Geo Cache Treasure Hunt
A light drizzle didn’t dampen the enthusiasm for the GeoCache Treasure Hunt, which was held Saturday, September 13th. Open to the public, this event provided the opportunity for participants to challenge their GPS skills by searching for hidden “caches” in each of five nature reserves in Murrysville; the King Nature Reserve on Crowfoot Road, the McGinnis Nature Reserve on Hunter Road, the Tomer Reserve on Twin Oaks, the Walter Reserve on Weistertown, and Potter’s Corner next to the King Reserve on Crowfoot. Coordinates for all of the caches were identified at the entrance to each reserve.
If they successfully located the caches, the treasure hunters were rewarded with a chip and an opportunity to sign their name in the cache’s log. A picnic followed the hunt where raffle tickets were exchanged for the cache chips and prizes awarded to the winning ticket holders. Some participants found every cache, entitling them to even more chances to win.
Generous sponsors of the event included Atrias, Bruschettas, Giant Eagle and Pasqualinos- all of Murrysville, Damons and Monster Golf of Monroeville, and Vincent’s Pizza Park in Plum Boro.
Cary Bohl
Most of you are aware that when you try something new, there are often “bugs” that need to be worked out, whether it’s a program or an event. This was no exception. The following is an account of working out that glitch.
GeoCache by Doug Bauman
The Westmoreland Conservancy recently hosted a Picnic and Geo-cache Treasure Hunt on Saturday, September 13th. The object was to find the caches at each reserve, then finish the day at our picnic at Townsend Park where prizes were awarded. Saturday morning the hunt began, there was 1 cache in each of the reserves: Tomer, McGinnis, King, Walter and Potter's Corner. I decided to give it a try, having never used a GPS device before, I was anxious to try.
My friend Ladia and I decided to start early, and our first attempt was at the King reserve. We set up the coordinates in his GPS device, and proceeded to hike the path. This was fun, and we spent much of the time engrossed in interesting conversation, occasionally stopping to see if we were getting closer to the treasure. After a while we got to the top of the hill, and noticed that of the two coordinates, one was getting closer N40 27.520, yet the other was actually getting further away W79 39.965. Ladia wanted to turn around and proceed up the power line, yet I told him that would take us out of the King reserve and into a plan of homes. So we kept walking, hoping that at least one number would match up.
Soon we got to a place along the trail where indeed that one coordinate matched, yet the other was way off, but I happened to notice that the reading (39.020) was indeed about 1.0 away from the desired. Ladia and I, both engineers, decided to subtract 1.0 from the number, in the event that perhaps that one digit was transcribed incorrectly. So we reprogrammed 38.965, and voila, we were off into the woods thinking we had fixed the problem. Ladia was so anxious to go, that he led us off the trail and into the briars of the woods near the neighboring property of the rod and gun club. I didn't get a chance to tell him about the club, but luckily no shooting was heard this day. Soon I caught up with him and we kept going toward the direction indicated by the device.
I wore shorts, and my legs were suffering at the hands of the briars. Again we met up with the trail, where it bends to the left and toward the stone foundation. His device was not a top of the line model, and it seemed to have difficulty when you get close to the point you are searching. We wandered to the stone foundation, but no luck, nothing there, so we wandered all over that vicinity trying to locate the cache. After a while we started back, thinking that maybe we wouldn't be able to find it, but he wanted to go back one more time an we did. This time I was able to see the cache, just based on luck, because it was cleverly hidden behind a tree, yet right next tot he path, which I did not know a-priori. I told Ladia that we really ought to have stuck to the trail, ha!
On the way back we met up with a troop of scouts and their leaders and told them of the transcription error, to which they were grateful. The boys all seemed like they were having great fun, and they told us that the cache at Potter's corner was easily acquired. We next visited 3 more reserves and were readily able to locate the rest of the caches more easily. Ladia and I learned quite a bit about geo-cache treasure hunts and how to use GPS. It was fun, and we are looking forward to the next hunt!
