Tag Archives: Mr Crow

solo

Corvine Trio

Thursday, 8th December 2016 Caz

Puzzle: 3
Walked: 1.8 miles

I’ve been banging my head against a few more of Mr Crow‘s evil Rally Round puzzles recently. I finally had two more cracked, and was pretty sure of a third, so I set off for Tiptree today to see what I could find.

The first was RR212 – Unproven Conjcture which I had sorted out rather quicker than anticipated. No trouble with the find. Next on my list was RR218 – Disdyakis Triacontahedron. Yes, that’s a mouthful.

The “solve” entailed playing an online betting game enough times that you eventually came out “on top”. Well, thankfully no money was changing hands, or I might have been bankrupt! But eventually I beat the odds and was taken to a most intriguing location. I won’t say much more, but it’s a wonder how Mr Crow finds these hidden gems! A bit of poking about soon produced the goods.

After my two certs, there was just RR213 – Brouwer left. This intriguing geo-spacial puzzle can be solved mathematically, but stuff that for a game of soldiers! I used some Ninja Photoshop skills which produced a loose plot worth looking at. Thankfully, it wasn’t too long before I had this delightful little duckie in hand!

by bike, solo

Tollesbury Totter

Sunday, 9th October 2016 Caz

Trad: 15 Earth: 1
Walked: 9 miles

I needed to find and Earthcache today for my International Eartcache Day souvenir. The nearest unfound was at Tollesbury, so that’s where I headed. The EC itself was quickly sorted out, then I went for a little walk around the town.

The Lightship is a familiar sight in Tollesbury, so of course I had to make a picture.

Before heading off for my big walk around the Essex 100 Section 4, I needed some fortification, so stopped off at the excellent café near the boatyard for a tasty bacon sarnie and a pot of tea.

Then I was off around the sea wall looking for caches as I went. It would have been quite a walk, but I had taken the geo-bike with me.

Plenty of boats and things to see along the way, and fluffy clouds floating above the salt marshes.

With the familiar shape of Bradwell Power Station in the background, I made quick progress along the sea wall on the bike. Although about half way round I saw a sign saying “no cycling”. Oops. Well, too late now!

It was good to get this section of the Essex 100 ticked off, I’ve been meaning to visit for ages. 16 finds today will do very nicely.

challenge cache, solo, with friends

Amwell Amble & Tiptree Totter

Saturday, 24th September 2016 Caz

Trad: 4 Multi: 1 Puzzle: 6 Challenge: 1
Walked: 5 miles

Today’s outing was a brief solo foray into Hertfordshire to pick up some caches around Amwell, followed by a nice walk around Tiptree Heath back in Essex with geo-buddy Kitty.

My first target in Amwell was a Challenge cache, Spread the Love Challenge (UK) all about resuscitating unloved caches which haven’t been found for over a year. Well I qualified easily enough, but also noted that this cache itself had been unfound since 5th September 2015, even though someone had tried in the interim. Challenge Accepted!

I wandered around for ages and eventually found the box, very sorry for itself, a little way from the co-ords and only just as described by the hint. The contents were pretty soggy.

However, I unfolded the log and was delighted to find nobody else had signed the book since the last recorded find online – so I had just managed to Resuscitate The Resuscitator Cache! Do I get extra points for that?

Yay! Resuscitate The Resuscitator Cache :-) — Yay! Resuscitate The Resuscitator Cache 🙂

Since I was in the area, and there were some other interesting caches nearby, I made it a little circular walk to pick up a few more. The next one was placed close to the marker for the Greenwich Meridian – but the GPS seemed to think this was a little way off the correct location for E/W 0° 00.000!

There was a bit of fine industrial architecture too; the old Victorian Pumping Station along the New River.

Having finished my walk in Herts, I had a rendez-vous planned with Kitty in Tiptree Heath, to search out a quartet of Mr Crow’s puzzles relating to the tree carvings in the area. There were some great examples. Not sure this lady wanted to be disturbed though!

Talking of Crows – Corvus plasticus was guarding one of his other puzzles which we had also solved. With the aid of a ladder we had in the car, we soon made quick work of finding the pot and wresting it from the avian beak!

Our final port of call this evening was Sing It Again Rod (Encour), an audio conundrum by Fenners1984. We had both had a hand in solving it, so a joint find was a nice way to round off our outing.

with friends

Essex 100 – Loop 5

Thursday, 22nd September 2016 Caz

Trad: 40 Puzzle: 4
Walked: 12 miles

I had a day off caching yesterday, as I had to go to London for work. But today I went out for a great 44-cache stroll around Mr Crow‘s Essex 100 – Loop 5 between Tollsebury, Salcott and Tolleshunt D’Arcy. Neither myself nor Kitty had previously done this section of the extended series, and Crow said it needed a maintenance walk, so we agreed to wander round and replace any missing pots where necessary. In the end it was a splendid day out.

For reasons I never really understood, Kitty had kidnapped Mr Crow’s Raccoon and was threatening to post it back to him. We just couldn’t fit the damned thing through the slot!

This penguin was a rather more modest critter found lurking in one of the pots.

We ended our walk just as some glorious light was highlighting the fields, with moody sky behind. We were glad to get back to the car!

events, solo

Silver End Search Plus

Tuesday, 13th September 2016 Caz

Trad: 7 Puzzle: 2 Event: 1
Walked: 9 miles

This morning I finally managed to vanquish one of Mr Crow’s more annoying puzzles which has been bugging me for months. But I was glad to finally have it ticked off the list.

Then I headed along the A12 to Silver End, for a walk around some more rural caches. The farmer was busy harrowing his field as I passed.

It was very warm out in the open, but in Kelvedon I was grateful for some tree cover as I walked along this attractive boardwalk to my next find.

Finally, on to Coggeshall – to find a puzzle cache which I had first attempted in 2011 but it turned out to be AWOL. No idea why its taken me so long to have another crack at it. But the big grin proves I was successful, at long last.

Having sorted that unfinished business, I headed to the little chapel for another of geotrowel‘s Utterly Pointless events. Two horses were at GZ, both blindfolded – or are they fly hoods? Not sure!

A few other folks turned up too. A nice little gathering and a sociable way to round off my caching day.

by bike, solo

Day #393 – Tiptree On Two Wheels

Monday, 22nd August 2016 Caz

Trad: 10
Cycled: 2 miles

Mr Crow is most renowned for setting fiendishly difficult puzzles, only some of which I’ve been able to crack. But he recently published a series of trads in Coneyfield Wood, which I decided to tackle today.

I drove to Tiptree and then unfolded my Get Thi’ Sen There GeoBike and took a ride around the lanes, picking up a few others before heading into the woods.

The hides all had great containers, but these were some of my favourites:

A fun outing, and 10 trads in the bag today.

by scooter, hq duck dash, solo

Day #362 – Tiptree Scoot

Friday, 22nd July 2016 Caz

Trad: 7 Multi: 1
Walked: 2.5 miles

This evening’s trip was to Tiptree to try and mop up a few more boxes there which are still outstanding. After finally bagging a very old Church Micro, I scooted off to Simple Command – a keysafe hidden on the back of a Give Way sign. However, finding the sign was the hard bit – it was buried deep in the hedge! Still, I’m used to hedge fiddling in this game, so it didn’t deter me much.

I have pimped up my scooter a little bit, with the addition of a mounting bracket for my GPS. Perfect for urban caching. Little Quacker seemed to think so too…

We also had to walk some footpaths in the countryside to find a couple of other boxes, but that’s no problem since the scooter folds up easily and isn’t too heavy to carry when not in use.

LQ found a little lizard to befriend in the box – he looked quite real but is just as plasticky as the duck!

Another enjoyable outing by scooter, which was rounded off by popping in to see Mr Crow on the way home for a welcome cup of tea.

puzzles, with friends

Day #173 – Cool Cuban Spirit

Friday, 15th January 2016 Caz 1 Comment

Trad: 1 Puzzle: 62
Walked: 12.4 miles

I’ve had my eye on the Cool Cuban Spirit circuit in Kent by jazzyjessups for a while. I think I solved all 60 main puzzles well before Christmas, but haven’t had the time to come and pick them up yet. And a couple of days ago at the Essex Meet, I mentioned the series to Kitty!! and Mr Crow who were very eager to join me on my proposed attack on the caches today.

Kitty!! spent most of yesterday solving the puzzles and after a few late night emails we finally had a set of co-ords we both agreed on. Having met at Kitty’s house, we travelled to Kent in one car, parked up and set off along the track.

To begin with, the going was pretty good – the ground was still frozen in many places and we made good time on the first section. The route was mainly micros, but occasionally we were rewarded with a bigger box.

We met a few furry four-legged friends along the way – this was the cutest (and shortest!).

We had each brought a packed lunch, and just after finding Number 31, we stopped and had a bite to eat in the woods.

I was very glad of my silly woollen hat at times – it was very sunny all day but perishing cold!

It was a great series to do, with only 1 cache which needed replacing (which we did with the CO’s blesssing, meaning we had no DNF’s – hurrah!).

SMILE - You've Found Lots Of Smileys Today! — SMILE – You’ve Found Lots Of Smileys Today!

After 61 puzzles and a trad Church Micro thrown in along the way, we were really pleased to finally reach cache #63 for the day – the bonus cache! That makes my best day’s caching so far, and it was great fun to have company for the route.

Job Done - At The Bonus! — Job Done – At The Bonus!

puzzles, solo

Day #122 – Crow-jecture

Wednesday, 25th November 2015 Caz

Trad: 1 Multi: 2 Puzzle: 2
Walked: 5.0 miles

Today’s outing was to Wickham Bishops and Great Braxted to pick up some mutlis, puzzles and revisit a trad which I had DNF’d a few weeks ago.

First stop was the Church Micro at Great Braxted. Despite owning the CM a Little Braxted, I’d never visited this church before, so it was definitely worth a visit. The sun eventually came out too, once I’d spent more than half an hour roaming the churchyard, looking for clues.

The Trad at Beacon Hill was the one which had been missing for my last visit. Today the weather was much better and so was the reward.

I then moved on to Wickham Bishops to do three multis around the village set by kareninwb. Two were successfully completed but the numbers at one clue point were missing and I could not pick up the last one. There’s always another day….

But the most satisfying find of the day was one of Mr Crow‘s fiendish Rally Round puzzles, RR31 – Urban Bishops. I’ve looked at it on and off for several years and made zero progress. But yesterday I took another look at the cache page and had an idea. Not how to solve the puzzle (I still have no idea) but where the hide might be.

A bit of speculative rummaging in my likely spot and there it was! Yay! Successful Crowjecture completed!

challenge cache, puzzles, solo

Day #40 – Rally Round Plus

Friday, 4th September 2015 Caz

Trad: 6 Puzzle: 3 Challenge: 1
Walked: 4.3 miles

I’ve had several of Mr Crow‘s Rally Round puzzles sitting on the solve-but-not-found pile for ages. And I needed to go to Colchester today so I thought I would take a winding route across Crow-country to pick up several from the solved batch. I’m happy to say that the finds themselves were a lot easier than the puzzles!

I also went via the Essex Resuscitator Challenge Cache as I have recently revived several caches and therefore qualify for the find – another easy locate once at GZ. The final hide was the Church Micro at Little Bromley – where I also found this dilapidated old barn.

Daily Cache