Meeting New Friends

After spending all of yesterday in bed recouping from a long first week, I decided to actually do something today. I wasn't sure at first but I kept going on the fact that the weather was not so great here and that just not too far away the weather was in the 70's and sunny and did I mention WARM!

I spent the morning talking with Jeff and the kids and gabbing online with some friends.  I then made up my mind and I decided to go to a Geocaching Event  The Big 5000. I figured I need to take advantage of my time here and where else do I know how to find interesting people. People I know I have at least one thing in common with. There was a meeting in Peoria and when I looked it was only 117 miles from my condo.  No big deal we drive that back home to go to meetings all the time.  So I loaded up the GPS with caches in my area and in Peoria. Got in the car and headed off.  The weather was in the low 40's here, but the sun was out and it was not that bad.  Come to find out after getting in the car and entering in the address where I was going into the navigation system, that my destination was 140 miles but Two and a half hour drive.  I figured oh well what else have I got planned for this evening.

So driving gave me the opportunity to read more of "Dear John" and by the time I arrived home I have just 2 short chapters left.

I got to the meeting about 45 minutes after it started and this place was huge and packed! It was at a place called Peter Piper Pizza and it is a huge establishment kind of like Chuckie Cheeses minus the live acts but open lots of games and people.

We had a section reserved over to the left and it was filled.  Must have been about 80 people.  I walked in and stood there for a moment scanning the group to see if by chance I recognized someone... well you know it is always a small world when you go places and I have been and worked at two Geowoodstocks.  I decided to put down my bag and unload some of the trackable items I brought with me when two fellows greeted me. They immediately noticed I was the girl that was traveling from South Carolina and I was offered a seat at their table. They even offered me pizza, but I told them I was on a strict diet. I was so proud of myself for not being tempted to eat out of nervousness or convience.

I was then introduced to the hostess and we played a really neat version of Bingo as well as a raffle idea that I will be definitely using on once back to SC.  I came close to winning several times and the prizes were all unactivated coins.  There was even a custom one made that was super cool. They are one of a kind, trackable and cost fifty dollars each.  My number was 36 and of course 34 35 and 37 were called.

After the meeting was over people were mingling and this event was to celebrate  TD Lover 5,000 finds.  Well she sought me out and was so nice and we had a nice conversation. She was excited that I had not only drove from SC to work but that I drove from Flagstaff to meet them.  She said that they have all states but Hawaii completed. She even took my picture... which was so close up and I thought it was funny:

 

The cachers I was sitting with were Team Evil Fish Regan and Jake and they love coins, path tags and caching.  I also found out that Regan was actually in an episode of Extreme Pig Outs that Jeff and I saw in the segment  on Heart Attack Grill. It is a place where they have a burger that is 8,000 calories, and fires cooked in pure lard. It has a medical theme (nurses as waitresses), a doctor who cooks, and they even will use a wheelchair to take you out to your car. They both even have a characture on the wall with their times. Watch the segment and you will never look at burgers again in the same way.  I am going to have to put this place on my to do list while I am here for sure.

After about an hour of chatting after the meeting, I left Team Evil Fish and headed off to cache with -one. 

In the parking lot was the funniest car I had to shoot a picture: 

It was a blast until after we got 4 caches it started to rain really hard and I knew I had to head back home as going back from 1100 ft to 7200 ft.   The first cache was easy and LPC and then the next two they found first so the last one I said I was going to find it to show them I can actually do this and sure enough I found it not only in the dark but in the pouring rain!

So I said my goodbye and headed back home and sure enough once atop the mountain the rain turned to snow. I got home about 12:45AM and was asleep by 1 AM.  Even though it was a 5 hour drive for two and a half hours of activity, I am glad I did it. I met some really great folks and have invitations to attend more events and caching while I am here.