US Trip 2017 – Day 13 – Around Utah Lake

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The route this day took us around Utah Lake. The plan was to find a lot of caches, and then some more. A couple trails, some virtuals and a couple GeoTour-caches was on the plan.

Approximate time on road/out caching: ~14 hours
Total miles driven: 182.7 mi / 294 km
Total cahes found: 182
Total DNF: 20
States visited: Utah
Famous places visited: None
Most memorable cache: GC5HA6K Utah GeoTour-Utah-Camp Floyd State Park Museum
Biggest surprise: The high quality of both the Pony Express caches and the road
Weather: Mostly sunny, some rain
Highest temperature: 100°F / 38°C
Lowest temperature: 70°F / 21°C
Roadwork: Yes

Not the best start

We started by stopping on a cache that wasn’t on our plan, and that ended with a DNF. When the first cache of the day ends with DNF, that usually tells us that we’re in for a day with more DNFs to come…

The first on our plan, was the Seinfeld trail. We were a bit surprised at how much longer time we used than we normally do on trails like this. But the scenery was nice! (As always in Utah)

Are you looking for something?

We didn’t get very far on the Seinfeld trail, before a muggle approached us. «Are you looking for something», he asked, before he quickly followed up by letting us know that he found a game piece. If we just waited, he would bring it to us. It was worth the shot, so we decided to wait. A couple minutes later, he arrived with the cache! Don’t think we’ve had that happen to us before. We signed, and put it back in place.

Road work ahead

We didn’t see much more muggles during the next caches, but we started seeing signs about a road closure. And sure enough, when we got to GC2C550 The Outing (Seinfeld Cache #59) the road was closed. So we had to go back, take the interstate to the next exit, and drive all the way backwards to GC2C6QB The Pilot (Seinfeld Cache #66).

A bit better

It got a bit better from here, and there was no more road closures. We also stoppet to find GC5Y6NR Utah GeoTour-Juab-The Smell of Lavender. When we eventually found GC2C6W1 The Race (Seinfeld Cache #100), we had used more than five and a half hour. A lot more time than we expected to use, based on the previous logs on these caches. Either we are very slow, or the people that found these caches before us, are really fast.

Caching like this often means that we have the windows open, to easily communicate with each other. That also meant that a lot of bugs got into the car. And they wouldn’t leave! In fact we struggled with them for almost a week…

DNF, DNF, DNF

When the DNF-frequency started to increase again, we decided to just stop and move to the next on the plan. And with a DNF both on GC2CQ0D The Cadillac (Seinfeld Cache #128) and two of the two caches we attempted in the Goin’ Fishing series, we decided to skip the Goin’ Fishing series as well. To make it worse, the toilet at the end of the trail was closed as well…

Either we are blinded by the natural beauty around us, or these caches are just too hard for us today…

A couple virtual caches

The next on our plan was some virtual caches, after a couple caches along the way. At least they were easy to find, which we needed after all the DNFs 😛

The Pony Express Trail

We had planned to do parts of the Pony Express trail backwards. But decided to do the other part in the right direction instead, since that probably saved us a lot of driving.

And wow, this was something completely different! Almost no traffic, easy caches and the unpaved road was a lot better than we expected. We should have started the day here!

We started at GC49A5M Pony Express #128 – Bauchmann’s Station – Utah and finished at GC49B1Q Pony Express #182 – Still Water – Nevada, and used about two hours on the 50+ caches. Not a single DNF!

Milestones!

We also reached a milestone during this trail, both of us. Heltinnen logged her cache number 12 000 and I logged my cache number 16 000.

Another GeoTour-cache

After the Pony Express, we continued to GC5HA6K Utah GeoTour-Utah-Camp Floyd State Park Museum in Fairfield. Another decorated GeoTour-cache. These caches are really awesome!

A very nice bonus was that we found another great cache in the same park. And for some reason, we didn’t have that cache on our plan! We even stopped at another bonus, awesome 😀

The homestretch

We only had a few more caches planned, and a long drive in the dark ahead of us. The last cache we found was kinda hard to sign, the logbook looked more like rust than paper…

We made it safely back to the hotel, having found 144 caches less than we had planned. Since it’s much better to find more than planned, we’re not putting this much on the plan itself next year 😛

Pictures

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