Another good day in the snow …

September 13, 2012 Scott Leave a comment

With overcast conditions and low temperatures this morning including a little fog, it looked like it may not have been a good day on the slopes at Falls Creek. It was good that everyone else was thinking that as there were hardly anyone on the slopes.

Started on the Summit on some nice groomed runs where I managed to make my own tracks up until 10:30 am when the ski schools descended. Made our way back over the mountain but couldn’t quite find runs that would top the ones from this morning.

Around lunchtime the clouds parted and we had blue skies which was unexpected. Then the temperature dropped and the snow crusted up followed by snowfalls.

After doing 55 kms for the day it was time to call it quits today and head back to the Schuss Lodge.

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12 of 12, Family Life, Holidays, Skiing

September 12 of 12 in the snow …

September 12, 2012 Scott Leave a comment

We were never going to get another day like yesterday. Even though the skies were clear and it was sort of warm (8C), there was a wind that dropped the wind chill down to -5C. Also as the temperature didn’t drop below zero last night, the slopes didn’t start the day as well as previous days.

But you make do with what you have and we headed out a little earlier than other days to enjoy another spring day of skiing at Falls Creek. The plan was to start over on the Summit and move across the mountain finishing up at Main Street. This seemed to work yesterday well.

The plan changed slightly once we got to the top of the mountain. Rachael needed some video for a school project so a few runs down Main Street before heading to the Summit.

We made it over to the Summit earlier than yesterday but the conditions weren’t the same as they never groomed the mountain so it was very similar to what was left yesterday afternoon. A couple of runs here then we headed over to Ruined Castle and Scotts. This seemed to be the pick today.

Eventually the wind won and I headed back to the Schuss Lodge while Rachael went for her second snowboard lesson while Jenny pottered around with a Blackwood Mum who was on the mountain as well.

Tomorrow looks like it may have some fresh snow falling – I guess the sunny days couldn’t last forever but it has been a great week so far. That’s it for the September 12 of 12 …. with a bonus video 🙂

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Family Life, Holidays, Skiing

2nd Day in the snow …

September 11, 2012 Scott Leave a comment

For our 2nd day in the snow, again it was a typical spring day with warmish weather (11C), clear skies and no wind.

We headed over to the Summit for the morning before spending the afternoon over at Scotts and Ruined Castle.

The snow held up a lot better today than yesterday and you could find somewhere to ski with reasonable snow up to around 3:00. A big day distance wise with 66kms on runs and lifts. 🙂

Rachael decided to try out snow boarding and it looks like that some more lessons are required.

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Family Life, Holidays, Skiing

Back in the snow …

September 10, 2012 Scott Leave a comment

Well after a 2 day drive, we have made it back to the snow at Falls Creek – and there is plenty of it. It has been said that it is the best in 8 years and I would have to concur it is pretty good for this late in the season. There is plenty of snow on the sides of the road coming up and the roads in the village are still covered. It has been quite a while that we haven’t been able to drive to our accommodation.

It is probably lucky that the roads are covered as the Lift company replaced all the Oversnow vehicles so they needed to recoup their outlay. I just wasn’t expecting to have to allow them to recoup their cost in the first year. They charged me for Rachael as an adult as they thought she looked older than 15. Not happy Jan 🙁

We arrived at our accommodation to find a lot of familiar faces staying in the lodge. We are almost becoming part of the furniture at Schuss Lodge. It has a great atmosphere and is a friendly lodge. One day we may even become members. 🙂

Today was our first day on the slopes and there was certainly a lot of snow. There were a lot of brown patches but it was not the dirt coming through but dust that blew over last week with the storms.

No matter what slope you chose the conditions were good but unfortunately the weather was warm (12C) so the snow became slushy around 1:30. Still managed to get in around 42 km of runs and lifts for the day so wasn’t too bad.

Another good day is in store for tomorrow.

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12 of 12, 4WDing, Geocaching, Out and About

August 12 of 12 …

August 12, 2012 Scott Leave a comment

A clear start to the day, not as cold as expected and we were soon on the road heading to Axedale. Today we were meeting up again with the Central Victorian Geocachers for a 4WD trip through the hills around Bendigo. The event for the day was CVG 4×4 Adventures #3 – Fosterville. In all there were 8 vehicles attending with around 30 geocachers.

It was pretty easy going early on with a couple of hill climbs and descents. Then we came to the mother of all hills and there was a new cache at the top – On top of Fosterville for the seriously insane! We were not set up to drive up this one as you would have needed some serious clearance and winching. So it became a heart starter with a climb to the top.

Continuing on again we came to an issue with washed out tracks which were not suitable to all our vehicles so a change of plans saw us not get some of the new caches that had been placed out for the event.

A stop for lunch at the Gunyah Picnic Area with another 22 caches published in the area for the Event and we were off trying for as many “First to Finds” as we could. We managed to get 10 FTF’s 🙂 – not a bad effort for the day.

The sun was getting low and we had one other task for the day. My GeoBuddy Garry was on track for his 5000th find and we found It’s all about the NUMBERS Challenge #1 as this milestone. It was time to head back to the cabin but not before grabbing some more geocaches on the way.

Another 12th of the month is finished.

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12 of 12, Geocaching, Out and About

A stormy day for the 12 of 12 July ….

July 12, 2012 Scott Leave a comment

I guess my 12 of 12 started yesterday afternoon with a return to night shift after a number of years. It was a busy night in Adelaide station but I only had one incident to attend – a motor vehicle accident at Flinders Park.

With the lights and bells going all night, I was a weary boy this morning and after collecting the mail from the post box, I was met at the door by Molly – our maltese shitzu. It was then to bed to catch up on a few hours sleep.

The house was busy when I woke with Jenny and Rachael taking a load of bottles up to the wood yard to get the refund money. Rachael is busy raising money for her World Challenge Expedition to Vietnam next year and bottle collecting along with chocolate selling and baby sitting are some of the ways she is raising money.

After lunch I decided to go walking through the grounds of Flinders University and then O’Halloran Hill Recreation Park to find some geocaches. This was about the same time as Adelaide and surrounding areas was getting hit by thunderstorms. The Barossa area became white with some large hail stones blanketing the area.

After a quick stop at the Scouts Rally SA office to do some maps and other administration things then it was back to work for my second night shift in a number of years.

$O\'Halloran Hill Park$

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Family Life, Geocaching, Out and About

Did you miss the leap second ….

July 1, 2012 Scott Leave a comment

Every now and then, due largely to the action of the seas on the surface of the earth, an extra second has to be slipped into the calendar because the earth’s rotation is being hindered by the friction. The days ARE getting longer. The latest one happened at 23:59:60 UTC on 30th June (09:29:60 CST July 1). One second later it was 00:00 (09:30:00 CST July 1).

The first leap second was in 1972 and the most recent in 2008.

So to see if we could feel it or see it I organised something of a flash mob event, Probably the World’s Shortest Event – 09:29:60 for the local Geocaching community.

And it was not a bad turnout for 9:30 am on a Sunday Morning with around 75 people turning up. This event was the first of a challenge today to get 10 different cache types culminating in a CITO Event, 10/10.

My personal tally was only 7 different types:

Traditional Cache – Life of the Beach – SLSSA Headquarters
Multi-Cache – Frequent Flier Mach Two
Mystery Cache – Nearly Gone
Wherigo Cache – Beware Drop Bears!!
Event Cache – Probably the World’s Shortest Event – 09:29:60
Cache In Trash Out Event – 10/10
Webcam Cache – Sailing the Web

To finish up the day, we had the family around for afternoon tea to celebrate Rachael’s 15th birthday (where did those years go)

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Geocaching, Holidays, Out and About

Another long distance First to Find …

June 22, 2012 Scott Leave a comment

Prior to leaving Alice Springs, I checked for any new cache listings since I had left South Australia. What luck, there was a new one at Glendambo – only 940 kilometres away. And at this time no one had made a find on it. The cache is Dam Glenbo.

It is only 10 hours driving away. Sounds like a good spot to stay tonight and maybe grab a FTF as well. 🙂

Today was uneventful, however, it was getting cooler the more I headed south. There were clear skies all the way to Coober Pedy and then there were some rain clouds heading over from the west. It is probably a good decision not taking the Oodnadatta Track as I wouldn’t want to get stuck there (or would I 😉 )

I arrived at Glendambo just after dark, negotiated a few tracks to find a tree on the edge of town.

Out with a torch, found the cache, opened the cache to find a virgin log book – Yay, another long distance “First to Find”. 🙂

Another big drive tomorrow across to Loxton.

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4WDing, Geocaching, Holidays, Out and About

A Town like Alice …

June 21, 2012 Scott Leave a comment

Today was a “rest” day of sorts. This meant that no long distance driving but take in some of the sights around Alice Springs.

I started at the northern end of town and drove what is left of the old Stuart Highway into the Alice Springs Telegraph Station Historical Reserve. One of the popular spots for the locals is Wigleys Waterhole but there was no-one there today.

Next onto the old Telegraph Station with a walk along the Todd River and up to Bungalow Hill to take in the view.

Up to Anzac Hill for lunch which has commanding views over the town and the MacDonnell Ranges.

I traveled west along the West MacDonnell Ranges and through Honeymoon Gap to the old Ghan Rail Line.

It was interesting that the track alongside the old rail line was in better condition than the Old South Road. Also managed to take in some of the track used by the Finke Desert Race.

After visiting the Ewaninga Fettler Cottages and Ewaninga Reserve it was back to the Heavitree Gap Outback Lodge to feed some very hungry Rock Wallabies.

Tomorrow is a 940 kilometre drive to Glendambo.

$Wigley\'s Waterhole$

$Flynn\'s Grave$

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Geocaching, Out and About

2902 kilometres for a First to Find ….

June 15, 2012 Scott Leave a comment

On the back of my challenge of the longest distance in a day for 2 cache finds (one in South Australia and one in Nevada), I thought I would do another challenge – longest drive for a First to Find (FTF).

My drive started at the Clare Caching Capers II Event GC3FXFG, where I was told of an unfound challenge cache up in Darwin.

The challenge involved having found a cache in every 10km band from your home location up to your age x10 so in my case 490 km.

It is GC3MBC5 – The Well-Travelled and Aged Cacher: NT.

I did the queries in GSAK and found that I had found a cache in the 49 distance bands required. Now to get the cache and hopefully a FTF.

I was heading north anyway so a long distance FTF was going to be a bonus.

Well after 4 days and 2902 km I arrived at ground zero (GZ) to find it all burnt out and on the ground were some burnt spray cans and a sorry looking eclipse tin. Surely this wasn’t it.

I looked over a couple of metres and there appeared to be something buried. I unscrewed it and it appeared to be the cache or was it.

I opened the container only to find a puzzle to be solved to find the final GZ.

Thinking caps on and a few texts to the owner on clues to solving the puzzle then finally about 10:30 pm I had the puzzle solved.

The only problem is that I would not be able to get to the final GZ for another 18 hours due to my commitments in Darwin.

It seemed a long day but finally the time came to find the cache.

I drove up to GZ, thinking surely the FTF would have gone by now. Opened the ammo tin, took out the log book, opened it up to find …… I was FTF. 😀

So after 5 days and 2902 kms (plus a few extra back and forth into Darwin) I had a long distance drive FTF.

I guess now how many have driven further for a FTF …

Thompson Life & Travels – Never @ Home

Another good day in the snow …

September 12 of 12 in the snow …

2nd Day in the snow …

Back in the snow …

August 12 of 12 …

A stormy day for the 12 of 12 July ….

Did you miss the leap second ….

Another long distance First to Find …

A Town like Alice …

2902 kilometres for a First to Find ….

Follow the Life and Times of the Thompson Family ….