24 hours of geoCaching

As January was ebbing out I felt that I had to do something to keep my FTF streak going; 4 months so far of FTFs since I found my first one during the Smokestone event in September.  Have not been hunting these actively but they have come my way since I have visited some events. Maybe I should have seen the signs when the e-mail notification, of a new cache just 8 km away, popped up one afternoon at work. "Oh... not that far!" So I jumped my bike and started let the feet work.  This was "Harvestad", just south/south east of Linköping, near Landeryd golf course.  I reached the spot, and joy - an empty log book!  Did not see anyone until I was going back home when I could see a car, and a couple of presumed geoCachers jumped out.  I suppose they were disappointed to be STF - but I was already on my way.

So, come January 29th and no FTFs for January.  What to do?  I enlarged my notification for the state, but no luck.  Instead I decided to go to another event, namely the Ficklampsevent i Göteborg (that is, the first yearly "Flash light event" in Gothenburg).  Sounded like it could be fun, and the only caches I had in the Västra Götaland state were from Borås.  Tried to see if I could find any one to make a joint trip with, but closest one was Mr Smokestoner himself, and he had re-prioritized since writting the "Will Attend" log.  "-Oh well, guess I have to go myself; I mean it's less than 300 km".

At the same time I got to adopt a cache just 30 km south-east, namely Brudklev just on the Kalmar state (Västervik county) side. This was a cache from 2002 that had been hidden by a familly in Germany. Also, I had some plans for hide some caches of my own.  Taking this together, I decided I should rent a car, taking up on the weekend offers that exist.  Did find a cheap one at Statoil (actually the station you end up on if you go for Made to Go) that just cost SEK 599 (about €60) for 24 hours, including free miles - just add fuel cost. Yeah, time to go a-caching!

I had booked the car from 9am Saturday morning (when they opened) and my original plan was to get back to Linköping around mid night, sleep some hours, and then deliver it to them at 9am Sunday morning when they opened again. As they closed for night at 10pm I definitly would not make it during the same day. Oh, yeah, an optimist plan if I have ever seen one.... as it would become appearent.

The trip started out fine with being on time. I had chosen a echo fueled Golf as it is being smaller one but still having lots of room for the driver. The plan was to go (south-east Linköping county) Sturefors - (county) Åtvidaberg - (cache in Västervik county) Brudklev - (county) Kinda - (county) Ydre and then head for Göteborg, or rather county of Mölndal, to be there in time for the event that started 5pm. Loads of time...

As I had that much time I could just as well log some on the way. The first stop was SJ01 Bridget Jones, the second oldest cache in Linköping (the first being a virtual at the University, which is also the oldest in Östergötland). It has been just out of reach when I have made my bike trips during my first months.  Anyway, after driving as close as I could on the roads near Landeryd church, I could walk over the snow covered fields down to a cache placed in a beautiful place near a train bridge that crossed a river. Nice! Being winter made it easier to pass the fields, but other parts was harder.  The time spent near the cache can be very relaxing, just you and the nature. I shot some photoes here which might catch a bit of that feeling; I'll try to add photos eventually.

Back to the car, and the next cache would be Owl Mountain, a cache without any logs for four months...  This was placed on the other side of a river, so I had to pass a "max 3 tons bridge" with "only traffic with permit allowed" sign.  Wont stop a cacher, will it.  But the cache was a bit away from the road, placed on a mountain, so I had soon to part the car and walk the km to the spot.  As I walked the road I did notice that this was an excellent day for outdoor activities as on the other side of Kinda Kanal, where Landeryd golf course is during summer, people were using the snow to go out nordic skiing.  Looked nice, but I haven't been doing that for 30 years...  Closing in on the mountain I realized that coming from the other way would have been better, as I met a car.  I also noticed that the area was probably crowded with wood cutters and wood machines during working days, the tracks of this could be seen everywhere. But at least that made it easier to go in the forrest, at the same time being a bit depressing.  Reaching the top of the mountain I was treated with a nice scenery of Kinda channel! (Pics to come?)  Here I was lucky as the position of the cache had protected it from the wind, and it was easily accessible.

So, 2 hours had already gone, and still I haven't reach Sturefors!  Better go there now.  But I passed Ärlången on the way, and had some more nice scenery. Just forgot that I shouldn't trust the GPS too much and had to needlessly climb some icy walls.  Reached Sturefors at last, a small town south east of Linköping. This was a place I had noticed having no caches!  So, I put just outside the local church (Vists kyrka) and another one that hasn't been published yet. I also have plans from a few more but I will get back to that.

After Sturefors it was time to go to Åtvidaberg, the county south-east of Linköping county. Here I have been many times, but not since I started caching... So, time for some caches. Åtvidaberg is a typical mill community, that has been struggling with closing of their large employer, Facit.  During the 70s, the local football team actually won Swedish highest division two years, and played teams like Chelsea and Bayern München. That might also be a reason why the mens football in Linköping never really had been any success...  Of the caches I could recommend Gammeldags godis with its excellent scenery, and Kalkugnen for a bit of historic touch. I also placed a multi here that I will publish, soon.

At this time I had given up on my smart phone. It have been problem recharging it, due to a mechanical problem. When I got as far as this I had to turn it of to save the battery, as it refused to recharge in the car. I had loaded some 1000 caches from Östergötland, Kalmar, Jönköping and Västra Götaland states, but that was just the easy ones...  Had no other choice than continue with a failing smart phone.


With time running out it was time to go for one of the main targets of this trip, namely Brudklev.  Going for that it was time to leave the larger roads and head into the forrest inland.  When I reached the spot the time was something like 2:30 pm...  The place was a nice one, with a tragic history.  Had to use the spoiler pictures on this one, maybe easier during summer?  Winter caching is hard, but at least my feet could dry up some between stops.

When I left the spot the clock had passed 3pm. I really had to set course for Göteborg. As I had no map, except the one in the GPS, it was hard to tell the best way. I choose to head towards Vimmerby, and from there due west to Göteborg. Most of the roads until reaching road 34 for Vimmerby was max 80 kph, so it took much longer than expected. Actually I did not get near the event until after 7 pm!  As I drove on the icy roads up to the sea near the event I met some cars, and when I got to the parking place I met some gangs going out in the forrest.  It turned up I had missed all the action and almost everyone at the event had headed out in the dark forrest, bearing flash lights, head lamps, UV lamps, .... you name it. Well, not all of them. One of the organizers, and four other guys (TimTimGo, ildur, blaufish, and one more) sat around a camp fire, having a barbecue... So I joined that group and had a nice time talking about geoCaching.

Eventually the fire had died, and the first group had reached their target, so we split up, and I had to go on my own again.  So why not cache some more!  By this time, the clock was just after 9:30pm. I started to realize that my plan were a bit optimistic, to say the least.  On the way back to Mölndal center I logged a quick one, where I met a gang coming from the event.  Maybe I should have something to eat? Had not had anything since breakfast.  But finding something in Mölndal close to 10pm Saturday night was not to be. "Well, maybe I could catch a hamburger on the way, in Borås for instance?" Just want to do some quick logs...  I just did a pair or so, before heading back east towards Borås.  Just made a stop on the way to get Ett populärt rastställe for driveby.

As I came to Borås I decided to go via Ramnaslätt and Tullen, an area I never did visit when I lived in Borås. Passing Bua-sjön I stumbled on Borås Ubuntu Cache at which you could have your own CD with Ubuntu!  Time was close to midnight when I reached the McDonalds close to the Rv40. I thought they were to close 1am, but as I got in there 10 minutes to midnight they had started to put up chairs on the tables, and clean the floor, so I skipped that stop. Instead three quick ones on these parts of Borås I know quite well.  During these there the clock passed midnight so this would be my first night caching! And still some way to drive before coming home.

Back on the road again, and next goal were to be the county of Ulricehamn, a nice little county between Borås and Jönköping. Before coming to the town I passed the little village of Hökerum, a place where some neighbors of mine had there summer house, so I had been around these parts before, but I had never noticed Bogastugan, and old wodden building by the river. With one logged in that county I could skip the town and go directly towards Jönköping.

Going from Linköping to Göteborg, I often make a stop right after Liared, where you can find two stations, and food. Heading the other way I noticed En vän på vägen and made a quick cache. But the winter, ice, snow and cold, had made the box stuck. To get it out I seemed to use to much force which broke the box. Sigh... I guess the time having passed 1am, and both my and the car fuel running low, could explain some of it.


Reaching Jönköping I had to refuel the car.  Jönköping has quite a few interesting caches, but I was starting to get a bit tired so I settled for the broken cache above. I will return with spring (or summer) and make a real caching trip to Jönköping / Huskvarna.


So, instead I headed for Eksjö, a town I had passed on my way from Vimmerby to Jönköping. As I had not planned to go this way I had no GPX files loaded for these parts of Jönköping state, and a dead smart phone, so I just drove on. The reason for going via Eksjö is that that is the best way for Ydre county, in the south part of Östergötland.


Ydre is really forrest county, with smaller town. Even Österbymo, the central town, is small. But I had set my goal to get Brantefall, a cache out in the deep forrest... Well, not that deep. I passed quite a few farms and houses so people were living here.  I found a good spot to park, I thought, on the top of a side road. Didn't want to block the way if there were to be any other cars here at 3am Sunday morning....  So, as I prepared to walk the 500 meters or so to the cache, I had to put some batteries in the head lamp. (This was the first time I were to use that.) But I was starting to run out of batteries...  4 AA for the head lamp, 2 AA for the GPS and no more. Well, the extra flash light had batteries but it used AAA. So, heading out into unknown territory with no extra batteries? I planned to use the flash light in case the head light were to consume the power, and keep the GPS, putting a waymark for the car. (Good move!)


Part of the way into the forrest was from snowy tracks made by wood cutting machinery or tractors, but eventually I had to head animal paths into the forrest. I did find a cabin used by hunters on the top of the hill that lead down to the cache. Here you could here the sound of a water fall!  I set down and rested for a while, 3:30am a Sunday night, in the middle of the dark forrest. Isn't life wonderful sometimes!  Lookating the cache I could head back for the car. Of course going the same way would have been a good choice, instead I choose a more difficult one, tredding across a swampy frozen territory, and wading through deep snow the last 100 meters, but at last I reached the car.  At that time my mood had changed a bit and I started to reflect on what I was doing. Was this really such a good idea? Well, better get going so that I get home.


As I wrote above I was driving around forrest roads. One risk of doing this is that you can get stuck. Going out from the side road I had to gas a bit to get out.  But heading the forrest roads I eventually reached what the GPS claimed to be the "big road" (that is open), at least I thought so when I checked the GPS. It turned out I had made a turn to early and ended up on a field that tractors had been driving around on.  I should have stopped and gone rear, but instead I choose to turn the car around; I mean it looked like packed snow. Wrong choice!  Having a two wheel driven car is not enough, so after going something like 300 degrees around the car got stuck and I could not get any further.  The wheels just spinning.  What should I do, 4am in the forrest of Ydre? (Actually I could see an industry not that far, so I guess I could get someone to help.) And no equipment that I could use...



Coming this far I could not give up. I tried to use full gas and go out and push the car. No luck. Eventually I realized that the car had easier to go backwards. So I put in the reverse and made the rear action. Yes! That worked and I go out of the field and back on the road. Ah... Next stop Österbymo.


Österbymo have no action a Sunday morning, so I could hide my cache there, the first in this town, without any mugglers watching. This cache has not been published yet but maybe next week.


The road for Kisa, capitol of Kinda county, was quite OK and caused no problems. The GPS showed no caches here but I seemed to remember one?  Yes, I think there is only one in this town.  As that is too little for a town of this size I decided to improve on that, but as usual, not published yet.


Instead I headed for Rimforsa, being in the north of Kinda county. There I did find a cache, Trollmor. (Swedes reading this will realize which Troll Mother this is if I say "O aj aj aj aj buff".) That is a place that you pass when you drive 34 south and probably think "This would be a nice place for a cache", and so it is.  With that cache I have also logged caches in all 13 counties of Östergötland! Which was one of the major targets with this trip.  So just 30 km to go before I'm home.


Coming this far, the clock had reached 06:15 am. Almost 3 hours before the car had to be returned. No use going home and sleep now so instead I got closer to home and logged some local caches around Linköping. The sun were to rise as well so it turned out to be a nice end to the caching trip.
Two of the last caches were actually mysteries, Challenge #002 - 100 founds and The Resistance Nest. The former could obviously have been logged 5 months ago. The latter had been solved for a month. One of RDun_Swe's caches, and a good mystery that is. Recommended.


The Resistance Nest was logged just before 9am, so after that I headed straight back to the station, where I could leave the car at the appointed time.  So in all I had spent 24 hours out caching, with 800 km travelling in car.  The number of caches logged was not very high, under 30, but at least I proved that I could stand such long going. Maybe I should go for a power trail in the future?