Night O’ Letterboxing

September 16, 2006

Tonight I ditched studying so I could hunt out a few more local letterboxes and Kevin happily joined me. He says he doesn’t need (or wouldn’t personally enjoy) the stamping part, but that he enjoys the hunt & puzzle aspects and likes that I like the stamping part. Plus, he enjoys taking photos of wherever we are while I’m busy cross-stamping the log books.

I felt even more sleuth-like than normal hunting for these because it was so dark and I had to keep an ultra-low profile, so I didn’t seem suspicious searching the bushes with my flashlight. 😆 I’ve decided if ever questioned, my excuse will be that I am doing a scavenger hunt. I really do try to grab the box as quickly as possible and move away from the hiding spot so as to not draw too much attention.

Anyway, my first find was the “Marina Pacifica Plumbing Problem” (or “The Legend of Nineteen Hundred and Fifty-Eight”) Letterbox. How’s that for a mouthful? It was located just beneath the Marina Pacifica Mall and right where it was supposed to be. Even though it was 9:00 PM, the foot traffic was fairly busy and I had to wait several minutes until no one was around when I retrieved the letterbox. I love reading through the letterbox log book first, to see who was last there and look at where all the other letterboxers came from. There was someone from Iowa and several other people from neighboring cities (Glendale, etc.).

[insert files/photos/letterbox-marina-pacifica01.jpg photo here]

I got several strange looks with all the stuff spread out, but no one questioned me. I forgot to bring my “flower stamp pad”, so only had my black rubber stamp inking pen (what I use to partially color in my personal stamp) to color the letterbox stamp with. Some letterboxes don’t contain their own stamp pad (like this one), so it’s always good to bring what I call a “flower stamp pad” and decide which color looks best for that stamp – in this case I wish I had blue. Oh well, the stamp is very well carved, so looks great with just the plain black. 🙂

[insert files/photos/letterbox-marina-pacifica02.jpg photo here]

Again, I had to wait for another lull in the foot traffic to replace it.

After replacing it, we took a short detour to Peet’s Coffee & Tea, to relax and sip our lattes :yum:, before heading towards Naples for the “Naples Canal Conundrum” Letterbox. This one was a little tougher because we were surrounded by a residential neighborhood and I definitely didn’t want to seem suspicious, walking around with my flashlight. We followed the clues and I spotted it, right where it should be. Surprisingly, again, this was a fairly busy area. Cars were driving by, parking/leaving and several people were out walking their dogs or rollerblading (!). As soon as it was clear, I grabbed the letterbox and spread out everything on a nearby bench.

[insert files/photos/letterbox-naples01.jpg photo here]

While I was looking through the letterbox log book, a couple came by on rollerblades (it was 10:00 PM by this time) and sorta hung around for a little bit. They kept looking over, but didn’t really say anything. I just did my thing and cross-stamped the logbooks, packed everything up and sat on the bench to enjoy the nearby fountain until they left.

Naples Canal Conundrum

After they were far from view I tucked the letterbox back in its hiding place and we headed home. Both of these were placed by Chowder the dog, by the way, and considering he has no opposable thumbs, he’s awfully good at carving stamps. 😉

Tomorrow, Kev and I plan to go hunting for two more local letterboxes before we both have to hunker down and study (and I have to prepare for the debut show of Digital Tapas!). This Letterboxing thing is just so fun – it’s shocking it’s such a simple concept. Just a warning that I’ll probably bore you with a post about those, too. 😛

Photos: K. Sigmund

{ 1 comment… read it below or add one }

Naples February 3, 2008 at 9:03 am

I found it interesting that there is a Naples in California. My wife loves to do stamping – but I’d rather be on my computer just surfing about and finding interesting things.

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