I had planned to take this day off several weeks in advance, which usually ensures poor weather. But this time, we were lucky. Though the day was cool and breezy, the sunshine was warm and inviting. Rich and I decided to take a trip to the Water Gap. We needed to change the container for one of our geocaches (Pocono Cold Air Cave), so that was the first order of business. It was so cold and windy along the river that I was almost wishing we had planned an indoor activity instead!
By the time we began our hike to GIRR, though, the air felt warmer and the forest shielded us from the chilly wind. Our potential access points for GIRR weren’t too helpful, and we never really found the woods roads or trails that the map indicated should take us near to the mark. Our hike was mainly a bushwhack, through open woods, to the top of the knoll. I was optimistic, but search as we might, we were unable to find even one of the three marks, which are now all underground. Without probes, we had to resort to using our fingers and boots to remove the soil. It was ineffective. Pondering the situation, we snacked on our consolation blueberry Smidgens (which were supposed to have been celebratory Smidgens!) and decided to try again another day, and with better tools. At least the area was pleasant and peaceful and sheltered from the breeze. (At this time we’re not going to log GIRR because we want to return and search more thoroughly, possibly with the aid of a metal detector.)
Watching my GPSr as we drove along Old Mine Road, I noticed that we were approaching another mark. This was S 30, which we stopped to find and document. T 30 is another silly roadside benchmark that we had been avoiding, but since we were in the area, we thought we would search for it. It was more of a challenge than we’d ever expected!
