Micro Mugglelog

What is a Micro Mugglelog?  It has to do with geocaching.  Unsuspecting people who don't know about geocaching and who are around you when you are geocaching are called "Muggles" (Like in Harry Potter).   "Micro" are hidden geocaches which normally are small and hidden in plain site.

This Micro Mugglelog was an 'event GeoMob' geocache.  At a pre-determined place and time,  multiple geocachers converge together and all pretend to be "Muggles" and then at a given time they all do something together. 

In this case, it was being held at a new outdoor mall called The Fountains (where we have hidden one of  our caches). There are always people around watching the fountains and shopping.  The person who thought this one up, was going around to everyone  and explaining that the date was an important one to his friend, who was with him, and from the country of  Cacheistan (Cache Uh Stan). 

He then went on to explain that at 4pm that day, it will mark the 350th anniversary of the first rains in Cacheistan after a 2 year drought.  It then rained for four days and there were many celebrations.  It was a tradition to celebrate the rains at midnight (4:00 our time) with squirt bottles and noise makers. At the stroke of 4:00 everyone will shout "Micro Mugglelog" which means "Thank You Rains" in Cacheistan and make  noise!  He was then inviting everyone there to sign his book and join with him in the festivities. He was passing out noise makers and party hats.

In case you couldn't figure out, that last paragraph is all made up.   So we went and joined in. He came around to us and told us the whole story, we signed his book, said hi to his "friend" and waited for 4:00.

Here he is talking to a Muggle. The one with the book and necklace is the "American" and the guy in the yellow shirt is his friend from Cacheistan.

 

Here they are with their party hats on - they put some on several people who continued wearing them even after the whole thing was over!

 

Here is Jacob waiting patiently for it to begin:

Right close to 4:00 he started counting down starting with 10......9.......8...7...6...5...4...3...2...1....

There are fountain shows at the top of each hour so he wanted to time it just right with the fountain starting.  There are TONS of security at this new mall and some of them were watching and wondering what was going on. They have already found and taken 3 geocaches that have been hidden at the mall (including one of ours) and currently our 2nd one we placed at the mall is still alive and remains!  (It's in a rain gutter).   

Here he is starting the countdown:

 

Finally got to 1 and everyone started yelling "Micro Mugglelog" and blowing whistles, squirting squirt guns and clapping......and the fountain started right up.  The security guard was perplexed. He didn't know what to do!  Here is a shot of the whole thing going down - but the leader was on the other side of the fountain because I was standing in a dumb place to record it, not realizing the fountain would be in the way!  Watch though for a quick glimpse of the security guard not knowing what to do!  He stood there for a few seconds, watched, and when it was over, got back into his golf cart and drove to the other security guard and was talking to him.

 

 

And we couldn't leave until the fountain show was done. Here is a sample of the show this hour (it changes each hour)

 

We had a lot of fun on this one. There wasn't as many Muggles as there usually is, but it was still lots of fun being in on the joke.

All Aboard!

We had talked all Summer (both this and last) that it would be fun to go for a "real" train ride. It was just never cost effective enough to do it.  So with the help of the Indians (I will explain that later) and an Amtrak special where kids 15 and under ride free on Saturdays in August, we finally did it!

We didn't tell the kids what we were doing, just that we were going to be gone all day and start out with some geocaches in downtown Sacramento.

We did one right across from the train station at the new Courthouse/Jail building.

 

We then walked across the street back in front of the train station and Doug walked in and everyone followed him. The kids got a big smile on their face as we walked to the train platform.  We waited for the train and got in!  They thought it was cool that it had an upstairs!

 

We found some seats and settled in for our ride to San Francisco.  It was about a two hour train ride and 15 min bus ride to Zeum, a children's science museum in San Fran that we hadn't been to in a couple years.

 

All the kids thought it was fun to walk around and walk between the different cars while the train was moving. They loved the snack car especially. Here Jacob and Hannah wanted to stand by the doors downstairs while the train was going:

 

We finally got to our station right near the Bay Bridge and had to transfer to an Amtrak bus because the train doesn't actually go into San Fran.  It was a little cooler here! We left 100 degree weather and arrived to 60 degrees! We got off the train and didn't realize how many people were on it until we saw them all get off! We heard that it was abnormally crowded this day-there was a baseball game in San Fran.

 

We then boarded a bus for the ride across the Bay Bridge and into San Fran. 

 

Our bus had a hole in the ceiling where the vent would normally be, but the entire vent was missing so we could totally see outside up towards the sky. We snapped these next pics as we went under the towers of the bridge.

 

 

And this one out of the dirty window of the bus:

 

We finally arrived and went to get something to eat for lunch as we were all hungry. We saw a Denny's and decided that they are usually inexpensive for the food you get, usually $6 or $7 for adult breakfast meals. Not in San Francisco they aren't!  The normal $5.99 breakfast was $12 here!  We didn't stay. We walked across the street to Jack In The Box and ate a lot of food for $20! And we even fed a homeless man who was sitting next to us.

We then walked to the  Zeum and walked around the grounds first, as Zeum is part of the Yerba Buena Gardens area. Of course, there were some geocaches to do. In this one, it was under a light pole cover, but it was in the middle of an amphitheater with people all around sitting on the lawn and with an event getting set up on the stage. Jacob and Marissa went to get it, trying not to be noticed, but I'm sure someone was wondering.

 

We went through a waterfall filled monument that was nearby and loved the different types of buildings that are in San Fran.

 

We then went into the Zeum museum which is free since we have a family pass to a museum near our house, and it's good for hundreds of museums across the country.  The kids always love this game:

It's a maze game that is projected on the floor onto a special mat. You then control the board by walking to one side or the other. As you do, the board "tilts" and the ball moves. You have to tilt the board to get the ball through the maze without the ball falling into the holes. It's harder than it looks!

Here the girls are revealing their true faces:

 

We decoded special messages:

 

Made stop action 3-D movies:

 

Made play dough figures to take home:

 

Jacob and Doug went exploring to find a geocache that was two blocks away.  It was in another museum that was dedicated to the Chinese immigrants who had settled in San Francisco long long ago.  The hint to the cache was that it's in plain view.  We were looking around and around, and once of the museum workers came up and asked if we needed any help or explaining of any of the exhibits.  Doug told her no.  As she walked away, Jacob said that the box should be around here somewhere. The lady overheard him and came back and said, "Are you looking for the special box?" Can you see it here?

 

It was sitting right on a table with other exhibits. She told us to take it down and look through it. Take as much time as you need, she said. It also dedicated to the Chinese settlers and had lots of stuff to read through and look at.

 

We headed back to the Zeum and found everyone else. It was time to go. We had seen and done the whole museum.  We said goodbye to the Merry Go Round.

We went back to the bus stop to retrace our steps back to the train station, and back to Sacramento.  As we were waiting for the bus, we noticed it was somewhat a little noisier in this city then in our city. Marissa wanted me to take a video of the fast moving clouds and to listen to the city noises..so here it is:  Ahhhh..the peaceful sounds of a big city!

 

We arrived back at the train station and waited for our train to come in. It was not nearly as full going back as it was coming. We practically had the entire car to ourselves all the way home.

 

On the way home we passed a lot of farm fields of lettuce, corn, tomatoes, but the most colorful one was this one of sunflowers.

 

And that was our Saturday! Lots of fun!  Two thumbs up!

So what about the Indians you say? How did they make this possible?  Well, you see, a few weeks ago Shelley and Doug went to Thunder Valley Casino near our house for a free dinner buffet coupon we had that was about to expire. Yummy buffet by the way and not very expensive on weekdays. Anyhow, the casino is owned by the Maidu Indian Tribe (as all casinos in California are owned by the Indians) and along with our free dinner, we each also had $10 of free slot play. So we headed over to the penny slots and played away our $10.  It took us about 30 minutes or so, and we decided we had played enough, and we decided to cash out.  You really don't know how much money you lost or won, as the machine just keeps track in the form of "credits" instead of actual dollar amounts.

We thought each of us had around $15, we knew we were up and decided to quit. Shelley cashed out and around $70 and Doug cashed out and he had around $50!  So we used that money for our trip to S.F. So thanks Indians!

Pillow Fighting 2.0

So Meghan and Marissa came up with a new and improved way to pillow fight (their mom doesn't know about this, so don't tell her!) Look for the big bang in the 2nd video

We call it:

Pillow Fighting 2.0

 

Did you ever wonder how Spanish people draw?

I sure did!  Luckily, Hannah provided the answer for us in this home video. 

Listen and watch carefully, and you too, will find the often searched out answer to the burning question everyone has, but is afraid to ask:

Just how do Spanish people draw?

Utah Here We Come!

IIt's that time again! Time to go to Utah!

We started out by doing some geo caches along the way. There were probably a hundred or so along the freeway between our house and Utah, so we just picked a few.

The first one we did, was near Truckee, still in California. It was through a wildlife underpass under the freeway. Most people don't even know this exists!  We didn't either!

Can you see where the cache was hidden below?

How about now?

 

Our next one was near the hot vernal pool and springs about an hour east of Reno. It was hidden in a pipe that went under the ground, and was guarded by a special creature!

We decided to do one in the thriving metropolis of PuckerBrush. It was attached to the back of the sign with velcro.

Our next stop was off the freeway about 1/2 mile in the middle of nowhere. No towns, no rest stops, nothing. Just an exit to dirt roads. It was in the middle of a field inside this rusty bucket.

 

The kids always look for two things on the way to Utah in Nevada. The tunnel before Elko, and the volcano near Wells.

 

Finally! We see this:

 

We always have to stop at the Salt Flats rest stop. The kids like running up and down the ramp. Of course there was a geo cache here too hidden behind the soda machine. (There were geo's at every rest stop along the way, but we didn't stop at all of them.)

 

The last one we did on the way was the "Tree of Utah" that you may have seen between Wendover and Salt Lake City. It's a "virtual cache" so all you have to do to log it is take a photo of it. In case you were wondering why it's there, here is the story:

The sculptor and artist, Karl Momen, from Sweden, financed and built it himself.  He was driving to California and had a "vision" of a Tree in the middle of the barren desert and salt. He did some research and built it where the crew of the Enola Gay practiced their bombing runs before proceeding on to Hiroshima, and also where members of the ill-fated Donner Party were delayed which caused them to be in the snows over the Sierra's. He built his tree between 1982-1986. It didn't used to have the fence around it, and you could stop and walk up to it.

Once we arrived at Grandma and Grandpa Binghams house, the kids were out playing in the back yard.

 

We miss being so close to the mountains. You forget how close they really are!

 

The two valley's: First Utah Valley, and the 2nd, Salt Lake Valley.

 

We stopped off in Sandy to do a nice cache. At first we saw this box and thought that can't be it. It's too much in the open. But the GPS was pointing to it, and then we noticed the cache ID on the box. Very clever! It is right next to the Auto Mall and all the prizes inside are car related.

 

And then it was off to our most favorite family place to eat!  It is SO YUMMY!!!! 

 

We spent a few days camping also at Cherry Hill near Ogden for a family reunion. Here are some pics from that:

 

 

 

Back at Grandma and Grandpa's, Jacob was teaching the horses how to dunk for apples, and Hannah was having fun running around.

 

We dropped Meghan off to go to EFY at BYU for the week. Her roommate was also named Megan and went on our cruise with us last year. They had a BLAST at EFY!

 

Here is Meghan giving us a tour of her apartment:

 

Quite the Ladies Man - in between two Meg's

Here is one of the dances.  What a shame the dances aren't well attended:

Can you find Meghan? Click to make it bigger:

 

Here is Meghan bowling not so good so the rest of her team would feel better, since she was like a bowl master!

These two boys thought it would be funny on the formal night, to stop off and cool down in the fountain. Their counselor didn't think it was all that funny. They couldn't go home to change and they had to have dinner in their wet clothes!

 

Which one is Meghan? (Hint: she has a white shirt on)

 

Here they are just getting started in the morning:

 

 

 

 

We went to an historic park and they were having activities as the pioneers would have done back in the day.

 

This park was in honor of John Moyle who walked from Alpine with his wooden leg each week to Salt Lake to work on the temple. (Click on the pic to see it larger)

We also were able to attend an African Children's Choir who were very very good!

Here is a video of them singing: It's a LONG video (8 mins) so feel free to use the slider bar to fast forward it.

 

All too quick, it was time to make the return trip back home. Shelley didn't stop for any geo caches along the way, as she was driving the whole way (Doug had come home earlier in the week). Their favorite sign on the way home was this: