Second to find, 45 minutes after The White Family.

A quick and straightforward find, a short walk from where I'd parked. However, I was glad I'd put on old jeans and hiking boots because it was slippery and muddy and everything was damp in the fog. I'd taken the clue coin from NAT2 on the way home from work last night, although I'd been tempted to grab it on the way to work yesterday and then look for the cache at lunch time. However, Monday morning sales meetings start at exactly 9am and the journey is notoriously unpredictable at this time of year, so I did not take a chance on the diversion and cursed when I arrived at the office with 20 minutes to spare!

Originally I'd intended to combine seeking the cache with this morning's school run which would have secured FTF, but in the event Mrs Muggle did the school run whilst I procrastinated in bed. Mrs Muggle is trying to cut down on our gas bill so no heating in the morning until she's got up and decided we need it, which we did today, but it was so damned cold I could not drag myself out of bed!

So, quite knowningly, I put the FTF in jeopardy and so it was that it became a lunch break find.

However, mildly disappointed at missing FTF I promptly took this cache to be the start of the Staines Moor ring, which I proceeded to do in reverse, in the fog. Not a smart move on either count. The circuit is most definitely designed to be done in ascending sequence and on two occasions I found myself on the wrong side of the river and twice on the wrong side of a fence. One was a brief diversion, the other a question of squeezing around the end of the fence where it did not quite join the adjacent railway fence. Had it not been for Amberel's assistance I'd probably have given up at the first water crossing and headed home, which would have been wise, but like a fool I stuck with it and went places I probably should not have done on my own. At #7 it was fairly obvious that a tree demanded climbing, but I was somewhat reticent to do so in the slippery wet conditions. However, a phone call to Amberel after exhausting the other possibilities confirmed this and when I finally scrambled to where I should have been able to sit and reach down to it, I would have needed a 6 foot long arm to get to it. Perhaps it is out of place? Anyhow, I climbed down into the cache hiding place hoping I would not fall in or down and balanced precariously I retrieved the cache. This was a log I signed rather than stamped! DNF on #5 mostly because I was getting very wet searching in the many possible places (come back on a day when the ivy is dry, not dripping)  and at #3A at which point Amberel was not available for PAF, though he had kindly given me the coordinates in view of my reversed tour. I went from #2 to #15 because I'd already found #1 when seeking "Off the Rails", returned to my car and then found #16 the wrong side of yet another fence - so I'll return to seek the remaining 3 as lunch-time caches.

Many thanks for a most entertaining rather extended lunch break!  Sandvika #1150 (a minor milestone by total coincidence)

PS - I dropped the clue coin for this cache in Staines Moor #13