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Wednesday 4th October 2023
Buckinghamshire is particularly rich in Challange caches. I have qualified for quite a few and am actively working on several others so I thought that it would be prudent to come over and grab a few. I know it can be very tricky around the M25 into Bucks during the rush hour so I left early to try to beat it. I wanted to start in Wingrave and then concentrate on the area around Aylesbury. Here's how the day went.
I parked up next to the church and walked down to the WM multi. Luckily my coords were in the direction that I wanted to go in and I found the cache at 0750. I continued on a linear walk out into the countryside for a line of four CCs. These were mainly based on finding mystery caches. I quickly found the 5/2 15th Century into the Unknown for which the qualification was 1500 mysteries and then the 5/5 125 CC where the challenge was to find five 5/5 caches.
Carrying on, I found the 5/1.5 20th Century which I qualified for but could only write a note for the 25th Century.🤔 It took about 20 minutes to walk back into the village. The next port of call was the church porch for the Ring the Bells trad and then I had to venture into the church yard to gather some more info for the 4/1.5 CM mystery. I had found some info on the internet but the rest had to be gathered in situ. I soon found the cunningly concealed cache.
I left the village and drove over to the Grand Union Canal for the 4.5/2 An Obnoxious Challenge. I had to spell out the word OBNOXIOUS with previously found caches which was more difficult than it seemed. After a walk along the towpath passing canal boats wishing that I had one, I arrived in the search area and soon spotted the clever container in the hawthorn.
I had to drive through the very busy Aylesbury to get to Waddesdon for the next stage of the day's plan. On the other side of the village, I swiftly spotted the 4/1.5 A Month of Church Micros CC. This was an easy one to qualify for, all you had to do was find a CM set by one of 30 different COs on each day of the month.🥴
I drove back into the village and picked up two CM multis before collecting the 3/2 CM Fleet Marston CC. This was another spelling challenge, having to spell out the FLEET MARSTON with previously found caches. I had hoped to do some of the Waddesdon Greenway walk but realised that I wouldn't have time so made do with the Waddesdon Greenway - Old Road Letterbox. This should have been easy but it seems that it's a muggle target. I eventually spotted the strewn contents of the caches and pieced it all back together and hid it the best I could.
Next up was the 4/2.5 Resuscitator CC in Weston Turville. There's evidently a famous windmill in the village but I never saw it. It was a long walk out to the search area and I eventually found the well hidden cache. Back at the motor, I decided to have a try at the CM multi. However, the cache was elusive and in the end I gave up.
I needed to be near Wendover for the next batch of caches on my list and I saw first hand how the white elephant HS2 construction is devastating the local beautiful countryside. I parked up as best I could to get on the path to the caches. The first one was the 3/2 International Cacher 3x3x3 CC. Just three different icons in three different countries would be enough here but there were 4x4x4, 5x5x5 and a 6x6x6 caches too but the first two have been archived and I had wondered why.🤔 On the ground, I could see why.☹️🥴 Those caches had been destroyed by the construction and a lot of the B&D Jigsaw series were now impossible to reach.🤬
I found the 3x3x3 and one of the Jigsaw series and thankfully the A Week of CMs CC and the Weekly Food Shopping CC were still attainable. I am not sure how much longer they will be though.🤔 It took me a while to get past the heavy plant obstruction to get to the 4.5/1.5 6x6x6 and then found that it was difficult to park. I managed it though and was pleased to add it to the tally.
By this time, I'd had enough of the traffic and the sight of the devastation. How the locals have put up with all of this, I dread to think. I couldn't wait to get out of the area and headed for home. However, I still had lots of time so I dropped off in Tring for the CM.. Tring - Corpus Christi mystery and then the CM.. Tring - St Martha's multi.
1 Letterbox 1 Traditional 4 Multi 15 Mystery
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