A Spectacular July Win!
- Details
- Written by Terri Nealon
- Hits: 1385
"July is a POP of Color, a Burst of Sunshine,
and a Promise of Adventure,"
as is SLAGA's July Adventure Awaits Winner,
brantole (Lena Dowers)!
Congratulations to Lena on her spectacular win and gift card prize. She began geocaching on the 4th of July 2010 and was immediately hooked. She chose to participate in the SLAGA monthly challenges because they keep her motivated to go out geocaching. Lena commented, "I have been participating since the beginning when I was still working full time. Work made it difficult for me to find time to geocache. Sometimes the only caches I did find for the month were the five caches necessary to complete the Adventure Awaits. Now I am working part-time and my cache finds per month have increased! I like the variation of the requirements for each month."
Lena has over 5000 geocache finds and 32 hides. She has completed her Fizzy challenge, geocached on every day of the calendar year (366 days), and cached in 5 different World Countries. It might surprise some geocachers to know that Lena's favorite type of caches are gadget caches. Her least favorite are Earthcaches. She loves tree climbing caches, but doesn't much care about getting First to Find.
Thankfully that was not a requirement for July's challenge. Instead, it was finding caches with at least 5 favorite points (FPs) and all qualifying finds had to add up to more than 40 FPs. During this July, Lena knew she would be traveling to visit family which would make it very easy to qualify. She was also on a 'mini' mission to find a lot of multi geocaches and most of her multi cache finds had significant favorite points attached to them which also helped. Her challenge entries included:
GC74ZB6: 50 Souvenirs Challenge (17 FP)
GCJVBR: Round Mound of Sound (19 FP)
GC947FC: Cascade- Goodbye 2020 (20 FP)
GCWMDF: West of the Mississippi in Illinois (37 FP)
GCAN2WG: SLAGA Summer Picnic 2024
When asked about her most memorable geocaching adventure(s), Lena expressed her thorough enjoyment in doing the extreme caches placed by Forest Ghost, such as Grant's Fear Factor and The Architect. ("Thanks Ethan!") She also fondly remembers some great geocaching road trips through the years. But said, "Although all the road trips have been a blast, I am truly thankful I took one with my mother driving up through IL, IN, and MI into Canada in 2016."
Lena is a fearless, fun and friendly geocacher and no doubt awaits more spectacular geocaching adventures, not unlike every SLAGA monthly challenge which holds a promise of a new adventure. Join the fun and find and submit your entries for the August challenge soon.
2024 SLAGA Travel Bug Race July Update
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- Written by Robert Klemme
- Hits: 1085
2 months in and first place distance wise is still sitting pretty. However, much like summertime, things are still heating up!
Best of SLAGA 2024 - Half Way There
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- Written by John Layman
- Hits: 1384
Best of SLAGA, Favorite Caches Placed in 2023
Of the 165 new caches published in the 100 mile radius SLAGA territory in the first half of 2024, these are the top caches, as determined by % of favorite points awarded.
By cache type
| Letterbox | Deeplight | Forest-Ghost | GCAK695 |
| Traditional | Da Turdy Point Buck! | HiddenCrazy | GCAM3Y8 |
| Traditional | Jail Time Tom Goes to The Potty | gugandgal8484 | GCANHJ5 |
| Puzzle | Double Reverse Wherigo – Think Outside the Box | Mean Gene | GCAJXKB |
| Virtual | Daily Dose of Happiness US #24 Monks Mound | Iamgrateful | GCAJJ7E |
| Multi | Graniteville 3 1/2 Stage Multi-Cache | Locola081115 | GCARRPH |
| Wherigo | Woodland Sprite5 | tricks33 | GCAQ7NB |
By overall % of favorite points awarded
| 82 | Letterbox | Deeplight | Forest-Ghost | GCAK695 |
| 74 | Traditional | Da Turdy Point Buck! | HiddenCrazy | GCAM3Y8 |
| 74 | Traditional | Jail Time Tom Goes to The Potty | gugandgal8484 | GCANHJ5 |
| 73 | Traditional | Low Striker | JoeBum | GCAF694 |
| 70 | Traditional | A Day at the Dog Park | HiddenCrazy | GCAMPWV |
| 61 | Traditional | One a-MAZE-ing Cache | nan-d1955 | GCAKDN7 |
| 59 | Traditional | Lady and the Tramp - MtO Gadget #5 | knowles5150 | GCANXQW |
| 57 | Traditional | Stewy's Nontraditional Gas Station Cache | stewy1966 | GCAM8BA |
| 52 | Traditional | On The Beaches of the Meramec | HiddenCrazy | GCAMNFM |
| 47 | Traditional | A Platonic Solid | HiddenCrazy | GCAM3YE |
Congrats and thanks to the Cache Owners and everyone else who continues to create and support quality caches in the St. Louis area!
POPEYE’S SLAGA FRIENDS - Summer Picnic 2024
- Details
- Written by Terri Nealon
- Hits: 1310
AHOY MATEYS! On Saturday, July 13, 2024, more than 35 of Popeye's new SLAGA friends converged on the town of Chester, IL for the summer picnic, hosted by deancmeredith. Chester, situated on the bluff above the Mississippi River, is the hometown of Elzie C. Seger, the creator of Popeye. To date, there are more than 20 statues of Popeye's friends spread throughout the city, and geocache COs have utilized all of them for one multi cache or another and for the Adventure Labs in town.
Picnic day was a hot one! Temperatures were in the low 90s but the high humidity made it feel hotter. The picnic attendees were very thankful that Dean graciously provided 2 fans (one a mister) and some freshly cut watermelon. They enjoyed the shade of a large shelter in the beautiful Cole Memorial Park, along with the lovely scenery, convenient parking, bathrooms and of course nearby geocaches. Folks socialized, talked all things geocaching, discovered or grabbed trackables, ate their lunches, and hunted down caches in the park as well as around town.
The Gateway to Summer Brings a new Winner!
- Details
- Written by Terri Nealon
- Hits: 1412
June, when days are brighter and smiles are bigger, was the month to chase dreams and bask in the glow of new found adventures! And that's just what Uga_Mom, Cindy Smith, did during her participation in the SLAGA Adventure Awaits Challenge. She utilized longer days to chase caches, earn smileys, submit her geocaches for the monthly challenge, and then WIN June's challenge Gift Card prize and sticker. Congratulations Cindy!
Cindy's qualifying caches for the two different states finds plus an event requirement, chosen simply from her recently learned search technique for recent caches that fit the challenge parameter, were the following.
GC9CYCQ Go With The Flow, IL
GC5E3PR THE CACHE CAN/CACHE ME IF YOU CAN, IL
GC77A9R Crooked arrow, MO
GC8KX6N Where is the lady dolphin of the park?, MO
GCAQFJ0 Happy solstice- Penguin Event, MO
When asked why she participates in Adventure Awaits, Cindy commented that "after learning about the Adventure Awaits monthly challenge, from another cacher (cootie_man), I thought I would give it a try. I was able to qualify several months ago, but then missed a month. This last month I tried again and SURPRISE I won the fabulous prize! I’m very excited."
Trash à la CARTe - SLAGA CITO
- Details
- Written by Terri Nealon
- Hits: 1432
Since SLAGA no longer has a MODot clean-up site, due to the program being dropped, the SLAGA CITO at Minnie Ha Ha event in Sunset Hills, hosted by Candyce54 on June 30, 2024, became the group's quarterly clean-up project. Of course for those there, it was fondly known as Trash à la CARTe, thanks to TheLegoPharoah and bobclassic's find and GeoWench78's witty input!
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