My main goal this year was to work on finding geocaches in each town in New England. I finished 2022 by adding a total of 240 towns to my count. Late in the year, I made the crossing by ferry to Block Island and completed finding geocaches in each town in Rhode Island. Hey, it’s a small state with only 39 towns, but I’ll take it. I had ambition to at least finish Vermont, but that didn’t happen due to weather and other issues. Still, I’m close, with just 76 towns to go in that state. That will definitely be completed in 2023. Maine and Connecticut will prove to be the hardest, with many towns 4 hours or more away from home. This winter I’m working on checking off towns in Massachusetts to hopefully knock off a good chunk of the towns that remain. There are 351 towns in Massachusetts and as of this writing I’ve only found geocaches in 109 of them.

In February we took a bucket-list cruise through the Panama Canal. This also accounts for what is now my southernmost geocache found. Along the way on that cruise I found a geocache in every country except Costa Rica, which at the time didn’t have a geocache near the Pacific cruise port or the towns we visited.

I didn’t really start geocaching again regularly until April due to my complications from appendicitis. I’d booked a timeshare in Westen Massachusetts the week the kids were off from school. I didn’t end up staying the entire week, due to still not feeling 100%, but I managed to knock off quite a few towns in the western part of Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Vermont.

I learned about the life of Susan B. Anthony, W.E.B. DuBois, Norman Rockwell, and more! I visited the Hoosac railroad tunnel, the longest active transportation tunnel east of the Rocky Mountains, I saw covered bridges, monuments, iron forges, and more. It was a great time exploring small towns and learning about the history in the area.

While visiting towns in Maine, I came across a lot of lighthouses. We West Quoddy Lighthouse is probably the most famous.

I also found the last cache I needed to complete the Maine DeLorme Challenge and signed the logbook for that cache the next weekend.

In September we took another transatlantic cruise from London. This one stopped in Iceland. The geology there is amazing and I completed a number of earthcaches and viewed continental plates, waterfalls, geothermal baths, and a geyser. It also gave me my new northernmost geocache. Wow – after 12 years of geocaching in one year I added two new personal records!

I also attended my first mega-event after all of these years of geocaching. It was a fun event in New Jersey centered around the theme of the American Revolution. I was looking forward to it again in 2023, only the weekend they are doing it is a weekend we are scheduled to be on an Alaskan cruise. It’s a shame because it sounds like some of the themes might be centered around Bruce Springsteen. Oh well. I am planning on attending 2023’s Geo-Wodstock, though in Kentucky.

This was a great year of exploring the world and finding geocaches. I love visiting new places and learning things, whether it’s history or science from an earthcache. Geocaching helps me stop and see the details we usually miss while driving by on the interstate or flying over the land. I can’t wait to see what 2023 has in store!