View From The Top

While needing to kill time for a good hour in the Lemon Grove area, we decided to go out and just drive around to explore the area and a bit further. Drove through Lemon Grove, through Spring Valley, and eventually ended up at Mt. Helix. My husband knew of the cross and the auditorium at the peak of Mt. Helix so we started on our drive up the mountain trying to find it. We made it there for the view and I pulled out my phone to see if there were any nearby caches. And yes, there were!

My husband made the find for this one. There were muggles around but they had no idea what we were doing, nor did they see us find the cache or replace it. They were just there enjoying themselves the the view of beautiful San Diego.

It was both my husband and my first time atop Mt. Helix and it was gorgeous looking out at San Diego from there. We recognized a few landmarks and sat in the auditorium for a bit to enjoy the scenery. Beautiful.

We left a coupon to the SD Aerospace Museum in this one. :D

MotoGP Cache & Collectible Pin!!!

N 36 35.140, W 121 44.912

I've been riding motorcycle's a long time and diligently follow motorcycling's premiere class of racing known as MotoGP. In this sport, brazen athletes (often with much character) ride prototype motorcycles and battle against each other to the finish line on tracks located around the world. Thanks to my wife, we're celebrating my birthday this year by attending the 2010 Laguna Seca MotoGP race and hiding a cache near the racetrack.

The Laguna Seca Recreation area is accessible year round not only to watch MotoGP but also for camping, hiking, biking, and to enjoy the great outdoors. This cache is a short hike from the track's most famous feature, "The Corkscrew" which is essentially a 5 1/2 story drop between turns 8 & 8A. Located inside is a first-to-find complimentary collectible geocaching pin.

The Laguna Seca MotoGP pin features two riders battling for position while coming down the corkscrew and is inspired by the now legendary 2008 clash between world champions Valentino Rossi & Casey Stoner and highlights the Doctor's famous move which ultimately broke the win streak of the talented #1. Those interested can relive the battle by clicking here. Additional pins to commemorate your find (if you aren't the first finder) can be had by contacting us with the "Secret Code" located on the inside front cover of the logbook.

Instructions for collectible pin:
A small fee of $0.99 per collectible pin will be charged to cover the cost of production.

1. Click the PayPal button below
2. During checkout, click "Add special instructions to merchant" and type in the secret code obtained from inside front cover of the logbook. Click the save button.
3. Finish your checkout and save a copy of your receipt
4. Your collectible pin will arrive shortly.

Laguna Second

MotoGP!!!!

Sweet! As we were enjoying our weekend at MotoGP, Laguna Seca, watching Rossi, Pedrosa, Dovi, and the other riders racing through the corkscrew, we decided during a break to go for a hunt! This one was a little tough to find but I liked it! The view from here was awesome and this area is where we ended up going to the next day to watch the final practice laps on race day. We saw muggles on the trails as we were getting to here and made us think more about actually coming out to Laguna Seca for camping and doing some good hikes sometime. We definitely had a great weekend and had an absolute blast watching Rossi race through the track. The Yamaha riders' interview we went to after this cache was great and though we didn't catch any of the t-shirts they were throwing, I still had a fun time yelling to Yorge to pass one our way.

Fun times with my husband :D

James Dean's Last Ride

Found this cache one the way up to MotoGP, Laguna Seca.

I didn't know anything about this it was really cool to learn the history of it from the cache description and more from my husband. Looks like this is pretty darn close to where the crash was and thinking about that is pretty sad and pretty crazy too.

Spotting this cache was easy and was also a nice stop and stretch from our long journey up to Monterey. The place smelled like pee though and was trashed too. Someone needs to bring out some gloves and a bag for CITO... maybe when we come around the area next time...

Rohr Park Foul Ball

With San Diego's weather looking nice and sunny again, we wanted to take the pups out for a walk in the park. We walked him around a bit before we took him for this cache which we found fairly quickly considering the muggles around. On the way to look for this, Ace remembered going to the community pool which which is no longer there and we also saw some kids ice-blocking down the hill. The pups was in the right area looking for this cache but was too distracted by the rabbits hopping around. I wonder if he actually likes geocaching or if it's that he likes coming out with us. :)

Big Blue View

Went snorkeling at the Cove with Elisa's family and decided to pick up this cache while the others were soaking up the sun and enjoying the water. Though I'd been to La Jolla Cove many times over the years I'd never walked the length of this trail until now. This is truly much of the fun of geocaching, seeing places you'd never even thought to go to.

There were several people on the trail on this beautiful summer day in San Diego so we had to be very discreet fishing out the cache. Inside we picked up the Travel Bug: Oh, The Places We'll Go which was started by a group of children in N. Carolina wanting to learn about geography -well here you go kids, pics of sunny San Diego looking at the gorgeous views from atop the La Jolla Cove. We'll be sure to keep your TB moving along.

G4T50 - EIGHTH Loop

We went for this cache after taking the pups to the dog park in Balboa. With all the times we've taken him there, we would have never guessed that just a walk away is this little film canister waiting for someone to log their visit. This one had us walking back and forth across the street but it was where I thought it might have been... it just took a while to find, especially with the many muggles walking, jogging, and biking pass. BebeDog had a lot of fun looking for this one... even stuck his head down a gopher hole to try and make this find (or maybe it was the gopher he was after) :P

Beyond the Bridge

After finding Steel Canyon Bridge, we continued with Gus Gus to take him to the trail. Before getting out of the car, I found that there was a cache that led you through the trails in a loop and thought to not only go for a little hike here but to do this multicache. The first waypoint took us a little while but my husband found it after bikers and joggers all went past and it gave us coordinates to the next waypoint. With this being our first multicache, we didn't know how to put in the coordinates into our programs and had to sit for a while trying to figure it out. When we did get it, we were well on our way to the second cache. This was a fun find being hidden in the trees, and it gave us coordinates for the final cache. The sun was pretty much set and behind clouds by the time we reached the final cache, but it was worth the cache and the nice night hike. There were several travel bugs and other items in this cache and the view was beautiful. We looped our way back on the trail and made our way to the car. Fun hike, hopefully the weather picks up for our next one. :)

Steel Canyon Bridge

We wanted to take Gus Gus for a hike and so we did. My husband had biked along the path here a few months back with a friend and wanted to take us here. On the way to the trail we took the Sweetwater River Historical Bridge and spotted this micro before continuing on. Easy find. :)

Zero's Heroes : Team GeoSurf's 1st collectible pin!

We've been wanting to hide our own geocache for some time now and in attempting to make our caches unique, we've decided to hide them at places special to us and commemorate these caches with collectible pins.

Our first cache and collectible pin will be hidden at one of our favorite surf spots in South Bay San Diego. Though not known for consistent or great surf, we've surfed here for years because of the friendliness of this particular area. Those that surf Silver Strand's entrance aka "Zero" or any part of Silver Strand are often light-hearted members of SWCsurf or Southwestern College's surf classes. At the Strand friends enjoy sharing waves and beginner surfers are free to practice their newly learned skills.

Zero is also one of the places you're most likely to witness wild bottle-nosed dolphins in San Diego. On many occasions, pods of dolphins will swim back and forth sometimes jumping out of the water and flipping in the air! Many surfers here (including ourselves) have witnessed dolphins swim within arm's length. On even rarer occasions a dolphin will actually surf a wave with us and show off its own wave riding skills!!!

The inspiration for this collectible pin comes from an actual picture taken at Zero and includes a dolphin riding the wave with the surfer. It will be included as a First Finder's prize in this cache. Additional pins to commemorate your find (if you aren't the first finder) can be had by contacting us with the "Secret Code" located in the inside front cover of the logbook.

Instructions for free collectible pin:

1. Go to www.SurferGirlCreations.com (makes the Team GeoSurf Collectible pins).
2. Click the Team GeoSurf link on the left.
3. Fill out form completely.
4. Your collectible pin will arrive shortly.

Baywatch

Another midnight dash, this time to Embarcadero Marina Park on the Seaport Village side. Here you can see how much Gus Gus enjoys geocaching and loves getting into everything. We found the camouflaged cache in the bushes and saw in the logbook that other geocachers found it right before us. We took nothing but left a Team GeoSurf pin.


Hoping to find another cache, we walked further down to the end of the park but saw other geocachers already hunting for their treasure and attempting to be inconspicuous so we left them to have their fun and instead let Gus Gus run around and chase the birds. Thanks for the cache :)

Pizza time

While getting some froyo with our friend, Silvia, we decided to go for a hunt which happened to be in the same plaza. This was a quick find by Silvia and her first time geocaching too! Looks like her puppies hiding her keys, sunglasses, etc. in her backyard became good practice for geocaching :D

Took a geocaching temp tat; left a coupon for the Museum of Man in Balboa Park and a coupon for the San Diego Automotive Museum in Balboa Park; signed logbook.

After the hunt, we watched Jonah Hex with the D-Box experience. My husband said it was like a 25cent chair massage. And Megan Fox... LOL... ::shakes head::... how sad. Look at you now.

OMG its a Eucalyptus tree... or not

Quick find for us after running some errands in the area. This micro cache was hidden nicely in the park but lots of muggles were around, especially since there were people coming by to practice some baseball on the fields. We would have been better off looking for this one in the morning with less people around, but still found it fairly quickly with no one watching us. SL.

CV Yachts

We continued our caching for the day with the pups in the J Street Marina after walking around a bit longer and seeing a large skunk walking past front us to the holes near the bay. Thankfully Gus Gus was on his leash or he would have come back to us with quite the smell, I'm sure. When we got to this cache, there were a muggles passing by every so often so we had be as discreet as possible with our searching. Having Gus Gus there, I think, made it easier, almost though we were just letting the pups explore with his largely imaginative mind. There were several bracelets and rings in this cache, and even a skeleton hand which, thanks to my husband, is now the first thing the next cacher will find when they open the cache.

TN; left a coupon for Bennigan's and a coupon for Sushi Fix; SL.

"Power to the People"

With this cache hidden at the J Street Marina, we decided to take the Gus Gus on another hunt. This one took a little while to find and it was probably because it looked like trash. It was hidden in the rocks and seems though the tide took it to a different part of the rocks where the container lid just got smashed and cracked open. Its contents were soaking in, and included some, nasty water. We didn't bother signing the log for this one and because its hider had posted it being a good CITO (cache-in, trash-out) area, my husband wanted to just take it a through it away. Instead we placed it a couple feet higher so that it wouldn't get washed up again. Hopefully it is changed soon so others who come by can enjoy finding this cache. It has a nice description of the view that I did not know about and thought to be pretty cool:

South across the estuary you can see the South Bay Power Station... Duke Energy owns the lease on the power plant until 2010. The company presented a $50,000 check from its foundation to the Chula Vista Nature Center to be used toward the new sea turtle exhibit that will open early in 2006. The Nature Center is north of this site, off of E Street.

I Need a Pen!

A really nice thing about geocaching is that it brings you to places you never even knew existed. Finding this cache took us on a little trail right next to my old elementary school and although I'd walked by several times as a kid and driven by it hundreds of times as an adult, I never even noticed it was there :)

After parking on a side street Elisa, Gus Gus, and myself went on a short hike to find this cache. Gus Gus loves these trail hunts and looks for all the little animals (from lizards to birds) to terrorize. Good thing we keep him on a leash otherwise he'd probably chase them into the brush. When we finally got near the cache, the radar pointed into the direction of lots of sharp thistle. We had to be very careful extracting the cache from its hiding spot but it was well worth it because inside we found our very first Travel Bug! This trackable item originated in New York and has since traveled to Florida, New Jersey, Texas & California. We'll be sure to keep it moving. For more info on this particular item, see the following link: Green Smart Car Travel Bug

We also picked up from this cache 1- "Bitten By The GeoBug" pin and 1- "Great Job" pin while leaving behind a coupon for the San Diego Museum of Man, another spikey toy ball, and a ring stamp.

Old Man's Cache

We celebrated father's day early today with my family and on the way home figured we'd stop by a park to see if we can make a find. Once we got to the area of the cache, a muggle was sitting a few feet from where it was stashed, so we waited at the closeby baseball stands. After waiting for some time, the muggle finally left and we made our move. Not using the hint made our search last just a few minutes. We were happy to see this cache filled with goodies including pens, punch balloons, and a yo-yo. We took nothing (but a picture of the cache we found), left a few things (a purple rubber spikey ball, a coupon good til December for $10 off admission to Raging Waters, and our calling card), and signed the logbook (yay Team GeoSurf)! Had a good time looking through this one. TFTC.

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Geocaching: To Die for?

I went on a quick solo mission this morning while my hubby caught a few waves with some buddies. I saw the tree from far away and found the cache within a few minutes. Had to avoid muggles running and biking past on the bike path, but easy enough to do so. Parked in the Coronado Cays and it was just a wall away (not too long of a wall). Always fun being able to find these caches. :D

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bobisocks Delight!

We had dinner at the house with Quyen and Ralf and played on the Wii when we decided to take Ralf for his first geocaching hunt while Quyen had to leave to salsa the night away. After attempting to find the cache from the street-side and poking ourselves with spikey plants, we trekked up to the park-side of this hill and found it quite easy and less painful finding this cache. Good sized cache with a sewing kit, marble, and boyscout badge in it. It did not have a logbook so I left some star-shaped post-its to mark our find... and the GeoSurf calling card, of course. We all had a fun time and it looks though we created a new geocacher. TFTH.

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NOVICE - End Of Road - Franklin

Lots of muggles around with the school letting out, but we managed to keep our search looking like two regular people just hanging about. We went for this cache after running some errands but decided to make the find before eating a yummy lunch buffet at Sizzler. My husband spotted this one nicely making it his third of the seven finds for Team GeoSurf!

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I love the smell of donuts in the morning

After finding the cache at North Clairemont Community Park, Elisa needed to use a restroom so we used the GPS to find the nearest Denny's (the only place open so late at night). Luckily it also showed us another cache just a few meters away. So after the potty break we continued our hunt. This cache actually contained quite a few little items but we took nothing and left only our Team GeoSurf calling card and signed the log book. -Ace

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BnT Community Park Series #3

We decided to hit up Tea N More for a late night drink and after some pudding milk tea & a cup of warm honey milk tea we went for a bit of hunting in the area. With police cars continuously circling, we decided that geocaching in North Clairemont Community Park would draw less suspicion than searching the bushes next to closed businesses. The park is actually one of Elisa's old Drum Corps practice areas and it was nice to visit some of her old stomping grounds. This hunt turned out to be a fun walk through the park with the reward of a nice sized cache. -Ace

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Team GeoSurf Logo

Created the Team GeoSurf logo today. It includes a surfboard, compass rose, "Team GeoSurf", and link to our blog. We will be putting these into the bigger geocaches we find so that others can click over and read up on our geocache findings, hides, collectibles, and experiences. If you happen to find our calling card in your cache, we thank you for the hunt!

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Sweetwater Bike Way

My husband and I decided to take Max for a walk by the river as we searched for this cache. Tried to go early enough to avoid any mosquitos. Searched for it a bit and had to cross the river, thankfully it was low tide. We finally got to the coordinates and found a huge bucket... that wasn't it. Kept on searching and found this nicely hidden cache. Not much was in it anymore but we signed and took a picture to remember it. This was our third cache we found together, my fourth one.

TNLNSL

Elisa

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What's Geocaching?

So Team GeoSurf's adventures got you intrigued? Awesome :) As Geocaching.com puts it:

Geocaching is a high-tech treasure hunting game played throughout the world by adventure seekers equipped with GPS devices. The basic idea is to locate hidden containers, called geocaches, outdoors and then share your experiences online. Geocaching is enjoyed by people from all age groups, with a strong sense of community and support for the environment.

It's easy to start once you have the basic tools. Hunting for geocaches is also a great way to spend time with the family & friends while keeping physically active since finding some of the advanced caches require miles of hiking through beautiful trails.

You'll first need to head to Geocaching.com and register your free membership. This will allow you to access the coordinates for caches near you as well as all over the world (try geocaching on your next vacation). The next thing you'll need is a GPS device. If your cell phone doesn't already have it, you might want to consider this feature during your next phone upgrade. Otherwise, see the GPS unit reviews at Geocaching.com as well as all the other great info they have.

We're partial to our Android phones and the following are applications we use:

C:GEO - author Carnero - Start it up, login using your Geocaching.com username & password and it'll load up all the caches around you.

Google Maps - Once you've decided on a cache, use Google Maps to get you nearthe vicinity of your cache.

Radar - author Mike Cleron - This will allow you get practically on top of the cache

We hope you'll contribute to the game, take care of the environment, and always have fun Geocaching!!!
-Team GeoSurf

About Team GeoSurf

I'd read about geocaching several years back and the thought of exploring new places and finding hidden treasures was always pretty exciting. Unfortunately I didn't know anyone who participated in the "game" and couldn't justify the cost of a dedicated GPS device with so many other things to pay for. Fast forward a few years and GPS comes standard in many of our cell phones -Yay! In June 2010 I bought my wife a new Android phone and in exploring all the cool things she can do, geocaching comes up once again.

With our cool Android phones and their near seamless integration of geocaching.com's data, getting into the game was very easy and we've dove in head first! We've already found a few caches and talk about how we'd like to create some of our own to share our life with people around the world. To top it off, my wife Elisa even dreams about geocaching :)

As of June 16th, 2010, we've formed Team GeoSurf. Surfing is an activity my wife & I enjoy immensely. We hope you'll enjoy this blog about our finds as well as the unique caches we create. Thanks to all who contribute to the game and make it so fun.

My Marie

Both my husband and I were looking forward to finding this one. We felt the dedication of this cache to the hider's late friend was very sweet and would have been worth the find. We were very excited to have this be our first find and be the start of our geocaching adventures. We've been to the area before but only for lunch and not for caching. This time we took our dog, Gus Gus, with us to share in our adventure and to have a nice walk. Unfortunately, we left this place not finding the cache and with mosquito bikes from the still waters. I thought we searched the area well but I guess we may have overlooked some things. Hopefully we can go back here sometime and find this cache. But for now, we're moving on to the next.