The Way-Vacation

We're getting ready for our road trip through the Midwest and I find it hilarious the level of planning that I'm putting into the waymarking aspect of the vacation. As many of you know, along with my special favorite categories, I like to fill up that waymarking grid, and so there's a certain desperation to make sure that I get those location specific categories taken care of. Along with 9 new state historic marker categories, we'll be able to waymark all three highway categories (Lincoln, Rte 66, and Dixie), the Pony Express and Butterfield Stage markers, the "Marry Me" category, and many, many more. I mean, we're talking the possibility of 30 or more new category icons on my grid! As with many of my beloved waymarking pals out there, I tend toward the compulsive side, and so I'm having to put a check on my urge to waymark my way across the middle of the country.


I have created a vacation spreadsheet like you will not believe - a sheet for the schedule, another for lodging, and another for activities. There's the highway geocache sheet and then there's the waymarking spreadsheet with a page for each state we'll be traveling in and the waymarks that I'd like to hit in each of those states. Waymarks for categories that can only be found in a particular state or region are highlighted. I know, it's sad isn't it. Luckily once I get on the road I loosen up and am actually fairly laid back when things don't go according to plan. My way is to plan things as thoroughly as possible, and then kick back and enjoy the surprises that get thrown at us.

We'll be hitting Utah, Wyoming, South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Illinois, a short 1/2 day in Indiana, and Nebraska. As you've just read, our time is a little over scheduled :) but if any of you lie along our path we'd love to meet you - and to have you sign our waymarking sticker seeker book. It would be nice to finally have someone log a visit to our sticker seeker waymark! (and vice versa.)

So - 23 days and counting until we embark on this summer's adventure! We should have internet access at least every other day, so we'll try to post to the blog about our adventures as we go.

Oh - by the way, the picture above is of the Gemini Giant in Illinois - one of the coolest muffler men ever. I have shamelessly snagged the photo from waymarkers Special Ed and FallenFaery who have waymarked him in the roadside attraction and rte. 66 categories (pssst - the muffler man waymark is still there for the taking.)

Happy waymarking!

Waymarking Rainier

We were moping about, feeling like the only people stuck at home over the long Memorial Day weekend, so we decided a day trip was in order. After ruling out any of the islands due to not wanting to wait in line or pay ferry fees, we decided on a day trip up to Mt. Rainier. My favorite entrance - Carbon River entrance - won't even open this season, and my next choice - Sunrise - doesn't open until June 15th. We settled for Longmire and Paradise. Of course "settling" is relative, as it's hard to find a spot in this large National park that isn't gorgeous.

We set out and on the way I talked the guys into stopping at a shooting range I read about that had a Paul Bunyan muffler man. There was some type of gun festival going on and as we wandered amongst the coyote skins, antler light fixtures and other assorted animal parts made into handy objects for the home, I wondered if I'd stepped into an alternate universe. Only waymarking would entice a me to enter a shooting club and actually waymark the place. We found the Paul Bunyan standing guard over a line of outhouses and quickly waymarked him and made our escape.

Our first stop inside the park was at the Longmire Historic District, the original administration district of the park. I'd never stopped at Longmire before and was impressed by the wide array of historic buildings the park was maintaining. My favorite was the old service station with its original pumps, pictured below. Inside of it there was a great photo showing a Model T at the pumps in the early 1900's. Other great stops are the historic administration building and the National Park Inn, which serves a great lunch. After walking around in the old housing quarters we came upon the cool suspension bridge below. I wonder if this one is a replacement after the storms of Winter 2006. A rainstorm dumped 12 inches of rain in less than 18 hours on the mountain, doing about 15 years worth of storm damage in one year, thanks to the awful flooding. Later in December a windstorm with winds topping out at over 110 mph further damaged the park, to the point that many popular areas such as the Wonderland trail and Carbon River road won't open this year.




After exploring Longmire and having a picnic in front of the old Admin building we continued up to the Paradise area. As expected, parking was a mess and the place was thick with people, but we still had fun. Hunter and Frodo played in the snow and after that we wandered through the Jackson Visitor Center, a great googie-style building that looks like a giant saucer swooped in and landed on the side of the mountain. Yesterday it was half buried in snow, but still accessible, as it is year round. Although most hate the building, I love it. I've heard that it will be torn down in the near future - very sad. It's too bad they can't renovate it and use it for another purpose. Even I will admit that the place is in serious need of some renovation. The pictures below show the Visitor center from the road, and an interesting stand of snags across the road from it.



Nearby, renovation work continues on the beautiful old Paradise Lodge (still in my queue for submission in multiple categories). Thanks to the short work season up there, the work seems to be taking forever. I'm not sure how many years are left before it opens again. The Guide Center next door, shown below the lodge photo, is still open and being used as the starting point for folks planning on climbing the mountain from Paradise.



Finally, we made our way back home after Hunter had tired of playing in the snow, and Frodo had tired of eating and peeing in the snow (in different spots, thankfully.) Now I am faced with the task of posting the 30 or so waymarks that I took during the visit (9 new categories waymarked in). I'm about half done and will try to finish up the rest over the course of the next week. All in all, a very good day - even if the Mountain refused to emerge from the clouds.

Weekly Rant: Lazy waymarkers

I'm an officer on several categories, and with the good weather of spring, there have been floods of new waymarks submitted lately. One thing that I've noticed is that sometimes people do the least amount of work possible to write up a mark. It seems that in the rush to list a weekend's worth of waymarks, they sacrifice the quality of individual marks to pump up their numbers. Really - how tough is it to check and see if a site has a website? To check and see what a business' hours are? As a waymarker you are known by the waymarks you post - do you really want the description "half-assed" be something people think of when they think of you?

It can get tedious when you have a bunch of waymarks to enter, but if you notice that you're starting to dread having to post the next mark then take a break. Try limiting it to 2-3 waymarks in a sitting. And if posting is that distasteful to you, then visit waymarks instead and let someone else do the spots justice when they post them to the Website.

It's one thing to have typos or to invert coordinates due to over-zealous typing. Lord knows I am regularly guilty of that. But to purposely skip adding information that will make a visit to the site easier and more fulfilling so you can move on to posting your next waymark, well that makes it to the top of my "lame list" for the day.

I don't want it to sound like there are a lot of people that do this. Most of the waymarks that come through my queue are well researched and written. Thankfully the lazy waymarker seems to be in the minority.

A Waymarking Milestone

Only recently I was celebrating reaching the 500 waymark point, but now I have reached an even cooler milestone. I have officially posted or visited waymarks in 1/2 of all of the grid categories - 260 of the 518 categories. Of course, with the mess of new categories that have been coming through peer review lately, this celebration might be short-lived, but for now I will pat myself on the back.

We spent some time waymarking in downtown Puyallup, Washington today. I found yet another neon pink elephant to waymark (this one was a "Li'l" Elephant), enjoyed the Farmers Market, and learned a bit about the town's founder, Ezra Meeker.

There were several spots that I waymarked in the "American Guide" category, and one of them was the mansion of pioneer, Ezra Meeker. This guy was one tough old coot. He traveled the Oregon Trail to the Puyallup Valley in the late 1800's and homesteaded there. After founding the town and living a full life, at the age of 70 he hopped in his wagon and back on the trail, heading east towards congress. His reason for this second journey was to survey the trail, and to ask congress for money to create a federal highway along the route. Later, in his 80's he had the chance to make the journey a third time, this time in an automobile. And finally, at the ripe old age of 94, he flew the length of the trail in an airplane. Pretty amazing.

The photo you see above is a statue of Meeker found in Pioneer Park, a park he gave to the city in the early 1900's. You can't see it in this picture, but behind the statue is a trellis supporting an ivy vine that was planted by his wife when they first arrived in the valley. It now looks more like a tree with a trunk than a vine.

If you decide to visit the park, stop in on a Saturday or Sunday while the Farmers Market is running - preferably during berry season when all of the local farms bring their delicious berries to the market. YUM!

Chain Restaurant Waymarking Poll

Well, I'm moving the poll feature over to the Wayward Waymarking Website, but I wanted to post the results of this last poll here on the blog.

There were a lot more participants in this poll; probably due to the contentious nature of the question posed. My question was: What do you think of chain restaurant waymarking categories?

Happily, the results were as I expected. A full 39% of those polled agreed with me that the chain restaurant categories are a black eye to the hobby of waymarking. Ahhh... It feels good when for once folks agree with you. Following the "they suck" option were the people who truly don't give a damn either way. (I'll have to keep working on them.) Finally, dragging in at 21% are the folks who inexplicably think that waymarking these categories are a great idea.

Of course, those of you who participated know that there was a 4th option. The "give it a rest and move on, for God's sake!" crowd. A paltry 11% chose this option. Barely worth reporting. Did I mention the fact that 39% agree with me? Oh, I did. Well, just checking.

The next poll can be found on Wayward's "waypoll" page. We want to know how big your waymarking backlog is. If you have some other thought provoking things that would make a good waypoll question (the more contentious, the better) :) e-mail me at info@waywardwaymarking.com.

Wayward Waymarking - Live and kickin'

Team Hikenutty is proud to announce the creation of our new Website, Wayward Waymarking, found at www.waywardwaymarking.com. The idea came to me when I started writing my beginner's guide and was getting so many emails from people wanting help getting started in the game. Slowly (too slowly) the idea evolved and we've created a site that will be helpful for beginners, but also has some great features for more advanced users. This blog's sidebar will change a bit, as the "feature" sections are duplicated and expanded on the website. The poll will be moved to the website now, and can be found as "waypoll" on the site's menu. Some parts of the site are still being tinkered with, so bear with us as we continue with the site's construction. I'll run through the sections of the website now and tell you a little about them.

Waypoll - Those of you who regular the blog will now find this feature on the Website instead. We'll poll you on different waymarking topics and you can view the current results to see how other folks fell about the subject. On occasion I'll post about the results of a poll here on the blog.

Wayfeature - The wayfeature section expands the features that you see to the right in the blog's sidebar. Having a full webpage allows us to add extra info and to add a few new feature topics as well. The four features currently on the Website are: Featured Category, Featured Waymarker, Featured Waymark, and Featured Wayphoto. The featured pages will change monthly at this point, while I'm busy adding to the site in other ways.

Wayblog - Next on the menu is a button that will send you to this blog. I probably should have moved the posts over to a blog on our server, but since a lot of people already have this spot favorited, and blogspot has done such a great job with features, I'll leave it here for now and won't change it's name.

Wayinfo - This section will hold tutorials, news and other waymarking related info. Currently it has the beginner's guide that I have written, a latest news section, and BQ's waymarking brochure that you can download and print up to bring to your local geocaching events. Later in the summer, after our road trip, I plan on writing additional tutorials on topics such as creating a category, group management, and more. The tutuorials are in depth, step-by-step guides written with the new waymarker in mind.

Waytools - Next in line is the waytools section. Currently in this section there is a Category spreadsheet that I created that lists every category and its basic requirements. The requirements are in a simple code (P=picture, C=coordinates) to save space, and there is a separate sheet included that has a key for this code. The second tool I have in the section at this time is a spreadsheet of the category grid with the boxes filled with the names of each category rather than the icons. I use this for playing waymarking bingo by highlighting the boxes of categories that I have posted in and it makes it easier to see what categories I still need to find waymarks for. Both of these documents can be opened in either MS Excel or PDF format. If you have a waymarking tool that you think I should add, let me know.

Wayfun - This section is a links page. It contains a section of links to other waymarker's blogs (only the ones that focus on waymarking,) a section for links to other location games, and a section for some of the wild and wacky sites that we come across while net surfing that have to do with travel or waymarking.

Waybooks - Last but not least is the Waybooks portion of the site. Here at Hikenutty headquarters we are avid readers and this is the section of the site that I'm most proud of. The concept is that many waymarkers enjoy the learning aspect of the game, and some of you are quite knowledgeable in the topics of certain categories. This section provides a place to recommend books about your favorite category to your fellow waymarkers. The waybooks section has a page for each of the 15 sections of the waymarking site. On those pages you will find books related to categories within that section. If you're interested in buying a book and supporting Wayward, hover over the book title and an Amazon.com link will appear with a photo of the book and its price. I've started things by adding a couple of book recommendations to each of the pages, but hope that the book reviews will grow as you guys make additional suggestions. I'm still working on adding the recommendation form to the main waybooks page, so until then you can email us with suggestions at info@waywardwaymarking.com . Include the book title, author, category that it's related to, and a little blurb with a description of the book and why you enjoyed it. When the "This section under construction" line disappear from the lower portion of the page, you'll be able to open a book review form by clicking on the clipboard at the bottom of the page.

So, there it is. Wayward Waymarking. We hope that you'll find it fun and informative. Spread the word about the site. If you have a website and could add a link to it for the Wayward site, we'd appreciate it. Thanks to those of you out there who have supported and helped us during the development of Wayward and to Dan Schlitzkus of www.atomicartone.com for the great web design. Happy Waymarking!

Mom's Day Waymarking

For Mother's Day this year I asked for a morning in Seattle at the Olympic Sculpture Park and then a quick stop at the Seattle Public Library to visit Rose Red's waymark there.

What a glorious day of waymarking. Troy and Hunter actually enjoyed the sculpture park (I was a bit worried) and we spent over an hour wandering the park from top to bottom. The only disappointment was missing the pavilion, because it didn't open until 11 a.m. Oh well, that leaves a few sculptures for someone else to waymark.

It's a magical place. Truly amazing and photographs can't do it justice. One of the greatest accomplishments of the designers is the vistas and perspectives that are created as the park steps down the hillside to the waterfront. Sculptures can be enjoyed up close, from a distance with the water as a backdrop or on the other side, from a distance with the city as a backdrop. The photo at left is a close-up of "Seattle Cloud Cover" looking through the piece to the Space Needle and city beyond.

Troy's favorite was the sculpture "Love & Loss". It's much more interesting in person than can be displayed in a photo. The piece uses 2 benches, a table and chairs, a reflecting pool, and a tree to form the words "love" and "loss" with both words intersecting at the letter "o", which is a reflecting pool. Spinning above the words is a red, neon ampersand.

Other stops included Henry Moore's, "Vertebrae" and the Rem Koolhaas building for the Seattle Public Library.

Above you see the neon ampersand from "Love & Loss", and Calder's "Eagle" framing the Space Needle.

Above is Richard Serra's "Wake" and Henry Moore's "Vertebrae".

So even though I spent Saturday tearing my hair out while writing code for a Website, Sunday was a beautiful day full of world class art and REALLY good coffee and muffins at Macrina's. (I can't believe there isn't an independent bakery category yet. Someone needs to get on that so I have an excuse to go back to Macrina's for another orange-hazelnut twist and some of their delicious coffee.)

Waymarking Backlogs

As anyone who's posted a waymark knows, it's a heck of a lot easier to take coordinates and photos for a waymark than it is to post one. Because of this, avid waymarkers can build up quite a backlog of waymarks that they need to post. Some of my online waymarking pals have backlogs in the hundreds. I personally don't know how they do it because I get completely overwhelmed if I get more than about 20 behind.

Well, when I started planning the road trip we'll be embarking on in 6 weeks, I had this brilliant idea. I would pre-post (without submitting for review) the waymarks for all of the spots that I know we would be in and then, once I had the photos and the exact coordinates, I would quickly edit the waymarks and submit it.

As of this date, I have pre-posted over 75 waymarks and my bright idea is starting to backfire a bit. Here in the Tacoma area, I waymark all by my lonesome. Team Hikenutty is pretty much it. However, the areas that I will be visiting have competition and I am slowly finding that my carefully pre-posted waymarks are turning up in categories as other waymarkers beat me to the punch. For the most part, it's no biggie, but when it's a category that I can't find here in Washington it's painful. The one place that I figured I'd have no trouble with is the spots that I plan to waymark in my husband's home town of Evanston, Wyoming. Who goes to Evanston? I mean, it's no Yellowstone, let's just put it that way. So imagine my amazement when today as I was browsing through the newest posted waymarks that I should happen upon two Evanston, WY waymarks - both for the town's Lincoln Highway marker, and a third, for the Utah/Wyoming border 4 miles out of town. A 4th waymark that I planned to post over in Laramie, Wyoming was on the list too. Unbelieveable! I mean, Caverspencer, WHY on earth were you in Evanston? I know you weren't caving, and I can't imagine it was for the booming tourism industry. And NevaP -- you're from Nebraska. Did you have to take Wyoming's giant Lincoln statue? I would think that a Lincoln statue would be pretty easy to find, say, in LINCOLN, Nebraska!

Okay, I'm just joking with you guys. It's not like I can't log a visit to them. It's just, well, - best laid plans and all that jazz. In the end I will likely come home from this trip with a backlog of hundreds that will keep me busy until December, when I start planning a 2008 trip.

The above photo is Caverspencer's shot of the Wyoming/Utah border on I-80 that I planned on waymarking on June 22. Why Devil's Tower is on the sign is beyond me. It's in the opposite (NE) corner of the state. Oh I know! It's because they didn't think that a picture of sagebrush and skinny half starved cattle would be welcoming enough. :) (If my in-laws find this blog I am SO screwed.)

Occupational Hazards of a Signature Item

We took our signature gnome out for his first waymarking adventure and decided since it was a clear day that we'd go play a round of putt-putt at "Parkland Putters Miniature Golf" and waymark the course while we were there. Parkland Putters is a mini-golf bonanza with 4 different 18-hole courses of varying difficulty, including an easy course for kids that snakes through a "pirate ship."

It all started out nice and friendly, until Hunter and I brought out the gnome. Troy, who had never seen Gerome before, was apalled. "God, he's hideous!" Troy exclaimed. Hunter and I tried our best to explain kitsch-appreciation to Troy, but he just wasn't getting it. Around the 8th hole, it seemed Troy's disgust for Gerome had grown to hatred. Hunter and I feared for Gerome's safety, and rightly so.

Gerome was just standing around on the green, minding his own business while, unbeknownst to him, danger lurked nearby.

With a quick tap Troy putted poor Gerome into the hole and shouted "hole-in-one." Poor Gerome. I suppose that things like this are an occupational hazard for roaming gnomes.

I'd like to say that this was the end of poor Gerome's golfing misadventures, however, as you see in the following picture they continued. Troy, unaware (so he says) that Gerome was taking a stroll along the 17th hole's bridge, prepared to putt.

I didn't have time to photograph the result of this mishap. I was too busy fishing Gerome out of the water trap and trying to repair the chip in his hat. Tired and broken, Gerome was laid in the car to recuperate from his first day out waymarking. Hunter and I decided that it's not safe for our little gnome to be around Troy and on future adventures we will have to spend more time watching out for him, as he tends to wander into danger if left to take care of himself. As penance for Troy's part in Gerome's troubles, he's been sentenced to at least 10 minutes a day of webtime on Archie McPhee's website until he can better appreciate kitsch.

Global vs. Region Specific Categories

Much arguing goes on over whether or not a category is "global" or not, meaning that waymarks for the category can be found on any part of the globe. It is one of the judging criteria when voting whether or not a proposed category should be added to the category list. Some folks are adament that only global categories be permitted, however, that seems to go beyond what Groundspeak envisioned when they formed that criteria.

I bring this up because I'm an officer in the managing group of waymarking's newest category, American Guides. During the great depression of the 1930's President Franklin D. Roosevelt created a work program called the Works Progress Administration and that group, along with creating many jobs building roads, lodges, and dams, also employed out-of-work writers to write the American Guide Series, guide books featuring driving tours of the United States. The goal was to create tourism markets. Over 100 of these guidebooks were created (over 300 books total if you include the oral history projects), written by some of the best 20th-century writers, such as Saul Bellows, Studs Terkel and John Cheever. The category asks waymarkers to find a site that is featured in one of the guide books and then to waymark the site, including the excerpt from the book in the waymark description.

When the votes came back there were several complaints about the category being "too American", or not global enough. My belief is that the global criteria should not discourage historically significant categories because they are limited to one country or region. I recently supported the "London Coal Tax Post" category. I've also voted yes on categories such as the categories approved earlier this year - "Maori Historic Sites" and "New Zealand Historic Site". The fact is that most of the folks waymarking are located in the United States and so it makes sense that many categories that are proposed focus on areas or topics that are concerned with local regions. As the hobby grows on other continents, I'm sure there will be many categories that are focused on those waymarkers' home countries. That's great! I look forward to learning more world history, and other lessons about this planet we share.

I agree that globalism in topics is important, and if there's a way to make a category global, then by all means do it. But look beyond the "global" criteria when you vote. Let's not lose historically important categories because of too much rigidity.

The above photo is of the Timberline Lodge, which was mentioned in the American Guide, "Mount Hood: A Guide", published in 1940. The lodge sits high on the southern flank of Mount Hood in Oregon State, and was built by WPA workers in 1937.