Mid Atlantic

Well, it has been a while since I have written one of these up, though have been on a few outing since the last trip report. Since Amyrica asked, I decided to throw something together. As usual, it was a trip of excessive boxing and much hiking, though I won't call it a "spring break" trip since it was more a "I had vacation I had to use before March or lose it" trip.

After a little deliberation, I decided I was going to go to DC. I had not been there for a long time (since middle school age when on that obligatory trip every class seems to make). Plus I like museums and the ones in DC have the right price as well as some interesting exhibits. Once I decided where I was going, I had to pick a driving route, which basically ended up being I-85 to I-95 to DC. Then the fun really started because this was a BOXING trip, meaning I had to look at every box starting in central NC, across the state and up the entire length of VA, as well as close MD boxes and all in DC. I have not had this much fun since the initial planning for Artemis and I's trip to New England last summer where my first round of edits, based strictly on the driving route, was about 2400 potential boxes. This time the list was much lower but a big part of that was because I pre-edited out some areas entirely since this trip would involve a lot more driving than the NE one. What I did instead was figure out where I was sleeping each night, plot it on the mapping program to get time estimates, then backwards plan the boxing days knowing I had only a certain number of hours per day to play with outside actual driving time. It all worked out to roughly be a two week trip (I had something like 4+ vacation days I _HAD_ to use but did not want to rush the trip so took extra). I was going to spend a few days driving/boxing my way north then a friend from England was going to fly into DC and play tourist for a while before driving back down to Atlanta with me and flying home from here.

Well by this time Artemis decided she was going too because she did not want me getting another 100+ boxes without her [she gets mad when I do that for some reason], so she planned to go on the first week of the trip, which was the heavy boxing part, then fly home when things slowed down (ie, once in DC).

I will try to fast forward through all the minute boxing details and just summarize, assuming I can stop being so wordy to do that. A lot of the boxes on the route were older ones or not found for a while with logged attempts so the status was iffy, not that I have ever let that stop me from looking. We also again tried tracking walking with a pedometer but eventually had to retire it after it stopped cooperating; does anyone have one of those that actually WORKS!?! LOL I don't have the day-specific breakdowns anymore, but before it quit (Day 5 or 6 sometime, I don't remember now) we were somewhere around 90 miles walked.

Day 1: [The first night we drove up after work to Winston-Salem, NC so nothing to report other than being tired from working then doing a nearly 5 hour drive.] We spent the day boxing around the north Winston-Salem/Greensboro area then driving all the way across to Petersburg, VA. The highlight of the day was Tammy's 'Lake Daniel' box in Greensboro that was actually planted in 1999 and is still there and still maintained by her!!! That may actually be the oldest box we have ever found. We found 13, missed 4 and drove about 270 miles.

Day 2: This was the day we started the massive 4 park, 24 box 'Clue' series around Richmond. It is one of those leftover series from a gathering they had and also was the best concentration of boxes around the area since most others were 1-2 per park. And no one will believe this, but I actually _PLANNED_ to stop boxing early this day; we were finishing at Hollywood Cemetery (highly recommended for more than just the couple boxes; I wish we had more time there to wander; they have a lot of history there, including a couple of presidents) which locks the gates at 5pm. We actually did a few other boxes in town later that day but still were done pretty early. We found 16, missed 7 and drove about 60 miles.

Day 3: 'Clue', part two was the start of the day and then it was mostly just a drive to DC. We were trying to meet up with Scarab that evening so did not want to get accidently get caught outside of the DC area and not have time to get to him before he went home. If anyone is ever making that trip I recommend making a stop in Fredericksburg to look for Riverby Books and Wallace Library. Even though there are not many boxes in town, it was worth spending an hour walking around and looking for these two. I found both creative and well worth the trip. We also did make it in time to visit with Scarab for 45 minutes or so before he headed home so that was fun. We found 25, missed 1 [that I expected not to find anyway but since we were already in the park, we looked...] and drove about 150 miles.

Day 4: Even though we were in DC, this was the 'Wildlife Refuge' day of the trip. We spent most of the day at the Accotink Bay NWR and while it would have taken MUCH longer than I thought to find the 20+ boxes. We actually gave up after only covering half the Refuge (there was essentially a "south" and a "west" boxing route; we did "west"). We did probably see a wild bald eagle flying in the woods, which was cool. I say "probably" because it was big and had a white tail but we did not get a good enough look to be certain. This was a really great place to walk and if anyone has a day to spend up that way I would take your boots and make a day of it. We found 15, missed 1 and drove about 75 miles.

Day 5: Today, we walked. We walked to Georgetown, we walked to the Mall, we walked around DC. We found a 3.5 year old urban box that according to the planter we were the first to find without help. It is hard to imagine an urban box surviving that long; I think they were as suprised as we were. *grin* We found 9 and missed 8.

Day 6: We went to the zoo. That was a big chunk of the day. We also did some more wandering around town but acted more like tourists than anything. We found 1 and missed 1.

Day 7: This is the day Artemis left and my friend arrived. I had to drop one off at the airport at 6am and pick the other up at 5pm. So initially I had GRAND plans for this day. I was going to box in MD, DE, PA and NJ!!! It was about a 13 hour loop, including boxing time, and would add three new states to my "states boxed" list. But then reality set in since I did not want to be hung up somewhere far from the airport accidently and I decided to do some in DC instead. I spent part of the day in Rock Creek park, looking for the boxes in the southern half of the park. And of course, while I was doing this, my friend called from England and told me her flight had been delayed at _LEAST_ 5 hours... maybe I should have gone up the coast on my grand tour... What I decided to do instead was do some boxes in Maryland that were on my list for later in the week. Since my friend is not a boxer (though will go boxing with me) I decided it might be nicer to do the boxes I really wanted before she was there and had to be dragged along. So after finishing up at Rock Creek Park I got in the car and headed out to Boyds, MD where I found some _AMAZING_ carvings by Scarab and Tempus Fugit (who also met up with me in a parking lot at one of her boxes for a quick exchange). Artemis and I have talked about this before when travelling; we seem to be spoiled with great carvers everywhere here in the Georgia but sometimes it is hit or miss in other places. Well, both Scarab and Tempus Fugit are definately on the "hit" list if there is one. I finished the day power hiking a 3+ mile series, trying to outrun sunset. I made it with about 20 minutes to spare and decided to head back to town since I still did not really know when my friend would arrive but in theory she was on the plane. I found 16 and missed 6.

Days 8-12: This was tourist time. I got one more around DC that Scarab had replanted the day we met up with him. Artemis and I tried but got to the park after some folks had moved into the benches for the night so did not want to risk the box and she was leaving in the morning so... My friend and I spent some time in DC, drove out to the Shenandoah Valley and spent a couple days working our way back to Atlanta. Over the course of that drive I found 21 and missed 16.

So all in all, it was just another of my boxing adventures that keep earning me my reputation. LOL Artemis finished with 79 found and 22 attemted for her part of the journey. As for me, in 12 days, including a 3-4 that were not really boxing days, I found 116, missed 44, drove about 2000 miles and walked well over 100. We even attempted numerous and found some boxes by the legendary Jolly G Man, Legerdemaine and Mapsurfer.