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It's Thursday so it must be time for a day's geocaching in London. The weather forecast was rain to start and then easing off towards noon. As it happened, it rained all bloody day.🥴 Here's how things went.
I was on the 0629 out of Basildon to Fenchurch and trundled on the tube around to Covent Garden to find the last base of the A Short Stroll around London's West End AdLab series. I took the short stroll over to the Fisher Alley trad to fail again here. This isn't a trad as it seems that I need a NFC tag reader to find a code to open the key safe. I have downloaded one now so I might have more luck next time.
It was only a short distance to the next one, the Paddington Bear & Mr Bean (Leicester Square) virtual. Now the task here is to get a photo with bear or bean. Unfotunately I think that the bear has gone back to Peru🙁 which left me with bean, a character and actor that I detest. However, needs must and the photo call was met.🤬
I started on the Soho Stories : True or False AdLab series but couldn't get one of them as Cutz was closed. I made do with the shelter of the splendid CM Soho ~ St Patrick multi. I sheltered from the rain for a while and ventured out to the final stage for a quick find. I found myself near a couple of stages of the Harry Potter's London 2 series with the last one near Tottenham Court Road. Luckily there was one of the ST : Elizabeth Line AdLab bases nearby, which was nice.
It was gone 0930 so I jumped a free ride on a bus going along Oxford Street alighting near New Bond Street. I walked nearly the other end visiting all the bases of the Bond Street : Life of Luxury AdLab series. A bonus here was the A Fine Pair ~ New Bond Street virtual which was easy sorted. However I had a setback at the Phenochryst - D_Leslie_A EC.☹️ I couldn't determine which panel/column to look at as the GPS was bouncing around so I reluctantly had to leave it.
I was near Regent Street so I jumped a bus going north and got off near Broadcasting House for the BBC : Broad Casts EC. I was well at home here with lots of fossils in Portland Stone.😀 I was heading towards Hyde Park now but took a slight detour here to go down to Herbert Asquith's house off Oxford Street which was a base for the Suffragettes AdLab series.
At the top of Hyde Park, I failed to find the More Jekyll the Hyde trad although plenty of people have found it since.🙄 It was teeming with rain as I walked through the park down to the A glacial erratic in Hyde Park EC. I eventually found all the info that I needed before heading over to The Arch EC, a sculpture formed from travertine rock. This is now closed off to the general public so I did the best that I could with the answers.🤫
I headed north through the Italian Garden and then took a cheeky bus ride down to Queensway tube. I sorted out the AFP ~ Queensway multi and then walked a few streets up for the Spot the Fake Houses virtual. After the photo call, I continued north up to Bishop's Bridge Road. I found the trad here and then carried on north to ST ~ Royal Oak. There was a trad here which was easily found but there was also a panhandler asking for the price of a coffee or a McDonalds.🤫 I would have bought him a coffee so I asked where the nearest coffee shop was. He said about half a mile. As I walked through the barrier, I told him that he would have more luck standing outside a coffee shop.😀
One stop down was Paddington Station, where I completed the ST ~ Paddington Station AL series and one base of the ST ~ Elizabeth Line AL series before heading back into the rain. I had a short break in a Costa before starting on the Tour of Paddington AL series. The bonus for this one took me up to the Harrow Road.
A few hundred yards from the final stage, towards the Marylebone Flyover, was the ST Paddington H&C trad. Unfortunately the trad was missing and time was getting on so I decided to take the Circle Line east. I thought that it would be a good idea to get off at Farringdon for another base of the ST ~ Elizabeth Line series. I used to work around here in the early 80s and my goodness, how it has changed.🥴 However, my local knowledge told me that I could jump a No.8 bus to Bank up on the Holborn Viaduct. Luckily one came along quickly.
It was a short walk from the Bank down to Fenchurch Station. However, I still had one task to complete in St Olave's just around the corner. The last piece of the jigsaw for the CM... St Olave virtual was quickly spotted this time.😀 Luckily the other nine clues went through the checker too and a cache that I have been after for three years was finally put to bed.👍🏻👍🏻
1 Mystery 2 Multi 3 Earthcache 3 Traditional 5 Virtual 24 AdLab
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