mortonfox: (morton blvd)
16 years ago, I lived in Northern New Jersey and I used to travel very far from home because at the time, geocaches were few and far between. One of those overnight trips brought me to Odenton, south of Baltimore, and to Patuxent Ponds Park. This park has two ponds. From the parking area, it was a short walk on the trail to the larger of the two ponds in the back section of the park. The geocache was tethered to a shrub on a small island in that larger pond. There was a fallen tree branch across the short stretch of water and I figured I could walk (well, half walk and half crawl) across that tree branch to the island. I made it out to the island and back, although it was a bit hazardous because the tree branch was unsteady and a bit slippery. However, it was an exciting way to finish off the day before getting crabcakes for dinner in Odenton.

I'm not as far from Odenton now but for some reason, I never went back to that area in 16 years. This past Sunday, I took a trip to Laurel for Flagstack since that town has become quite a hub of emerging smartphone-GPS gameplay. Then I switched over to Munzee and noticed some goodies in the Odenton area. Very little about that area was familiar to me until I got close to Patuxent Ponds, where I was stopping to capture a pegasus munzee. When I took a walk back to the larger pond, suddenly it all came back to me. The layout of the pond and trail was familiar. The island was still there, although it's now a bit farther from the bank than I remember so there could have been some erosion or change in water level.

Anyway, that was a great revisit and it's neat how I remember the area just because of a thrilling experience. Maybe I'll be back again in another 16 years, if not sooner, for a different game.
mortonfox: (rakket)
This past weekend, I went to FA United 2017 at the Hyatt Regency in Herndon, VA. There was also a pair of Flagstack events on the other side of Washington, DC, so I left the con Sunday afternoon to attend those.

I arrived in the DC area Thursday afternoon, so there was time for a Munzee-capping spree in downtown Washington DC. I took the Metro from Reston Station. I hit the National Mall and saw some sculptures. The boulder with a face on the car makes me think it's time to start paying attention to those "falling rock" signs. I also went to Chinatown for dinner, which was something I didn't get to do on my previous DC trip in April.

As for FAU itself, I treated the con as a relaxacon, just like I did in previous years. It looked like the con had a bit more programming this year than last year but I didn't feel like I had to go to everything. I hit a couple of panels, went to both loot brawls, and walked in the fursuit parade. Also fursuited in short bursts a bunch of times, went to the dance but only on Friday, and played some tabletop games. Also had a lot of couch time. Hey, I had a hotel suite all to myself. Might as well enjoy it!

Then on Sunday, I went to the Flagstack events in Fort Hunt and Alexandria. They posted two events a few miles apart, because apparently, they could deploy more party flags this way. The eight of us met up at a picnic table in a park in Fort Hunt. Then we split up into three cars. From there on, it was a drive around town with everyone capturing as many flags as possible. We went around the Fort Hunt area first to capture the first batch of flags. Then we went to the second event site in Alexandria and then drove around that part of town to get the other bunch of flags. Then we returned to Fort Hunt via a different route to get more flags along the way. The only snag was we had some problems with cell phone reception in Fort Hunt and between Alexandria and Fort Hunt, which is surprising considering how close the area was to DC. Aside from that though, it was a lot of fun, almost like a video game in the real world. And we're already planning another Flagstack event in Laurel this October.
mortonfox: (morton blvd)
Saturday's trip was to Haddon Heights, Cherry Hill, Mount Laurel, and Willingboro in South Jersey. This area is pretty much inexhaustible for Munzee because the local Munzers keep deploying more of those. However, I wanted to capture some of the new air mysteries that they have deployed in Mount Laurel and Willingboro. These are fun. Capturing the virtual air mystery scatters some feather munzees in the vicinity. Capturing the feathers in turn scatters some golden feathers.

Sunday's trip was pretty simple. Went down I-95 from Newark to Baltimore, capturing Flagstack flags along the way. Found one geocache at the turnaround spot. Then from Baltimore back to Newark, I captured virtual munzees as well as some of the flags I missed on the way down. What's remarkable is the way Flagstack has grown recently. Just this quick there-and-back trip alone netted 258 flags! There are many more flags along the other roads around Baltimore but I decided to save those for another time. Finished up with a little walk on the James F Hall Trail in Newark for a few more munzees before an early dinner.

The munzees... )

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Morton Fox

May 2020

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