"In your hands, the birth of a new day... " (Limahl)

27 July 2007

Travel Gnome Geocoin

"Coblyn Glas" Travel Gnome Geocoin


It's not often you'll find a geocoin in a micro cache (because of the prohibitive size) but this little one was found in the film canister that is the "Cardiff Parks 1: Roath" geocache. I was up early for a jog today and slipped into the park to pick this up. Had to evade several wardens to make the grab.

The owners of the coin, "Jamesand Ellen" have named it "Coblyn Glas" - Welsh for "Blue Goblin".

26 July 2007

100th Geocache!

Mint 8 (Traditional cache)


Garth Hill (Multicache)


Tortoiseshell's 100 finds "geo-acheivement" geocoin


NOTE: Thanks to all who have voted for Tortoiseshell in the latest round of the Welsh blog awards (Best Specialist Blog category). You can still vote for the blog HERE over the next 24 hours or so.

Pic 1: "Mint 8" - my 100th geocache

So, after 11 months, it finally boiled down to this - a small film canister hidden under a stone on a soggy early morning in the Brecon Beacons. "Mint 8" was my 100th geocache, I found it at around 6.45 am.

Now that the 100 has been attained, and the 100 geocoin activated, I'm finally pleased to be able to get on with the rest of my life!

The next "geo-acheivement" geocoin is 250, but I have a feeling that may be some time away...


Later on in the day, I had the opportunity to do a more challenging multicache - Garth Hill, above Bulith Wells. After an unsatisfactory "find" at Flat Holm - when I didn't discover the actual cache, it was nice to make up for it wth a challenging slog.

Pic. 2: Garth Hill multicache. GPS perched on top of a trig point, with Royal Welsh Showground in the background.
There were several possible routes to the cache and I ended up contriving a long circular walk through a muddy footpath when I could have got to it via an easy country lane.

Nevertheless, it was worth it in the end. I had to reach the trig point (pictured) and take down the reference number, which led to the co-ordinates for the final cache.

After finding the final cache site, I shooed away a couple of horses and reached into the tree where the cache was hidden. Dropped off a couple of travelbugs.

17 July 2007

Croeso!

UPDATE: VOTE TORTOISESHELL HERE!!!

Mae Tortoiseshell yn croesawi cynrychiolwyr o'r gwobrau blogio Cymreig 2007. Mae'r blog yma wedi ei enwebu ar gyfer "blog arbenigol gorau", sydd wedi eu threfnu gan Ordovicius. Gweler isod am grynodeb o'm hobi a'r terminoleg.


Tortoiseshell welcomes delegates from the Welsh blog awards 2007, organised by Ordovicius. This blog has been nominated for "best specialist blog". See below for a summary of my hobby and the terminology.



GEOCACHING is "the best fun you can have with $12bn of military hardware". The game involves looking for tupperware containers with the help of a hand-held global positioning system (GPS), which provides location info by logging onto space satellites. I use the very basic Garmin Gecko GPS.

The sport is organised entirely on the website geocaching.com, which also provides a FAQ for newcomers to the sport. In the meantime, here are some explanations to various icons which will help you decypher the site.

Traditional cache: your bog-standard geocache which is simply hidden with a set of accompanying co-ordinates. I have hidden one.

Travelbugs: an item of bric-a-brac which is attached to a coded tag, travelling from cache to cache. A good example is found here. I own several. One of them is involved in a "travelbug race" with other geocachers from Aberystwyth. See sidebar for a full list of my travelbugs.


Geocoins: elaborate, collectable tokens which travel from cache to cache in the same way as travelbugs. Each comes with their own unique icon - which you accumulate in your profile when you find one. I had several good ones in one go back in April. See my sidebar for a list of my favourite geocoin finds!


Multi-cache: a geocache that involves some sort of numerical clues in order to reach the cache.



Event cache; a gathering of geocachers, who will meet up of a weekend to go geocaching, and to exchange travelbugs and geocoins. I've only been to one - and that's how it's likely to stay!

Abercachers: a group of enthusiasts from Aberystwyth, to which I'm vaguely affiliated. Click the icon to visit their site.






Tortoiseshell on Flat Holm

Flat Holm Island (Traditional Cache)


The sunniest day of last week happily coincided with a trip to Flat Holm Island. This is a brief picture blog with some of the highlights of the day.

Pic.1: Leaving Cardiff Bay - the "armadillo" shape of the Wales Milennium Centre can be clearly seen.
















Pic.2: The visitor centre, where we were mustered into groups for the tour guides. The Flat Holm Island cache, by the prolific German geocacher Steinmann, was supposedly hidden in this building. Unfortunately I couldn't find the actual cache.

However, Steinmann's cache listing stipulated that a photograph of the general vicinity would count as a "find". This was my 99th cache! This is a collection of plastic flotsam gathered in the visitor centre which I used as evidence that I had visited the vicinity of the cache.















Pic.3: Wild leek, a rare plant found on Flat Holm. Somerset can be seen in the background.















Pic 4: The Guglielmo Marconi memorial in the garden on Flat Holm.Marconi sent the first radio signals across water from Lavernock Point (near Penarth) to the island. A potted history is found here.
















Pic.5: The garden, a small but beautiful area of plants and flowers. A tortoiseshell butterfly is shown here.
















Pic.6: The lighthouse, just before our group entered the gull colony.




















Pic.7: The boat back to Cardiff

13 July 2007

Scavenging: 3

Master Blue Knight Travelbug


Primary School Badge Travelbug


A quick post before the weekend just to note two travelbug finds from my own cache.

One travelbug is a laminated badge of Waun Wen Primary school (Swansea, I presume), whose mission is to be photographed with other primary school logos.

The second one really tickled me -"Master Blue Knight" - very cute (and durable) TB. Not sure if I'll be able to move these on anytime soon so I may just return them to my own travelbug exchange cache.

12 July 2007

The Trabant Driver - "now with added Barkas"

Good to see that Steeplejack (aka The Trabant Driver) is up and running again - this time in a Barkas camper van. For the uninitiated, the Barkas was basically the official van of East Germany (DDR). Although they are no longer in production, they still have a fan site which no doubt Steeplejack will have already checked out.

Another Wimbledon over...

Pic 1: Wimbledon Centre Court, with the old roof.

The end of Wimbledon always brings with it a melancholy feeling at the end of a fortnight's tennis. I caught the bug in 1987. I was at home nursing a nasty injury as an 11-year old. I got to watch the whole thing for 2 weeks. "Star Trekking across the universe" was in the charts; I was addicted to chocolate "Weetos" cereal and Milky Bars. The enduring image of that championship was the victorious Pat Cash running into the stands to greet his father.

Pic 2: Pat Cash wins Wimbledon in 1987

During that 1987 championship, I also recall watching doubles tennis for the first including the "Woodies" doubles pairing - the Aussies Mark Woodforde and Todd Woodbridge.

My interest wained for a few years (although I won a 20 quid sweep stake on Andre Agassi in 1992). However, since around 2000, my interest has been rekindled as K is a big fan. Moreover, K's friend Raelha is an equally big fan.

Pic 3: Evergreen Australian doubles pairing - Mark Woodforde and Todd Woodbridge

In the early 2000s, K and I went twice to Wimbledon. On one occasion, we listened in the queue on our trannies as a new era in mens tennis arrived - a young Roger Federer defeating Pete Samprass was considered a huge upset back then.

We also got to see the incomparable Martina Navratilova for a couple of precious sets of doubles on court 2. Nothing will ever erase the memory of seeing the great Martina in action. Another memory of 2001 was the phenominal Ivanesavic - Rafter final played on a Monday.

Pic. 4: The great Martina Navratilova wins her 20th Wimbledon title. On this occasion it was the mixed doubles with Leander Paes in 2003.

The fact that I've posted about tennis means that I predict some juvenile comments about Sharapova's legs, or similar, to appear from certain quarters. Needless to say, these types of comment shall be deleted without recourse to appeal. You know who you are. I hope you'll surprise me by not leaving a smutty comment in the first place!

Pic. 5: Wimbledon final, 2001 - the greatest game I ever saw: Goran Ivanisevic bt. Pat Rafter 6-3, 3-6, 6-3, 2-6, 9-7.

Raelha's new blog "Graff, Evert, Ashe" has been a welcome newcomer this month. It chronicles the fantasy tennis tournament that the 3 of us have played out for seven years now! Hopefully the blog, and the wonderful memories of the 2007 men's final (Federer bt. Nadal 7-6, 4-6, 7-6, 2-6, 6-2.), will stimulate Tortoiseshell's tennis buds again - I wish I could develop a closer interest in this great game.

A free blog

Back in May, I decided to trim down the blog. Out with politics, faith, soccer, creative writing and a load of other flotsam. The blog was to be a geocaching from now on, with some passing references to real ale, food and scenery etc. The Trabant Driver being my main influence on how to blog an acutely specialist topic - and to blog ONLY on that.

This worked well for a while. Geocaching excursions to Cardigan and Surrey, and placing my own geocache, gave me lots to write about.

Pic 1: Iced gems - one of my favourite childhood snacks

However, in the last couple of weeks, geocaching has been thin on the ground and the blog has suffered. There is also the dawning realisation that the safe arrival of a Small Tortoiseshell in November is expected to turn my geocaching career into toast.

Recently, I confessed to Maalie that I was thinking of bringing the curtain down on the blog, but he persuaded me out of this.

Pic. 2: Sweet Williams - my favourite flower

I have decided to go to the other extreme - to completely open the blog out to any kind of random stuff. As part of the build-up to the 100th cache celebrations - and the de facto end of my geocaching career - I hereby declare Tortoiseshell a free blog.

3 July 2007

Curtis C. Ebbesmeyer

I am breaking my geocaching theme to write about an extraordinary bit of bric-a-brac. I was alerted to this news on the blog of Peter Black.

Basically, a cargo of rubber ducks was spilled in the Pacific Ocean way back in 1992. An oceanographer named Curtis C. Ebbesmeyer has been tracking this cargo faithfully. Beachcombersalert.org is his website, dedicated to the tracking of the rubber ducks and other cargo spills of note.

It seems that Ebbesmeyer has attracted periodic press interest across the world. Currently, the rubber ducks of 1992 are headed for the British Isles after a trip around the Pacific, Arctic and Atlantic Oceans. Typical UK Press reports here, and here, and a more erudite article on the science of sea flotsam here.

2 July 2007

Tintern

Ferryman's Fury (Traditional cache)


Went for a day our to Tintern, scene of one of a previous memorable outing to the spectacular Devil's Pulpit cache. This time, it was a quick cache and dash for a micro on Brockweir Bridge. Cache no. 98!

Afterwards, we went for a stroll around the Mill and the Abbey. Had a delicious Wye Valley ice cream made by the Brookes company which is based in Deuvaden near Chepstow.

I chose the honeycomb-based "Welsh gold" in a waffle cone. Pictured.

Scavenging: 2

The moo-mobile


Travel-bug dog tag


Max


A belated post to update some travelbug discoveries last week, on a lunchtime stroll to my cache in Hymadriad Park. I was momentarilly excited because I thought I'd found a rare green jeep from the 2006 Jeep geocaching competition. It was not to be - just a regular travelbug attached to someone's green jeep toy - aka "The Moo Mobile".

Pic 1: The Jeep that wasn't