A day paperless geocaching in the Welsh hills
I treated myself to a day out geocaching yesterday. A good excuse to play with some of my Xmas presents and enjoy the winter sunshine. Before I go any further I should of course thank Anna for looking after Morgan all day long and letting me go out to play.
I started off with a relatively easy cache just above the shores of Tal-y-Llyn. Sam’s Cache was found easily and gave me a chance to try out my new toys. Before setting out I had downloaded information about the nearest 100 geocaches to our house and had uploaded them to my iPod as contacts. So, my new iPod as well as providing me with entertainment on my walk also provided me with the necessary coo-ordinates for the caches I was trying to find, along with the various clues and details needed. It has to be said it isn’t the perfect solution as I still had to enter the coordinates into my GPS receiver and the iPod probably isn’t the most robust tool or taking into the hills. It did however save me printing out the cache notes and as the iPod is new it was fun to play with it.
I then headed off to an Earth Cache (These are virtual caches with a geological point of interest and an educational element too.) I was the first to find this one (Sliding with Stile)which is always a bonus. 
From here I decided to head off towards another cache higher up the hills in a ‘forgotten valley’ near to the ‘Devils Stone‘ which dates from the 16th Century. It was a lovely walk through a very peaceful valley, made even better by the fact that I knew Cadair Idris just to the east was teaming with walkers. In this valley I saw no one at all. I found the cache without any difficulty and found the Devils Stone .
Folk lore has it that before the days of the Reformation, local parishioners used to gather in the Rhiwogof Valley below Cadair Idris on the Sabbath to dance and play games.
One Sunday, the Devil appeared perched on a rock in the form of an ass, rearing up on its hind legs he let out a frightening howl that shook the surrounding mountains, everyone fled, no one had the courage to visit the spot for months afterwards.
However in time, two local shepherds one from Pencoed and the other from Rhiwogof, went to examine the rock and found the Devil’s hoof print embedded in it.
I then headed back down the hill to the car before driving to Abergynolwyn and then off up the valley to find two ore caches: Tal-y-Llyn adventure was found easily, but Quarryman and the Monkey Puzzle Tree took me a little longer to find the actual container. I was in the right area but there were so many potential hiding places that it took me ages to find the cache.
All in all a lovely day making the most of the local countryside. My new rucksack was comfortable, my iPod worked well, my new boots were OK but did give me some small blisters and my FM transmitter for my iPod worked well too. The engine management light on my new car came on again though so I still need to get that sorted.
