In which I get poison oak, Hannah encounters a snake, and we find hidden treasure

Letterboxing - an outdoor hoby that involves following clues to a waterproof box hidden in a public place (like parks) and containing a rubber stamp and a logbook. Finders stamp an impression of the stamp in a personal logbook and then leave their own stamp in the letterbox's logbook.

My friend Heather introduced me to letterboxing earlier this year. We needed to take our Webelos on a hike and she thought a letterboxing hike would be fun. She found one at the Hoyt Arboretum that was about 2 miles long and had 4 letterboxes hiden along the way. It was a good hike and it was fun for the boys to have something to look for while we hiked.

Since then I have looked up several letterboxing routes in our area to take the kids on this summer. The boys aren't interested, Luke actually laughed at me (teenagers!). Cole had fun when he was with his friends but has no desire to go with his sisters. It has turned out to be a good Saturday activity for us girls to do when the boys are gone all day dirtbiking. They have had a lot of fun with it and it has taken us to some pretty local parks and nature trails.

This is our first letterboxing trip to the Tualitin Hills Nature Trails.

Last weekend we went to Cook Park in Tigard. Tyler was not sure about reaching down inside this stump to get the box out.

So Hannah said she would do it. (Surprising considering #2 below.)

Our supplies.

Some things that we have learned on our adventures:

#1 Wear shoes and socks. For some reason I did not consider that I might have to actually do some work to find some of these boxes and after the first trip when I had to wade through poison oak to get to the hiding place I have decided that flip flops are not appropriate footwear for letterboxing. As carefully as I tried to step around it, I still got a spot of poison oak on my leg that itched for some time.

#2 Sometimes letterbox hiding places are also home to other things. Like snakes. As Hannah discovered when she picked up a box that we found at Pirate Ship park and found a little black garter snake underneath. I don't think screaming and running are in keeping with the letterboxing code of discretion. Luckily she kept her head and held on to the letterbox.

#3 If at first you do not succeed try, try again. Some letterboxes are easy to find, others require some thought and carefull searching. A few times I have been ready to give up when I just had to sit down and think and look around to make sure I have searched everywhere, and suddenly we find what we have been looking for!