Alscot Amble

Snowdrops

ALSCOT AMBLE

A series of 11 caches on a 4 mile walk around the Alscot Estate, Preston-on-Stour, Warwickshire.

The Alscot Estate sits in 4000 acres of beautiful Warwickshire countryside, mainly within the parish of Preston on Stour, Stratford upon Avon.

We had to drop our son off at work in Stratford quite early this morning so decided to do this series afterwards.  It also looked like the ideal length of walk for our dogs so Poppy and Whisper came along too.  We parked up near the church in Preston-on-Stour and started at the multi.    A very foggy cold start to the walk but once we got going we soon warmed up.

Sheepdog on top of the hay bales!

We really enjoyed the walk, a nice variety of hides some were quite challenging and not all the caches had hints but we  found all of them without too much trouble.  There was even a trig point to bag on the way round which was very tricky to spot in the thick fog as it was painted white.   Apart from one dog-proof stile that we had to lift both dogs over the walk was dog friendly and well marked with some stiles and kissing gates.

Ash Hill

To round off the morning we went to find Brilliant Warwickshire.  We remembered the location from another JimJinks cache that we were first to find on called Small Change, didn't realise it had been archived so out of interest when we got home we looked it up and surprised to see that it was nearly 4 years ago that we found it !  How time flies when you're having fun

Alscote Amble

Caching in the Solihull Area

St Giles Church

We had to stay close to home/office this weekend due to Mark's work commitments so we decided to clear up some caches in the Solihull area, we had cleared the map not so long ago but every time we look more caches have popped up to find.

We noticed that we could make a circular walk of about 4 miles starting in Elmdon Heath and walking up the Grand Union Canal towards Olton then back along the edge of Olton golf course.

Enjoyed the walk on a chilly but sunny winter morning.  We didn't have much luck with the caches along the golf course, they were very overlooked and were at the end of gardens so quite tricky to search so I'm afraid we didn't give them too long and only found 1 out of the 4 Anyone for Golf caches.  For one of them we met fellow cachers Masmithma and joined forces to search but still no luck.

The funniest part of the walk was when we were heading towards Dovehouse, there were about a dozen teenagers all wearing pyjamas crossing over the road .... yes you did read it correctly ...... we could see they were heading towards the benches so we sat down quickly, otherwise we could see they would've been there for quite some time, luckily they were too busy discussing what they were going to eat for breakfast (@ 13:04!) and saying to each other how silly they felt to notice what we were doing so luckily no problem at all and the cache was located easily.  Lots of lovely food smells from the chippy and cafe but we resisted as our butties were waiting for us in the car [:D]

Then we still had a couple of hours spare so decided to do a short walk around Packwood Hall on our way home.  We parked in the car park of St Giles church to do four of Max's Favourite Walk caches.  Packwood Hall, next to the church, is surrounded by a moat and is the manor house of the parish.  It stands on the site of a 13th century monastery and is now privately owned. We have enjoyed many walks in this area and it was nice to be back, all the caches were easily found and the walk was extremely dog friendly.

Then it was time to head home as Poppy and Whisper were worn out 

Waiting patiently

Dadu's 1st XI

 

Dadu's 1st XI

 

A series of 11 caches set on a 2½ mile walk in the Ridgeway area not far from Astwood Bank, Redditch.  The caches have been set to celebrate Dadu's 11th birthday.

A new series came up a couple of weeks ago a just under 4 miles from home so we thought it would be a nice idea to leave it for a Friday afternoon dog walk.  A lovely sunny afternoon for a walk so we put Poppy and Whisper in the car and off we went.

We parked in Whitemoor Lane just outside Sambourne and headed in a clockwise direction.  All the caches were fairly easy to find apart from one which we had to DNF, we see it's been found now so as it's quite close to home we'll be back soon to have another look.

Some lovely countryside views on the way round in an area we pass nearly every week but have never stopped to explore the paths.  Wellies were recommended in the cache description and we decided to heed the warning and glad we did as it was quite muddy in places after the recent rain.

We were soon back at the car, we completed the walk in 1 hour and 40 mins - we managed to add 10 mins on due to taking a wrong turning by a hedge .

Dadu's 1st XI

LEAP FROG

 
This is a quote taken from the groundspeak blog Latitude 47.

'In the 11 years and 9 months since the first geocache was placed, there is single date on which only a small fraction of geocachers have ever logged a cache. We suspect that’s because this particular date has only happened twice in geocaching history; it’s February 29, also known as leap day.'

We had been planning an event for this day for quite some time but we couldn't decide on a venue.  Our daughter's band regularly plays at a small pub not far from where we live called 'The Frog' and we've often thought what a great location it would be for an event so decided to hold the 'Leap Day' event there.

Everyone who logs a cache or attends an event on February 29th will receive a Leap Day souvenir on their profile and premium members who like to fill in the 'finds by date' grid will find that this is the perfect opportunity to fill in the square - the 366th day of geocaching!