Geocaching Northwet

All week (and for weeks previous) the forecast was calling for rain. The Spokane River was running high and fast. The Earth Cache at this point was observable, but ground zero was about 60 feet out from shore.

I'd never visited Post Falls before - just driven through. The Spokane river temporarily splits here, rushing through some narrow slots that have been leveraged for power production for decades.

This time I wanted to spend a bit of time since there were some quality caches in the area. There was an excellent earth cache at the falls,

A challenge cache, some letterbox caches, and more earth caches rounded out the few hours I had available on my last day in Spokane.

First thing the next morning, I jumped on a flight to Seattle where there was no question about the weather. With rental car in hand, I headed to Tacoma where I would work a few chosen caches and then start my way north.

I haven't visited downtown Tacoma for forty years. They've done a great job of redevelopment. With the paper mills gone, the obnoxious smell is gone as well. Now the University of Washington has a notable presence.

One of the newer additions to the area is the Glass Bridge which features three different collections of Chihuly glass.

As is typical of Chihuly, the glass includes wonderful colors, swirls, and shapes. Unfortunately, in my quest to concentrate on some virtuals, earth caches, and key challenges, I totally missed that there was a nearby webcam cache that I should have visited.

The near constant rain let up a bit as I approached a couple of caches in Point Defiance Park, where the trees sport thick coats of moss.

A visit to a peat bog was appropriately accompanied by rain.

As I worked to the north, I made a decision to not pay $20 for game day parking near Safeco field (or Pike Street market.)

The nice thing about stopping under I-5's Ship Canal Bridge was easy parking. The not so nice thing was that moss grows on picnic table benches, too.

The thing I like about geocaching is that it takes me to places I wouldn't have visited otherwise. Kerry Park is such an example. It's a little pocket park up on the side of Queen Anne hill that sports a very interesting view of Seattle. It would be really special on a clear day!

I just touched the surface, not even scratching it. I need to spend more time wandering around the area!