I'm probably going to butcher this...and at some point in 2037 when Jeff remembers I actually blog, I have no doubt he'll correct any errant fabrications...but Pennsylvania is much different than New York in how they manage their parks, forests and other public lands. In New York, we have town parks - which are governed by the particular township that they reside in. In New York we also have County Lands, as well as State Forests and State Parks. In the great all knowing Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the Department of Conservation and Natural Resources manages just about EVERYTHING. So basically if you want to place a cache in a little town park down the road, the DCNR has to approve it. It's certainly a lot more bureaucracy - but for how much work the DCNR does in making PA parks awesome, I can't blame them.
Now...the caveat to this pointless boring drivel: there exists something in PA called State Game Lands (SGLs) that somehow circumvent DCNR oversight when it comes to placing caches. I don't now how that works, and frankly, my head hurts so bad from trying to make sense of what I've already written, that I'm just going to accept it and move on with this damn blog.
Alright..................I lied................I looked it up. It seems the SGLs are managed by the Pennsylvania Game Commission. They must be a separate function aside from the DCNR.
You're probably wondering where I'm going with this huh? Well at first I was going to try and distinguish the difference between SGL's and the rest of the world...but then curiosity got the best of me...and as a result you all had to suffer. I'm sorry. The true purpose in all this is to explain that the rest of our caching adventures for today would all occur on SGL's - which are usually numbered (SGL #1, SGL #2, etc.) But for the life of me, I'm not even going to try and wrap my noodle around that...
Anyway - after a long morning/afternoon of spelunking, rock climbing, hiking, drooling, and standing amidst the natural beauty of CPA trying to keep our heads from exploding from sheer enjoyment - we returned home to eat and sloth away the rest of the afternoon watching day old college playoff hockey (or whatever other random things were on cable TV). Eventually we caught our twelfth or so wind, and decided to hit up a few more caches later in the evening. So Jeff started scouring the internet, and in short order he had picked two caches for us to check out. They were:
For acting like a sweet innocent cherub, Jeff is kind of a sneaky bastard. Which is why I love him, but still...you have keep an eye on him. I say this because the first cache was a multi, which required us to find several stages before finding the final. The final was a film canister, which is classified in geocache speak as a micro. Eric doesn't usually like micros as he likes find nice big ammo boxes in the woods. Ideally, I like anything that shows me something sweet...but the larger caches always make me happy. I'm a nerd...who rambles...a lot.
Anyway, Scotia Mines was actually a really awesome area. It was pretty removed, with well defined trails, little bridges and some beautiful open woods scenery. Added to this, was the fact that there were still remnants of the old mining operation that existed here from the late 1800/early 1900's. If you want to geek out further (because we all know I just did...), check out the history I found bitches or hereeeeeeeee!!! The highlight (unexpectedly of course), was when we were on our way back from finding the cache and came across an overlook of a pond that I imagine was at one time a mined out crater that had since filled with water.
Strewn about EVERYWHERE was a myriad of spent ammunition...deer slugs...pistol and rifle cartridges...anything you could imagine. Clearly the visitors to this spot are living the gun toting hillbilly stereotype. Hahahaha.
Our next stop was the Yellow Cache - yet another hide on SGLs. This dandy was a sub-half mile hike leading to my beloved ammo box hide. Not too much crazy happened on this particular hike, but I do remember enjoying my time chatting with Jeff. I love that kid so much. (I know, a sappy geek...I'm hopeless). This would be our final hurrah for this super busy fun-filled Saturday of caching. We had seen and done so much...it was awesome.
Don't worry though faithful readers - Sunday is chalked full of more stupendous adventures starring everyone's favorite (and exceptionally studly) heroes!
Where the heck is the Sunday blog post?!?!?!? I want to read about Stone Valley, the views from the old fire tower, and your flabberghastedness at how I got the Neon down Pennsylvania Furnace Rd. Get with it, slacker. :-)
ReplyDeleteAlso...there is a local parks authority to add another level of geocaching bureaucracy. It's the Centre Region Parks and Recreation around here. I'm not sure what they do in other counties though.
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