500!

Sunday, June 11, was another picture perfect weather day. Boy, weren't we blessed with a lot of them this spring? I decided it was time to hunt for my 500th box - but I still had to find 497, 498 and 499 and I didn't really want to travel too far. After my long drive to Maryland and the recent drive to Canada, I was now ready to capture some of the more local boxes. The new set of boxes in Phoenixville by a Scout Troop who are posting under the name of Kodi's 1766 Friends looked promising, especially since this little town is right down the road from Reading and I had never explored it. The only thing that I knew about Phoenixville was that I had to drive through it to take Laura home when she was attending massage therapy school and that it had a Produce Junction there. So, what did I have to lose. As it turned out, I did lose a lot of time there searching for these boxes but I also did have a nice tour of the town while doing it. My first box there, and my favorite search, was The Hungry Tree. This box was along a lock. The sign for this lock was right across the street from Produce Junction. I had never, never, seen it before even with all of the stops that Laura and I had made at Produce Junction. As I was driving back the long narrow road to reach the lock, I was doubting that there was even anything back there, but I turned out to be very pleasantly surprised. As I drove past a group of "Grumpy Old Men" type fishermen, just sitting in their lawn chairs silently fishing along the canal, I began to notice signs of the lock. I found a parking space, not too hard since I was the only one there, and began to put on my hiking boots when another car pulled up. The man who got out was carrying a piece of paper......hmmmm, another letterboxer perhaps? So I did the obvious and asked him and found out that he was a brand new geocacher who had received a GPS unit from his daughter as a birthday gift. She apparently was worried that he would be too sedentary in his retirement years and decided to get him out and about. He and I chatted for a few minutes and he told me that there were actually four geocaches in this little area and that he lived in Phoenixville and had never known that this park was here either. Sounds like one of those well kept secrets - one that I really love about letterboxing. How else would I ever have gotten there if there weren't a box there. Anyway, I started on my quest to find this box and I have to say, the walk was absolutely drop dead gorgeous, as long as I didn't dwell on all of the poison that was off the path. The weather was perfect, crystal clear again, sunshine, and cool. Through most of the walk I could see a river dead ahead of me, there were some bluffs on the side, there was lots of bright green vegetation. The only bad part was that the walk was not long enough to explore too much of the area and I found the box in fairly short order. And another negative, although not a deterrant to me was that the stamp was a store bought stamp. But I did know ahead of time that these boxes were done by kids so that wasn't a big issue for me. I made a mental note to myself to take my GPS there and search for those caches sometime in the fall or winter when the vegetation was a little sparser and I could avoid the poison a little easier. Box number 497 was now safely found.

My next search was for The Purple Penguin by another of Kodi's 1766 Friends. This one would have been a long walk along a nondescript trail at the beginning but I was able to follow the directions and drive to within a block of the box. The building where I parked was interesting and gave me a hint about the history of this iron making town. The trail ran across from this building and I passed these beautiful wildflowers on my way to find the box. When I look at this picture, I can actually still feel the weather of that morning. I came to the end of the trail and thought....what the heck? There was no sign of the object which was the final clue for this box. I poked around a bit and eventually did find the box and by stretching my imagination and again, remembering that these were boxes by kids, was able to relate the end result to the clues. And box number 498 was now officially in my logbook.

I then moved on to find the other three boxes in this group but was unsuccessful. One of them did take me up and down and all around the town but in the end, the clues were too vague for me to finish the box. Another one was definitely missing, I could see where it had been and I could also see signs that there had been non-letterboxing visitors there. And the third one....well, let's just say I was getting frustrated by vague clues when I attempted this one and gave up before I ever got really started.

I still needed at least two more boxes so I travelled a bit to Lansdale to look for Wednesday Bowler and Celtic Cat's Light a Candle, a tribute to a murdered friend. I am really glad that I looked for this box. As I sat in this little copse and looked down at third base on this beautiful day, it was so hard to imagine the ugliness that had taken place there. In fact, it was almost impossible to think that someone could lose their lives by being beaten to death on a baseball field where children played and families enjoyed life. This is a tribute that is worth the effort for any letterboxer who is in the area to make. The walk is short but the impression is long lasting.

Well, now it was time for number 500 - but which one would it be. I pulled out my trusty computer and looked for boxes which were in the area and quickly decided that I would go for Indigo Vulture's Giant Peach. I was happy that the honor, even though "honor" was only in my mind, would go to the one person who has searched for almost every one of my boxes. Thanks Myke for taking the time to do that! As I was organizing myself in the parking lot to begin looking for this box, a couple of cars pulled up beside me and some moms, grandmoms and a couple of cute blonde little girls got out of the cars. The trail began as a paved one around the open park area and I started my walk around the fields. The cute little girls soon caught up with me, one on roller blades and one on a scooter. After exchanging a few words with them, they headed into the wooded part of the trail with their moms watching from afar. I guess I have been watching too much of NBC's "To Catch a Predator" because I suddenly had a very uncomfortable feeling about entering those woods while the children were in there alone. So I backtracked a little while waiting for them to appear again and took another look at this little shack which Myke mentions in his clues. Alright, Myke, you asked the question....can you answer it? Just what is this little shack used for? All right, the little girls were now heading safely back to their moms and I could continue on my walk. I headed into the woods and soon found this little birdhouse which would be the key to finding my 500th! My excitement was building, my heart was beating fast and then my fear struck....what if it was missing? It was an older box after all. And I don't remember a recent find listed for it. Would this mission have to be scrubbed? Now full of anticipation, I walked through the woods, carefully following all of the clues and ......there it was! Sitting right out in the open! Waiting for me! My 500th Box! I quickly dialed Laura's number to share the news and was astounded....yes, astounded....that she was not as excited as I was. Phooey on her! It didn't matter, I had accomplished my goal for the day and could now return home successful. I stamped in, savoring the moment, and then floated back to my car, waved goodbye to the cute little girls and decided that one more box was needed, just to make sure that I hadn't counted incorrectly.

Green Lane County Park was nearby so I riffled through my stacks of clues and found a Raindear box which had been found recently. Intro to Boxing is a three box series in Green Lane. I have found in my experience that most of the boxes in Green Lane go missing rather quickly so I was really debating whether I wanted to go after this one or not, especially since the second box was already listed as missing. But I decided to give it a try anyway. The park was packed with people. I have been to this park many times in the past few years and this was the most crowded that I had ever seen it. Fortunately, I was able to find the first box very quickly and I have to tell you, I really like this stamp a lot. Tim had mentioned in the clues that it was made to teach using foam on wood but I never would have thought that this one was an experiment or a teaching tool. It is really neat. I didn't get to see either of the two other foam stamps because as I had mentioned, number two box was missing and I suspect that number three could be missing also. I couldn't investigate as much as I normally would have for the last box because there were too darned many people milling around but I was still able to head for home with an elated and successful feeling.