IDENTIFICATION

GC12K94	Cottonwood Cache	N 49° 38.254 W 112° 52.619
	Difficulty 1; Terrain 3; size - regular. Creator: Midnight Sun transplants . Date First Hidden: May 1/07 Date Last Found: Oct 26/08	West Lethbridge
Description	The cache is located on the east edge of Cottonwood Park Nature Reserve. This is a very tranquil area south of the city of Lethbridge that is ideal for a nature walk, as the park is home to a multitude of flora and fauna. The parking area is gated. From the parking area, allow yourself approximately an hour in total. Round trip distance is about 3.2 km. You can get within 30m of the cache on established pathways and game trails, so no bushwacking is necessary. Follow the path from the parking lot down the coulee until you reach the bottom, where the path branches to the left and right. Take the left branch and follow it to the NE until you are just past the second set of wooden steps. At this point you will be standing on a dry, grass covered flood channel. A well defined game trail leads off the main pathway to the East (co-ordinates N49 38.211 W112 52.837). This trail will take you to within 30m of the cache container. The last 30m is a steep scramble up the coulee, not recommeded if it has rained recently, as the footing with be sketchy at best. Also watch for cactus on the slopes. The cache container is a small ammo box that is not well hidden due to its isolated location, so will be easy to find once you reach the co-ordinates. Once there, sit awhile and enjoy the view. For those that really enjoy hiking, there is also the Riverside Coulee Cache located at the far south edge of the reserve.
Comments	Great view from the Cache. I come in from the top, not sure if it was a good idea or not as I wasn't looking forward to going back up after I had found the Cache. But I made it. This is a great cache! Hiked all the way along the river from Popsom Park and back around the road. What a pretty view from up there!

PLANNING

The weather is staying unseasonably warm. The forecast is sunshine with a high of +21 C. Definitely a day to try for the caches in Popson Park.

OUTCOME

By the time I parked the truck at Cottonwood park at 12:15 PM, the wind had picked up noticeably. But the sky was still clear and the temperature warm. This turned out to be the most difficult terrain of the day. It was a combination of a fairly long hike, a large change in elevation, and a difficult scramble up some erosion slopes at the end. But the view was worth it. This is the right place sign #2 rattlesnake heaven looking downstream - Popson park was at the far end close-up of Popson park - trees on the left - looking east looking west at the bottom of the coulee good trail poor trail now to start climbing view from cache area cache looking west looking east foliated sandstone I arrived at the cache at 1:05 PM, 50 minutes after I left the truck. This was the first of two caches in Cottonwood park. It was a good day for this cache. The climb up would be impossible if the ground was wet as much of the ground was a fine clay. There were a lot of interesting shapes caused by weathering of the sandstone rocks that were embedded in the clay. Geology abounds! The cache was not hidden, but getting to it was a real challenge.