The Sussex Amble - Geocache

Just taking a trip to a childhood location and added some caches onto the GPS while we were in the area! We only did four but they were part of a much bigger series, in total there are 72 caches! I'm not even sure it's possible to do in one day. 

SA36 The Sussex Amble

This cache was by no means fun to get too. We were up on a footpath on the other side of the river and crossing was not much fun! We fought threw lots of brambles and dead ferns to get onto the right path. When reaching the location it was hinted to be a fallen tree but there wasn't one in site. I stuck my head in a bush and behold I could see a tree inside. It was very over grown and I had to wrestle to get inside the bush. The log itself was wet and hadn't been signed in exactly a year to the day (spooky!)

Stick your head in! 

SA35 The Sussex Amble

Walking along the path, the clue was "above your head", the GPS took us to another tree but had no luck, I walked down the path slightly and checked out this tree. 

Safely nestled away onto in the trunk! Wet log though, even though they seem secure. 

SA34 The Sussex Amble

 This was an easy find and not hard to get too, located at the bottom of a birch tree. Log was full and slightly wet but not as bad as previous ones. 

SA33 The Sussex Amble

Locating which pine tree was the correct pine tree in a clearing of pine trees was a pain! Easy to spot though and log was better condition than the others. 

We were walking for an hour and twenty minutes but we were detouring off of the caches to explore so an accurate time to find them would have been around 30 minutes or so. We walked 4.3km - 2.6 miles. The terrain can get hilly and steep, also sandy and flint paths which makes it harder. A nice area although it's changed a lot since when I came, lots of trees being cut down despite it's National Park status.

Glenturret 05 - Trackable UPDATE

We found the trackable Glenturret 05 - besucht alle Deutschen Bundesländer in Florence while at Forte Belveder. It was a nice coin and had come from Germany before hand. It had travelled around a lot of Germany but I believe that was its goal. By taking it home we may have ruined its initial goal, hopefully it can make it back over to Germany. 

We dropped it off near Chichester Marina on a series called The Return 1 in which I wrote the first part of the series here. We added on 744 miles to its journey even if it wasn't really wanted.. This is the 3rd trackable under our belt!

The video of the drop off can be watched here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFjE5Ee2dKo

The Return, Chichester - Geocache

After a while of not doing a series me and Lewis decided to head to Chichester Marina and start another series where the Lipchis canal series finished. it was also mine and Lewis' 1st year anniversary so it was nice to visit the location that our 2nd date (also the same day he asked me to be his boyfriend) took place! We only went from 1-9 as the series can be done in two parts, it's quite a big walk to do in one, we'll do the rest another time soon! 

You can watch the journey here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rFjE5Ee2dKo

The Return 1

An easy cache but hard for your eyes to adjust too among the bush, it's right at the start of the footpath so I assume in the summer it's muggle central!

The Return 2

 A small container, easy to spot but I think my eye is just becoming well trained in spotting English trail caches! We also dropped of a trackable here that we picked up in Florence from Fort Belvedere, I shall also link to it's own travel blog update once completed. These caches have lovely logs, nice big notebooks that have lots of room to write the date and your name!

The Return 3

Slightly obvious to spot as the brick were unnaturally stacked by I suppose a passer by wouldn't suspect a thing!

Just a little further up you can see a small barn with lots of cows in. Not very exciting but it's a break from all the green lovely scenery!

The Return 4

 This cache was marked as under maintenance but checking the logs I saw that someone had fixed it, I added it to the GPS just in case it was there and behold it was! It was previously believed to be vandalised but it is kind of suspicious with some twigs stacked up on a tree. Perhaps the farmer was sick of people hanging around near his cows. 

The Return 5

At a 45 degree angle.. I wonder where it could be!

In among some stinging nettles of course.

The Return 6

 A nice little co-ordinates cache (multi-cache). I did wonder how there would be one at first when it was just open field after open field and then there was this random sign in the middle of no where to get the answers to the questions! It's about the Airfield, gives you something to learn along the walk. 

After putting in the co-ordinates you can easily find the cache hidden away, there were lots of little mice running around, they must have been protecting the cache from any more vandals! 

The Return 7

High in a tree, easy to see and probably a bit odd to anyone who spots it. A random box in a tree! It did have a one off signature in it that wasn't in the previous cache or the one after so maybe someone spotted it and decided to add their name.

The Return 8

 Hiding lower in a tree this time, not as easy to spot as it's tucked away but still an easy find!

Reaching Dell Quay and it was quite a nice view, not so much the smell though. It was a very sunny day and seemed to be hotter than when we set off. Very nice place that I haven't visited before, we plan to park up here when we continue the caches.

The Return 9

 Last for the day but not least! Hidden in a overgrowth behind a post, tucked away and probably the most well hidden cache so far. 

 #9 is located right by this pub, The Crown & Anchor. It looked lovely inside but we already had dinner plans so sadly didn't go inside. It was such a beautiful day with no breeze and the view from the pub was great! The seats outside looked like they had an even better view but if you plan on stopping by and it's not very nice weather you'd still get a great view inside. (Slightly expensive with cod and chips costing £14 but I bet it taste great!)

 We headed back to the Marina after 9 and then went and enjoyed a nice Indian, where we also ate on our date. We ended up walking for 56 minutes one way and that was 3.7km - 2.2 miles but Lewis turned of the GPS so the total distance would be an average of 3 miles as we walked a shorter footpath back! The first photo was taken at half past 2 and the last video was shot at quarter to 5 so  we were out for 2 hours and 15 minutes. I'd estimate we walked for about an hour and 45 minutes there and back! It was lovely day, with nice and easy caches. They were all small containers so made for nice trades and trackables. Will be nice to finish the series!

Pagham, again! - Geocache

Pagham Reserve

Took a trip back to Pagham today just so we cleared both the caches! It was a lovely warm day but the terrain was quite muddy and wet in areas. We didn't take our latest trackable because we'd checked the logs and seen it's not really visited frequently enough. 

The cache is a Premium cache so those who don't have Premium can unfortunately not take part but alas I shall show you otherwise! 

 Along our travels I spotted a little lady bug in the grass, with my super hawk vision I picked him up. They are so happy to just crawl onto your hand and sit there it makes me wonder if they're scared or not. 

  Returned him to a little nice patch of long grass with some dandelions in, he (or she) went on their way!

The cache can be found by looping around a footpath, it was 850m for the start of the reserve so it's not too far of a walk. It's quite a quick footpath walk compared to the rest of the others so it's a nice easy pick up. The cache itself is also big, has lots of things inside and lots of cachers cards that people have dropped off. Not many people do this cache so the log book dates back to 2007 where people have left longer messages as a sort of journal of cachers!

 There's plenty of swaps inside and easy for trackables to be dropped off. Suring the summer perhaps this gets more visits from the near by holiday caravan park but at the moment we were the second visitors of the year.

A nice little cache, not hard to find (just wear something long sleeves otherwise you'll risk getting an arm full of needles). I did reset my trip counter but it seemed to have not worked so unfortunately I don't know how long we walked for, probably about 40 minutes maybe less.. It was around 1.8 miles in distance. If you like nice views and birds then it's a nice cache to do!

Florence and Pisa - Geocaching

Florence

While sight seeing the many Renaissance buildings around Florence we decided to find a few caches along the way. Firstly we attempted a cache which is located at the top of Piazzale Michelangelo. The location of the cache was quite muggle free as it's actually located on the "less cool" view side of the Plaza. There is also another co-ordinates cache near by but it does involve walking down the hill looking for clues and then back up! Perhaps a more better cache in a cool evening when you haven't done much walking during the day. We were unable to find the cache but were aware that there was a spoiler picture in the gallery. 

No signal up the Plaza so we decided to come back at night and were successful with the cache. The cache had been ruined and unfortunately was literally just a small bag with a log that was full and people were using recipients to write on. I didn't get a picture of the log purely because I just forgot but I took some photos of the view!

Forte Belvedere

The next cache we did was, as mentioned in the Travelling Troll and Bunculuka updates, a hard walk up a steep hill. I got quite fed up of the continuous climb especially after having just climbed the steps to the Plaza. It was a small cache but luckily we squeezed in two trackables. We also picked up a trackable Glenturret 05 - besucht alle Deutschen Bundesländer which had come from Germany and we have bought it back to the UK with us. 

MOZART E L' AQUILA NERA

A much more central cache, it's very close to the Cathedral but just off a side street with hardly any muggles. Although it is quite close to a restaurant/cafe that people were outside. I don't think anyone paid much attention to us but hopefully we weren't too suspicious. 

I notice with Florence caches is that they aren't rain protected at all, the Mozart cache was just literally sitting on the post, they clearly don't have any concerns for rain or wind unlike our caches in the UK that are wrapped in bags, tight boxes and hidden in holes!

Torre di Santa Maria

On our last day we traveled to Pisa for some sight seeing as the airport we were traveling to was in Pisa.  We went to the location of the cache but after actually reading the description we realised it wasn't in the central tourist area inside the walls. It was actually located externally which required us walking around the whole wall because the footpath was locked for some reason. 

The hole in the wall is pretty obviously hand stacked to hide something but I think it's far away enough from the path that passers by wouldn't ever even look. It was a simple small cache literally placed behind the stacked rocks.  

We only managed a few caches around Florence and one in Pisa but we can safely say we have some Italian caches under our belt! 

Travelling Troll - Trackable UPDATE

We found this Travelling Troll back in the Highleigh Speedy Hike, he'd currently only traveled around England a little and a visit to Scotland. I contacted the owner whether it would be alright to keep him just over 2 weeks so that we could move him over to Italy. She was fine with idea and so his story began!

Firstly I thought this little man was slightly cold and perhaps needed an outfit to wear on his travels. I made him a dress that buttons on the back so that he can be slightly warmer during winter months! Also adds my own personal touch to the trackable, although he isn't mine his clothes shall travel the world with him!

The troll ended up in Forte Belvedere in Florence, Italy. We added 742.95 miles to his journey and a new country! The troll was placed with Bunculuka but was picked up the same day that we dropped him off. Can't wait to see where this little guy goes next, fingers crossed he doesn't come back to England..

As quoted in the Bunculuka post, "The walk to the cache however was hard work, the terrain only got 2 stars out of 5 but it was a very steep walk. If it had been any hotter, like during the summer, we probably would have been very fed up and exhausted by the time we reached the top. So word of warning to anyone thinking of cache, be prepared for a long steep slope!"

For Bunculuka's journey click here

Travel Bug - Bunculuka UPDATE

We finally shift on this little travel bug, Bunculuka, we kept it for over a month and a half which was not our intention at all. The cache had traveled to so many places yet it hadn't been to Italy so we felt we really should take it on our holiday. I did contact the owner as to whether we could keep it but no reply, so I just kept it! I picked Bunculuka up from the Chichester Lipchis Canal walk which was at the time only recorded on our YouTube channel (video here).

The cache we went to was Forte Belvedere in Florence, Italy. We added on another 743.48 miles for this trackable as well as a new visited country. The cache itself is hidden well, I don't think you'd see it with just a glance. The walk to the cache however was hard work, the terrain only got 2 stars out of 5 but it was a very steep walk. If it had been any hotter, like during the summer, we probably would have been very fed up and exhausted by the time we reached the top. So word of warning to anyone thinking of cache, be prepared for a long steep slope! 

The Bunculuka has been taken from the cache, it was removed the same day. We also took along another travelling companion that we found in the Highleigh Speedy Hike. For the Travelling Troll blog, click here.

The Royal Albert Hall - Geocache

While in London we thought it would be nice to add some caches to our list, we did attempt one by the Science Museum but had no luck at all finding it. our GPS kept loosing signal because of the high buildings are it couldn't pin point where we were exactly! We also tried a co-ordinates cache in Hyde Park which we hired bicycles and cycled around the whole park collection clues. Only to have the last clue be unobtainable and therefore resulting in an un-found cache..

A cache we did actually find was The Royal Albert Hall, it was an easy find and luckily there were absolutely no one around at the time! 

I don't really know what these two were thinking when I was taking a picture, they look pretty puzzled as to what a camera is..

The cache was hidden well but easy to spot if you look, the log itself is clean, dry and lots of room which is always nice!