29 February 2016

GeoCache, a fun challenge - aka "The World's Largest Treasure Hunt"

Adventure is worthwhile.   ~ Aristotle
Geocaching is an outdoor treasure-hunting game using GPS-enabled devices (such as a smart phone). Participants navigate to a specific set of coordinates and look for the geocache container hidden at that location. Once a cache is found, each 'geo-cacher' signs the logbook and return the geocache to its original location.   ~ geocaching.com
[Click here to view a 75-second explanation.]

Gloria introduced to me this fun activity, having discovered it herself a few months ago.
The first cache I found was near Nanyuki, at a curio shop on the equator.

This shop attendant helped me find the cache with some general clues, all the while enjoying watching me search.
Meanwhile, our tuk-tuk driver (in the white shirt) was quite fascinated with the activity.
In locations such as this one, it's considered good manners to purchase something, which Gloria and I each did.

Gloria fills out the logbook with the date and her GeoCache nickname


Nanyuki War Cemetery



Along with our tuk-tuk driver we headed next to the Nanyuki War Cemetery, where we hunted for another cache. Part of the fun of this activity is to visit and learn about new locations. We spent a fair amount of time strolling through the beautifully landscaped grounds and reading some of the tombstones. The caretaker (pictured on the right) explained many things to us.


We even got a great view of Mount Kenya off in the distance. 

Leap Year 
Because leap year only comes around once every four years, the GeoCache app on our smart phones allowed us to see even more caches over the weekend. After church and a great lunch we headed off to find a few more, all in the Karen area.

The first one was at the Karen Blixen Museum

The next two were inside Oloolua Forest. We ran out of time, energy, and daylight so we'll have to go back again
for the other seven located here. The first one was near the waterfall in a hard-to-find spot.

The second one was near the large bamboo plants and also quite a challenge to find.

The contents of this cache include a Bible verse. Pretty neat!

After finding these two caches, we enjoyed watching a few Sykes monkeys frolic in the forest. They were after food crumbs leftover from a large group that had come for a tour of the forest. Hope you'll enjoy the video I made!





February 29th: Leap Day makes for an extra day in the year to GeoCache!

Today - Leap Year Day, 29 February 2016 - we each did our own hunting.
Gloria headed to the Nairobi National Museum and I headed to Ngong Hills, near Upper Matasia Road.

The one I was after was simply impossible to find on my own.
Luckily, these three guys knew about it and helped me uncover it.

Here's the logbook and cute little gnome I found inside.

Perhaps you'll also decide to take up this great activity! Do something different than your normal routine. Get outdoors and enjoy God's creation. Stretch your mind and stretch your legs.
You can either be a victim of the world or an adventurer in search of treasure. It all depends on how you view your life.   ~ Paulo Coelho, Brazilian lyricist and novelist

1 comment:

Lila said...

How fun! I've been wanting to do this Carter - just in the Omaha area. :)