Oak Mountain State Park in Review

This was our last full day at Oak Mountain and I wanted to say just a couple of other things about the park.  We came to hike and hike we did.  We were very pleased with the trail system and the condition of the trails.  There are over 50 miles of trail in the park.  The bike trail and the horse trail we left for their respective users.

One thing that I haven’t mentioned at all is the number of geocaches here.  There are over 55 in the park.  We’re not geocache people, so weren’t interested in trying to find any, but we did stumble upon one during one of our hikes.  In the interest of keeping the location a secret and not giving away any clues, I left that part out of my earlier posts.  Now that there’s no way to tell where this cache is located, I’ll show you what we found.    That was just a little extra treat one day.

So, we have been very impressed with this park, both with the facilities and the staff, and have enjoyed our stay.  We anticipate returning many times in the future.

Yesterday, I mentioned being a type A personality.  I like to make lists because I like the organization and structure it gives to my tasks.  As a type A I don’t do so well with unscheduled events.  We had one today that sent my little step 1, step 2, step 3 mind into a frenzy.  As I came in the door from putting the last load of laundry in the drying, Gene said, “we have a problem”.  Those are never good words to hear.

The problem was a tire issue.  We’re planning to leave tomorrow and Gene was checking air pressure this morning when he discovered that our front passenger side tire on the motor home was 40 lbs low on air pressure.  Unable to imagine any reason why the tire would have lost that much pressure during this week other than a leak, he called around to find a place to fix the tire.  He finally settled on Don’s Tire about 10 miles from here.  Of course, we had to take the tire to them, so we packed everything up, unhooked our life support, and drove on over to Don’s.  Tim (Don was out doing other stuff) was unable to find anything wrong with the tire.  So far today it has maintained its pressure.  What a mystery.

That little episode took a couple hours out of my day so I didn’t get to mark off nearly as much stuff from those lists as I’d hoped.  Oh well, there’s always tomorrow.

My Maineiac friend, Mike, was wondering if his name appeared on the “naughty” list.  Let me just say that I’m not the keeper of that list, nor the “nice” list.  I suspect everyone knows on which of those lists their name might appear.  Just remember, Santa is always watching.

That’s it for tonight.  Thanks for tagging along.

More Geocaching and Some Pretty Cool Ducks

Even though it was cold, with some snow showers along the outer edges of the county, the sun was bright and it was a beautiful day.  This afternoon, we took advantage of the sunshine to try another geocaching outing.

Buchanan Cemetery at Buchanan Station

The Buchanans seem to be a popular family with geocachers in Nashville.  Last week, our first cache was at the old log home of James Buchanan.  Today’s search was at the John Buchanan Cemetery located near Buchanan Station.  John may have been the uncle of the log cabin James, but John had a brother named James, sons of James and Jane Buchanan who came to Tennessee in the mid 1700s.  John was the proud owner (and I assume the builder) of the 3rd house built in Nashville on the banks of the Cumberland at Fort Nashborough.   In the early days of the settlement there were outlying forts erected as safe places for the settlers to gather in times of danger, especially from the Indians.  Buchanan Station was one of these forts.  Buchanan Station was attacked by some 900 Indian warriors in 1792, but the settlers sent their attackers running after mortally wounding the chief.  We did not find the cache in this location, but it was great fun to explore the history.

We had time for one more search.  This one was much easier and we found it within just a few minutes.  Gene was very excited that the coordinates listed in the geocache description and the coordinates on the GPS screen were identical when he was standing right under the cache.  Since our GPS is designed primarily as a route finding device to be used on roads, it is not so precise when you carry it in your hand and walk away from the roadway.  Accuracy varies between 15 and maybe 40 feet.  That can be a pretty large area when you are looking for something as small as a film canister which has intentionally been hidden from view.  It’s always fun to find what you’re searching for.

You can't help but smile.

We also went in search of the sunglasses yard art.  We had discovered this special little place several years ago when we were commuting to work downtown.  Each morning we passed and I always had to smile no matter what kind of mood I was in.  One morning we stopped and I put a note on the porch thanking the owner for the display which was such a highlight of my drive in to work.  Buchanan Station is nearby.  Since we were in the area we just had to see if the display was still there.  Yes, indeed! And it has grown since last we passed this way.  It still makes me smile.

Geocaching In The Rain

We have a new toy.  My parents gave us a GPS for our birthdays.  In between work and chores, Gene has been getting it charged, reading the instruction manual, and programming a few “favorite” places.  Today, we took it out for a test drive.

He found it!

For some time now, Gene has been talking about taking up a new hobby—geocaching.  Now that we have a GPS, he can pursue this new activity.  What better first run with the GPS than a first geocache?  He was able to find several on the geocaching website,  HYPERLINK "http://www.geocaching.com" www.geocaching.com.   He chose 5 which were located fairly close together and printed out the clues.  With clues in hand and our new GPS mounted on the windshield, we were off on a new adventure.  The GPS worked great.  Now Mr. Curp has someone else to tell him how to drive besides me and  I’m happy to share that responsibility.

James Buchanan House

Perhaps the kitchen behind the main house

Our first geocache was at the home of James Buchanan who built this 2-story log house about 1807.  The single story addition was built some years later to accommodate his growing family of 16 children.  Looks like it would have still been pretty crowded to me.  This was an easy geocache to find and only took us a few minutes.  After looking around this old homestead we went on to the next geocache.

The back door

Signing his first geocache

This one was at the American Legion in Donelson, a mere half mile from the Buchanan house.  It, however, was more difficult and, though we spent some time with the clues and looking in every nook of the tank, it still eluded us.  The raindrops were heavier and more frequent so we finally gave that one up for the time being.  Our third stop sounded like it would be very easy to find, and it was, but by that time it was really raining so we opted for coffee at McDonalds instead of continuing our searches.

Reading the clues

For our first experience with geocaching, we liked it even in the rain.  One stop we made was in the parking lot of a small strip mall.  I was especially uncomfortable roaming around the parking lot obviously looking for something.  It seemed like the kind of suspicious activity someone might call the police for.  We didn’t stay long there, but it did teach us that we want to stick to caches that are not in commercial areas.

It looks like the rain has set in for the rest of the day.   This seems to be a good time for a pot of soup for dinner. Oh, and cornbread.