Delicious Delights Day 2

After a good night's sleep I woke up this morning at 6:00am. I already had things ready for day 2 of the Delicious Delights event so I wasn't sure what to do until the park opened at 9:00am. So I stayed in bed and read for an hour and then got up and showered and dressed. I then put things in the car and went down to breakfast. There I met Mosaic Butterfly, Basketcase and screamin' meemie. We talked about the day and made plans to meet at the dining hall and start boxing. Once I was done eating I left the hotel and drove to a store to get something for the potluck at noon. After that I made my way to the park and the dining hall. I was the first one there except for Mr. Open Space and I sat at the table and started looking at clues. When screamin' meemie and Mosaic Butterfly arrived we decided to letterbox around the dining hall. We started with a series of boxes that involved triangulation - it was pretty hard and it took us a while to find all six boxes - but it was worth it, the stamps are incredible. After we found all of these we looked for some stamps just lying around hidden in plastic carrots. By the time we finished the two series we had found 13 boxes. Then we returned to the dining hall and had some lunch and visited with everyone. At 1:00pm Open Space wanted to get a group photo and then it was time to head out on the trails again.


Mosaic Butterfly, screamin' meemie and I got in the car and drove around to the main entrance to start at the Peach Creek Loop trail and then connect to the Dogwood trail. After walking both these trails and exhausting all the clues that we had we ending up finding 13 boxes. During our time on these trails we didn't meet up with any other boxers and we felt isolated because we knew there were other people in the park. But we didn't worry too much about it we just kept on boxing. After finding all the boxes we returned to the car and then drove to the nature center and parked. From this point we headed for the Forest trail. Again we divided the clues up and we each followed our clues until we reached the landmarks we were looking for. We were having trouble with two of the clues and no matter what we did we couldn't find the boxes so we put those away and continued on for the other boxes. When we had found all but one box we turned around and made our way back toward the car. The one clue we had left (besides the two we couldn't find) was on a trail closer to the car. So we arrived at the trail and I heard someone calling my name - it was Bell Motel. Then she said "Talk to NLW. Talk to NLW." and I was starting to thing she had lost her mind. Then we saw NLW and asked what was going on. She told me to look to my left for a box. At first I was confused about what she was telling me but then it dawned on me that this was one of the boxes we had looked for earlier. But because the trails have changed we couldn't locate it. I was so happy to have found this box and I don't know if I would have located it if it hadn't been for NLW. She had been coming to this park for years - first as a girl scout and then just to go when it changed to a State Park and now a Houston City Park. So she knew where the trails used to be and was able to figure the clues out. Now that we had that one we continued on to that last box we were looking for. Along the way we got to an intersection with a bench and a sign and that sounded familiar. So we looked at the clue for the other box we couldn't find earlier. So we followed the clues and Mosaic Butterfly found the box. We took it to the bench and opened it to find it very wet and yucky. The logbook was wet and we took it and placed it in a new and dry baggie. Then we dried off the box and stamp and stamped in. We put the stamp into a new baggie and made sure the box was closed well before putting it back into place. Now we only had that last box - and we wanted this box. Throughout the event you could get tokens by finding them in boxes. Once you had five tokens you could get the clue for this one box. Finally we found the box and stamped in. On this trail we ended up finding another 13 boxes.

Now that we had found all the boxes we returned to the car and then drove around to the dining hall. Once back at the dining hall we snacked a bit and visited but then I decided to go and find two more boxes just down the road from the dining hall. So I set out and easily found the two boxes I needed and stamped in and then put them back in place. It was time to call it a day as I was starting to feel tired. So for today I found 41 boxes and with the 39 boxes I found yesterday it brought my two day total to 80 boxes. I returned to the dining hall and sat and visited with everyone but within about 20 minutes my eyes were closing and I decided it was time to return to the hotel and get some rest. When I got back to the hotel the first thing I did was take a shower and now that this post is done I can get some rest for my trip tomorrow to Dallas.

I really enjoyed this event and I am glad I made the trip to New Caney. I had a great time visiting with old friends and I have gotten some amazing carves in my logbook. Now I am all excited about returning to Texas in March for TALE 11 - Naughty or Nice in Huntsville at Huntsville State Park.