Iphoneography and Letterboxing

My xmas gift this year was an iPhone. I’m loving the camera apps that are available. Here’s a couple of photos that I’ve snapped and filtered. (I’ve tied them into letterboxing so it’s not all about my new toy )

This is the footbridge you walk over on the way to the Green Acres letterbox --Photo app: Snapseed

This campus will have a couple of OPAL boxes this February (nudge nudge wink wink) --Photo app: ToonPaint

Is Letterboxing a Hidden Art Movement?

I’ve been thinking about this since the summer when I found a letterbox in the handrail on an urban bridge. Finding a block print hidden from view so that only those-in-the-know know about it, feels like a social art form. A form of graffiti with out the unacceptable consequences of marring a location with paint. Plus a kinder and gentler form of artistic expression and sharing. Graffiti tends to be a political form of expression and often disturbing. Hidden block prints, for me, are a craftspersons’s form of artistic expression. A way of sharing art and locations. Is letterboxing a hidden social arts & crafts movement? Are there other forms of hidden art that are discretely hidden away for people to stumble upon or for those-in-the-know to find?

Two forms of street art with another art form hidden nearby

My newest handcarved virtual letterbox: Skunked

It’s that time of year again. When the weather gets cold and the days get dark. The opportunity to plant and find physical letterboxes diminishes. My thoughts turn to Virtual letterboxes. I enjoy creating virtual puzzles/quizzes and sharing my hand-carved stamps via this medium.

Creating virtuals is quite a bit of fun and I learn something each time. All of my virtuals involves a hunt of some sort. Usually a hunt of the internet to get answers to questions. Sometimes a hunt using online maps – to me this is more like real letterboxing. All of my virtuals have hand-carved rewards. All images are hand-carved by me. Here are a few links to my Virtuals on Atlas Quest:

My latest virtual creation:

Skunked

My Christmas virtuals:

Have Yourself a Merry Google Christmas

Famous Faces – Santa Claus

Here’s a list of all of my virtuals:

My hand-carved virtual letterboxes

To search for Virtuals on Atlas Quest go here:

Virtual Search
Note that you can only search one year at a time.

Atlas Quest Virtual Database

P.S. I appreciate all the feedback I get on my virtuals. Please let me know if you spot anything that is broken, wrong or out-of-date.

Letterboxing, Commuting and Chickadees

I took the afternoon off to enjoy a letterboxing excursion to 2 of mmmtika’s letterboxes.  The weather was nice – sunny, dry, not too cold, no wind.

First stop, Holidays Start at Midnight.

Picked up the geocache first. A small logsheet-only cache. It is at the other end of the parking lot and has been there since 2009 so will likely stick around and protect the letterbox – another cache can’t be hidden in the lot i.e. within 161m of the cache.

Had to wait out a woman taking a smoke break in her van. Then a couple of  commuters meeting up in the lot. When the coast was clear I went in for the grab.

Mmmtika asked if she could use the black sock camouflage method. I used this method twice. I got the idea when I found a geocache hidden this way, then re-found it about 3 years later and the sock was doing quite well and blended in even better with age. Also a great way to use up lone knee socks. But it has it’s drawbacks – mostly, it gets wet. It can be icky to pull the box out of a wet sock. One other thing that I learned today – if it gets wet in the winter, it freezes up.

This was a nice little letterbox. Good container. Handmade logbook. Fun hand carved stamp that went with the theme. And the new cool thing about this letterbox was the stamp pocket and how mmmtika incorporated the stamp.

A quick dash over to rehide the box/sock before any other cars arrived and I was off to Ayr for Chickadee, Chickadee.

Drove down Fountain to Dickie Settlement and then the lI remembered. I was also supposed to check on Blair Sheaves. Bumble couldn’t find it when she visited. So down Old Mill I drove and stopped in at the tower. The ramp off of the footbridge has a broken first rung. Not good. This ramp will be especially slippery when it’s wet. I took photos and have reported this to Heritage Cambridge. Hopefully they have the budget and manpower to repair this quickly. Addendum: they got back to me today and will forward it on the appropriate staff so that the rung gets fixed asap.

I was relieved to find the container exactly where I left it. It’s a tough find, especially if you’ve never found a box hidden like this before. The box is in great shape. Bumble, if you’re reading this, it’s hidden somewhat like your stamp-only box at the McMaster building in downtown Hamilton.

After the successful maintenance visit I continued on to the Chickadee box in the FWR Dickson Wilderness Area. I think this is my 3rd visit. I’ve cached here before. (Found one cache today after finding Chickadee.)

Got to the boardwalk and right away a chickadee flew past me and landed on a bush about 2 feet away. Then another arrived. I didn’t bring seeds so I looked around and spotted a few seeds that were left on a boardwalk post. I stretched out my hand. A few seconds later I was one with nature.  So cool.

Then on to the letterbox. I overshot and picked the wrong Y tree. (It turned out the be the more obvious Y tree, that I had ignored.) So I stayed about 30 feet from the trail and walked parallel to it until I spotted the prize. Nice craftmanship. A letterbox that’s built to last. Loved the hand carved stamp and the artsy stamp pocket and the handmade logbook. A job, well done. I left an HH, that I picked up in November at the Lazy Susan box in Williamsburg.

I really enjoyed this caching experience.

How do I make a Virtual?

http://www.atlasquest.com/about/wiki/question.html?gWikiId=549

Click the images below for larger versions.

Step 1: Basics

• Give your Virtual letterbox a name.
• Mark it “active” when it is ready to be published, otherwise choose “unavailable” until you’ve completed all the steps and it’s ready to be solved.

Step 2: Attributes

• Choose a stamp type. Most Virtual solvers prefer your own hand carved stamp as a reward for solving the puzzle. For definitions of the other stamp types see:

  http://www.atlasquest.com/about/wiki/question.html?gWikiId=304

• For your typical basic Virtual puzzle you won’t need the Attributes: “Off Line”, “Includes Bonus Clue” or “On Location” but if you think you might need them, you can see their definitions here:
  http://www.atlasquest.com/about/wiki/question.html?gWikiId=304
• There are basically 2 subtypes – the typical basic Virtual puzzle uses a Passkey, the other type is more complicated and involves hunting by “mousing-over” an image to find a stamped image. Instructions for image search puzzles are here: http://www.atlasquest.com/about/wiki/browse.html?gCatId=5#q462

Step 3: Solution

• Here’s where you add the passkey, a congratulations statement and the link to the reward image – ideally a hand carved image of a stamp you carved.
• The passkey could be a word, a string of words (no spaces) or any string of letters and/or numbers
• You need to store the image off-site i.e. not on Atlas Quest.
• Scan or digitally photograph your stamp image and upload it to a photo sharing site (e.g. Photobucket, Flickr) or a blog (e.g. WordPress, Blogger) or if you have your own website you might want to store the image there.
• The file must be an image file.
  The file extension will end in .jpg or .jpeg or .gif or .png.
• This is a correct url format:
  http://farm7.static.flickr.com/6217/6337047245_9c0636.jpg
• This is wrong:
  http://www.flickr.com/photos/10105922@N00/6352925

Step 4: Clue

• This is where you place your puzzle questions.
• I suggest you also save the answers to your puzzle somewhere so you can refer back to them if a letterboxer contacts you wanting a bit of help. I like to email myself the puzzle questions and answers and store it in a folder in my Inbox for easy access.

Step 5: Location

• The Location page is not used for the typical basic Virtual.
• Some letterboxers create a type of Virtual letterbox where the finder must physically visit a location in order to find answers (perhaps off of a plaque at the location). The answers will provide the finder with a passkey which they will use to get, ideally, a virtual hand carved stamp image. These types of boxes are typically placed in interesting locations that don’t allow or are unsuitable for physical letterboxes (e.g. many U. S. National Forests).

Step 6: Restrictions

• Restrictions are generally not used when placing a Virtual but it is possible to restrict to a certain Member Group.

Step 7: Save and activate

• Click the save button to publish your Virtual. (If you marked your box as “unavailable”, click the Basics button and change “unavailable” to “available”.

Hidden street art

A double treat here -- a great view and a hidden printing block

There’s something exciting about finding hidden pieces of art in a cityscape.

That’s what today’s “$1 Tour of Hamilton” was like for me, exciting – as well as cool, intriguing, fun and even nerve-wrecking (trying to be nonchalant and not to be discovered). Finding not only interesting parts of Hamilton but, even more awesome, finding hidden print blocks tucked away for those in the know to find and experience.

Happy Hunting in Hamilton

Left on a frosty Friday morning to go letterboxing and geocaching in Hamilton.

First stop was a driveby country road cache. Then 2 more nice geocaches in the Flamborough rural area before continuing my drive to Hamilton.

Last time I was in Hamilton I started to go down a triple lane one-way street the wrong way. This time I came more prepared. I figured out coordinates for the letterboxes in the area using the handy “custom location” and GPX AQ features and let my GPS tell me how to navigate the streets. Made my way safe and sound to the parking lot beside the Whitehern House and behind City Hall. Parking fees were reasonable – $2 per hour.

First, the letterbox at City Hall. I had been here once before but it was a weekend, the building was closed. The interior was quite nice, an open plan, lots of marble accents. I made my way up, where I saw the glassed in Council Chambers. Very interesting. I had never been close to council chambers before.

I recommend that before ascending the next set of stairs you read the directions again so you can grab n go quickly.

A most interesting visit to a place I would never go to if it wasn’t for letterboxing.

Next, I walked over to Whitehern House and enjoyed a stroll through the front yard of the estate. Took a photo of the plaque and the detail of the front entry of the house. Then on to the ‘dungeon’. It was a reach to get the box but there was a handy stick available. Made the grab and took the box to the back of the estate to enjoy the back gardens. They were still quite nice this time of year, the hostas were in surprisingly good shape. Sat on a bench, enjoying the view of the old dark church across the street. The stamp is a very detailed handcarved momento of the visit. Enjoyed another walk around the house before returning the box to its hiding spot and covering it well with leaves.

I checked my GPS, the Incredible Hulk was less then 400 metres away. So off I went for a quick downtown walk. Got to the old court houses, now a McMaster University downtown building. Quickly found the ramp. Here’s another place where it’s good to thoroughly read the instructions before going in for the grab in order to spend as little time as possible groping around. Grabbed the stamp (nice work on embedding the magnet into the rubber, Bumble) and walked over to the benches by the loyalist statue to do the stamping up.

Then back to Whitehern House. I checked the sign to see when the doors would open but unfortunately I was an hour to early for the 1pm opening. There was a cache about 300 meters away. It was in a nice little parkette across the street from the historical 1853 Central Public School. Enjoyed the find then headed back to the car to continue to the next letterbox, The Long Kiss Goodbye.

Loved the old neo-classic-style 1930 CNR building. LIUNA gardens were nice even at this time of year. Sat on a stone bench and stamped up in the warmth of the sun. Some nice bronze statues in this small park.

My plan was to head over to Burlington for the Mapleview box but on the way over I came to Dundurn Castle. Realizing Bumble had a box on the grounds and there was also a cache here, I changed my  plans.

I visited the “castle” years ago and had a tour of the interior but didn’t walk through the grounds. Passed the closed white building and had a look through the french doors. There were posters inside stating that the structure was built for cock fighting. Those were different times.

The cache was within site of this building. A good hide, a real lock n lock box in good shape. Then on to Bumble’s box. The kitchen garden is huge. The gates were up so I couldn’t go in but I had a look over the log fencing. Found the oval lawn area, wasn’t absolutely sure I had to correct oval area but when I saw the path at the back I was pretty sure I was right. Then the fallen tree can’t be missed. The box was in great shape and the stamp was my first piece of the $1 Tour of Hamilton series puzzle.

Took a photo of the dovecote building at the back of the mansion. Note the woman in period costume.

It was 3:30pm, time to head back home. Still plenty of Bumble boxes left in the area for another letterboxing excursion in the near future.

Thanksgiving weekend letterboxing – Monday

Spent the morning cleaning the house. By noon I wanted to enjoy this great October weather. I thought about which geocaches were available nearby. Then I remembered Fiddleheads’ train letterbox. Would the Halton Railway Museum be open on Thanksgiving? A quick phone call and off I went with my letterboxing gear.

Growing up in Toronto I spent my teen years riding streetcars, buses and subways. The old TTC streetcars brought back memories. The really old cars brought back memories of my old neighbourhood and my retired neighbour, Mrs. Luck. She was born around the turn of last century. She likely rode the old streetcars with the wooden and brass interiors.

Old Toronto streetcar. Built in the 1920s. Retired in the 1960s.

Lots of wood trim and brass in the interior.

Glass light fixtures, wood trim and ad space on the ceiling

They probably only hired thin drivers with short legs. Not much space here.

All aboard the Port Stanley to London train.

Port Stanley to St Thomas to London train

I really liked the ride on this train. It reminded me of my mother-in-law (she passed away a few years ago). When she was young she lived in Port Stanley and road the train from the Port to London to attend high school. She may have sat in this very train.

Our porter and tour guide gave a talk about the history of the train

Really enjoyed the ride through the property’s forests, the whistle of the train added nicely to the atmosphere. I was amazed at how much pristine forest was here.

After a pleasant ride it was time to disembark. On the way out I caught a glimpse of the washroom. The conductor saw me looking inside and asked me if I could imagine changing a baby in there. I told him I couldn’t imagine using it, there was barely any leg room. Nice original sink and toilet.

There were about 25 people that left the train. Luckily most hung out near the ice cream train. When all was quiet at the boardwalk and Meadowvale station, I checked out the letterbox location. Oh no, it’s not there! Then I re-read the clues, I usually get it wrong the first time. Ah ha! I did it get wrong. Quickly found the box. What a perfect stamp. Stamped up fast and returned the box then went back to the ice cream train platform. A few minutes and a yellow streetcar arrived but kept going. Hmmm. Maybe it was heading further into the forest. I walked back to the Meadowvale platform to have another look around at the displays. The car had stopped at the Meadowvale platform. I ran up and got on. Got a seat near the front. In a few minutes we were heading back. Stopped to pick up the folks at the ice cream station. Good thing I got on up ahead because most of the people at the ice cream stop had to stand. Reminded me of riding the bus in Toronto.

This streetcar was more like the streetcars that I grew up with.

The streetcar tour guide telling us a bit about TTC history

Getting off the old yellow streetcar

The old station was donated to the museum back in the 1970s

Thanksgiving weekend letterboxing – Sunday

Got a late start today and left to go letterboxing at around noon. Another beautiful warm sunny day. Almost too warm – temperatures rose to 25 degrees today.

First stop, the Jesuit College to check on Water Lily’s labyrinth box. Bumble let her know that the hiding spot had been compromised. Gardeners had cut away the cedars and exposed the box. Luckily Bumble came by at the right time to rescue the box and put it under some other nearby cedars. When she found it it was wet, the logbook was soaked. She did her best to dry things up. When I found it today it was still quite wet. I replaced the logbook and wiped up all the moisture. I couldn’t see why the authentic lock n lock would be so wet, perhaps the baggie got stuck in the seal. I removed the baggie. Hopefully it will stay dry. Bumble planted it in a good spot. It should be safe and sound.

Then off to Orangeville I went. Through Fergus where I found a geocache and checked on my Fergus Cache by the dam. The dam was being repaired. About 1/3 of it was boarded up and new cement had been poured. My cache was in good shape. Oddly some people had left pieces of paper as temporary logsheets, but my logbook still had plenty of empty pages in it – it wasn’t even half full.

After Fergus (yes I forgot about Fiddleheads’ GAQ boxes) I headed out to Orangeville for some geocaching. The first few Orangeville boxes were quite frustrating – poorly placed and poorly maintained.

I love geocaching but here’s an example of one that makes me ask “Why?”. Well, actually the why for this one is the empty cement shell of an old well. I think a kid found this particularly intriguing so they placed a dollar store container in the shallow pit next to the backpack that was probably stolen and thrown into the shallow pit ages ago (it was so deteriorated and messy I didn’t dare touch it). The cache was wet, the Post It Note logbook was moldy. The coordinates were 75 metres off. Ground zero was down the street in front of a house.  The cache was next to a chain linked easement pathway in the tall grass by some trees. My guess is the cache owner used google maps to get the coordinates. Found it with a previous finder’s posted coordinates.

Finally I visited 2 caches just north of Orangeville on a trail that started in a lovely neighbourhood, went into the woods, then through a clover field and then back into the woods. The boxes were in great shape and well maintained with very good hints. A delight to find.

Then it was time to go back home. I liked the drive over from Fergus so I took the same route home. When I got to Fergus I remembered Fiddleheads’ new GAQLBE11: Scottish Emblems (2). It was getting late but still light out so I plugged Thistle Street into my GPS and off I went. All these years and so many visits to Fergus and I had no idea this large cemetery was here. I tried the first box Celtic Snowdrop. I found the headstone and I’m pretty sure I had the correct spot in the hedge but no luck. So off I went to Lion Rampant of Scotland. It was a good idea to plant at both ends of the cemetery because they are quite different from each other – one old, one new. I quickly found the Lion and stamped up as the sun was fading.

Strange though, the logbook’s cover had the stamped image of a snow drop. I hurried back to the other side of the cemetery and had another look through the hedge. Still no luck. Now that I saw the snowdrop logbook in the Lion box I’m wondering if there’s a connection.

I hope to get out and do a little more geocaching on Thanksgiving Monday because the weather is supposed to be great again, but I reeeaaalllllllyyy should do some house cleaning. Maybe just a couple of nearby caches.

Thanksgiving weekend letterboxing – Saturday

Yesterday I enjoyed the beautiful weather and the free time I had to travel east for some letterboxing.

First stop Ajax ON. Last time I was here there was a big event going on. No parking was available so I didn’t do the Omen Birds boxes. This time it was relatively quiet in the park. I found parking a little closer to the boxes and enjoyed a walk along the waterfront with my dog. Nice area. It was interesting seeing the border between 2 cities marked the trail signage. Really liked JayBird’s handcarved birds. At the 3rd find, Famous Birds of Ill Omen: The Raven, I took the box down the grassy path to the beach where I found a quiet spot to stamp up and enjoy the lake views.

After Ajax, I drove further east to Port Hope. First box the blue diamond Ganaraska River-Float your Fanny Down the Ganny. The walk by the river was quite nice. Didn’t take long to get to the box location. Saw the red factory and when I got close, saw 3 men hanging out about 20 feet from where the box is supposed to be. Seemed like a homeless camp situation. Dang. Oh well, I’ll probably come back another time for a second try.

Next off to Port Hope Waterfront Series: Box #2 Kermit the Frog. A quick walk over from the parking lot. Interesting marsh with lots of bulrushes.

A trail and a bit of beach separated the marsh from the lake. The box was nicely hidden next to the quiet beach. A good size box, plenty of room for hitchhikers. An old box, it’s been out there since 2005 – 6 years old.

Next box and the coolest experience, Ganaraska River Fishway-Corbett’s Dam Salmon Run

When I got to the dam the parking lot was full and there were a few cars parked along the road. I joined the cars at the road and walked over to the people at the dam.

At first I wondered what they were looking at, then there was a large splash as a salmon flashed a tail fin out of the water. Then I let my eyes focus into the water and saw many dark spots. Then I could make out large salmon. Lots and lots of large salmon. The kind you expect to see in British Columbia – 3 foot long dark salmon. Wow, what a sight. I climbed the stairs to get a better view of the chute at the fish ladder and stared at the cascading water for a minute and then suddenly a huge salmon leaped out of the water and up into the chute. How cool. The audience oohed and aahed. I stayed for another 5 minutes watching salmon jump up the chute and salmon fall back through. Here are a couple of really grainy videos I shot with my cell phone camera:

Then it was time to go find the box. It wasn’t far from the dam and nicely camo’d among the rocks. It was a good shape and the stamp was just right for the location.

Then I checked my GPS for the next nearest letterbox. There was one in Cobourg and there was one north west. I preferred to head in the direction of home so I chose Bumble’s Polar Bear, Polar Bear.

I drove for quite a while, through some very beautiful scenic countryside. It felt like what I imagine Vermont in the autumn would be like. Rolling hills of colourful trees and golden fields of drying crops. Tiny towns with churches with tall white steeples poking through the trees. Absolutely lovely. I arrived at the cemetery for another scenic view of an old abandoned wooden church with a stone foundation. The boards were painted green and the window frames were painted white. The cemetery and church were raised on a hill with a beautiful backdrop of farmer’s fields and trees in full autumn colour. I found Bumble’s letterbox quickly and it was in great shape.

It was dusk so the photo didn’t come out very well, more reason for you to visit and get a better look.