and left some foreign coins.

The travel bug I took is called The Miller's Inn TB, and it was a tiny keg of Guinness beer on a keychain. This geocache was a completely suitable location for this travel bug, which actually originated in Switzerland last October. The goal of this bug is to travel from cache to cache, preferrably those at or near other Irish pubs. I will do my best to keep the tradition going and find a pub with a nearby cache to place this.

The Crater

The third and final geocache that Celeste and I took the kids to find today was called The Crater. It was in a wooded area behind a Green Acres site in another very nice residential community. Aside from the occasional thorn bushes and the rather large orange-colored stream that ran through the woods, the kids did fine with the terrain.

The tree cover created a lot of GPS signal bounce, but we eventually spotted the container. This time, Giuli found some swag that met her criteria, but Gino didn't want anything. We also left the tiger travel bug called Fast Cache that I found last month while working way out in Pennsylvania.

SJCC: Oak

This was the second geocache that Celeste and I took the kids to find today. It was called SJCC: Oak and it was way back in the woods just off a small hiking trail that ran through a very nice residential community. We actually saw a group of about 30 white tailed deer in a field nearby, and we also scared some while we were wandering noisily through the woods.

Gino found the container pretty quickly when we reached the area. He picked his prize, but Giuli found nothing that interested her. We also left our Recon Soldier travel bug in the cache.

Anna's Cache

Celeste and I took Gino and Giuli out geocaching this afternoon. It was actually beautiful day for mid-January. The first geocache we found was called Anna's Cache. It was in a wooded area behind a very nice residential neighborhood. We found the container pretty quickly. Both kids rummaged through the contents and picked out their prizes. We left our own travel bug called Stop For A Minute.