[Northwoods Tom]

Time for us to take out a page from Muggle B’s play book and get out our compass and check out a hard copy map.

[Northwoods Tom]

That’s great! I had the same sort of experience about a year ago at Big Arb Ruins. Even had a camera… But there I stood slack jawed looking and enjoying before I thought of pulling the camera out. Glad they were quicker on the trigger!

[Northwoods Tom]

I like to place mosquito wipes and hand warmers in my caches when they will fit, in that I think they would come in handy at their locations. In one of my local caches, I have placed sealed sets of prints of local landmarks that I created quite a while ago, and have quit selling. They seem to be popular.

Rarely trade items but of the few I have taken, small tape measure (comes in handy a lot of times), small mesh bag (I use it as a gear bag to keep stuff organized) and of all things, a small hand garden spade (the one I had just recently broke). I actually had to travel back to my vehicle to get something to trade with.

I like the unusual and enjoy checking it out but often it’s the same old stuff.

[Northwoods Tom]

I don’t know if there is more then 1 outfit that rents them in Door County, but there are tours around the county and occasionally a group will board the ferry at Northport and tour Washington Island.

[Northwoods Tom]

@theStoneHausLady wrote:

Iron River National Fish Hatchery wants to become a cache site, but we need someone to make sure we’re doing it right!! Anybody available (Iron River, WI – 35 miles east of Superior, WI) to meet with group?

You might try looking at some of the caches that are placed in the area to see which ones are placed by local individuals (go to Geocaching.com and/or the WGA site). This might give you a list of individuals that may be willing to help out. There are a lot of great people out there!

[Northwoods Tom]

Noise, noise, noise! Like to sing, sing out loud! If it knows you’re in the area, it will avoid you, most of the time.

I purposely travel silent when caching in the north woods trying to view/photograph wildlife at the same time. Yet I also occasionally will carry a firearm when I’m in an area of high wolf depredation. The DNR identifies these areas on their website. Bear encounters are becoming less of a problem due to the increase in hunter tags being issued. Those bears want nothing to do with humans unless you get between a sow and its cub. Wolves are another problem, with their protected status, and their association with humans as being a curiosity that seems to pose no threat, they will check you out. Often you will never know. I personally have never had any adverse encounters with either species, but am aware of individuals who have with both. Cougar encounters in Wisconsin are extremely rare yet they are there. Traveling in a group or with a partner, lessens the chance of encounters with all those critters even more.

As far as being comfortable, I don’t think you ever are completely when traveling far off the beaten path on foot. You know they are there, they know you are there, you just stay aware. Even when I carry a firearm, I still remain alert. This isn’t a cache in your city park you’re going after, and the rewards are so much more when you get there, especially if you safely encounter lions, tigers and bears, OH MY!

[Northwoods Tom]

Congratulations on 600. Northeast Wisconsin has some great caches!

[Northwoods Tom]

A day trip to Madeline Island. Big Top Chautauqua (http://www.bigtop.org/) in Bayfield. Ashland, and the Hurley area in fact all along the route have numerous museums, attractions etc. dedicated to mining. Not sure what’s available as far as art and craft fairs, but you might check out some chamber sites. One of the hardest to find caches in the area: BIG ROCK, GC1DB6N. A little west of Washburn in Big Rock campground. If you take HWY 13 heading north, here are two of my favorite Earthcaches. Minersville Artesian GC1PM7Y (best darn water) and BLACK GRANITE GC1A3WR (truly beautiful). The first is only about a mile off 13 and the second is right on 13.

[Northwoods Tom]

@RSplash40 wrote:

Just had a great meal at the Thorpedo in …. Wait for it….

Thorp!

Huge portions at reasonable prices

Easy on off at the Thorp exit on 29

Thanks for the reminder! I use to stop there on a regular basis when I would go to Eau Claire to see family but for some reason got out of the habit. Time to stop again.

[Northwoods Tom]

Good article! It makes some points that really hit close to home for me. The numbers thing seems to be valid in many ways. I find myself driving by some of the same old caches because they didn’t pique my interest when I checked them out online. I then instead will end up walking or driving to some remote area for just a few hides because of what the cache page told me. Sure I will grab a few of those easy ones in the area, but I may ignore others. Living on Washington Island makes me take breaks from caching for periods of time and I think that helps keep it fresher for me. I find more time to search out on line what I think may be those gems that I want to discover. The puzzles (if you’re a puzzle person) give you a way to solve the location of a cache (although it can often be a magnetic guardrail cache), yet claim a difficult cache when you aren’t in the field. The joy here is the solve, not necessarily the cache.

[Northwoods Tom]

The Bearskin is a good choice for walking. But here’s one for when you have to return home to do by vehicle that’s south of Minocqua.

Starting (backwards), The Dead End HWY 51 series. The last cache starts about 4 miles south of HWY 51 and HWY 8. The series follows HWY 51 for about 6 miles. 8 total caches with a series final that you can’t solve without finding 1-7. Good one for a rainy day.

[Northwoods Tom]

@Lostby7 wrote:

Pretty much anything which has equations to solve goes on my ignore pile.

That’s to bad, because the answer isn’t derived from an equation…

[Northwoods Tom]

A roller ball pen. It rights on any log sheet, even damp ones! My walking stick comes in handy also, for those hard to reach caches. With a little practice, it also comes in handy when replacing them.

[Northwoods Tom]

@seldom|seen wrote:

…But I still revel on the good part of the game, the one in five logs that give me a chuckle, or a sense of satisfaction that someone went the distance on a solve or had a great time getting the physical cache…

Reading some of the posts I’ve missed and this comment for me, hits the nail on the head. If the quality of the hunt and find reaches that personal peak for each of us, let the cache owner know.

I strive to do this for those certain caches. Another way of saying thank you.

[Northwoods Tom]

I had over a dozen stumps in my yard left over after I had the electric co-op drop a bunch of trees that were to close to my house. All in the 1.5 to 2 foot diameter.

These are my observations and the decision I made.

I had tried those stump solutions that are suppose to rot the stump out, had no luck.

The solution were you drill holes and burn it out route, didn’t work.

Stump grinder guy wanted over $200/ stump.

One of my students wanted about a $100/ stump to pull them out with his tractor.

This is the route I took:
Bought a spare bar and 2 spare chains for my chainsaw. Dug all around the stump, would use the garden hose and sprayer to remove as much dirt and junk from around the roots as possible. When I would get roots exposed that were at least a foot underground, I would cut them with the chainsaw.

Each stump would take 1-2 evenings of work maximum after work as well as numerous times sharpening the chain. The work was not that difficult, the hose and sprayer and using the water to erode the soil under the stump worked beautiful.

In the end, I destroyed two chains and a bar, but saved well over a $1000 dollars.

[Author]

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