Month: January 2023

Cache Owner boydfamily asks us to scout around for a 12-year-old cache.

Passing a truckers’ shopping mall, today’s answer to the 208-year-old question billows above: “Yes, it does. It does yet wave.”

Our coordinates are taking us west and south, to the edge of John Bryan State Park. This land fell under the Bryan name in 1896, when John wanted to build a huge barn and needed 335 acres along the Gorge to do so. His barn is gone, and so is the public swimming pool that lived in the park in the 1940s. He left a legacy that continues today, donating owned lands to public institutions for preservation, public enjoyment, and protection from profit-seekers.

Saturday morning yawns and stretches, as sunlight shivers in the wind, and feet feel the Earth’s tremor beneath. GPS spans satellites spinning in space, perhaps passing the lone space cache living on the ISS, with all of four visits logged so far.

Squarely on Earth, we pause to remove brown squishiness from shoe soles. The geotrail scraggles and drags through leaves and underbrush.

A bit wet behind the ears, the log appears. Our geolexicon expands: We will log our names on the waterlogged log in the log, before logging our find on the weblog. Scout troops, Eagles, and Scoutmasters have signed the log before us. A 2016 cacher assures, “No knot skills, first aid, fire starting, knife, axe or saw skills, no climbing, canoeing or camping, nor wilderness survival skills were needed to find this cache. I dumbly stared at my GPS screen, walking blindly until I bumped my head into a tree, and there it was.”

As we emerge from the brush, history comes to life. Today’s dads and moms carry on Scout choices for patriotism, courage, self-reliance, and care for others. Weathering bankruptcy on the national level, along with charges of bullying, abuse, and mismanagement, local Scouts preserve the best of scouting. Eagle Scout footprints are on the moon, anchoring and inspiring a time-honored American institution. In the chilly exhilaration of this perfect scouting excursion, dads linger in the back, phones down.

We say goodby to CO boydfamily, owner or adopter of seven of our Wilberforce caches, and Guardian Angel to all nine, who has shared with us these quivering, blazing, splendid wonders.