A lofty milestone

Since I started geocaching I've kept track of two stats that most cachers do not bother with. Miles hiked and elevation climbed in pursuit of geocaches. I was prompted to do this by a local challenge cache GC1G1N4, located in the Organ mountains. The challenge was to accumulate 100,000 ft of vertical elevation gain from geocaching hikes.  This challenge is well thought out, with caveats for what can count as elevation gain on a hike, and how to keep your records. Since I was new to geocaching, it was easy enough to set up a spreadsheet and every time I went on a hike, I would note the miles hiked and elevation gains. I reached 100,000 ft of elevation gain in a bit less than 2 years of geocaching, but even after completing this challenge I have kept up my spreadsheet. There is no driving reason for me to do so, but once in the habit, I find that I enjoy looking back and seeing how far I've hiked, and how much I've climbed while hunting geocaches. Since moving to Tennessee, my elevation gains have been quite a bit less. Except for the Smokies, most of the hikes around here do not involve large elevation changes, the topography just isn't the same as out west. But my mileage has stayed pretty consistent, especially with the hikes I've been doing on the Cumberland Trail.

A lofty geocache, Higher than the Buzzard's Roost

This past weekend, I visited the Laurel-Snow Pocket Wilderness, which is also part of the Cumberland Trail. The hike was another gem of the Cumberland Plateau, with waterfalls, rocky bluffs, and swimming holes. There are also a bunch of geocaches, like some older traditional ammo can hides and some more recent earthcaches highlighting some of the areas nicest geologic features. I planned my hike to visit all the areas highlights, which meant a long hiking day and two steep climbs. Normally this would be a pretty tough hike on a hot and humid summer day, but I wore my swim suit and cooled off in every swimming hole I cam to (almost) so it made the hike pretty manageable. The trade-off for keeping cool by swimming was some serious chaffing, but I only felt the pains of that later after the hike was done. This hike involved two big climbs and the total elevation gain for the day was 1571', putting my grand total of elevation gain at 201,357'. A little over 3 years since I passed 100,000' I have now doubled that achievement. It is a good feeling, knowing that I am still getting out and doing long and strenous hikes. I sincerely hope that I will reach 300,000 ft in another few years. As long as I keep hiking and geocaching, this will happen. On another note, I am very close to another distant milestone, I currently have logged 984 miles hiking and jogging in the pursuit of geocaches. Heck, if I could go on one more marathon hike I could be at 1,000 miles.

In the Hoggitville Entrance

Snow Falls

Buzzard Point

Dog Tired at our last geocache stop, Bryan Overlook