Friday, March 28, 2008

Car-marking

I've noticed recently that several of the category descriptions say something about waymarks with "photos taken from car windows will be denied." Well, I'm here to tell you that most commercial waymarks that I post have photos taken from car windows. Who cares?! Now, I realize that you don't want a photo with an antenna running through it or part of the car door in the shot, but if it's a business, it's not like we are photographing a breathtaking or even interesting subject that needs extra care taken with the angle of the shot. Why would I get out of the car to photograph a cigar store, or a Burger King, or a Pizza Hut? I'm not going inside the places, for God's sake!

Now I know that some of you are saying, "but you have to get out of the car anyhow to get the coordinates at the door." Actually, no, I don't really. For the sake of the category officers I will try to get as close to the door as possible, but again, puleeeeeease, what is with this requirement?! If I take the coordinates from the first row of the parking lot, 15 feet from the entrance, is some poor waymark visitor that's going to show up, find the coordinates, and then say, "damn it! There's no McDonalds at this spot! Where the hell is the McDonalds?!" No, they will know where the McDonalds is from a mile down the road. That's what thirty foot golden arches are for.

Sometimes, it is important to be absolutely exact with your coordinates - a benchmark, a historic marker, a Toynbee tile.... But a restaurant or other business establishment is not a tiny, difficult to locate spot. If you can get a person within 20 feet of the door, unless they're an idiot they should manage to look up and notice the business. An exception to this rule might be a business inside a mall - then it would be important to get coordinates at the closest mall entrance, not from the far reaches of the parking lot. But that's the thing, people. There are always exceptions. Being rigid will just cause your category to lose some perfectly good waymarks. Is a waymark really less worthy of your category because the coordinates are 15 feet from the door? In my opinion, no.

So before you hit that deny button, take a deep breath, count to ten, and then ask yourself "is this really worth turning down a perfectly good waymark?" My guess is that 9 times out of 10 the answer will be (should be) no.

I'm sure that some of you are wondering if a denial spurred this diatribe. Nope. I have never had a waymark declined because the information and photos were taken from my car. It's just that most of the ultra rigid requirements, IMO, are detrimental to the hobby and really turn new people off from continuing to waymark. This is just the most recent of the many rigid requirements that I happened to come across right before writing this blog post.

Oh, BTW, the photo above is of "Bob's World Famous Java Jive", a US Route 99 Americana landmark in south Tacoma, and YES, I took this photo through my car window.

Monday, March 24, 2008

Bingo!

Assuming that my weather station waymark that I just submitted yesterday is approved, I finally got around to finishing off my 2nd bingo on the waymarking grid. Since weather stations aren't especially exciting, I thought I'd post some photos of favorite waymarks from this row of the grid.


Oregon Trail - Independence Rock in the "Wagon Roads and Trails" category - Many emmigrants left home in the spring, hoping to make it to Independence Rock by July 4th, hence the rock's name. Names of the many travellers are inscribed on the rock.


Left - Pick-Quick Drive In - Fife, WA in "Independent Diners"; I highly recommend a stop here if you're in the area. It's extremely popular, so you may wait awhile, but if you love drive-in food (burgers, onion rings, hand-scooped milkshakes in about 40 flavors) you'll love Pick Quick.
Right - Sears Tower in "Engineering Landmarks"; From 1974 to 1996 the building remained the tallest in the world at 1,730 feet.


Henry M. Jackson Visitor Center - Mt. Rainier National Park in "Googie Architecture"; I have several favorites waymarked here and although the Space Needle is a googie icon, I went with my favorite, the soon to be demolished Jackson Visitor Center in the Paradise area of Mt. Rainier NP.


Art of Chicago in the "Waytours" category; my favorite part of visiting Chicago was the art. Everywhere you turn there seems to be another world class sculputure - Chagall, Picasso, Calder, Moore, Miro - they're just sitting there amidst the skyscrapers waiting for you to find them.



Corina Bakery in "Independent Bakeries"; This little family owned bakery is somewhat hidden with a side entrance in the Merlino Art Center, but don't make the mistake of missing it if you like cake. I love the lemon coconut layer cake and a cup of french-pressed coffee, my husband is nuts for the Red Velvet cake, mother-in-law loves the hummingbird cake and my son is a fan of their super huge lemon bars. Don't miss it! News Tribune Review


So there are some of my favorites from grid row "27". There were some Engineering Landmarks, Googie Architecture, and Waytours that I REALLY wanted to include, but that would have made this long post even longer, so if you have the time check out my waymarks in those categoriers. There are some fun ones. Happy waymarking!

Monday, March 17, 2008

Coal, Fossils and Graves: A reason to visit existing waymarks

I know that most waymarkers live for finding a new spot to waymark, but this weekend I went on a hike specifically to visit one. It was an old ghost town located near the town that I grew up in and I had heard stories about the town and mines of Franklin from my great uncles, both miners. Thanks to the new Franklin waymarks I finally knew where the town was and how to find the trail to get there. We hiked the short muddy 1 1/2 mile trail, knowing that pretty much whatever could be waymarked up there was already posted. Boy would we have missed out on a fun afternoon if we had decided to go off looking for new spots to mark.
The best thing about a ghost town hike is that if you keep your eyes open you will see things that others may have missed - the ruins of old buildings off under 75 years of moss and duff, a coal car trestle amongst the alders, old tangles of cables and rusty pipes, and for us, fossils!

The waymarks we visited where the Franklin Ghost Town, Franklin Mine, and the Franklin Cemetery, all waymarked by Prying Pandora. While at the mine, a covered 1300' deep hole in the ground (covered with grating) that you can drop rocks into, I mentioned to my son how many leaf fossils can be found in coal and the stone in coal mining areas. He gave me the "uh-huh mom" nod as he continued throwing things into the mine. So I wandered over to the sheer rock wall that was behind the mine opening. It was AMAZING! This rock wall, about 8 feet high and 10 feet wide, was covered with leaf and twig fossils. It was like an imprint of the forest floor - millions of years ago. Above you can see one of the photos that I took of it.

Then we hiked on to the abandoned cemetery that some boy scouts and school kids had dug out of the blackberry briars. Daffodils, which had been planted on graves over 75 years before, had naturalized and were blooming everywhere. Bleeding heart was sprouting up and soon their purple flowers would take over when the daffodils finish their show. It was beautiful and touching and so peaceful.

Anyhow, I just wanted to write this and remind you to check and see what other waymarkers in your area (or an area you are traveling to) are out marking. You may just discover a no longer hidden treasure. If you are in the area and decide to visit Franklin a word of caution: the area is riddled with mines and there have been many cave ins in the past, resulting in 1300 feet deep holes. Stay on the trail!

Below are some of the photos from our lovely Sunday hike.


A bolt on an old coal car


Exploring moss covered ruins; a bolt being camouflaged by nature


Another old building's foundation


The mine


A grave at the cemetery


Another grave; Berry blossoms


A coal car trestle near the cemetery

Wednesday, March 12, 2008

The Neon of Tacoma

I was looking at a discussion post in a Flickr.com Tacoma group and noticed that the Ed Murietta article on Tacoma restaurant neon has been published. Very cool article, especially how they attribute the whole Waymarking Website to me (Sorry, Groundspeak. He misunderstood the difference between the Wayward Waymarking and Waymarking Websites.)

The author interviewed the restaurant owners about their signs, and also some local neon artists and put together a very interesting article. It was very cool to learn some background about the signs, and the different owners' dedication to their vintage neon extravaganzas. So, I thought I'd give you a little photographic sampler of some of my favorite neon in the Tacoma/South Sound area.



The Poodle Dog Restaurant - day and night




The Frisko Freeze Drive-In near downtown Tacoma on 6th Avenue, and the Golden City Cafe in South Tacoma




The Lucky Silver Tavern in South Tacoma and the Pick-Quick Drive-In in Fife (burgers and shakes to die for!)



The Flying Boots Cafe in South Tacoma




The Daffodil Motel north of Tacoma in Milton - day and night

There are many more beauties here, and don't even get me started on Seattle signs, but I've got to get back to work. Happy waymarking, everyone!

Tuesday, March 11, 2008

Wearing Wayward

Okay, just a quick ad here. Our Website, Wayward Waymarking recently opened a little store selling a few items with our logo on it. Here Mr. Hikenutty is modeling the ringer T.

So you, your kids, or even your dog can spread the word about the fun hobby of waymarking! Come on - you know you want one. Help pay my hosting fees so my husband will stop griping! :)

Alright, advertisement over. If you decide you want to check the store out at a later date, you'll find a link on Wayward's home page. Happy Waymarking!

Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Reaching Saturation

I'm meeting fishingwishing for coffee today as she makes her way home from Seattle and something she joked about made me think. She said, I was thinking of stopping in Tacoma to do a little waymarking - is there anything there that you haven't waymarked?

My answer - "there are a ton of McDonalds there that are waiting to be waymarked." I thought about it and when it comes to history/culture categories Tacoma is pretty much done. Well, except for "NRHP - Contributing buildings". Tacoma has 5 National Historic Districts, if I remember correctly and I have waymarked the contributing buildings of the two smallest ones. There's a residential district called the North Slope Historic District that has over 750 contributing buildings, so unless BruceS moves to Washington state, I don't see that getting cleaned out anytime soon. :)


Some people like to save waymarks for other people - they feel guilty about saturating an area with waymarks. Personally, I've never had a problem with it. I would rather have a place marked so that it's out there on the Web and interested people know how to find it. And sometimes I do leave a spot - for instance, there are two Ansel Adams photo locations in Western Washington and I've waymarked one. I've been to the other spot, but am leaving that for someone else because this category has so few possibilities. For most categories though, I figure that people can still post a visit. And in my defense, there are only about 10 of the nearly 700 categories that I have saturated. That leaves a lot of possibilities. I guess if I lived in a remote area I might feel a little guilty, but come on - Seattle is barely touched when it comes to waymarking. Bellevue and the eastside are even cleaner slates. That's a lot of waymarks there for the taking within a 30-40 mile radius.


So, if you want to come to waymark in Tacoma, here are some categories that you will find plenty of spots waiting to be waymarked, not necessarily because I hate the category, but because it's just not my thing:


Police and fire stations, art galleries (love them but don't tend to waymark them), any of the business commerce categories other than indie breakfast spots (Tacoma has almost no good spots for breakfast - if you find one PLEASE waymark it), bells and anchors, bridges (especially RR bridges), Wi-fi hotspots (most anywhere downtown has free wi-fi and I just can't post every building in the city), ghost signs and murals (again, almost all the downtown buildings have ghost signs and although I love them, I don't tend to waymark them), benchmarks (I think I have one posted in Tacoma), stained glass, libraries, Starbucks (I've waymarked one in Tacoma and trust me, this is Washington so that leaves about 30 or 40 for the rest of you), indie coffee houses (again - 30 or 40 of these are available - it's Washington for Christ's sake), most of the sports/recreation categories, municipal parks (tons of them), weird story locations and haunted locations (lots of old buildings listed on "haunting" databases), post offices, Washington State Historic Markers (check out Point Defiance Park), "building buildings" (constant construction of downtown condos), fountains, any of the cemetery categories, playgrounds, golf courses...............

So if anyone is planning on spending some time in Tacoma, there's a long list of categories that really need help getting to the saturated level. Just be sure to let me know you'll be there so I can meet you at one of those coffee houses that I left for you to waymark so we can do a "Sticker Seeker" visit!

The photo above is of a 1889 Queen Anne Victorian house that is a contributing building to the Stadium-Seminary National Historic District. I'm slowly working my way through this district and waymarking all of the primary and pivotal contributors. It will take awhile since there are over 175 contributing buildings in the neighborhood.