Geocaching

After sleeping well into the morning after the most enjoyable code yellow ever, I awoke to find my lovely family all in the living room, enjoying a visit by my sister in law and her two kids. They had arrived on Sunday night on a mini-vacation of sorts, and I had wondered about taking them to Oxbow Park and Zoo. Our little family visited for the first time a few weeks ago and had a ball. The zoo there is very well kept and has many critters not found in Minnesota.

But I had slept late, and then there were the cloudy, rainy skies to contend with. Instead we visited with each other. I played a few games of chess with my 10 year old nephew, who had just learned the game a week before. He was pretty good for a newbie.

Then I mentioned a new 'hobby' I have recently picked up...Geocaching. It's sort of like treasure hunting for the masses. Someone places a little treasure chest or 'cache' someplace, marks the GPS coordinates and posts those on a website. Then others can get the coordinates and the hunt begins! We've been doing them sans GPS, just printing out a map from Google Maps of the location. This seems much more piratey and easily justifies the term Treasure Hunt for my four year old. The 'loot' is usually little trinkets and toys, and there is almost always a logbook to sign. It really is quite enjoyable, and the price can't be beat!

So my 17 year old niece, my nephew, my son and I all ventured out to see what we could find! After two hours of searching around a local lake, we came up empty. But everyone said they had a good time. Upon returning home, we all decided to go to dinner. The kids and I set forth one last time to look for a different cache before we ate. Finally success! I think they might get hooked on this 'sport' too. It really is a lot of fun.

After dinner we went home for more talking, chess and general family bonding.

More Later