Cars

Belton And Back

Although we swore we were going to be staying home this weekend because we will be on the move the next two, we couldn’t stand it. We had completed the Alphabet Soup – South Carolina Style Challenge a couple months ago by grabbing 26 caches within the state’s border, each one beginning with a different letter of the alphabet, we hadn’t done the final stage in Belton. That was today’s destination.

We started by doing the bread crumb series of caches which start in North Augusta and end in Greenwood (or vice versa.) At each cache you get part of a set of coordinates and after doing all 6 you end up with the whereabouts of 2 different caches, one in each of the end point cities. Seeing as we were heading north, when we got to Greenwood we plugged in our bonus cache coords and headed off for it. When we pulled into the park where it was located the place was jammed with cars and people soccer balls. Turned around and left, to come back another day.

We also had a few others to look for on the way up and way back besides our goal cache in Belton. We finished the day with 10 caches found, 2 counties checked off, one more DeLorme page complete and one DNF.

Unfortunately the DNF was for the one cache we really wanted, Alphabet Soup. I know I really shouldn’t wear shorts when caching, but I’m willing to put up with a few random scratches for comfort, so I risk it. Hunting for this cache I really regretted it. Here is the log I left on the cache page:

It was easier finding the 26 letters of the alphabet caches than it was finding this one.

Walking along next to a stream when the arrow of the GPSr points 40′ into the the brush perpendicular to the trail. After about 5 feet in I knew I was not coming out of this unscathed, there were pointy thorns aplenty tangled everywhere. I got within 25′ of GZ and couldn’t get to it for the brambles. Backed up a few feet and attacked at another angle. Different briars stopped me, still about 25′ away.

Struggled back to the trail looking for another way in. Spotted something promising about 15 feet further along. Only a few steps in and already it was major pokeville. Dodge. Weave. Duck. GZ is 25′ way. Dang it. I’ve already been stuck several times, so I barge along parallel to the trail and get myself locked in real good in a tangle of stickers. Check the GPSr, yep, 25′ away. Losing a little more skin and blood I forge through the stickers in that direction.

I stop when I get to a point where there is an inch of water on the ground. The arrow on the GPSr is pointing back the way I came and you can guess as to how far away it said I was…twenty-five feet.

My wife, who had given up long ago because of the briers, talked me out of the sticker bushes before I passed out from blood loss and we mumbled and grumbled our way back to the car. I am not going to look good in shorts for several weeks…

If we ever come back for this one I’m bringing a DR Brush Mower!

Started down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 475

98,000 Pieces of Coal

Loading CoalSaturday the MMC took a trip to Winnsboro to visit the South Carolina Railroad Museum. This weekend there was a visiting steam engine to give that old time feel (and smell) to your train ride. We combined the Club’s monthly breakfast with the train event, plus following the hour long train ride we drove to a nearby town for lunch making for almost a full day Miataness.

After lunch Donna and I went our separate ways from the group because we had an alternative agenda, that’s right, geocaching. Before leaving we made tentative dinner plans with another MMC couple to meet in Lexington at the Uno Chicago Grill at 5:30 to complete the Trifecta (all 3 meals out.)

Got all caught up chasing camo’d containers in the north central part of the state and ended up not being able to make it back to Lexington in time for pizza with Rudy & Patti. We were disappointed on two levels. With the dreary day and approaching of dusk we opted for the more direct way home from where we were and resigned ourselves to eat in Newberry at whatever place we could find. Luck was on our side though, willing to dine in a Hardee’s or a Subway, we stumbled on The Flying Pie on Main St and had a wonderful pizza about half way between the thin crust of West One in Hendersonville and the thick Chicago style pie in Lexington.

Saturday by the numbers:
299 – Miles driven on the day
98,000 – Total miles now on the Emperor
1 – Tank of gas used
5 – O’clock wake up call
14 – Hours from leaving home until returning
58° – High for the day, 20 below normal
9 – Cars in a line (7 Miatas, 1 Boxster and a Jeep)
11 – Mile train ride (5-1/2 under steam power)
100 – Pounds of coal burned by the train per mile traveled
8 – Caches found
3 – SC County Challenge caches and
2 – DeLorme Challenge pages finished

Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 437

The Biggest Thing To Hit Aiken Hits Johnston

After a couple of weeks languishing on the eastern bypass of Aiken and setting tongue’s a wagging all over town, the biggest thing, literally, to hit town has moved on. We know this because on our way back from Hendersonville this afternoon we were stopped by a huge commotion of cop cars and 18 wheeler trucks in the town of Johnston. The 1.2 1.89 million pound generator (according to an earlier referenced Aiken Standard article) and its entourage was parking for the night at the corner of SC 121 & SC 191.

Big Thing

Started up, went down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 430

4.5 Months To Go

Until Season 6 of TDTVS. They are already filming episodes in Hawaii and like the junkie I am I’m already reading the spoilers…

I had downloaded all the Season 5 vids from a back alley of the interweb and burned them onto DVDs. I lent these out to a co-worker a couple of weeks ago and yesterday he came up to me and asked what he needed to do to get another set of discs. Seems he has misplaced them. He has turned his office, home and cars inside out with no luck. Curiously a Neflix disc of Air Bud: Golden Receiver (AKA: Air Bud II) is also missing from his possession. Coincidence, I think not.

This Sunday is Episode 5 of TDTVS2 and AMC is going to run a mini-marathon of the first 4 episodes leading into numero cinco. Guess where I’ll be from 6:00PM until 11:00PM?

Started up, went down, back up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 385

Dead Bugs in the Middle of the Car

2009 Bug Splat WinnersTonight was the MMC’s Annual Bug Splat Rally. With only five cars in attendance nearly everyone was assured of a prize. From left to right, John Nicholls, Closest to the Dot with his prize of Bullseye BBQ Sauce; Dave Schumacher with the Cleanest Car prize of Bug Stickers to use next year; Donna Bogardus with Bath Time Stickers to wash the Most Bugs off the nose of the Emperor and Denny Smith with the Trophy for Biggest Bug. If you look just to the right of the Big Bug on the Trophy you will see the ghostly apparition of Rudy Wilmoth who was the driver of the only car not to take home a prize. Don’t feel too sorry for Rudy as he and Patti are past winners of the coveted BBT and are just coming off a two year streak of winning the Cleanest Car.

Started up, went down, went up, back down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 356

Old Guys Almost Rule

1) Fifty-nine year-old Tom Watson almost won the British Open.

2) Thirty-seven year-old Lance Armstrong couldn’t hang with Alberto, but still is in 2nd place in the GC.

3) Fifty-three year-old Brian Bogardus can only seem to find half of the geocaches he is looking for.

Brian_the_Red found The Retirement Cache (Traditional Cache)
We were 2 for 2 on the Odell Weeks caches tonight after a pizza dinner at Ferrandos. Nicely done on the hide, been wondering when we would see one of these in action.

Brian_the_Red found Love Sports-Hook, Line and Sinker (Traditional Cache)
We were 2 for 2 on the Odell Weeks caches tonight after a pizza dinner at Ferrandos. We had never attempted these 2 at the Weeks Center for fear they would be right along the walking track and awfully hard to get stealth-fully. But we were pleasantly surprised that they were far enough away as to be easy to not get muggled.

Brian_the_Red couldn’t find “SECTION” (Unknown Cache)
Sometimes you get the cache and sometimes the cache gets you.

This one has got us stumped, we just can’t find stage 1. The cache owner has confirmed we solved the code right, so our coordinates are correct and he even gave us a small clue…

They say it takes a big man to admit defeat, well tonight I am a very big man.

Brian_the_Red couldn’t find Valor is a Virtue (Unknown Cache)
Didn’t get a chance to find the cache yesterday as we got a late start with this one and ran out of light to finish solving for the coordinates.

Came back today and went hunting for the cache. We spent quite a bit of time hiding in the bushes avoiding the surprising amount of cars driving by. While we were in there we looked with no success.

Started down, still down.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 300

93,000 Empty Seats

93,000 Empty SeatsWhile circling the Lowes Motor Speedway loop road looking for the registration building, the Emperor rolled past the 93,000 mile mark.

Today’s mission was a resounding success. We spent the morning watching all variations of cars race around 3/4 of the big oval and a t-shaped infield course at the Speedway. Lunch was a taste bud tantalizing mixture of red beans and rice with andouille for me and stuffed shrimp for Donna. That was after our appetizers of Crawdaddy Fondue Dip for her and Rat Toes for me (don’t worry, I saved you some Mark.) We found some nice light hikers for Donna that were cheaper than expected and we snagged three caches (1 at the race track and 2 near the mall.)

I even have the film I kiddingly promised, but it is so lame I won’t post it. I decided to use the camera and take a short video of our friends Miatas as they went by. The movie consists of about 3 seconds of cars flashing by and then the next 12 seconds are of my (and Donna’s) feet and legs as we walk away from the fence. I forgot to push the shutter a second time to stop the movie…

Started up, went down, went up, still up.
Miata Top Transitions since 10/24/08: 279