NorthWest Arkansas Cachers

I drove from Centerton, Arkansas to get the Mingo Cache. I left around 8:30 am and arrived around 17:45. It took about 9 hours and 561 miles. This was not an uneventful trip. As I was driving north through Salina, an airplane landed in the south bound lane of I-135.

http://www.saljournal.com/news/story/Plane101808

I also saw a 18 wheeler standing on its nose with a trailer attached but that was designed to draw attention and it works. I also saw a large statue of a very large weird funny looking man.

As I entered Wichita, I heard about the Garmin Geocaching Lottery Scratcher on the radio. I thought this has to be a sign. I am following my Garmin. I'm here because of a Garmin. I stopped and bought one while I was getting gas. And I scratched it off and I won a $1000. Nah, I was just making that part up for the story. I lost, but kept the ticket as a souvenir of the trip.

One of my dogs name is Mongo. So I had to drive to Mingo to take a picture of Mongo with Mingo in Mingo. He was happy to find the cache. Actually I think he was just happy to be out of the car. Bailey the other dog was happy to find the cache as well. Or she may have just been happy to get out of the car as well. I took the Epsy Seay Geocoin and Jeep TB back with me to Arkansas.

I went on to Colorado after that to get a cache. I stopped and took pictures with me and the dogs at the Colorado Border sign. The first cache I went for was at a rest area in Burlington, Co. The rest area was under construction so I had to pick another. It was at the Pizza Hut, GCJB6C. I went across the street and got some water for the dogs and feed them.

There was an outside picnic area outside the PH and a BK next door. I went over to the BK and got a Whopper Meal and at on the PH picnic table. The most adventurous part of the part of the story is, I was worried the manger would come out and tell me I had to move. Well that and cop waved at me while I was carrying the dogs water to them and I spilled a little. And the burger was a little under cooked. I was worried I might get salmonella.

After this I was going to go Pine Bluffs, Wyoming. I grew up Pine Bluff, Arkansas. I drove through PB, WY in 1994 during a coast to coast drive. PB WY does not seem to have any caches so I was going to drive Cheyenne for the closest. After looking at the time estimate, I decided there was no way I could make that one and make it back to Ar and get some sleep before work Monday. I usually never stop spinning on what to do next.

I was not happy about having to give up Wyoming. That meant I would be a state down on my quest. I started moving to Nebraska for my next cache. I noticed on my map New Mexico and Texas were both on the same parallel as NW Arkansas. I dropped my plans to pick up my planned Nebraska cache and picked up the closest one which was GCXFQX. That in turn meant that I also dropped my planned cache for Iowa. But I gained several hours on my trip so it was OK and my goal was still intact. I also gave up my trip to get the oldest Nebraska geocache. There are only 50 of those so I better go slow anyway.

I found Custer Slept Here (GCXFQX). I made a quick alterations of plans to come get this one. I listened to the KState-Colorado game. K-State fans have to have the longest post game radio show I have ever heard. And this was after they lost. I can't imagine how long it would have been if they had won. After I grabbed it, I made my down to New Mexico to look for Dinosaurs, GC16PYF.

I stopped and got picture with the dogs at the Nebraska state line, it was friggin cold and the wind was blowing hard. I did not get the dogs out at Custer. I just wanted to sign it get in the car and go. I stopped at the Kansas Border and got a picture of the dogs at the sign. This would be the last time I got the dogs out. It was just too cold to set up the photo. I just pulled the car in front of whatever. The dogs stuck their noses in the car window a couple of times.

I found this one, Dinosaurs!, GC16PYF. I had a some what more eventful trip the closer I got to NM. My gas guage does not work and that always makes for high adventure. Especially when you decide to see if you can guess right. Driving across western Kansas in the middle of the night with barely any visible lights, I began to question that spirit of adventure. I finally found a spot open. But at the cost of gas in the middle of nowhere, I decided to chance it again and only buy enough to get me to the next city.

I am from Arkansas and finally came to the Arkansas River. In Arkansas, the river is a big deadly, navigatable river. This was my second time to cross it on this day in Kansas. The first time, it looked like a Bayou. This time it look more like a large creek. I took a lot of pictures of it. With my shotty camera, I don't think they will turn out well.

I started to walk across it just so I could tell folks back home I did it. And I said across it, not on it. I made that distinction for all you wise guys out there. It was very cold and windy. I understand why I saw all those wind mills in Kansas now. I decided not to traverse the river. Now I have an excuse to take my kids to that spot with me sometime.

So I kept driving and saw a few falling stars across the Kansas sky. With very little ambient light around, they were quiet bright.

I kept thinking about stopping to sleep but never did. I was going to sleep at the Arkansas so I could take pictures during the day but opted to keep driving.

Just before I hit the NM border, I saw a car that had either crashed or very hastily parked. I was going to get out and check it. I opted to drive around it and shine my lights in it. Nobody appeared to be in it. So I phoned the location to the cops.

As I hit the NM border, I mean the exact line, the sky lit up. At first I thought it was a LARGE falling star coming down. But this had two tails, not one and there was a less bright light connecting the two tails. Usually the tail goes away when the metorite burns out. These stuck around. With a better camera and tripod, I could have got a photo of it.

Then the tails turned green and seemed to have electricity pulse through them like the Aurora Borealis. And then the wind evetually disapated tails. They stuck around for a while. After talking to one of my friends, I wonder if this was just a comet bouncing of the atmosphere.

And on a equally freaky side note. The Heater/AC blower does not work on my car. I leave the heat on when it is cold. Some heat will just drift out. It is just enough heat to keep the bite out of the car. It is still a little uncomfortable.

As the sky lit up, the blower came on. I was looking up at the sky over the steering wheel all slack jawed saying. "Welllll, what the ..." and then all the dust, dust bunnies and a few errant dirt clods that had been collecting my in vents blew in my mouth and eyes. I had been kind of sleepy to that point and I was considering going to sleep at the next available spot. I was awake after that.

I finally got to Clayton, NM and the Dinosaurs. Signed the log and started out for my next leg in Texas, GCT1BF.

I was going to take some pictures of the Dinosaurs there but left town abruptly after some thug a in a white caddy just out of the blue pulled up beside me and said, you got a problem with me. I just put it drive and sped out of town. It made my trip longer. I went back in Oklahoma where I came from instead of just heading into Texas.

I eventually wandered into Dumas, Tx. My other half, she is from Dumas, Ar. She wanted to know what in the heck I was doing there. These two towns fight over which town an obscure song was written about. Dumas, Tx smells like bovine scat or BS. It has large amount of cattle in the town.
It was nice to see what the other Dumas looks like. She was in Dumas, Ar while I was in Dumas, Tx. I started to call her up and say "Hey, I am in Dumas, where the heck are you." She would not have appreciated being woke up that early for not such a great joke.

Even though both towns are in the same time zone 7:00 am in Ar is bright. 7:00 am in Tx, you can just barely see the sun coming up.
I went to GC1EVG4 from here. The language below is CB slang keeping in character with the theme of the cache. He describes some CB slang.
I caught this on a multi-state geocaching adventure. I came here from GCT1BF. This was one of the uneventful legs. Well except for brake check on a greasy side up. (Traffic jam from an accident.) Not me fortunately.
Well after that, and I nearly ran out of go-go juice. My gauge don't work. Well that and my GPS turned off around OKC and I missed a beep that let me go up 35N 10 miles to Kansas. Then I had to turn around and get back on 44E. I was going to get the rest area in Tulsa but decided to get this one.

I went to Helping Hands from Oklahoma. This was my last of a seven state tour of seven caches in just a little over 36 hours on a solo cache trip. I started to make it 8 states, 8 caches and hit Missouri. At this point though, I got close to home and just started crashing.

That was the only one left near my house I had not picked. I am glad I left it alone, otherwise I would have to drive to Rogers and I may have just drove home otherwise. The other option was to pick one of *TnT*'s brain busters but I just wanted to go to sleep. I was not tired until I started getting close to the house.