Can you identify these?

Made another visit to this area on October 13th.

Arrived at the Archway about 7:30, hoping to catch another sunrise, but it was far too cloudy for that.  Was a very dreary-looking day, but that didn't hurt the caching any.

Walked from the Archway all the way to the Fort Kearney S.R.A., looking for a couple of caches I missed the last time.  Good thing I enjoyed the walk so much, because I couldn't find either cache!  It was 12 miles by the time I returned to the Archway, about 1 p.m.   The rain, blessedly, didn't start in earnest until almost 2.

Took a couple of pictures I am trying to identify.  I will be pointing geocachers to come here and look, but you can try to identify them, too!  The fruit was growing everywhere, I don't think I've ever seen this before, can someone tell me what it is?  There were at least three of these skeletons, a scant ~40 feet from the Interstate.  Does anyone know what they are?

Posted by marshallmd at 8:48 AM CDT

Updated: Friday, 2 November 2007 11:28 PM CDT

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Mood:  quizzical

My schoolteacher of a sister had to point out that it's "Fort Kearny," not "Fort Kearney."

Can't believe none of you noticed that!!  Shame on you!!  J

Posted by marshallmd at 12:15 AM CDT

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Mood:  happy

Wow, it's been a while, eh?

 Just had to get down my thoughts about the great time I had near Kearney Saturday the 17th.

 Was plannning on coming this way this year, the place is loaded with geocaches, just wasn't planning so soon.  Then the World-Herald had an article about crane-watching, I didn't know you could see them from Fort Kearney!  It said there was a bridge out here over the river, and it was a popular spot for watching the birds, and to get here before sunrise.

 I e-mailed Mel first, I knew he had property here, wanted to know if I could find the bridge in the dark!  I also knew he might not be at home, as they were going to spend time with Mom & Dad in Arizona.  Mel got home Friday and replied right away, but I didn't check my mail after Friday morning.

 I found the bridge with just a little trespassing, and had a blast watching the birds.  Got a picture or two, but they were too far for my little camera, there are much better pictures of cranes out there.  Did get a nice picture of the sunrise, though.....

Get back to the car, grab my backpack, but figure I won't need my food or water, since I wasn't going to be gone long.  (See where this is going?)

 The first cache is on the far side of the bridge, and a little path led behind a tree.  As I come around, I see a guy get out of his truck on the far side of the fence.  It's obvious the guy knows where I'm going, the cache was only 20 feet from his fence.  He seems interested in me, so I say "Hi, I'm Mike Marshall from Cozad."  He says "Hi, I'm Mel Wiens!"..................

D'oh!!

It sounds like such a lame excuse to say "The sun was in my eyes," but it's true!!  The sun was right behind him, he had his hat and sunglasses on.......

So, anyhow, we had a nice chat, he says he'll have a cabin in this area someday, which he will rent out.  We watched as a guy walked right through the gate to Mel's property like he owned the place!  I told Mel he'll probably have to put up a sign....  I posted on geocaching.com that the gate here leads to private property, who knows if it will help?

Mel did know where the cache was, he's been watching a lot of people grab this one, so close to his property.  We then said Good-bye, Mel had a lot of branches to clean up from the horrible ice storms we had this winter.

This Hike & Bike trail they have here is neat!!  It leads all the way from the Fort Kearney SRA to I-80, and will soon link up with the trail that goes through town, so you could walk all the way to Cottonmill lake, if you wanted to!  I wondered how it would get over I-80, I never realized there's a way under it here!  I even climbed up onto the median of the Interstate and took a picture or two!

So, I hit another cache, and then another.....I figure I will reach a point somewhere when I will want to head back to the car, and drive to the other caches.  But they're so close together, they just kind of led me along, and I was having so much fun, I didn't really care!  There's a nice mowed trail here, that follows I-80 to the east.  The caches are all south of me, along the river, and I'm having a blast!  Then I see a sign along I-80:

Minden:  1 Mile

Yikes!!  I didn't know I had gone that far!  Well, there was only a few more to go, so why stop now?  I actually hopped the fence at the end and walked south toward Minden for a mile or so, and then headed back to the park.  I'll put up a map of where I walked.  Grand total:  12.29 miles!  Of course, my food and water sat in the car this whole time, so I was very glad when I got back!  I was a bit sore, but grabbed three more caches (from the car!) and was even able to walk five miles around Cozad on Sunday, so I must not be too bad!

So, I hit eleven caches on my walk, and had 14 for the day.  This gives me 110 total, and I left a special coin with my name on it in cache #100 to commemorate the event, and can watch on the Internet as the coin gets moved around.  Yay!!

All I'd had to eat all day was a candy bar and some water, so now it was time to reward myself!  I had coupons for Quizno's, so I had a "Prime Rib on Garlic Bread" sandwich!  MMMMMMMM......Good reward!!

 So, I'll put up a few pictures, and let you go!  Thanks for reading!
       
Fort Kearney

Posted by marshallmd at 3:59 PM CDT

Updated: Tuesday, 20 March 2007 12:43 AM CDT

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