Trad: 6 Virtual: 7
Walked: 8.7 miles
Before driving up to the North East for this trip, I had done some research and realised there were quite a few old Virtual caches in the area. So today I persuaded Alistair to come with me on a road trip to visit as many as we could manage, plus finding a few trads in counties or cities which were missing from my map.
The first Virtual on the list was a short trip across the Tyne in Jarrow, to Spirit of Jarrow (Tyne & Wear), commemorating the Jarrow March.
Next up was a pair in Middlesborough – first the Transporter Bridge, (which I had visited before I knew about caching), so it was nice to return and have another look.
Then we walked into the centre of town to visit Alistair’s own Virtual cache, Spectra txt, But Is It Art? He’s not looking very happy about it!
The lovely little village of Yarm was our next stop, to pick up Under Water? (Cleveland).
Alistair had already found quite a few of the virtuals we wanted to visit, but not Steam Bricks (Co. Durham) – so next, we headed for the impressive sculpture of the train made from bricks on the outskirts of Darlington.
We then moved the car and had a walk into the centre of Darlington to visit Town Tie Up. More gurning for the camera….
Our last location was the surprisingly difficult virtual at Hurworth-on-Tees, Clocks That Never Need Winding Up. We eventually spotted the required three sundials as the light was beginning to fade!
So all in all a very enjoyable virtual geo-tour around the area. There are still some more which I can target for my next visit, but for the moment, that takes my total above 50, which qualifies me for another Challenge cache. Yay!
Next up was a short diversion via Bishop’s Stortford to collect Hertfordshire. This is where it all went pear-shaped. There were too many muggles at my first target, I couldn’t find the next TWO and had to resort to a hastily-downloaded back up cache from my phone to finally find something! Phew.
A small detour from the A1 brought me into Northants, where I spotted the cache quickly, under a tree at the side of the road. There were big, wide open skies and it was still sunny and warm.
The pretty village of Tinwell was my stop in Rutland. Originally, I was going to go for the Church Micro in the village, but I had problems finding the right footpath. So instead I went for a quick find at the Village Sign.
A bit further up the A1(M) was my next target, another Church Micro, this time in Marr. It was an inventive hide up the spout of a water pump. And onto the next…
I had plans to scout out a high D/T cache near Knottingly as a grid filler, but sadly it wasn’t to be today. I just couldn’t spot it. However, I did find another bridge-based cache close by, to make sure I had picked up one for North Yorkshire (which actually protrudes quite far south at this point).
This cache was rather well themed – it was set near the site of an old brewery, and the log sheet was set into the side of a little barrel! Pity it wasn’t full, after the day I had had, I could have done with a bit of a tipple. Never mind, the light was beginning to fade a little which meant I couldn’t hang around. I had one more county to collect…
The final pick up of the day was in Tyne & Wear. It was a magnetic bolt on the base of a gate post. I was very glad to have finally finished my mission, just a mile or two from my final destination at Alistair’s house in Newcastle. What a day! I think it has qualified me for three different Challenge Caches, so it was definitely worth the effort.
