I left the house at 5:30 in the morning heading for Lightnin' Bug territory in Lehigh County. Had a map all planned out on my handy, dandy little map planner with 14 boxes plotted out for the day. Well, it started a little rough, the temp was 19 degrees when I left home with a wind chill of a lot less than that and the wind WAS blowing. Then when I got to Lehigh County, I was a bit discouraged to see snow on the ground, not much, just a coating, but with the way I hate snow, it put an immediate damper on my morning. I started out at Kalmbach Park, which I had visited unsuccessfully before during the summer months. At that time, I had assumed that I couldn't see the downed logs because of all of the undergrowth. Well, this time there was absolutely no undergrowth and I still couldn't see the downed logs. I will wait for Rich to confirm that this box is still there before I attempt it the third time. Next I headed for Reimert Bird Sanctuary which houses two boxes but they are located at the top of the mini mountain there. Thank goodness I had done my homework ahead of time on this one and I was able to find these two boxes after huffing and puffing up the hill. But on my way down, it looked as though the blazed trail was going to wind its way through the forest and since I could see the tops of the houses at the base of the hill which were near where I had parked and since the forest was pretty clear, I decided to blaze my way to the bottom - not a good move on my part. I ended up on the other side of the park and still had to walk down the road to the parking lot. I am chalking it up to brain freeze, it was very cold out there after all.
My next stop was at the Zuflucht Haus which is almost a driveby. Unfortunately, I got there too early to get to see the house but I did find the box successfully and then I was off to the Pool Wildlife Sanctuary. I really liked this little park. It took me a while to figure out why and then it hit me - it has a boardwalk. I seem to be strongly attracted to boardwalks, the neatest one I was on was at the Brandywine Trail in Delaware County. This one was also pretty neat and was lined with information signs so it made it even more interesting. The boxes were hidden in neat locations here but the second one must be near a geocache since several cachers had also signed into it.
Then on to the Chainletter Box. I basically knew where I was going on this one since I had visited the same area last summer to get the 419 box. In case you didn't know it, Rich is a truly devious person and I find his box strategies fascinating. I keep working on finding all of the boxes in his area but at the same time, I keep hoping that he continues to plant more of them.
After this I headed for Tom's Alien Spaceship which I had already logged into last year. This was actually the starting point to find Doctor Who #4 so I stopped to read the log on the Spaceship box and to stamp in as Team Little Dog. The last time I had been there, I was still using Janila, which I have seriously been considering using again since Barney doesn't box with me as often as he used to. Anyway, the Spaceship box was frozen into its hidey hole and eventually I was able to work it out only to discover a layer of ice on the inside bottom of it. After chipping as much out as I could, I put it back and headed for Doctor Who #4 which I did find in a really pretty setting.
Then on to the Lehigh Parkway and to the Fish Out of Water. I was not successful with box number one of this series but the walk to find it was really neat. They have a solar system set up beginning with the sun and then each planet spread out proportionately to the real life setting. Several of the planets were grouped together fairly close to the sun and then you have to walk about a quarter of a mile till you can find the next planet. It was really neat but when I didn't find the first box and the clues said it was a 3 mile walk, I decided to pass on the second one also and headed instead to the the Village People which was on the other side of the park. I must have just missed Indigo Vulture here since he had signed in also. It also appears that there must be a geocache in this area since there were several geocachers signed in.
Lastly, I headed to the Allentown Rose Garden which I had tried to find during the summer and again, I was unsuccessful. I think I have a mental block with this box, or else I am just too tired each time I get there to poke around all of the downed trees that seem to be in the area where I think the box is. I think I need to visit that one with another person to give additional insight.
I headed home after this one, totally exhausted, a little frostbitten, and happy with my eight new stamps. Hopefully tomorrow I will get to go back and search for the remaining six boxes that I had on my original plan for the Lehigh area. Today we are headed for Cumberland, Maryland to take Bill's aunt home and there is a box about six miles from her house on an easy .4 mile trail. Wonder if I can talk Bill into stopping for a little while! We will see!
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