We were so excited to see that a "local" boxer planted a new series in our "area" last month! I placed LOCAL and AREA in quotes because it was a 2 hour drive for us! This new series has 31 boxes with most of them being drive-by boxes! We knew that we could tackle most (if not all) of those in one day. Yesterday promised to be a sunny day with no rain or snow in the forecast - and it turned out to be just that! The rain and warmer temps from the previous week helped melt all the snow as well.
We left our house around 8:30 Saturday morning and headed to our first set of boxes in Galesburg, IL. We were able to find all 12 within 2 hours. Next, we headed west to Monmouth and nabbed a box on the north side of town and then headed to find lunch. There were 4 more left to find which we did with little problem. At this point in the day, we discussed heading home or going further south to Burlington, IA to finish the series. Becki had been fighting a migraine as well as sinus stuff and the kids were a "bit" ansy from sitting for the past 4-5 hours! We decided to head south to complete the series. We later decided that was a good decision!
While looking for one of the boxes on the way to Burlington, we came across this gigantic cannon! Isn't it beautiful (as far as cannons go!)! While searching for this box, the kids were able to run off some energy at the playground. The letterbox at this particular location proved to be a bit hard to locate! We were 99% sure that the tree we were looking in was the correct one, however, Matt wasn't finding it! At one point, we got back in the van and drove around the block to see if anything else fit the clues better...no luck. So, we headed back to the tree. After searching another 10-15 minutes, Matt spotted it (he was IN the tree at this point!). Unfortunately, the box was hanging about 7 ft off the ground! Matt & Becki both tried to reach it with no luck (not even close!). Will's hands were then enlisted! Becki put him on her shoulders and he successfully grabbed the box (I am sure that it didn't look that smooth)! We stamped in and replaced it a few feet lower! We laughed when we realized we knew the previous boxer who had found it...and he is well over 6 feet.
Burlington, IA was our last stop for the day. We headed over the bridge and stopped at the library to use the restrooms. We were all happy to see "Book Sale Today"!! We browsed through the books and came out with a few treasures. We located the next few boxes in the series. One of the boxes was at Crapo park. We told the kids we had a surprise for them and mentioned a slide...they immediately knew that we were referring to the "man-eating slide"! They have talked about this slide since we visited the park a few years ago. It truly is a beast! It is very high and has tight turns (check out all the skid marks/scratches on the slide in the close up picture of Alex). The kids loved going up & down numerous times!
I looked at the clock and realized it was 4:35. Two of our boxes (yet to be found) were in Aspen Grove Cemetery - which closes at 5:00. We've heard from other letterboxers that the gates DO get locked and you are out of luck if you are inside!! We diverted our plans and raced over to the cemetery. Luckily, Matt knew right where the boxes were (at least the monuments spoken of). We drove into the cemetery at 4:47 and found the first spot. After hunting, we found it and stamped in. Jumping into the van, we drove to the other spot and searched for the correct headstone. Just as we were ready to give up, Becki found it and we went hunting in the tree. Becki put the box away while Matt drove the van to her. We zipped around turns - knowing that our time was running out quickly. We arrived at the gate at 4:54 and waved to the groundskeeper who was waiting for 5:00 to close to the gate. We were all laughing and stunned that we had found 2 boxes in 7 minutes!! The kids later told us that seeing Mom & Dad running and looking for the boxes was their favorite part of the day. We backtracked to our original spot to finish the series.
We ended our day with dinner and a movie for the drive home. We weren't able to search for 2 of the boxes due to the day getting dark. Our previous record was 23 boxes...we have beat that record!
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