VaxCave

Didn’t have coordinates for the Gravity Hill Mini-Cache, but knew generally where it was. Being from the area, this place was something that was talked about all the time in high school and in the local coffee shop. This would be our first visit to the famed hill that defied physics!

We drove around for a long time, couldn’t find it, and ended up stopping and asking some nice people where the hill was.

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p>We arrived at the hill and saw the tell-tale markings on the road “GH”. We moved our car to the starting mark and decided to try it. Honest to God, the car seemingly rolled uphill. We took elevation stats, and we got vastly differing readings. One reading told us it was 19 feet uphill, another told us it was 4 ft downhill. This made us speculate as to what could be going on at that location. Regardless, we found the cache at 7:30pm on 4/20, took a Triangle Tech reference card, and left our usual RAM keychain.

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Filed by AxsDeny at 10:05 pm under General
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We started off to Trough Creek around 2:30pm on 4/19. We hadn’t looked at the hints, so we weren’t sure exactly where we were going. We tried to drive as close to the location as we could, but the GPS kept putting us across private property lines. We decided to try and get it from another angle.

On our way down the hill we ran into my cousin Tyson, who works at the Youth Forestry Camp that is in Trough Creek. We told him where the GPS had sent us and he knew a back way into the area. We followed him to an access road and proceeded up the hill. We got to the top of the hill and saw that we needed to head back down some pretty scary terrain. Dan and I decided to proceed, but we sent mom and Bridget back to the car. It was crazy steep on that hill.

Dan and I followed the signal for another tenth of a mile and we came to posted property again. We decided that something had to be wrong and headed back to the car.

We looked at the hint once we got in the car and headed for the region that it indicated. We knew pretty much where they were talking about. We parked, headed across the suspension bridge, past rainbow falls, and a quick stop at balanced rock for the obligatory photo-op. Then back down to go up toward the blue trail. We made our way up the hill and followed the clue but it offered no real help. We found it by pure luck and found that the hint was wrong as well as the coordinates. The coordinates seem to have been mistyped by one number. When we went looking the site reported N40 18.2…. We took a reading and found N40 19.257 by W78 07.889, elevation 1113 ft.

We found it at 5:30pm, took a wooden figure and wheres george dollar, left a notepad and meant to leave a RAM keychain, but forgot to take it out of my pocket due to frustration with the search.

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p> SPOILER: Cache is after the 6th marker from the small lookout. 90 degree right turn from that marker about 45 feet. Spoiler image#1, #2, and #3.

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Filed by AxsDeny at 10:01 pm under General
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On 4/19, we set out for this one and we thought we knew where it was. We were sure it was at Tatman Run, a local place where we used to go swimming. We got to Tatman and parked and started walking. The GPS reported that we were 0.60 miles from the cache. It was going to be a long walk to this one.

Mom and Dad had tagged along and it looked like we were going to go through some hairy terrain. Dad decided not to go because of his bad back. We ended up walking around a grove of trees and coming to the water line. The GPS said it was 0.50 away. Directly across the lake. D’oh.

Back we went to the car. We loaded up and Dad drove us almost right to it. He knew exactly where it had been hidden. We parked and started up the access road, Dad even came along, but i’m not sure the ground was flat enough for him. We came to the area where the cache was hidden and started looking around. After about 2 minutes mom found it. She squealed with glee.

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p>We uncapped the cache and proceeded to take inventory. The old logbook was soaked along with some other things i couldnn’t identify. Luckily someone had added a new ziplock and a new logbook. We took the Pitt mascot figurine and left our standard RAM keychain. The cache is a nice container, but the rubber seal doesn’t fit quite right, so extra care has to be taken to close it properly. Until next time…

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Filed by AxsDeny at 9:57 pm under General
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We decided to place a cache while we were home with the parents. We placed it near the Captain Phillips’ Rangers Memorial on Route 26 north of Saxton. We have already had someone visit the cache, so it has been very exciting for us.

Below is the description placed on the geocaching.com site:

Cache is located close to Captain Phillips’ Rangers Memorial off Route 26, near Saxton, PA.

Be sure to check out the memorial while you are there as it is on the historical register and a beautiful area (especially in the Summer and Fall). Be careful during hunting season. Wearing blaze orange is a good idea when walking in the woods anyway. You can drive right up to the monument, so don’t worry about parking along the road.

From the marker that was placed in 1966:

Capt. William Phillips and 11 men of his militia company were captured near this point by Indians, July 16, 1780. Ten men were killed here and were buried later by a search party. Capt. Phillips and son Elijah, taken prisoner, were freed by British at end of Revolution.

The cache is a green .50 caliber ammo box with several white markings on the outside to identify it as a cache.

Contents include:

• 3 RAM Keychains
• 1 Magnifier / Spy Glass
• 1 Juniata College Bottle Opener
• 1 Juniata College Luggage Tag
• 1 Kodak Photo Mousepad
• 1 Light Bulb Stress Toy
• 1 Pack of Matches (Chelsea Grille, Oakmont, PA)
• 1 Calculator/Ruler Bookmark
• 1 Cross Pendant from Robertsdale Church of God
• 1 Logbook
• 1 Extra Ziplock Bag
• Miscellaneous Pens and Pencils

Difficulty determined using the Geocache Rating System at ClayJar.com

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Filed by AxsDeny at 9:56 pm under General
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On our way home to visit the parents for Easter, we decided to try and log PA Turnpike Cache #1. The directions said to park at the Ramada Inn, but that was WAY too far away. Luckily we are from the area and we knew the logging road that took us very close to it. That’s right, the Oregon Trail!

We parked in a clearing off of Oregon Trail and were about 0.3 miles from the cache. It was a definite hike through some dense forest which included many thorn bushes, a barbed wire fence, a steep gully with a stream, and climbing down the side of a cliff.

Our initial readings set us on the wrong side of the cache area. We scoured the area for about 10 minutes and Dan finally found it. The GPS reported we were in a 24 foot area which fell within my accuracy reading so it seems the coordinates are pretty good. It’s well hidden and that’s a fact.

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p>It was cold out. Bridget’s nose was running so we took 1 tissue. We left 1 RAM keychain, as usual. All in all it was a good cache, but it would’ve been better if we had walked down the turnpike to it, not trudged through the woods. Great for a bike ride or a long walk from the Ramada.

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Filed by AxsDeny at 7:53 pm under General
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