January 20 : Trackable : Community Volunteer Tag

During our caching trip around Weybridge, we found two trackables. Finding one trackable is quite rare, finding two very rare indeed. Also, trackables tend to be found in rural caches, rather than the urban ones in Weybridge.

Community Volunteer Trackable Tag

The first trackable was a Community Volunteer Tag. We have found at least one of these tags before – we believe they are given to noteworthy cachers on an ad hoc basis. This tag started in Poland in March 2022 and in less than 2 years has had a varied journey.

Not surprisingly its first few caches were in Poland/Germany/central Europe. It quickly arrived in the UK. Here it was taken to some iconic London landmarks, including Big Ben and Kew Gardens. It travelled to Australia (via the Philippines) and has been pictured outside the Sydney Opera House and Melbourne Cricket Ground!

Returning to Europe, it toured France, Italy and Portugal, before another trip to Australia, before returning to the UK, and was placed in the Weybridge cache on Christmas Day 2023.

A well travelled trackable – good luck on your future adventures!

November 30 : Trackable Sawyer Koala Bear

During our exploration of the woods around Sindlesham and Woosehill, we found a trackable, Sawyer Koala Bear.

On the face of it a very simple trackable.

Until you explore its history.

Firstly its a Koala Bear. Did it start from Australia? Does it want to finish its travels in Australia?
No, it started its journey just outside Los Angeles on the Western side of America and wants to travel the world.

Secondly the name. It is listed on the http://www.geocaching.com website as being called ‘Sawyer’. Yet on the reverse of the bear (above the trackable number which is why we’ve not shown it) is the name of the bear…Sydney.

Sawyer (or Sydney) wants to travel the world and from time to time return to Los Angeles. It left LA on the 24 January 2019 and it is therefore under a year old. The bear made its way North Eastwards to Iowa where it skirted around Des Moines, before heading to West Bend, some way north of Milwaukee. Then it headed East to Europe and visited several caches in Czechia, Romania and Serbia.

What follows is the third little conundrum with this trackable. It was marked as ‘missing’ in Serbia after 26th August 2019, yet a couple of weeks later appeared in a British cache. It was found in one of the Loddon Loop caches, a series we completed back in July 2016 when the footpaths were at their most overgrown!
https://sandhurstgeocachers.wordpress.com/2016/07/16/july-16-loddon-loop-sherfield-on-loddon/

Almost immediately Sawyer/Sydney was placed in the cache we found it in.

So although this trackable has been going less than a year.. its got a naming problem, visited at least 5 countries, got lost, found and travelled (apparently) nearly 8000 miles. Quite an adventure for a little bear!

November 3 : Trackable – Keys!

Our short caching trip around Lightwater yielded 5 trackables. The first was Keys!

Keys!

This is one the heaviest and possibly largest trackables we have ever found.

It weighs just under 1 Lb, (420g) and is about 3.5 inch round and contains at least 40 metal keys. Some the keys are small (perhaps briefcase keys), others old door keys. Some of the keys reflect the trackable’s journey. There are German keys, Australian keys and one from the Geocaching Association of Great Britain. The trackable started in Los Angeles in May 2007 with just 4 keys attached so it has grown a lot since then.

It is quite remarkable that the trackable still continues to be moved, but in general every few weeks or months the current holder finds a new cache for it to visit. Until about a year ago, when it was placed in a cache on the Oxfordshire/Berkshire border.
Unfortunately the current owner at the time placed it on one cache, but electronically logged it into another.

Keys! were picked up shortly after, but not logged by another cacher, so the journey stopped.

About a month ago, the keys ‘appeared’ in the Lightwater cache, but it is not clear who moved it. We will never know…but what we do know is we have a challenge to find a cache big enough and strong enough to place Keys! in.

Wish us luck!

June 15: Trackable ‘The GlobeTrotter’ (Phillip Island)

During our walk from Jack and Jill to the A27 we walked through Ashcombe Bottom, just off the South Downs Way.

The GlobeTrotter

One of the caches we found contained the geocoin ‘The GlobeTrotter’.

The picture is of Phillip Island, where the trackable owner, Singapore Girl, spends Christmas every year. (Editor : the trackable description cites an 11 year old girl, but the trackable first started its journey early 2014 so the girl is now likely to be 16 or 17!)

Phillip Island is a small island (measuring 16 x 5.5 miles) and separates the Bass Strait from Westernport Bay 80 or so miles South of Melbourne. It is actually no longer an island as 2,100 foot concrete bridge connects Phillip Island to mainland, Australia. The Island is a tourist resort and the population typically swells from about 9,000 to 40,000 when the holidays are on!

The trackable has travelled far and wide during the last 5 years.
During the first 4 years it stayed in Australia, generally in the Brisbane area until cacher nature0nut picked up and wrote “Buckle up! At the end of next month you’ll be tagging along on my adventure to Hong Kong, England, Scotland, Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland, Wales, France and Switzerland”.

Well somehow Hong Kong got missed, and by early 2019 the GlobeTrotter was in England and in another cacher’s hands. After a quick sortie to Malta it has remained in Southern England since (including a visit to the British Library).

We will move you on soon… so everyone worldwide can enjoy the delights of Phillip Island.