Adventures with Marcus: Garden Island Alternate Geocache

—Garden Island Alternate Site—

(Zippel Bay State Park on the south shore of Lake of the Woods)
Williams, MN

After getting back to the cabin on Saturday night and after the long day of adventuring on the Northwest Angle, we were welcomed back by Marcus and his grandma, and they were very happy to see us. They had a big day of their own that included hiking, baking, napping, and visiting a playground. We had a very fun evening just hanging out, but when bedtime came along Marcus decided that he would rather hang out with Grandpa and read books than go bed....

He sat on Grandpa's lap reading away until Mommy made him go to bed! That is actually a kind of funny story, too, because he got to sleep in a bunk bed with Daddy taking the top bunk... he really liked that! You can't tell in these pictures but he was in his diaper running around..... (added disclaimer requested by Grandpa Z)...

On Sunday morning, the next day, we got up and had a pretty lazy morning, spent a bit more time checking out the resort, and ate a very yummy breakfast. Eventually, we got moving because we still had a lot of geocaching to do. We packed up and headed out.

Since we did not make it to Garden Island State Recreation Area in the middle of Lake of the Woods (if there is such a thing as its "middle"), we still had to get the avian geocache card for Garden Island. Fortunately, the Minnesota DNR had an easy answer for that. They actually set up an alternate geocache at Zippel Bay (the closest park to the island, which lies on the south shore of the lake). This means we had two complete geocache series to do at Zippel Bay State Park—the traditional one and the alternate one for Garden Island.

Here is what Luke has to say: "As it happened, we did not land on Garden Island. This really eats at Luke. He solemnly vows to one day stand on those shores. But, whatever. For the less nautically-inclined, land-loving, saner folk they placed a duplicate multicache in Zippel Bay State Park on the south shore of Lake of the Woods. This one avoided having to cross into Canada or cross the lake from the south shore (winter might be ideal with a snowmobile). All one had to do is a multicache in Zippel Bay State Park to get the same bird card that was on Garden Island."

We all—Vonnie, Luke, Marcus, and Grandma and Grandpa Z.—headed over to the park to check the geocaches out.

We decided to do the alternate first; however, if you are doing this in the future, I would recommend doing the regular Zippel Bay State Park geocache first (it will save you some backtracking).

When we got to the park, everything was still wet from the rain the night before—good thing that Marcus had his handy boots to wear. He stayed drier than the rest of us. We drove through the park until we made it very close to the first location. This was actually over 2 miles because this park is pretty big.

*** Warning--- lots of pictures of this geocache because it was so amazing along the lakeshore ****

When we parked, we could kind of see Lake of the Woods, but most of our view was blocked from the trees around us. The first clue actually brought us away from the waterfront and towards a clump of trees a bit farther down the road.

Since Marcus did not get to geocache on Friday, he was so excited to get going and help on Sunday.

We all hiked over and started to look for the next clue...

It only took a little bit before I found it. It was actually taped to a 1"x4"-paper and stuck into the ground right near a clump of trees.

We entered the next set of coordinates, and these were a bit farther away and by the lakeshore (yeah!), so we all headed off to our first real sight of both the beach and Lake of the the Woods. It was amazing, and the weather was perfect for hiking.

Grandma Z. decided to stay back and hang out on the beach and read (she always has a book handy) while the rest of the group went ahead.

We all headed down the beach... by looking at the map and coordinates, I could tell that our next clues were going to bring us to the place where the beach turns... you can't tell looking at these pictures, but that was about 1/3 mile down the beach.

On the first side of the beach, it was super-fine sand, but it also had a lot of shells (but not a lot of rocks). It didn't take us very long to reach our goal and for me to find the next clue.

The boys looked on while I read off the next set of coordinates.

This set of coordinates was right at the start of the Hiking Club Trail, and looking at the map, we figured that we could either take the beach or the trail to get to our next stop. We decided to take the scenic path on the way out.

I know some of these pictures are repetitive, but they are so pretty!

The hike ahead of us was about another 1/3 mile, but we had nothing to complain about with this amazing view. The beach changed a bit and became much more full of rocks and driftwood.

At some point the group separated, and Luke and I hiked ahead leaving Marcus to explore the beach with Grandpa Z.

We hiked up to the beach until we came very close to the inlet channel and a light marker (unmanned lighthouse).

We never figured it out, but our guess was that this channel would have actually led to the resort we stayed at if it was followed (it does, says Luke). We were also close to the final cache.

Can you see it? It is chained to the tree.

After Luke and I found it and grabbed our cards, we headed back up the beach to find Marcus and Grandpa Z (they had a bit slower pace).

Once we met up with them, we decided to head back to the cache so Marcus and Grandpa Z. could check it out, too.

Luke and his walking stick. Everyone had one, even Marcus.

Here is Marcus and his walking stick at the cache.

Right near the cache was the clue for the hiking club, as well as a beautiful place to picnic. We decided that we would take the trail back instead of the beach – just so we could say that we completed it.