Caching around DC

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Before we went the 10 miles or so to Washington, DC  (on the 2nd) We went to find a cache in a neighborhood near National Harbor. You could tell it had been there many more years than 4 years like the town. I’m pretty sure it’s Oxion Hill, MD. We drove by a Cirque du Soleil tent. That would have been fascinating to see. Did I mention it was raining? So we pull up to the area and I see a fence and guardrail. Sometimes I get so excited to find the cache, I forget the hint and things I have read about it! Plus I am getting out of the car in the rain in a strange neighborhood. Brian and Sean stayed in the car. I looked along the fence and turned around-the GPS showed it was close to the road-come on mush brain-it’s the guardrail! And there it was! I brought it back in the car and dumped it out and stuck a travel bug in it, then squeezed everything back in.

Didn’t I get a tick on me from this 5 minute caching! All the times I’m in the woods and I find a tick on me in a neighborhood!

I was checking out the phone for another cache and brain fog set in again! Brian had said he needed gas and drove by a nice gas station looking for another cache. We turned around as we thought we missed the road and as we approached the station again, the numbers went down! He had decided to skip the gas and it was there at that station-rats.

We got to DC in about 20 minutes and the hardest part was finding a place to park, next to the crazy streets there. We had to get ourselves around to the back of Union Station and then we did park on the roof of the garage. We looked around the station a little and the guys got coffee. We headed out to look for the caches (marble brain #3 episode-2 hours sleep just doesn’t cut it for me).

So we walk toward the Capitol. It is quite a sight. Oh, I’ve seen it in 5th grade (been in it also) and seen it many other times, but to see it from other angles is amazing.

Getting close to the Capitol

So here it is in all it’s historic majesty!

The only problem-I forgot it was a ‘virtual’ cache until we looked around a park nearby-that was a waste of time because are they going to let you put a box next to a historic place like this-really? Anyway, when I figured it out, I was suppose to take a photo of  the other side, where the Presidents take the oath of office! Grrrr-well, I had seen that area too, and I am sure a kid in my 5th grade class fell down in that general area (I’m talking 1970) and Cam broke his leg! It may have been Arlington, but it was in DC.  I told the C.O. what happened on geocaching.com and he didn’t say anything.

The next was also a virtual and within 10 minutes I remembered something about turtle eyes in the questions. This was across the way from the Capitol at the Library of Congress. Another issue was I had forgotten my geocaching bag with the GPS device and my phone’s battery was going. It was making the screen darken up. So I looked at the description again and answered the questions. The turtles were in a fountain near the sidewalk. The ‘authors’ were along the top of the building show below. That was all we did as we were tired and had a 6 block walk back to the car.

We grabbed some pizza and headed home. Well we started to head home and I mentioned that DC Cupcakes was in Georgetown. We tried to find that for almost an hour-Sean’s GPS took us to the incorrect end of  ‘M’ St. When we located it, it was 6:30 and it was hopping in that town with limited parking with no place to park in the area of the shop. But the shop was going to close at 7:00 and there was a line going out the door! For cupcakes! I guess because they have a tv show and all. I am going to make my own cupcakes for the fellas after all that running around. And we want to go back to Georgetown-it looks like a nice place, similar to New Hope in PA.

So again we are on the road to home-we are going through downpours every 5 miles or so. I then mention a easy virtual cache in Baltimore-you just get info from a memorial. We get off the exit and run into traffic and roads that we had needed to take being closed. No baseball game, but Sean remembered there was a Nascar show there and they were letting out! We never got near the cache and ended up going through an ‘iffy’ part of town. We were all getting tired of city driving. Did I tell you how awful it is to drive in DC? This was pretty bad too.

I’m glad we stopped, but I would have liked to see the President exhibit at the Madame Tussand  Museum, which I didn’t remember about until we got home. Not a good day for remembering anything! I truly do research my cache hunting well and things go smoothly-most times. Big city caching is harder! There aren’t a ton of box caches, but there are a ton of virtual ones to be found-in the future.

Union Station

Seen anything familiar from the roof of the garage?

3 responses »

  1. Such a shame the weather wasn’t cooperating and when you’re tired on top of that, geocaching doesn’t seem to work so well! lol I really enjoy virtual caches IF I remember everything they want you to do. I usually write everything down in a note book so that I don’t forget. Geocaching in big cities is stressful indeed and I’d much rather find them in the country or small neighbourhoods. How wonderful that you got to see the Capitol building, though, I imagine it’s quite breathtaking to see such an important part of history in person!! Glad you got home safe & sound. xoxo

  2. It sounds like a nice trip even though you did not have good weather.

    I have never heard of DC Cupcakes. Too bad you could not get in, but I bet yours will be just as good!

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