By Allan Olson
This past weekend was a warm and truly fun
weekend for mid-October. We spent several hours outdoors on Saturday, followed
by many more on Sunday. It was a most perfect weekend, weather-wise.
Friday evening, while a bit chilly, was a fun
time for us. For the first time ever in my nine years of covering Panther
football, my entire family attended the game. My wife helped sell hot chocolate,
coffee and some suckers for the third grade field trip, while I did what I
usually do at a football game – took photos. We arrived back at home late, all a
little cold and tired.
I slept in on Saturday morning – I think I
managed to not get out of bed before 8 a.m. That is amazing considering the fact
that my four children typically argue over the Saturday morning programming on
the tube. If they did on this day, I just did a better job of tuning them out.
After breakfast, we headed to town to go look for winter boots for the girls.
Our first stop was to check out the selection at Bemidji Woolen Mills, and we
found a good pair for both girls, and at good prices. Alivia was able to take
her new boots home; Abigail’s will be arriving via special order in the next
week or two (hopefully we won’t be needing them for quite a while yet). We
stopped to grab a couple food items for this week’s meals and then headed
home.
I messed around the house for a little while,
but I really didn’t have anything I wanted to do. The weather was just too nice
for me to sit still reading or watching the tube. I debated on doing some
maintenance on some of caches or taking a nap, and finally decided to go out. My
wife suggested that I should take two of the kids, so I asked Alivia and Marcus
if they wanted to go. I fully expected a “no,” but I got a resounding “yes”
instead.
Since they both decided they wanted to go, I
decided that we were going to find some new caches instead. A couple of weeks
ago nine new ones had been posted that we hadn’t found yet, so that’s what we
did. We took off a little after 3:00, and I informed my wife that we would be
gone a couple hours, figuring that’s all the longer it would take. It turns out
I was wrong – it took twice that long! Thankfully I found some areas with 4G
cell coverage so I could let her know how we were doing. Anyway, the three of us
had a lot of fun and managed to find all nine of those.
That evening, Abigail and I made a pumpkin cake
treat, which I messed up again. It still turned out, but it just tastes good,
not great.
Sunday was International Earth Cache Day, and
for geocaching our goal was to find an Earth Cache. There were only two options
locally – one near Bemidji, which ha several steps, or head to the Lost 40. We
had decided on Thursday that we were going to the Lost 40 if the weather was
nice. I informed a geocaching friend of ours about this plan and said we would
have room for her if she wanted to go, and we left her place at about 8 a.m.
Sunday morning.
After making several stops along the way, we got
out to the Lost 40 somewhere between 12-12:30 p.m. We did our walk to find the
information on the Earth Cache, re-checked our math for the Puzzle Cache outside
the Lost 40, and started walking out. On our way out, we met another cacher and
his wife from Bemidji. I had not met them yet, but our geocaching companion knew
who they were and made the introductions. We discussed the Earth Cache and
informed them about the Puzzle Cache, helped them out by giving them the
coordinates, and finally headed back to the parking lot. We made sandwiches and
then headed out to try and find the other cache. My wife and a couple of the
others had tried already, to no avail, so we attempted it again and this time we
scored! We were just back in the parking lot when the other cachers appeared. We
discussed it with them. Nikolai led them down the trail to the vicinity of the
cache, and sat back and waited for them to make the find.
Once they returned, we visited a little more
before heading further north to find more caches. Our target was Northome and
Mizpah, with one stop in Funkley before heading home. Before we were done we
found four in Northome, six in Mizpah (leaving us with three to find sometime on
a trip to International Falls), the lone cache in Funkley and two we hadn’t
found previously in Blackduck – in all we found 21. There was one cache we
couldn’t find, but that one hasn’t been found in two years, so it might be
missing. I did get to see a gorgeous view of the Mississippi River from a spot I
didn’t even know existed.
We finally arrived home just before 6 p.m., just
in time to start supper and showers to make sure the kids were zestfully clean
for school the next day.
This is MEA week in Minnesota – no school
Thursday and Friday! As far as I know, we could have a house full. Saturday
there is another group geocaching adventure planned for somewhere in the Foot
Hills State Forest south of Akeley and/or west of Backus – that should be
fun!
Please be safe while enjoying your favorite
outdoor recreational activity and on the lakes, and remember to take pictures to
preserve a lifetime of memories. Remember to drive safely, and watch out for
those buses carrying our children. Thanks for reading, and have a great week!
For more of my columns visit: http://allan-crazykids.blogspot.com.
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