Antietam Adventure Logbook

[Dradicus]

I worked on and completed these as my very first set of lab caches on Saturday. I went along with AL's Guide, AlwaysLost00 & nomaland and I'm really glad that I did. It was much more enjoyable and easier to do this in a group. It seemed to have helped that I had just done the wherigo a few weeks ago because at one point it wasn't so clear on where to gather some needed information. The puzzles at the end had my head spinning but we made it through and I thoroughly enjoyed the entire adventure! I'd really like to see more of these as well. I don't get to make it to very many events so this would really put a great new spin on the regular every day caching experience. Thanks for all the hard work!


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[4lostmarbles!]

This was our first CAM picnic and it was amazing to be the "guinea pigs" for the new Lab Adventure. We arrived around 11am in time to get some food, eat and watch the awards being passed out to everyone who helped with placing the caches and helping with the picnic. Soon after we were taking a group photo and the announcement was made about HQ giving you permission to do this Lab Cache at the picnic, excitedly we grabbed the paper and decoder and were off on the first bus in the rain to start the fun. We thoroughly enjoyed driving around the battlegrounds and learning about the history of the bloodiest battle. Hixon did a fantastic job!! Having never experienced Hixon puzzles, we able to crack the code easily enough while standing around the final stop listening to other groups listening to the video trying to figure out what they had to do. A balanced mixture of fun and history for all to enjoy. We hope this stays around for other cachers to experience and enjoy as we did. Looking forward to next year's CAM and are hoping for another Hixon surprise.

4LostMarbles!

[paklein58]

I had a wonderful time completing the Antietam Adventure. I sure like these log caches and this was my first one. Thanks to all who were involved in ALL the work to put this one together.

[jpatton]

Since I was staying in the area after the CAM events, I decided to come back Sunday to try this adventure with fewer people around. At the AfterCam event I heard that the later stages could be tricky and started to wonder if trying this myself would be a good idea. I got an early start and with the wind blowing, felt pretty cold outside. I got through the first 7 stages without any trouble. Starting stage 8 I stared the the page for a few minutes before I figured out exactly what needed to be done. Stage 9 wasn't really difficut, just time consuming as I paused the replayed the video quite few times.

Overall, this was an excellent adventure with a lot of time put into creating it. Finishing this adventure was probably my favorite part of the weekend.

[C2D2H4]

We were very excited to see lab caches in the area. This series was our first! We set out on a rainy Sunday afternoon with lots of enthusiasm and anticipation. We stopped off at the visitor center and the folks there were friendly and inviting. We headed off to lab 1 and solved it quickly. The rain was not going to dampen our fun! AND it didn't! We thoroughly enjoyed learning lots of history and spending time with our family. The boys loved the challenges and watching the videos! We truly appreciate all of the work and time that was put into this. We finished the series and even though it rained the entire time we were on the trail, we had the best day of geocaching ever! Thank you!

[TheLoneBaker]

Moments after the announcement of the lab caches, I joined forces with Bladen and we hopped on the first shuttle bus back to parking. We then took a few minutes inside the visitors center before starting the lab caches which we worked through pretty quickly. There was one stage that took us a few minutes but that was only because we were trying to pinpoint the location using the rough map instead of the actual coordinates. Then at another point we managed to jump to the very front of the pack and get first to find on one of the stages. But then we took a wrong turn on the way to the last couple stages and lost a couple precious minutes.

The puzzle ended up giving us some trouble but moments after Bladen went to see if anyone else could figure it out I had an aha moment and ran after him. Sure enough I had indeed figured it out. Thankfully Bladen had already written down all the flag waves and I was able to just quickly convert to what I needed. After I solved it I then shared how to solve with the large group that was still struggling. I didn't however give them the actual solution because I was still hoping for first to find.

We then raced across the street to grab the final cache and discovered we had missed first to find by just 2 minutes! So we were instead the second group to complete the series. If only we hadn't lost those extra minutes on making that wrong turn!

I've now completed 93 lab caches from 10 events and I must say that these lab caches are easily among the top 3 adventures. Thank you to anyone who had a hand in creating them!

TheLoneBaker

[ZippyFinn]

I'm not much of a CAM-er but wanted to make sure I got the lab caches done. Wasn't sure if they were sticking around or going so I planned a trip up north to take it all in.

I started off at the visitor's center where the kind park rangers at the front desk hooked me up with some scissors before I began so I could cut out my cipher disk. Luckily for me, they said it was included in my admission fee. They told me that the use of the bathroom was also. Score!

WOW! Honestly, this must have taken months to put together. It was so well-designed, thought-out and educational. I especially enjoyed the small puzzles at the end. The map was perfect and you can see the high level of collaboration with the people at Antietam. There were also plenty of Battle Field Ambassadors around who were flippin' WONDERFUL! They really WANT to help you out and tell you about the battle. I must have spent at least 20 minutes with the ambassador at Burnside's Bridge and with the ones near The Tower.

Overall - FANTASTIC! I would actually like to bring my son and daughter back to do it again at some point. Sometimes history can be dry for kids, but this would make it more enjoyable for that age group. I also think going by myself was a plus. I was able to take my time and read what I wanted to read, rather than try to rush through with a group in a quest to git-r-done.

Standing ovation to Hixon, NPS Antietam and the MGS for a most excellent experience!

[Run&Hike]

TUESDAY, JUNE 7
At the CAM Picnic Prudy and I were recovering from Flu and didn't feel like caching afterward, especially in the rain, so we drove back to the Shore hoping we could do the Lab Adventure at a later date. Planning this day we included all of LPYF's "GC34E8x" historic puzzle caches and some others to make the trip worthwhile.
Having seen and heard that many had experienced problems with Verizon cell signal, especially downloading and watching videos on small cellphone screens, we prepared by watching the flag video on my 21" HD monitor, getting the numbers we needed. We figured we could watch the others in the battlefield (and could). Before we started today I turned off Bluetooth, WIFI and some other stuff and uninstalled Facebook. Even so, by the time we finished my battery was down to 36%.
Most places I actually had 4G, but the videos "stuttered." At one site it was down to 1X and the video locked up several times. At another site I had 4G but the website froze several times and I finally restarted my phone to clear it. Arriving at Stage 8 we didn't realize we had somehow missed the info at one of the stages, but detective work, a SWAG or two and deductive reasoning prevailed and we got the "OK". From there we still found ourselves saying, "Huh?" a lot, but Prudy was inspired to think outside the box and got the last answer we needed! All in all, it took us 3 hrs 40 min to get all the information, log all ten stages and look around at each stage.
With having driven the tour route on Monday to get the information for the puzzle caches, then driving it for the Lab Adventure, then a third time to really see and enjoy it, we came away with a new appreciation for what happened here.
All in all, we drove 581 miles to get the Lab Adventure and 32 other caches.
Thanks to the NPS, MGS and Hixon for this challenging, informative experience!

[amanda and knobbie]

I was heading westward to Ohio over the Christmas break and had really wanted to do the lab caches at Antietam. I'm so glad they are still active. Antietam is a favorite battlefield for me to visit about the Civil War. I think the adventure was very well done. Other than some connectivity issues at times, the lab caches came off without a hitch. I did the first 8 and got to the cemetery and decided to call it for the night as I had more road to travel to Ohio.
I came back and finished on my return home to Delaware. I was able to figure out the cipher disk and everything. Amazing! I really liked the theme of the lab caches and where it took me on the battlefield. I know it took a lot of work to put together. This would be great idea for other battlefields or cities like NYC or Washington DC where physical caches are limited.
Thanks for the adventure and lessons on Antietam. Amanda and Knobbie