08-24-2008: Camp Randall Stadium (Madison) and Oregon, Wisconsin

Call me Ishmael. Let me tell you my story about the great white whale, Moby-Dick...

Well, my story is not about a whale, but about a geocache. One that I have been trying to find off/on for 5 years. It began in 2003, I had just discovered geocaching, and was a little bit cocky with success with my first 4 or 5 finds. Two of those involved multiple stages, and some challenge guessing the correct way to go. I looked up a puzzle geocache that was in the memorial park alongside Camp Randall Stadium in Madison, Wisconsin. It involved finding various survey markers placed there (for the students to use in labs at the engineering school adjacent to the park) and navigating with compass and bearing to find numbers to plug into an equation and get the coordinates for the final. I dutifully did this, took a couple of tries to get everything correct (my first run through gave me coordinates for a golf course miles away). However, when I searched for the container at the final location, I just did not see it. I returned to search 2-3 more times over the next couple of years, but still did not find. Today was the day to get that monkey off my back.

I got up in the pre-dawn hours to get to this location early. I did not want a lot of people around to stir up curiosity since this is a heavily traveled area as the morning turns to afternoon. Also there is no parking enforcement at this time and day.

A lesser-known parking lot along the School of Engineering of the University of Wisconsin, and behind Camp Randall Stadium.

Walk down the alley by the McClain Practice Facility. I saw an owl fly into a tree down at the end of this alley.

Around the corner to "The Shell". The target area is that landscaping to the left.

I already picked up one rock to check if it was a fake. I was pretty certain from my reviewing this cache in my mind for several years that I'm looking for a fake rock. I next go to check this one hiding in the brush.

I swear that on a prior trip here that I picked this rock up for sure and checked to see if there was some container hiding under it.

I however failed to flip it over and look at the bottom of the rock.

I triumphantly signed the log. By 7:30am the last geocaching monkey suddenly jumped off my back and I felt better. Took about 10 minutes from the time I parked my Jeep.

Here's the walk overlaid on an aerial photo. Short and sweet.

I did anticipate a quick find, and had loaded a series of geocaches into my gps receiver in 3 different parks around the suburban village of Oregon, Wisconsin. Chosen because the road south to get to there is very near the football stadium I was located at. I started at a conservation park on the north side of Oregon.

This is basically swamp land in a business park. Too wet to build on, so they turned it into a park. It looks like it was once quite a nice park, but is in great need of maintenance. I'm not sure if this is a result of this year's flooding or not, but it is terribly overgrown everywhere.

I put on my water-resistant hiking boots, had on water-resistant pants, and a fairly water-resistant long-sleeved shirt on also. Good thing because I was getting wet from the swampy land, and dew on the tall grasses. Here is where my gps is pointing at to find the cache.

It is way off of the trail, so I suppose the exposed container is pretty safe. Not many people visiting this year that I can tell.

An example of the poor state of maintenance.

The plus side was that the park is teeming with wildlife. The grass was constantly moving as I was stirring up frogs when I walked. Many birds, and I even spied a yellow hummingbird. I may return with a tripod and my long zoom lens just to capture the critters on camera.

This was the best the trails got. Some places I could barely see the stone dust among the grasses.

At least they are mowing along the drainage ditch.

A memorial marker.

Check out the overgrown amphitheater that the Boy Scouts built. Looks spooky now.

There is a trail to an observation deck somewhere there.

Well let's get out of here and dry off.

I did walk the wrong approach to the geocache here, and explored about 2/3 of the trails.

Back in the Jeep to drive to the southeast of Oregon, for a sleepy and again little-used Bicentennial Park.

The trails are a mix of stuff like this and some more rustic paths.

The geocache was pretty easy to find here.

I put a Travel-Bug inside that I retrieved last weekend by Oakfield.

Hey, a scenic overlook.

Do you see any 20-year-old tree here?

I think somebody planted it and then forgot to water it.

Another short hike here, but the miles are adding up.

Now back into my Jeep, drive a few miles west, and now to my last park. This one has 2 geocaches in it!

Here's the first on in the woods.

Trust me, I could see where it was immediately.

Hmmm, Dora the Explorer is tempting... Nahhh.

I actually ran back to my Jeep quick to retrieve a ziploc bag and put all the goodies inside of that. I was concerned about the water-tightness of this one. Then on to the second find.

I was just about standing on top of this one and did not see it. I had to back away to notice it.

I walked around most of the trails after that. Saw a hawk fly off and screeched as it did so. Lot's of deer sign, but no sightings.

And here's the walk overlaid on a photo of this area.

I told you those miles were adding up. 3.71 miles accumulated in all locations.

Not really the scenic wonder of my last several hiking trips, but I just felt like finding some caches today. I'm at 95 found lifetime right now and hope to get #100 as early as this weekend. I have 4 newly-placed caches targeted that are within walking distance of my home to work on this week.