18,000 Finds at The Ghost Orchid

For our first 17 caches at 1,000 find milestones we were in Pennsylvania with the dogs hunting a terrain 3 or higher cache.  We've always planned to make those milestones with the dogs as they are a big part of our outdoor lives.  We were in great shape to continue that tradition for 18,000 until I got deathly sick on vacation in October.  October became one of our lightest months ever for geocaching.  It also meant we were going to find a milestone in Florida without the dogs.  Choosing a cache wasn't a question.  We both knew it would be The Ghost Orchid in Fakahatchee Swamp.  It is now a thirteen year old cache.  It has been found 113 times in thirteen years.  Most of the visits have been group outings with prior visitors acting as tour guides.

Fakahatchee is an amazing place.  Our first visit was in 2017.  We found a few caches, but the wildlife viewing was the hook that captured us.

Old tramways from citrus days serve as trails.

Sometimes

Some citrus trees still hang on and bear fruit.

2017 had us hooked.  We returned to Fakahatchee in 2018.  Our first venture was to find Share the Music Cache.  It was also our first experience at getting wet in the swamp.

Despite some blood and spotting a cottonmouth on the way out we were hooked.  We came back the next day to tackle The Ghost Orchid.  We were cocky.  We can do this.

It was wet from the moment we left the tramway and knee-deep and raining.  We looked a long time without finding stage one.  The birds were laughing at us.

The vultures were waiting.

We retreated back to the tramway and set our sites for 2019.  This was supposed to be the easy stage.

We were ready in 2019.  We had a dry bag and a dry box.  We planned more.  We headed into the swamp and found a warm up cache at an old camp on the way to the parking area.

Even the really large gator with really sharp teeth could deter us.

Moving was tough and wet, but we spotted stage one!

Ali spotted this turtle.  It's odd to think we will most likely be the only people this turtle ever sees.

Fakahatchee was peaceful and awesome.

We spent over four hours in the swamp on this journey and did not reach the final.  The area closes at sunset.  Even if staying after dark were possible, I have no desire to meet a panther after dark.  We left with one dead gps as a sacrifice to Fakahatchee.  We would be waiting another year.

We were back for another visit in February. We were already aware of the growing risk of COVID-19.  Fakahatchee seemed like a good place to be on our own.  With a few birds.

There's no real getting used to being in the swamp.  Once you step off a tramway, you are there in the water.

Once you are in, you pretty much stay in.  If the water is below your knees, it is low.  The image below is easy walking with a long stretch of open low water, and few downed tree parts to crawl over.  The worst risk is finding tree trunks and limbs to trip over.

Cypress Knees

The deep portions of the water came up to my chin.  Ali had picked a shallower path in the crossing, but the water was still quite deep.  It was enough to feel the bouyancy of the water and a little float while crossing.

We fared better on our journey than this alligator did.  It was near the final, but wasn't the skull by the cache.

Spoiler Alert. 😉

Ali with Find #18,000!

It's not a journey for everyone.  It was a wonderful adventure for us.  We spent over four hours on this last journey to the final.  We spent almost ten hours making the journey together.  We could have joined the tour to the cache, but were happy to work through the stages as a team.  It was a special milestone.  I hope we are able to revisit Fakahatchee Swamp for other adventures as we look for more of the hides in this amazing place.