Along with many other cachers, I'm sure, I maintain a "to do" list. This cache has been longer on the list than any other cache. But not any more :-)

At 66, I'm far too old for the "spiderman" technique, leaving me with the option of cadging a lift or bringing my own boat here. It's been 15 years since I've brought Amberel so far upstream, and it was good to have an excuse to do so againThis was a seven day trip from Chertsey to Lechlade and back, taking in five T5 caches, one T3 cache and one Church Micro "en route". I arrived here late afternoon on the third day.

I wasn't entirely sure the present Amberel would go under Osney Bridge, but she did, with the canopy lowered and an inch to spare. And not far after the bridge, I turned to starboard, into the cut. Not a lot of headroom under the railway bridge either, and then I was at GZ.

In accordance with the D1 rating, the cache was easily spotted. Amberel's cockpit is rather lower than the roof of a narrow boat, so I had brought along a metre long "grabber". Well, I could reach the cache with the grabber, but I couldn't grip it sufficiently tightly to release the powerful magnet! I had to carefully position the boat and stand on the cockpit side, if I then lifted myself up with one hand grasping the bridge I-beam I could just reach to grab the cache with the other hand. This was a fairly precarious position - the cockpit side is less than 3 inches wide, the current was steady but the wind was strong and gusty, so it was hard to predict the movement of the boat, and I could ill afford to come down on the outside of the cockpit when I released my hold on the bridge!

Log signed. I was unable to see any second magnet, but the grip of just the one attached to the cache was far more than enough to hold it. As I flopped back down into the boat after a second precarious maneuver to replace the cache, a narrow boat approached from the other direction. I can't imagine what he thought I was doing, or even what he thought a wide beam boat was doing in the cutIt's rather narrow here, but luckily my 2 engines give me considerable maneuverability and I was able to tuck myself out of his way :-)

Lovely to tick this one off,

Thanks for the cache,

Rgds, Andy

The following log was originally posted elsewhere:

After my visit the other day, I went home, read some of the logs, and thought about this cache. Boards? Boards are something that people worry about when they're not Batman. A cache that's placed in the middle of dead space? That's not a problem Batman would have. I can be Batman, sure. I AM BATMAN!

So today, I finished work, changed into a set of loose clothing (that I could comfortably climb in and wouldn't mind having to swim in if I had to), rallied my coworker and fellow 'cacher kateevery to act as my eyes-on-land - and my photographer - and set out to the bridge.

The boards on the side I opted to start my expedition from were a little more-troublesome - stretching farther out over the water - than the one I'd taken on before, but that hardly mattered: today, I was Batman. A grab and a leap, and I was on the other side. Next came the tough bit - the crossing: no Bat-Belt; no Batarang... but I still had my pure Batmanosity. Leaping up and bracing myself against the beams, I began shuffling across. Just as I began to tire, kateevery - my very own Robin - called out, "just four more steps", exactly the motivation I needed to complete my crossing and grab the cache.

Totally great location. Totally Batman expedition. Totally adding this cache to my favourites.

EDIT: I've now written a blog post about the experience - http://www.scatmania.org/2014/05/18/batman-geocaching/

Have looked at the cache before but couldn't get to it.

Today, I was back again and decided to use what has been nicked named the 'spiderman' technique. Found it tough but managed to get out to the cache but then found I couldn't write the log out in the middle, so had to take the log book back to the edge. After a rest and writing my log, got out to the middle again to put the log back and secure the cache

Great fun, wonder what a boat would have made of me if they had past by

TFTC

Just realised this cache is also listed here!

At last, luck was on my side as I've been trying to grab this one for ages! I just happened to be passing and spotted a boat heading slowly towards the bridge. I rushed over to try and cadge a lift and they were more than happy to oblige. After signing the logbook, it was just a case of trying to manoeuvre back in position to replace where it came from. Then after dropping me back off on the bank another boat appeared heading towards me from the other direction, typical.

TFTC TNLN SL

Logged this cache after a sudden rush of blood to the head and daredevil acrobatics.

A very satisfing find... that I won't be repeating in a hurry.