There are few things Team Kuclick enjoys more than a good handout.
And this, my friends, is a good handout (courtesy of team member Dee).
Yes, this tiny scrap of paper held the key to successfully navigating London and surrounding areas over our great adventure during New Year’s Eve 2004.
Handouts Rule!*
chris on April 3rd 2009 in Travel
As the Canadian branch of Team Kuclick (CTK) said so succinctly, don’t call it a comeback.
The U.S. branch of Team Kuclick (UTK) had been rather negligent in visiting the Far Northern branch HQ. Our earlier planned trip fell by the wayside when sickness hit UTK and then scheduling hell caused more issues.
Our only concern this time was that the previous two times that Team Kuclick was together, SCW (Small Child W) took one look at Chad and had a complete and unstoppable MELT DOWN. Catastrophic and utter rejection of Chad, the thought of Chad, the word Chad and all things Chadean. The potential for disaster was high. SCR (Small Child R) was cool with Chad though, fortunately.
In an attempt to ensure that Chad didn’t have to spend his visit in Canandia hanging out by himself in the guestroom, CTK undertook a PR campaign on behalf of UTK.
“Friends are Coming!”
“Yay! Chad and Chris are coming.”
“We like Brad Chad!!!”
There was only one little glitch. We were “grown up” friends, not exactly the friends that SCW & SCR were expecting, but after a close examination and some goofiness by Chad, we deemed the PR campaign a success.
After a complex navigation of our scheduling options (we actually were expecting a handout with our various choices) we decided upon morning at the gym and then an afternoon of hauling a wagon of children on a river trail in order to geocache. There’s always geocaching. Always.
The only downside to our epic geocaching adventure (yes, it was epic the kids had to fjord a stream and sidekick Engineer had to move a tree from our path – EPIC I tell you) was that it wore the grown ups out. Unlike the rest of the landscape in the part of Canadia we were visiting, the river trail was not level. No. It was not. It had hills. And ice. Not to mention the 50 or so pounds of small children in the wagon being hauled behind sidekick Engineer & little wooden boy. And then there was the 24-ish pounds of small child that Purple Monkey Dishwasher was carrying.
So instead of staying up late after the kiddies went to bed and carrying on like we had planned, we crashed. Sidekick Engineer fell first and despite attempts by PMD to wake him, he missed out on the nachos. Little wooden boy fell next, stretched out on the sofa. He did regain consciousness for a fully caffeinated soda and nachos, but his time was limited.
PMD & I did our best to stay awake until at least 11 p.m. I think we made it, but I’m not sure. Oh how the mighty have fallen.
We had a better plan for the following day. Two words: Endless Sushi. And geocaching. Our plan was to tackle A Kach to Remember a 9 stage multi-cache and then have dinner. After all, we had a wagon & a stroller. How could we go wrong? Well first there was the wind. And lack of gloves for PMD. And lack of sunscreen for me (what was I thinking?). And some early-on fussiness from the Giant Baby. Not to be daunted though, Team Kuclick perservered and found ourselves at the final. Whereupon I fetched the final while everyone else got chased by rather irate geese.
Objective achieved, we headed for sushi. Suffice to say, enless sushi is a whole heaping lot of sushi. I think I’m still stuffed.
Good times, man. Good times.
chris on March 26th 2009 in Geocaching, Travel
Chad: “So we were in the border line…”
Mr. K: “Dude, what’s up with you and the Madonna songs?”
We were sitting in line at the Canadian border, on our way to visit the northern most branch of Team Kuclick headquarters. We were pondering what exactly the correct term was for the inhabitants of Ontario.
“Ontarios. You know, like cheerios,” says Chad. I countered with Ontarians, which seemed much more likely. Hey, after being in the car for 5 or so hours, anything sounded good.
Finally it was our turn. Whereupon we had the following exchange.
Border Guy: Do you have any weapons?
Me: <kind of incoherent> No.
Border Guy: <grinning>But you’re from West Virginia.
Me: <puzzled look> We don’t hunt, if that’s what you mean.
Border Guy: <still grinning> But you’re from West Virginia.
Me: <catching on> Yeah, well they’ll be kicking us out soon you know.
Totally wearing cammo next time I visit Canada.
chris on March 22nd 2009 in Travel
The end of October signals time for our annual visit to The Greenbrier (forshadowing people, we’ve only been twice, but this seems as good a time as any to let my plans be known!). This year’s weather was heads and tails above the cold, wet deluge that greeted us upon arrival last year.
Somehow we thought we’d manage to go on a horseback ride in the mountains, play golf and skeet shoot during this sort little jaunt. But in the grand tradition of me being unable to focus once actually on vacation, we accomplished none of the above. Sometimes it’s just as much fun to wander around aimlessly – even when not in search of an ammo can.
Not to say that there wasn’t geocaching, because honestly, do I ever go anywhere that doesn’t inolve geocaching? Exactly. Since Knight Who Says Ni was in town as well, we decided it would be a great opportunity to knock off four pages of the DeLorme Challenge. It’s a good thing I keep dramamine in the glove compartment because all the tiny windy roads aren’t always agreeable to my stomach and that could have ended quite poorly for my new car.
We got all four pages (yay for us!) , had two DNFs, and managed to out wait a van full of guys in orange jumpsuits. Three people giving a grove of pine trees the shake down for 15 minutes must have looked completely normal to those guys! We continued to circle, look and poke even after the van had gone on to other areas that needed grounds keeping help to no avail. Oh the sadness of a DNF.
To bouy our spirits we headed back and indulged in tea. Chad honed in on a nice warm, suncovered spot where we settled in and tried not to fall asleep. It was a struggle, Kris battled back by sitting up prim and proper which makes it rather difficult to nod off. I relied on her to not let me slump forward and slide to the floor as I was getting pretty darn comfortable as I filled myself with lovely petite fours….mmmmm…..delicious tea cakes. At any rate, we had urgent things to do after tea – such as find a place to eat and then get all dressed up. But more about the latter in a different post.
Ah, sometimes it is good to be me! Or Ping….it’s always good to be Ping.