Apr 17/2010
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Geocache Activity 632 |
FIND 574 |
IDENTIFICATION
Difficulty 1.5; Terrain 1.5; size micro Creator: Elementry Date First Hidden: 4/4/2010 Date Last Found: 4/9/2010 Description West Canadian Collieries’ Bellevue Mine was opened in 1903,with production beginning in 1904.At its peak of production, from 1925 though 1929,the Bellevue Mine employed over 500 men and produced over 200 000 tons of coal per year.
Hint You have to check out this "Old Car" to find this cache. Comments
PLANNING
This morning I planned to attend a photography field trip in the Crowsnest Pass. I then thought I would try to combine this with some geocaching in the same area. There are a number of new caches in this area and since it is almost an hour and a half drive to get here, I wanted to make the most of the trip. This time I was going to focus on the Bellevue area. I am slowly working my west through the Pass. Since I had no sense of how long the photography field trip would last, I decided to make notes for only 4 caches in the immediate vicinity of the field trip.
OUTCOME
The photography field trip took a break at noon for lunch. I decided to leave the group at that point and spend the afternoon geocaching. This was my first search (after a quick lunch at Tim Hortons in Blairmore). Time of find: 1:05 PM. From the hint I was sure the cache was somewhere on the old coal car. I crouched down and looked at the axle and immediately saw the magnetic container. A good start to the geocaching activities.
Here is my posting to the geocaching.com website:
The gate to the mine entrance was still closed, but the cache is located before the gate. I can remember coal fired furnaces when I was a boy and it was a nostalgic moment to see the coal in the old coal car. Getting the log out of the container was a bit of a challenge but I was finally able to sign in. TFTC. Here are a few photos:
cache area
"old car"
coal load
cache site
I am now 1/1 for today.
