Wilmington Hermits

From: Eidolon
Date: Wednesday, June 27, 2007 2:15 PM
To: Pinky
Subject: Wilmington Part 1

I promised you a little bit of a recap but never got around to it last night since I decided I should probably sleep at some point. The day started by leaving Topsail Island at about 6:30 and heading south towards Wilmington. Along the way I stopped for box planted by a "George Washington Slept Here" tree (ok, that was not really it, but something about GW) but could not find it. It did not strike me as something to go missing so I will probably check it again tomorrow on the way back down there. I then went on nature trail at a plantation back into the woods, circling a pond and I so wish you were there. Granted, I wanted you for your bug spray!!! They were irritating me, which is not normal. Plus it was muggy. There is nothing like walking along a swampish pond in 90+ degrees. From there I actually made a wrong turn (the crazy GPS lady did not know about a new route for the main road so I went the way she said) and had to improvise the order for the rest of the day. I came out ok and still got to almost everything I had planned to do, just in the wrong order. The next few were drive by boxes along the Cape Fear river, a Hot Dog store, a lake next to a power plant and one by the Battleship North Carolina. After that I went into downtown Wilmington. They have pay parking meters so I guess 1.5 hours for my hunting, then took off. Considering I was only trying for four boxes, that is a lot but I also like walking to did not see any point in park, box, move, park, box, move... Well I found 3/4 and probably missed the other one b/c someone else had it; there was another family in town Tuesday apparently who found that one. I may try for it once more on the next trip down tomorrow since I KNOW it is not really missing. I also tried to help some geocachers find a box where I was stamping but had no luck. I assume they really did the right coordinates so looked at the only places that made sense but had no luck. I then high-tailed it back across town and got to the car with 6 minutes left on the counter, so I thought that was a pretty good guess. For the next couple hours, I was at Lake Greenfield park, which has a few boxes and a big lake. However, I had general bad luck there. I don't know if it was just bad clues, bad reading or just me, but I did not find one, struggled to find two others and had to rent a paddlewheel boat to get the last one; it was attached to a cypress tree in the middle of the lake. That is my first true extreme box but I SSSOOO wish I had rented a canoe instead; after having already walked 6-8 miles in the morning, that about did my legs in... I then went to get 'The Scream' and thought it was very well done. I took a class on Austrian Expressionism when in college so Munch (though Norwegian) was one of the people we dealt with. The next place would have been REALLY cool had I been a month sooner; it is a plant trail that is all meat eaters!!! Apparently there are 5-6 types, including venus flytraps, that are all native to the swamps around here and they have a field you can walk through that is full of them. Unfortunately most of them do not do well in the heat so I only saw a couple of really little VFT, so little I almost did not see them. I finished up the day by walking a nice little nature trail in a park (though again missing one that I may try for again since I have to pass the park to get to where I am heading tomorrow) and a box at UNC-Wilmington; for some reason, I like campus boxes. I guess I just enjoy walking around the colleges and looking at stuff. One of my favorite boxes ever was basically a tour of Arizona State in Tempe. Anyway, all in all, I found 17/23 I searched for and three of those should actually be there if I try again. I am heading back out Thursday to look for the rest on my list plus will be squeezing in an exchange with Being Shielded since she learned I was in town when I logged some of her boxes and wanted to try meet up after work.

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From: Eidolon
Date: Wednesday, June 30, 2007 3:25 AM
To: Pinky
Subject: Wilmington Part 2

Well, it is 3:30am Saturday morning and I seem to be wide awake and scratching my legs. It is not like I have a burn or anything so it is probably sand fleas or some other nasty critter since I had a swarm of something around my legs for a while when boxing the other day (I know, GREAT!!!) Anyway, since I can't seem to sleep, I figured I would write.

The second day of boxing in Wilmington was less ambitious, mainly because I was starting to feel a bit worn out from a week of lots of sun and little sleep. After stopping by that George Washington tree again quickly (and still finding nothing), I started out by going to a fancy restaurant. Yeah, sounds weird, but it is actually the start of a "nature trail" (their term, not mine) out of the parking lot and down to the intercoastal waterway. It was actually being used pretty heavily that morning so the locals seem to like it. From their I went over to Wrightsville Beach but just had no luck; there are a couple boxes there, one with vague clues and the other with somewhat normal ones but I had no luck with either. I hate days that start like that. From there I went to some pretty gardens and found a nice dragon stamp. I went back to a park from the first day that I forgot to cross the road and get the second box plus went back for another try and box 3 of a series I did not find originally and came up with both ::YAY:: That was followed up with another labeled nature trail (they have a lot of those here it seems) and a trip to the library. The library frustrated me; the clues seemed pretty obvious but I just was not finding it so, plus I was trying not to be conspicuous while looking. It is a tiny library, honestly about the size of your new apartment so not a lot of room to hide. I spent a lot more time there than I thought I would and did eventually find a magnetic box in a place my arm barely fit. We will come back to this box later. From there, I kept working south down the peninsula grabbing a couple in a small park, one fairly urban one, if you can call the beach urban, then did a couple with decent hikes. Well, they really were not long, just longer than I had been doing and in the heat of the day so they seemed long at least... One had clues like "walk down the path 65 paces, then go to the little cemetery and look at a few certain gravestones; then return to step 65 and take another 195 paces on down the road, then 10 paces to the right, then 45 paces to the right." I finally got there, actually counting the steps and my pace was right on with his actually, only to discover why I should read the clues... it said "from this point, take a compass heading that is the combined ages of those three gravestones I told you to look at"!!! I just guessed all were 50+ and got lucky finding the box. This is the box where all those bugs swarmed my legs that may be the cause of my being awake right now. From there I went to do what turned out to be a hot walk through the marsh, beach and salt flats but it was pretty. And again, more bugs, I need to start planning better for that. It was a walk by an old WWII bunker that some hermit had moved into during the 60's and lived there, surviving in the marsh, for something like 17 years. Finally, I drove to the end of the road. Literally. It was a state highway that ended at a parking lot by the water. I looked for a box here and found a geocache at the position instead. It had a crappy stamp inside so I still inked it up and logged it; later I learned the letterbox went "missing" right about the time the cache was placed. And considering that the letterbox was 7 feet of the ground, as was the geocache, it makes you wonder. It is just an interesting coincidence I am sure... By this point, it was getting late, maybe 3:00, and I had to make a decision of whether I was going to take the ferry across the water to get four boxes in the town on the other side or not. Luckily(?) Being Shielded called; we had planned to meet up about 5:30 for an exchange but she said she could do it earlier so that was my decision maker; I started working my way back north, as luck would have it back to Wrightsville Beach where I had such bad luck that morning. She gave me a couple of tips on the boxes there I had missed and I was able to find them both. One I will still take the blame for just screwing up but the other was so vague I felt like I was looking for a Stone Mountain picture box that only a local would know. The totals for the day were 15/19 including one box that is in both the found and attempt list as well as an exchange and a PT. Oh, and that box I told you I would come back to? That was a box of Being Shielded and she told me later when we met up that it was missing... she had planted a replacement OUTSIDE the library which I did not know about; LBNA had one set of clues and AQ the other and I had the "wrong" ones so the fact I found it at all was shocking, but also explains why I had so much trouble finding it.

Now I am preparing for the drive home. But with so little sleep I may end up cutting some boxes. In theory, I am going to do about 10 this morning, then drive home. No sleep, boxing in the morning and a long drive... Sounds similar to last Saturday don't you think? Anyway, I am going to try and doze a little bit since I have not scratched for a little while now, wish me luck.