Quite a nice midweek day as my walking partner and I set out around lunchtime in search of more drop spots. After Monday's disappointment I was determined to get at least two cassettes in and did the duplication and research in the morning. After one of my previous excursions in Hove I had noticed some likely sized caches in the Portslade area but decided to take a scenic detour to visit this cache on the way. Despite a local woman who insisted in sitting in her car across the road as I fumbled with the box I was successful in planting the first of the day's cassettes. I retrieved a geocoin which I'll most likely drop off next week and headed North across the A27, back through Benfield Nature Reserve and towards Devil's Dyke.
The Dyke is old news to us now (ahem) so we headed West for a kilometer or so across the South Downs Way. At roughly 4.30ish the light was fading slightly so we decided to head South through the valley, following the decending pylons. I was aiming for this particular cache and dragged us off course a little (being on a parallel road to the track we were on) but eventually we reached the very lovely Mile Oak Farm and spoke for a few minutes with a very nice local man (possibly the proprietor?) who was beaming at the lovely evening. By this stage I had realised I couldn't make the cache I was heading for and had rerouted us towards one over the Shoreham By-Pass tunnel.
Heading under the motorway and further down Mile Oak Road I was gutted that we seemed to be moving away from the destination but I spotted a pedestrian laneway which lead back up to the hills above the tunnel. After a few minutes wrestling with some pretty tough gorse bushes before the light completely disappeared I had located the cache and dropped a triple-ziplocked cassette into it. Great site but the box definately needs waterproofing.
Photo taken from here.
The Dyke is old news to us now (ahem) so we headed West for a kilometer or so across the South Downs Way. At roughly 4.30ish the light was fading slightly so we decided to head South through the valley, following the decending pylons. I was aiming for this particular cache and dragged us off course a little (being on a parallel road to the track we were on) but eventually we reached the very lovely Mile Oak Farm and spoke for a few minutes with a very nice local man (possibly the proprietor?) who was beaming at the lovely evening. By this stage I had realised I couldn't make the cache I was heading for and had rerouted us towards one over the Shoreham By-Pass tunnel.
Heading under the motorway and further down Mile Oak Road I was gutted that we seemed to be moving away from the destination but I spotted a pedestrian laneway which lead back up to the hills above the tunnel. After a few minutes wrestling with some pretty tough gorse bushes before the light completely disappeared I had located the cache and dropped a triple-ziplocked cassette into it. Great site but the box definately needs waterproofing.
Photo taken from here.