Fri, Nov 14, 2008

Posted in the Groundseak forum by ccwrestlechik105

Because we cache exclusively at night we usually have run-ins with the cops, but this was our best one yet!

Lets see, where to start?  We (me, cynicalifornia, ccwrestlechick, and one of our first-time friends) started the night at our east-side caching headquarters. After grouping up we headed off into the night. As we got close to the coordinates we found ourselves on top of a bridge, when all of a sudden the GPS pointed 40 feet to one side of it (once again our habit of not reading the info in the cache description or the previous logs came into play) so we continued over the bridge and went into the neighborhood under the bridge.

We had noticed when we crossed that there were some railroad tracks under the bridge, so of course we thought the cache was under the bridge, possibly by the tracks. We pulled off into the dirt and noticed that several bars from the fence by the tracks were missing... so of course we went in!

We searched all under the bridge, and I decided to climb up and check on top of the bridge while the others where still down below. I'm not on the roadside by the bridge for three minutes when all of a sudden a squad car pulls up and blocks off the road, then another one pulls up and blocks the other side, and then another!

The first cop gets out of his car and asks me where I'm going. I look at all the squad cars and officers and say "I'm not going anywhere!" He then tells me to put my hands up where he can see them. As soon as I do, all the cops rush over to me, grab my arms, pull them behind my back and put me in handcuffs.

He then asks me if I have anything illegal as he begins to search my pockets and pat me down. I tell him that I have a pocket knife in my right pocket. After that he starts to ask me what is in each of my many pockets before he goes through them. I got a weird look when I told him that one of my pockets held a camera and Oreos! After he goes through all of my pockets he asks me who is down below, so I tell him it's my buddies, and that they are actually on their way up here. He says "No they aren't" as a squad car pulls up beside them.

He then asks me what I am doing out here, and in my most serious voice I tell them that I am geocaching, which of course they have never heard of. I am met with blank stares, so I tell him it is like treasure hunting with a GPS. Now they give me a funny look as if to say "What is a grown man doin treasure hunting in the middle of the night?" Then they ask me what I'm looking for, and I look like an even bigger fool when I say "I don't know what I'm looking for!" I was trying to explain that it could be any number of things when I hear over their radio "Yeah, it looks like these guys are doin some sort of treasure-hunting thing".

After that (it's been about 15 minutes) they take the handcuffs off and let me go. Apparently someone called the cops because they thought we were taggers. One of them sticks around for a couple of minutes helping me look in the bushes because he is curious to see what I am trying to find. After a few minutes of no success he takes off too. After a minute or to I am reunited with the rest of the group. We search all over, up down and on both sides; eventually cynicalifornia goes back to his vehicle and gets online to read more about the cache... after that it is an easy find! We log it and continue on with the rest of the night's adventures!

TEAM NIGHTWATCH

The funniest part was that they patted down both of us boys but left the two girls alone!