Return to Santa Fe

While in the area, we had a chance to visit a few boxes in some wonderful spots with beautiful scenery ("Blue Dot", "The Art of Ebru", "I'm a Lumberjack and I'm OK", and "You're so vain you probably think..."). For those of you who have a chance to visit Santa Fe, you'll be amazed by the hospitality of the local boxers and blown away by the wonderful letterboxes in this area. Definitely enough to keep you busy for a week of solid boxing!

West Texas Letterboxing

We just returned from a great trip to New Mexico (more on that in the next post) and wanted to say a special thank you to several letterboxers who made the drive through west Texas (going and coming) much more enjoyable thanks to their letterboxes. Thank you to Lionsmane ("Muleshoe" and an attempt on "AT&SF"), flat tire ("Out of gas"), Astro D ("Seminole"), jj kokopelli ("Barry Corbin"), and Maybelle QueenBee ("A Granny's Love" and "I CAN"). Your boxes were a welcome change of scenery!

New letterbox planted today

Actually worked on three letterboxes and hope to plant the other two tomorrow. The one we planted today is a good hike in a magnificent municipal park (Cameron Park, Waco, Texas). It's an amazing hidden gem of over 400 acres of beautiful and varied trails along the Bosque and Brazos Rivers. The box is called "Rock Hopper" and tips its hat to the many mountain bikers that enjoy the park. This letterbox is bikeable if you're a hardcore mountain biker, otherwise hike it. There's a LOT of elevation gain (and loss and gain and loss and gain, etc.) on this trail.

Two other boxes for tomorrow that we're excited about: "Davy Jones' Locker" and "Bird Takes Flight." I'll post more info as soon as we get them planted, but the second one, will be a migrating box whose location will be updated on Twitter. See http://twitter.com/birdtakesflight.

little letterboxer

Our oldest son (who just turned six) has always been interested in letterboxing. The part that interests him is always shifting - sometimes it's following the clue, sometimes retrieving the box, sometimes seeing the stamp, and often investigating the logbook to look for familiar trailnames and signature stamps. Recently he really wanted to try his hand at carving and so he free handed some drawings on some pink stuff and worked on carving them. I can't guarantee that finders will be able to identify what the carvings are, but his interest enthusiasm brought a smile to my face! I helped him with the logbook and he wrote the name of the letterbox and a description of the multiple stamps. He then wanted to go right out and hide it, even though it was almost dark. He was so cute and his eagerness was infectious. He decided on the location and even came up with the clues. The letterbox is called, A Few of My Favorite Things. We asked him if he wanted to come up with his own trail name (we've always just used a family trail name for everything we've done so far). He was so cute - he asked "does mom have her own trail name? does dad have his own?" When we told him we didn't have our own, he said, "well then I want to use the family one too."

Quiet Angel Revisited

Planted another box today for one that went missing and that I really liked (Quiet Angel). The placement is different and it because it's a micro, it doesn't have a logbook. To see the clues, click here.

New plants and replants

We planted some new letterboxes this evening - three microboxes at the park in the new Legends Crossing area in Waco. They're all on Atlasquest.com and use photo clues. None of the three have logbooks (if logbooks could fit, you'd need a microscope to read them!). We're hoping folks will log their finds on Atlasquest so we'll know who's been there. I have mixed feelings about logless boxes. They're certainly much easier on the planter and have less issues, but there's a sense of community in seeing the other boxers who've found a box before you (unless you're Gryzzled Gryphon, who I think is ALWAYS the first finder around these parts!). There was no way to even consider a logbook for these ultramicroboxes though. I also put a small F count on these three, which I also had mixed feelings about. I've always enjoyed new folks finding our boxes and having boxes to find in this area - an area that just a few years ago had very few boxes (three that I can think of when we started?). However, I've seen too many of our boxes not rehidden well (or not rehidden at all!). I guess boxers with high F counts can be careless too, but I hope that in making sure folks that look for these three have at least had a little bit of experience, maybe these won't go missing quickly. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this if you have a chance.

We also replanted two of our first boxes, the Waco Creek ones. Both of these had sustained considerable water damage to the logbooks. In fact, one finder left a note saying they had removed the logbook because it was damaged and were planning to mail it to us, though we never heard from them and were unable to track them down. Because this area is prone to a lot of moisture, we decided to replant without logbooks rather than just retire them completely. We did have to find a new location for the second Waco Creek microbox.

I had another Waco Creek addition to add tonight, but couldn't find a good place for it (even though I could have sworn I had a great place in mind the last time I checked!). I also carved a replacement for "Quiet Angel" which was one of my favorites that went missing a while back. It'll be in a different but nearby location so it can use part of the previous clues.

The Bookworm

New letterbox planted today! The Bookworm is fittingly located in a library and involves delving into a number of books to solve the mystery. Click here for the clues.