Second Day in the First State

After an exhausting but happy day in the state of Delaware, Barney and I headed home that night. I had been thinking about camping for the night but since there were no campgrounds, that idea went out the door. In actuality though, we were only a little over an hour's drive from home when we were at Brandywine Creek State Park so home is where we went. Barney slept the whole way home and then walked in the house and straight to his bed and slept all night. So did I! I got up early on Sunday morning feeling very, very stiff and debated whether I really wanted to go back out. But the weatherman was advertising some perfect weather and I told myself - when Bill comes home, I won't be able to go as often as I want so I left. But even though Barney was jumping around and ready to go too, I left him home this time.

My first chore was to drop off a box that I had prepared to hide in Delaware. Saturday I had made a wrong turn into a little parking lot and had decided to just stay there to eat my lunch. While I was there, I noticed a little path and a lot of bicycles so I stopped there again on Sunday morning to investigate and found just the right spot to hide my License to Plant - Delaware. I have prepared a whole series of these stamps to hide in every different state that I visit and Delaware is the first.

From here, I moseyed back down the road to the upper part of Brandywine Creek State Park. I had the clues to Sheba's Into the Woods series, a four box series with a couple of added surprises. Oh no, the first clue was taking me back up the same rocky path where the mother and baby had passed me the night before. And this time I didn't have Barney to blame for my difficulties in going up it. Take it slow, I thought and I did. I was totally enjoying the fact that I was pretty much alone in the park on a beautiful crisp sunshiny morning when I found the first box. As I was stamping in, a white haired gentleman with two large poodles passed by me effortlessly. Was this trail only a challenge to me? I headed for the next box and while I was stamping in the Poodle Man again passed me and greeted me. Was it coincidence when he passed me again at the third box? I got my pepper spray ready and kept my pointy walking stick very close by as I asked him if he was following me - in a joking manner of course. He put my mind at ease when he told me that he wasn't able to run anymore so he travelled all the trails in the park regularly for exercise. Made sense to me and I relaxed but kept my weapons close, just in case. And after all, he was a man with poodles!

I finished this wonderful series which takes you on a creative tour of a beautiful park and headed for The Box Formerly Known as 132 Minus 5. Yes, that is really the name and from the clues, I thought that this box would be a quick driveby. Wrong, wrong, wrong. My first obstacle appeared as soon as I approached the park and I saw at least a million people, well, maybe only several hundred. As I began to groan inwardly, I began to notice the Walk for Diabetes signs hanging all around. How could I resent something like that for interfering with my letterboxing. After all, I am still hoping for some type of relief for Laura in her lifetime. There have been many improvements in the treatments for this terrible disease but there still is no cure and I keep hoping and hoping..... But I had a box to find that day and the finding part was easy enough. However, the actual retrieval of the box proved to be a tremendous challenge for height challenged me. There was a rock grouping and the box was in the middle of it but these rocks went straight downhill to the Brandywine Creek. I held my breath and tried not to look down as I located this box. There was no way that I was going back down to put this box back after stamping in so I did it right there, standing uncomfortably with my back to the creek. But the stamp was worth it and once I got back up on solid land, I really enjoyed the view down the rocks.

By this time, I figured that Barney's bladder was probably swimming so I reluctantly headed for home with 18 new boxes under my belt. I am finding that I really feel relaxed when I come home from my letterboxing ventures. It really does give me a break from the mental stress that my job puts on me and gives me the physical exercise that my job denies me so it is something that I am beginning to need to do to function the rest of the week. I no longer think that I am obsessed with this hobby but instead, I am using it to keep my mental and physical health in better shape.