Landed our Planetary Pursuits

Bright Saturday morning found us in the freezing (24 degrees) outdoors...

Heading to the North to work on the MOTel-T geo-art (created by TomasDiaz and hidden by GSIXX) on the MOT Apple trial. 

Accompanied by WikidKriket, we happily completed half of them.

It's always a fun adventure with my sister and my Sweetie. What is this thing about bridges, though?

30 caches in 3 hours it was definitely a lovely walk. 

And, with that, we earned our last four souvenirs including the Official Space Explorer!

Then back into the car and race to Harrison Township. Team Gates is hosting a Geocaching 101 event, and TaGeez & I hid the temporary caches for finding.  

As you can see, there were more geocachers than locals! Great time!

Where have you gone, Brummelbear?

Brummelbear, a gentleman and a scholar

I met Brummelbear in 2013 when he sent me the sweetest email. I had just grabbed several FTF's on his new Detroit MLT geocaches. He loved both Detroit history and geocaching so releasing Michigan Lost Town caches was right up his alley. His congratulatory email was my introduction to his passion for telling long, detailed (and did I say "long") narratives about Detroit. He had been a principal in the Detroit Public School system for 20 years! Typical of this smiling, generous soul, Brummelbear ended his email with an admonishment for geocaching this rough area alone.

Brummelbear was one of the Belle Isle Cachers, who host an annual event and bi-annual CITO. You were guaranteed to find him bellied up to the grill, cooking hot dogs (he always picked out the best for me). He always had a smile and a story to tell - he always gave you his full attention and treated even the newbies as if we'd been friends for life.

Spring Belle Isle Event - 2014

Brummelbear, Rattrak, Caching Fire, and Team Rumble

Fall CITO - 2014

Fall CITO - 2014

But things changed last year. TaGeez had broken his leg so he manned the grill with our late friend Othum. Brummelbear had been diagnosed with the same cancer that struck Othum and would only be paying a short visit to the event he loved so much. At that time, he was still looking robust with that lovely twinkle in his eye, but he was moving slower, trailing behind his lovely golden retriever. He had specifically wanted to see me, and he extracted a promise from me as he unloaded his geocaching supplies from his van to my car. And, in his memory, I will be hosting a letterboxing 101 event in his memory later this year. 

We said goodbye to dear Brummelbear today. 

His service was lovely. Admittedly, one of my favorite parts was the priest eulogizing, “Leo and his son, David, enjoyed taking walks in the woods. They liked to find tupperware. What is this thing about finding Tupperware while in the woods? Anyone know what this is? I don’t understand it.”

After leaving the church, TaGeez and I headed to Detroit to hide a cache in his honor. It is, of course, hidden in the woods and in Detroit in his memory. It's 24 days until the annual Belle Isle event; although someone else will be cooking the hot dogs I know we will feel Brummelbear's presence every step we take.

We’re In Pursuit

TaGeez and I have already earned 4 planets in the first two days. This is the fun way to complete this challenge!

Looking at my Friends League, quite a few have already earned all 10 of them. I'm seeing this on the YMBAGI Facebook group, too. Some of my friends decided to save themselves the trouble of earning points by dropping their trackable collection into a geocache - 4 points apiece.  I'm not judging - everybody plays the game their own way. 

Planetary Pursuit Scoring

What are the 10 souvenirs that I can earn?

Souvenirs	Points needed on the Friend League (individual)
Planetary Pursuit: Earth	5 points
Planetary Pursuit: Venus	10 points
Planetary Pursuit: Mercury	20 points
Planetary Pursuit: Mars	40 points
Planetary Pursuit: Jupiter	65 points
Planetary Pursuit: Saturn	100 points
Planetary Pursuit: Uranus	200 points
Planetary Pursuit: Neptune	300 points
Planetary Pursuit: Pluto	500 points
Official Space Explorer	Collect all planet souvenirs (500 points) and earn this meta souvenir.

How can I earn points?

If you log a cache, attend an event, or perform other geocaching actions, you collect points.

Action	Point value
Log a Found it on any geocache (Traditional, Virtual, Webcam, Wherigo)	5
Log a Found it on a Multi-Cache or Letterbox Hybrid	10
Log a Found it on a Mystery Cache or EarthCache	15
Log a Found it on a geocache with 10 or more Favorite points	15
Attend any event	15
Drop off trackable	4

Source

Planetary Challenge Time!

TaGeez and I have a nice geoart set aside for this upcoming beautiful weekend! The HNY-17-MOTel-T geoart is 59 puzzle caches along the 24-Mile Macomb Orchard Trail.

That will net us 885 of the 500 points needed to earn Geocaching.com's 10 souvenirs during its 3-week Planetary Pursuit challenge.

Ah! Time to #getoutside and #gogeocaching - woot!

Spring is Peeking Around the Corner

... just like TaGeez! Haha! I love caching with him ☀️

6 Years: A Little Streaking Never Hurts!

Six times around the sun!

Yesterday was 60 degrees and sunny so, of course, we had to have a blizzard on this great milestone day! After a failed FTF and with snowflakes coming down, TaGeez and I grabbed this little guy to  complete six straight years of cache-a-day streaking!

ShelleyJean asked if I'm going to make it a seventh. I guess it all depends on what the weather is like tomorrow :)