After 8.25 years of caching, I found my 2,000th geocache today. I no longer really care about the so-called "milestones" in geocaching (every 100 finds, for most), however, find number two-thousand does have some meaning.
Of course there are geocachers who find 1,000 caches in a single year. There are geocachers who find 5,000 geocachers in a year. Or more. (Seriously.) And then there are the more, ahem, sane among us who do it more for "location" than the find count.
Eight days in Southern California with Jakob for March Break!
We started with three nights in Los Angeles at the Magic Castle, a boutique hotel in downtown Hollywood. The first night, Jakob went on his own to The Troubador Club to see one of his faves "Chris Webby", while Jennifer and I explored Griffith Park Observatory (top picture, above. Link to more photos below).
1. Our first baby, 2. Grows up and graduates from high school, then 3. Off she goes.
Kristin Ann Clements' grade 12 graduation ceremony turned out pretty spectacular for her family when Kristin graduated from Barrie Central Collegiate at the top of her class. We knew she was doing very well, but she did not have her final exam marks, and we arrived just before the ceremony began and all the programs were gone.
Jennifer had quickly borrowed a program from the person beside her and scanned through the pages of awards to see if her name was there, but she didn't see it. Until the end, that is, when she came across the final page which was pretty much filled with Kristin's academic accomplishments. The best part for me was that she did not mention it, so what happened next came as a big surprise.
The Pinery Provincial Park is an interesting and unique spot located on Lake Huron about 50 km north-west of London and 9 km south of Grand Bend. Jennifer -- the family Social Director and Marvelous Matriarch -- organized a three-night camp out for the last weekend in August, and it was fabulous.
The description on The Pinery's website starts with "towering oak trees, sun flecks on a golden carpet of leaves, shrubs & wildflowers and a rich abundance of unique and rare organisms" and it does live up to that. The landscape is undulating sand dunes (up to 30+ m high) with most of the surviving oak savanna in North America. All of this along a 10 km stretch of sand beach with water that is actually warm enough to swim in.
Wow! Time flies when you're having fun! It is hard to believe that six weeks has already passed and we are saying good bye to Isabelle. It has been a real treat having Isabelle as our "surrogate" daughter for the summer, but I am sure she is glad to be back home again. And Kristin is happy to be back home, too.
