Trip to Grays Harbor Cache Machine II, Dec. 29-31

We left Vancouver at 8:30AM on Friday, Dec. 29 for travisl's Cache Machine II in and around Aberdeen, Washington.  It was quite stormy.  We stopped at 9:15 at McDonald's Restaurant in Kelso for breakfast.  Christopher had a big breakfast and I had a hot apple pie.  We traveled north past Centralia to drive westbound on US12.  We stopped at the library in Elma.  I bought a paperback book - "Journey" a novel by James A. Michener, used the restroom and got a long drink of water. I did not realize until later that there was a cache at the library. I had even Bookmarked it.

We checked into the Comfort Inn at Ocean Shores.  We had a very large suite on the 4th floor with a view of the ocean.  We had a delicious lunch nearby at Alec's By The Sea.  Got candy and a bottled water at Ocean Shores Mini Mart.  No fresh baked cookies at this Comfort Inn.  Back at the room Christopher slept.  I curled up on the small sofa with my favorite fuzzy blanket and read a novel listening to the storm shake the building. 

I put earplugs in at 11:30PM so I couldn't hear the storm.  Slept soundly.  I got up at 7:00AM for breakfast.  Bananas but no yogurt.  We headed out for a day of geocaching.  The storm had passed.  The sky was clear with some puffy clouds.  Very cold though.  We saw a large herd of deer.  We loaned our 3 gallon water bottle of warm water at the 2nd cache of the day.  We had already found the water cache at the Interpretive Center.  We found 12 caches and one benchmark.  Actually Christopher found 12 caches and I just found ten caches.  We usually find 3 to 4 caches per hour however there was a lot of driving between caches.  I loved the Gnome House at the beginning of the Gnome Trail.  We attended the Grays Harbor Cache Machine II dinner at 5:00PM.  Good food and good conversation.  We retrieved our 3 gallon water bottle.  Long drive back to Ocean Shores but the Aberdeen area did not have any hotels as nice as the ones at Ocean Shores.

We woke up at 7:00AM for breakfast.  Packed the car and headed home.  We found six caches and did not find one.  We had mighty tasty lunch at Sheila's Country Kitchen in Raymond.  I had a toasted cheese sandwich with split pea and ham soup.  Christopher found a cache at Bush Pacific Pioneer County Park at Bay Center while I took a short nap.  When Hwy101 split I turned left onto US 4 to Longview/Kelso.  We stopped at McDonalds in Longview at 4:15PM for ice cream as the sun was setting.

We got back safely.  It was a very enjoyable trip.  There are four Cache Machines this coming year: Wenatchee III, March 24, Vancouver WA II, June 23, Colville, September 22, and Shelton, December 29.  Tri-Cities Geocoin Challenge is likely June 23 at the same time as Vancouver WA II Cache Machine.  We will likely go to the Shelton Cache machine depending on the weather.