Treasures of our Town
Adventures on Historic Route 66 w/ Scott Miller (gsmX2)
Ever wondered what it’s like to travel down the historic Route 66 while geocaching? In this week's episode of Treasures of Our Town, we bring you the magic and adventure of one of America’s most iconic highways. We start with a quirky chat about spooky clown-themed accommodations, setting a fun tone before introducing our special guest, Scott Miller, a true expert on Route 66. Joshua and Craig can't contain their excitement as they share their dreams of leisurely exploring Route 66, and Joshua even recounts his recent geocaching escapades across all 87 counties of Minnesota. Craig keeps us on our toes, hinting at more exciting updates and topics coming soon.
Scott Miller, aka GSM times two, takes us on an enlightening journey through the Route 66 Adventure Lab Series. Learn from Scott's extensive geocaching experience since 2004 and discover how Adventure Labs transform geocaching into an educational quest. He opens up about the inspiration and collaboration that brought the Route 66 series to life, offering listeners a behind-the-scenes look at the meticulous planning involved. Whether you're new to geocaching or a seasoned pro, Scott’s insights promise to enrich your next adventure along this famed highway.
Traveling Route 66 comes with its own set of joys and challenges, and we cover them all—from the convenience of camper vans to the nostalgic charm of vintage motels. Hear our personal tips on overnight parking at truck stops and state park campgrounds, ensuring a hassle-free journey. We also dive into the varying road conditions across states and the revival of old landmarks, emphasizing the blend of history and culture that makes Route 66 so special. To top it all off, Scott shares some heartwarming moments and valuable tips for making the most out of your Route 66 adventure, whether you’re geocaching or simply soaking in the sights. Don't miss out on this blend of camaraderie, adventure, and heartfelt memories along America’s Main Street.
Historic Route 66 AL Website
Lincoln Highway and Route 66 Intersection
Ever wondered what it’s like to travel down the historic Route 66 while geocaching? In this week's episode of Treasures of Our Town, we bring you the magic and adventure of one of America’s most iconic highways. We start with a quirky chat about spooky clown-themed accommodations, setting a fun tone before introducing our special guest, Scott Miller, a true expert on Route 66. Joshua and Craig can't contain their excitement as they share their dreams of leisurely exploring Route 66, and Joshua even recounts his recent geocaching escapades across all 87 counties of Minnesota. Craig keeps us on our toes, hinting at more exciting updates and topics coming soon.
Scott Miller, aka GSM times two, takes us on an enlightening journey through the Route 66 Adventure Lab Series. Learn from Scott's extensive geocaching experience since 2004 and discover how Adventure Labs transform geocaching into an educational quest. He opens up about the inspiration and collaboration that brought the Route 66 series to life, offering listeners a behind-the-scenes look at the meticulous planning involved. Whether you're new to geocaching or a seasoned pro, Scott’s insights promise to enrich your next adventure along this famed highway.
Traveling Route 66 comes with its own set of joys and challenges, and we cover them all—from the convenience of camper vans to the nostalgic charm of vintage motels. Hear our personal tips on overnight parking at truck stops and state park campgrounds, ensuring a hassle-free journey. We also dive into the varying road conditions across states and the revival of old landmarks, emphasizing the blend of history and culture that makes Route 66 so special. To top it all off, Scott shares some heartwarming moments and valuable tips for making the most out of your Route 66 adventure, whether you’re geocaching or simply soaking in the sights. Don't miss out on this blend of camaraderie, adventure, and heartfelt memories along America’s Main Street.
Historic Route 66 AL Website
Lincoln Highway and Route 66 Intersection
You want to stay, josh, in the one that's designated as a clown spooky one. You don't want one that's not designated as that. But it's just naturally that you know what I mean.
Speaker 2:Yeah, just random clowns showing up. That would not be good.
Speaker 1:You're like. Well, this is part of the show. Oh, no Do you love the outdoors.
Speaker 2:Do you love the outdoors? Do you love road trips? Do you love finding hidden treasures in towns all over the USA? Hi, I'm Joshua.
Speaker 1:And I'm Craig. Welcome to Treasures of Our Town. It's the podcast that explores the unique and charming towns scattered throughout the United States.
Speaker 2:Join us as we venture into some of the country's most intriguing destinations, uncovering hidden gems and local secrets along the way.
Speaker 1:On today's episode, josh, we're going to talk to someone who knows Route 66 inside and out and back to front and east to west, in every direction. You can imagine, mate, how's that?
Speaker 2:I am so excited. You know what they say Life is a highway. I'm gonna ride it all night long. It makes me think of the movie Cars, which took place on Route 66. I am so excited to talk to Scott. I have been wanting to explore Route 66 for so long.
Speaker 2:I just got a taste of it just a little bitty taste of it when I was in Flagstaff and it made me want to do more. And I know, craig, that you've been on lots of it, but you've kind of rushed through. Well, you've been on more parts of me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, well, that's yeah, exactly. That's part and parcel. But again, josh, I went on and off and on and off on my way heading back east, um, after flagstaff itself as well. I want to do the same thing, josh. I want to stick to the entire 66, mate, I don't want to get on and off, and on, and off and on and I want to actually do the entire. I want to slow down, you know, because you can't do the same speed on 66 as you do on the interstate which is next to it.
Speaker 3:You know I'm saying so I want to down, I want to take my pace, et cetera, and do Bruce 66 that way.
Speaker 1:Mate, that's what I want to do too, one day, one day. But before we talk to Scott, we've got to talk to each other first, because you've had a couple of good upgrades this last two weeks.
Speaker 2:Upgrades and delays. Upgrades I've had get this, this craig. I had 10 days off of work in a row.
Speaker 1:10 days, wow how did you manage?
Speaker 2:that well. My company is very generous. They always give us the whole first week of july off. Oh wow, because usually the fourth of july follows falls some sort of midweek and it's just like it's not like a great week for work anyway. So yeah, I had some time off. So you know, last year I was thinking like where should I go? I was like what trip should I go on? And last year we didn't go on a trip, we just finished our floors yeah, which I'm very grateful for.
Speaker 1:Well, your father-in-law and wife finished the floors. You assisted slightly.
Speaker 2:I did quite a bit of hammering, but okay, touche, but I decided I had to do something. So, I just took. You know, sometimes it's fun, craig, just to take like mini road trips. Oh, 100%.
Speaker 1:Like weekenders.
Speaker 2:Yeah, one or two days. Yes, so get this. I've been geocaching for 16 years. Yeah, and can you believe it? I live in the state of Minnesota. Can you believe that I have never have yet to find all 87 counties, a geocache in all 87?
Speaker 1:counties in Minnesota. Well, josh, I've got a question for you then. Well, josh, I've got a question for you. Then Was the fact that we had Mag Planner on last episode and he did it in every county in the continental US. Was that an inspiration for you? Just to finish your state?
Speaker 2:I didn't think about it that way, but that might have been subconscious. I was like this guy's done the whole country, I can at least do my whole state.
Speaker 1:So you did the rest of your counties in the minnesota uh state itself. That's good.
Speaker 2:I only had three left and you know cashly pro not sponsored of this show no, no no, but you know, nick, if you're listening, um has a special special thing where he has a pro version where you can actually see the state, the counties that you have found yeah, caches in. So I noticed there were three that were red and I went to find them and it was beautiful. I visited a cave, which was great, that's cool, and this cave, niagara cave in southern minnesota, get this.
Speaker 1:It had a 60 foot waterfall inside of it like so underground waterfall yes, 60 foot 60 foot, that's high.
Speaker 2:It was so cool.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:Are we going to see a video of?
Speaker 1:this? Are we going to see a video, josh? Probably a short. Yes, a short. Okay, a short's fine.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so I did that. And then I also you know, I love the theater. I love the theater. Yes, you do the theater. Yes, you do craig. Yes, I went to see little shop of horrors oh, one of my favorite musicals at the guthrie theater in minneapolis. So that was great. So lots of upgrades. And I'm looking at my notes right now. I know I couldn't even think of a delay really you got no delays.
Speaker 1:Well, you've had 10 10 days of work, so no delays. How about you? What are your upgrades.
Speaker 1:I'll start with my upgrade first, because then it leads into my delay slightly. My upgrade I've got two upgrades, Josh. The first one is the fact that I visited Montreal on Canada Day, the Jazz Festival. I was there for six days in Montreal. People have asked me you know, why did you go to Montreal, Craig, and visit? Because, Josh, I've got free accommodation, because my wife was working, so she gets accommodation through her work and so I just slip in next to it. So it's easy See.
Speaker 2:Did you brush up on your French while you were there?
Speaker 1:No, I didn't. I had a good friend over in France, geocaching with Lampy. I did message him a couple of times and I said to him what's the best way? How can I say hello? How can I say hello, how can I say goodbye, that sort of thing? And he did message me back in regards to freshening up a little bit on my French. So yeah, mr Lamp, you remember him, don't you?
Speaker 3:Yeah.
Speaker 1:Yes of course, yeah, so I was over there in Montreal itself as well. The other upgrade, actually Actually I could do the delay, so I'm in Montreal having dinner in Montreal itself. French Canada dinner Like these are delicious meals, josh. Over there I had a Montreal poutine like a traditional Montreal poutine. Now, the difference between Montreal poutine and other Canada poutine is the Montreal version has got this French connection. So you have slices of bacon on it and then you've got the foie gras on top. Wow, do you know what foie gras is?
Speaker 1:No, but it sounds very fancy, very French. It's actually duck liver pate on top like a dollop of duck liver pate and you mix that in with the gravy and the cheese curds and, oh man, it was just divine.
Speaker 2:So, yes, Duck liver pate.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah.
Speaker 2:It doesn't sound good.
Speaker 1:Oh no, it's delicious. It doesn't look good, I'll be honest. It's very gray and very like a dollop of grayness, but it's absolutely delicious and divine. Meanwhile, another meal that I had there as well it came out on a hot skillet this is my delay, josh. It came out on a hot skillet and this is my delay, josh and come out on a hot skillet with a handle at the side. They put the handle towards me. No, it didn't tell me it was hot, did it? No? And I've gone as I grabbed it to turn it around, got my hand and so I burnt my hand and I got a little blister up on my fingers and stuff.
Speaker 2:I'm like, ah well, did they give you anything free for burning your hand?
Speaker 1:no, but I didn't whinge or complain either. So I'm not not like that. But then it leads me into my next upgrade, josh, and that is an actual upgrade on the way home, of course. Yes, upgrade to first class with the lounge as well. So we were in the airport for three hours and when you're in the airport for three hours and you're actually in the lounge, josh the really official lounge, the Canada lounge or the whatever airplane that you're flying, with their actual luxury lounges, you don't mind getting delayed because you can stay in the lounge and have more free drinks, free food. I'm so jealous. So, upgrade to first class, a real, true upgrade to first class, josh. So there you go, yeah, yeah, should we crack on with Scott mate?
Speaker 2:I think we should. We should get out of the sky. Yes, we should get back on the ground. Look at you with your segway, take us to Route 66 through the heart of America, or the heart of the West at least. Firstly, josh.
Speaker 1:Yes, route 66. Now, this is from Google. Okay, highway, us Highway 66. It's known as Route 66. It embodies a rich, complex history that goes well beyond any chronicle of the road itself. It's an Artery. It's an artery. Yeah, I know, it's an artery of transportation, an agent of social transformation and a remnant of America's past. It stretches 2,400 miles across two-thirds of the continent. So there you go, yes, and you want to hear a bit of a fun fact.
Speaker 2:I want to hear fun facts.
Speaker 1:This fun fact is direct now from our guest tonight as well. Tonight, today, whenever you're listening to this, our fun fact is from GSM Times 2. And he basically organized the entire Route 66 Adventure Lab series. Now, this Adventure Lab series, it took eight state coordinators who then divided each state and recruited reliable and task-orientated geocachers to create the Adventure Labs. Now, josh, within four months yes, four months there was 88 actual geocacheurs that created 94 adventures with 852 locations. Now, today, after all that, today, there's still 844 unique locations in the Route 66 Adventure Lab series. Should we bring you on?
Speaker 2:We should, but before we do I think this is very important because you just said a geo term there might be somebody listening for the very first time that doesn't know what an adventure lab is. We do. Yes, I think this is very important because you just said you just said a geo term. There might be somebody listening for the very first time. Of course that doesn't know what an adventure lab is of course, josh.
Speaker 1:What's an adventure lab?
Speaker 2:adventure lab is a, I'd say, a side game of geocaching. It's connected to geocachingcom or geocaching hq, where you're going to a location. It has a separate app. You're not finding a container, but you're finding some sort of information, and once you put the information inside the app, then you get a find for your geocaching account. And it's all about history. It's all about answering questions, it's all about learning things, and I'm really excited because we have Scott Miller here, gsm times two, who has organized the Route 66 Adventure Lab Adventure Series. Scott, how are you?
Speaker 3:doing. Welcome, Mike. Thank you very much. I am doing. I could hardly do any better. I can't think of how to do better. I'm doing fantastic, Just had a great trip and I'm really excited to be able to talk about it.
Speaker 1:So, josh, we actually reached out to Scott because, as he just heard, he did part of the Route 66 Venture Lab series and Route 66 itself. So he's not just the expert on computer or on paper, so to speak, but he's expert in physicals as well. So he's actually been there, done that, bought the t-shirt, got the photo. You like the whole lot. So, scott, before we go, mate, uh, if those people don't know anything about you, etc. Introduce yourself, who are you, where you're from and, uh, how can we contact you if we need to?
Speaker 3:okay, uh, my caching name is gsm times two. It looks like like GSM X two, but that's a multiplication sign because it's my wife and I. If I use my first name and she used my last name, we'd have the same initials. So, GSM times two. Let's see. Tell me more about myself. Ask the questions again.
Speaker 2:How long have you been? How long have you been a geocacher Scott? Okay, longer have you been a geocacher Scott?
Speaker 3:Okay long I've been a geocacher that's a great answer. Started in November 2004, so coming up to my 20 years of geocaching, wow, and I've been really involved in a lot of things, but nothing more exciting than what we're going to talk about tonight, where I conceived of and facilitated the historic Route 66 Adventure Lab series, and it's going very, very well.
Speaker 2:I can't think of a more exciting of an adventure in an appropriate location, or 800 plus locations than. Route 66. We are huge fans on this show of especially roadside attractions, and Route 66 is just all about seeing cool, interesting, strange, quirky, fun things. So what made you conceive of creating this series in particular, what was the inspiration behind it and why did you decide to create it?
Speaker 3:The inspiration behind it and I just have to go back to Casey underscore 11, hereby known as Casey 11. He conceived of doing a little bit of the Lincoln Highway. The Lincoln Highway is the first mapped I'm just going to say mapped highway in the United States. And he got together with three friends who had some adventure labs and they didn't know what to do with it. He says, hey, why don't we just go ahead and we'll just do three little sections of the Lincoln Highway? Friends got word of that and my wife is handing me my slow down note. Love that. And my wife is handing me my slow down note.
Speaker 3:Friends got word of that and they decided to do all of Illinois. Then Pennsylvania got word of it and suddenly GCHQ was involved and he did. He organized the whole from New York City city to san francisco adventure lab series. Wow, I was able to get one of those sections in nevada, 400 miles from home. So yeah, which is kind of a cool thing about the adventure labs is they don't have to be, you know, 100 miles from your house. So I went up and I created that and then then on the way home, as I'm driving home, I'm doing Lincoln Highway Adventure Labs and somewhere along the line I'm thinking someone should do this on Route 66. You know, somebody should do this on Route 66. And before I got home I'm like Scott, you should do this on Route 66. So I contacted Gear Guru up at GCHQ and the next thing we know, we are putting together an Adventure Lab series on Route 66.
Speaker 2:So how did you reach out to the people that were close to that area. Did Gear Guru from HQ? Did he know people that were close to the routes?
Speaker 3:No, I actually reached out to my state coordinators. You know fairly well connected with geocaching and some people in most of the states reached out to them and said would you be willing to divide your state into appropriate sections and then contact and you used the words reliable and task-oriented geocachers? And that's what they did. And that was the hardest part of it was getting that divided up into good sections and getting good people to fill those sections.
Speaker 2:Truly a divide and conquer Truly.
Speaker 3:Truly a team effort. Yeah, so great.
Speaker 1:I love it, Scott as well, Going off that as well. Who did the research for those particular locations? Was it the actual geocachers that put in the adventure lab themselves? Was it state coordinators, or was it yourself?
Speaker 3:It was the individuals. The individuals went to their area, sometimes traveling great distances. Did the researches wrote up the adventures, did the questions and they did the. You know this was early on. This was, you know, in May 2021. So adventure labs were fairly new, so people weren't getting them like they're getting them now.
Speaker 3:And so people did the best job that they could and I'm really, I'm really pleased with every, with every one of them, and so that's how, and we I don't micromanage, so we did not say oh, I didn't even correct spelling, as a matter of fact so that's that's really good to know um a very, very interesting in regards to it as well.
Speaker 1:But, scott, now we're going to talk about how you traveled your recent trip as well. So we met you in uh in flagstaff at geowoodstock, and you told us then that you're on your your little road trip, uh, along 66, which we loved as well and, by the way, congratulations, you were recognized at geowoodstock as well, which is awesome to see. You got like a plaque or something. What was that on the route 66 sign, was it?
Speaker 3:okay, I'm going to back up for one thing about, uh, gear guru. So what we were getting were 10 location adventures instead of the five. And so you know, basically, I'd say this is the person who's going to do this section. He'd give them a credit and they'd move on. And then, yeah, I'm getting ready to go to Flagstaff and I'm like, oh well, cool, I can do, you know this little sections of Route 66. And all of a sudden I'm thinking, and I can do all those sections of Route 66.
Speaker 3:I can do all of Route 66. Yes, you can.
Speaker 1:Yes, yes, you can, yes I can, so you know.
Speaker 3:so I talked to my dear wife and she said, yeah, you should go do that. And so off we went and it was fantastic, I had already done all the Route 66 in California. So basically I was going to start at Top Rock, arizona, which is the Arizona border, go to Geo Woodstock and do the adventure labs on the way there, and then once I left Geo Woodstock it was head to Chicago.
Speaker 1:That's really cool. That's really cool. How long did you actually take mate in your actual road trip itself that you've recently been on?
Speaker 3:And how far did you get? I was on the road for 18 days, except some of those days I was at Geo Woodstock and then some of those days I have a niece and nephew who are geocachers in St Louis, so I did spend a couple nights with them, but all total I had 16 travel days that I worked on and it was amazing.
Speaker 1:That's really cool. It really was. I know how you traveled, scott, because I'm very, very familiar with how you traveled, scott, because I'm very, very familiar with how you traveled, and I will say this I loved it, I loved it so much. But, uh, obviously, those who don't know or haven't seen you as you're traveling across, how did you travel? Um, you know, how far did you get, etc.
Speaker 3:Etc um so, and I have traveled with you guys and I actually follow some of your travel guidance also. You guys, it's not about the numbers to you, it's about the experience for you, exactly. And so I did it for the experience. On day one, I was already behind schedule and I'm like, oh okay, so what am I going to do? Am I going to try and catch up?
Speaker 3:And I'm like, no, you're doing this for the experience, so slow down and you know you're going to get to whatever you get, and what I wound up doing, and I did the bulk of I have done about 744 of the 844. But then what I decided is okay, I'm going to have a.
Speaker 3:I already had an event planned in St Louis with my niece, nephew and a lot of other geocachers and I'm like, okay, I'm just going to work that direction and when I get half a day from St Louis, I'm getting on the interstate and I'm going to drive to St Louis. So now I have done everything except Kansas to St Louis and that's going to get done soon, that's fine. Another road trip.
Speaker 2:Exactly.
Speaker 1:Another excuse.
Speaker 2:Something to look forward to. Now we know that you traveled in an escape camper van, which craig is very familiar about. Tell us about the decision process of deciding to do the camper van versus a car and hotels and stuff like that well, I learned from craig when he was doing his trip across the country.
Speaker 3:Um, I hosted an event for him in los angeles on the last day that he was going to be there. He showed me the camper van and I'm like, oh, this is pretty cool. When I went to do my adventure lab for the Lincoln Highway in Nevada, I rented a camper van an escape camper van, and not sponsored, by the way, but if they're listening, Exactly, that would be a great sponsor.
Speaker 3:Oh it would. I used them and it worked out just fabulous. So this time, when I was going to do it, there was no question, there was no exploring, there was no. What am I going to do? Let's rent an escape camper van. They have a location by LAX. They have a location in Chicago, los angeles, lax. They have a location in chicago, by ohio. So it was just a matter of picking it up, dropping it off and flying home, and that's what I loved about my trip to scott.
Speaker 1:And escape campers again, as we said before, escape campers, not sponsored. There is a link in the description, but if you want to know more and what escape campers is is, there's several different types of vans. You can hire josh as well. You can have the smaller size uh, like suv sort of styles, or minivan sort of styles, or you can go up to the larger, like the uh, the f, f 250, f, 350s, whatever they're called as well as a van itself as well.
Speaker 1:So, and they're all decked out, they're self-contained, they've got solar on the roof, they've got a kitchen in the back as well that opens up. They've got bedding, they've got tables and chairs and and stuff like that too. So, scott, you had uh, I think, one of the larger ones, was it not, or what size was yours?
Speaker 3:uh, mine was actually kind of one of the basic ones, but it's built on a ford f and ford 350 frame, uh, drives like a truck, which is fine and yeah, and so it was, you know, just kind of your basic and for one person and it worked out great. And the fun thing about them is you can see them all over the place because they have those funky funky yeah, but every one is painted different and you can spot them. You know, I was pulling into a rest stop in Arizona and there's another one right there and we just had a conversation and it was fantastic.
Speaker 2:So where did you normally park it for the night on Route 66? Where were some of the places that you parked for the evening?
Speaker 3:My favorite place that worked out was truck stops.
Speaker 2:Oh, really, you go to a truck stop.
Speaker 3:Everybody knows you're camping there, nobody's going to bother you. In the morning, at night, you can go use a clean restroom. In the morning, you can go use a clean restroom, and so that was kind of my go-to. I did stay in some state park or, I'm sorry, stayed in some Forest Service campgrounds and side of the road one night just ran out of energy and just pulled over and thought, okay, this looks like there's nothing around, so let's do this and yeah, and it worked out well. I just, you know, I also did stay some nights in some motels, some typical Route 66 motels, and you know where you pull up and it's a little U shape and you pull right in front of your house or right in front of your room. And that if I was to say, you know one suggestion for people who are doing Route 66, go to those places, don't go to Ramada, don't go to Ramada, don't go to Holiday Inn. I have nothing against them, but these places are trying to maintain the feel of Route 66. Support them.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I was going to ask you that question too because I was doing a little bit of armchair planning for my Route 66 trip. That may or may not happen in my life and it was really hard for me to sort of decide it. As far as like price, like what is cheaper, what experience do I want to have? You know, it's kind of seemed when I was doing my a little bit of my research that staying in hotels might be almost the same amount of money, maybe maybe a little bit more expensive, and I guess it just depends on what kind of experience you want. Part of the experience for me, I think, would be visiting a lot of these interesting hotels, like the one I talked about here before, craig, like the Clown Hotel oh, the Clown, the creepy Cl hotel. So I guess my question is if you were to do this trip again, would you do the camper van thing or would you stay at more of these kind of interesting hotels?
Speaker 3:And I'm going to cut you, I'm going to correct you, you keep calling them hotels. They are motels.
Speaker 1:Oh yes, yes too, motels, motels, of course. Thank you.
Speaker 3:You're welcome. You know I would consider it. The camper van worked out really well. I am getting a little old for the camper van to crawl around there in the little back space by myself. Had some leg cramp issues, so I would look at different options but not rule out any of them right now.
Speaker 1:So good luck with your decision.
Speaker 2:Yeah, we'll see. I'm kind of. I'm not much of a camper, but I like the idea of camping. But actually when I'm out camping it's a lot of work. So there's something nice about having the shower and staying in the clown hotel and being haunted.
Speaker 1:And that's the thing, josh as well. It's the same with what MagPlanner said, and Scott just brought up a great comment as well, again mimicking what MagPlanner said, and that was, you know, he ran out of steam for the day. If you're driving along and you go, you know what I'm too tired to drive now and you find a little spot to pull off, that you can have a sleep, whatever you can, because you've got your full bed and everything in the back. You've got your meals there as well, so you can cook yourself a nice little dinner. You know, yes, you don't have a shower or sometimes a bathroom. You know, in these locations if you're in the middle of nowhere, but still, you know, us men only need a tree.
Speaker 2:Let's be honest well, hearing, hearing that what actually I'll probably do is sort of a hybrid. I'll probably convert, convert my forester into, uh, something that I can sleep in, but not that I want to sleep in every night.
Speaker 3:Yeah yeah, there you go.
Speaker 2:So, scott, do you have plans I think you do to finish the rest of the adventure labs? Um, because you said you had that section still that you have to get to.
Speaker 3:I have that section and I have plans. Actually, we have plans oh my wife. I talked to my wife about it and she's like I. You know she she's not a geocacher but she likes adventure labs. One one addition I would give to your, your uh definition of adventure. A lot of geocachers say oh, geocaching takes me to the most interesting places, places I didn't know about. Adventure labs take you to those same places and teach you something about it.
Speaker 2:Love that.
Speaker 3:Yeah, I had kind of an epiphany in Flagstaff. One of the adventures I was doing took me to a mansion and so I'm doing the mansion and they're taking me information about the mansion, the history of the mansion, the architecture of the mansion. I'm counting windows or whatever it is I'm counting. Had that been a geocache, I'd been looking for a pill bottle and a sport rail fence. So she likes that, and so we have our plane reservations and we are going to land in Kansas City, drive down to Joliet and finish them off Nice.
Speaker 1:I too have friends like that, scott, as well. They know about geocaching, but they don't have a geocaching account, but they've got an Adventure Lab account, you see. So, yeah, and they like the Adventure Labs for that reason. They also like the Adventure Labs, scott, because they don't have to actually physically look for, as you said, pill bottles, lamp skirts or any of that sort of stuff. All they can do is, I find that most and I'm going to say most, I'm talking about 95%, 96% of adventure labs do take you to those special locations that you wouldn't ordinarily go to. Uh, not all, not that higher percentage of geocaches do that. You know what I mean. So, yeah, that's what I like about adventure labs too, mate, so very I.
Speaker 1:I've never had an adventure lab take me to a guardrail or an lpc unless you, unless you do those uh adventure labs that are in the G1 adventure labs.
Speaker 2:Those are real. They have their place. People love to do them.
Speaker 3:I'm just not going to be one of those people.
Speaker 1:It's like me, scott, I'm like I don't agree with them. Did I do the ones here in New Jersey? Yes, it didn't stop me from doing it, you know what I mean, but I didn't actually participate in placing any here in the New Jersey one. So, yeah, I agree.
Speaker 2:Scott, you bring up a great point, a point that we often bring up on this podcast, which is a lot of people don't slow down and just take in what they're seeing, or they don't slow down to to actually learn something about the thing that they're looking at. Um, so I think adventure labs are they force you to do that. They force you to to look into the information. And one of the things I love about the adventure lab app and I experienced this when we were on the south rim of the grand canyon when we did that one, craig do you remember, we were walking along the grand canyon and the adventure lab app has a little feature where you can click a button and it actually reads the information to you. Oh yes, as you're walking, so you can be looking at, you know the thing you're looking at and then listening to the information that has been provided on the on the adventure which I love that love.
Speaker 1:You love doing that, Josh. You love doing that.
Speaker 2:It's kind of like a little audio tour.
Speaker 1:Yes.
Speaker 2:It's really cool.
Speaker 3:So can you have like an Australian woman talk to you?
Speaker 1:I don't think so yet, scott. Mind you, maybe you can reach out to your contacts at HQ and say look, can we change now? Obviously, that would have a language difference, josh, as well, because if you're in a different country with a non-English speaking background, maybe it speaks English, I'm not sure. Or does it speak French, for instance? I don't know. There's one for you, I don't know.
Speaker 2:You can probably cut and paste and have Google Translate read it to you in your language, True, true true, true, I'm gonna. I'm gonna jump ahead to a question because it's related to what I was just talking about. Yeah, scott. Uh, if you don't know this, he is. He's a youtuber he's one of. He's one of us and he makes geocaching videos. And I mean as a as a youtuber. Scott, you're like I'm doing all of route 66, man, if I didn't vlog it, if I didn't film it, did it really happen?
Speaker 3:and you guys just talked to mag planner, who was an inspiration to me. I've been watching him, you know, for watching his videos for a long time and I'm like, oh man, if this guy can do 366 days or 365 days of a video every day, I can do 18.
Speaker 2:Uh, that didn't work out so so, uh, scott, tell us a little bit about that decision because, um, you did recently I think last week have your first video come out of route 66. Yeah, and then there was you. You had a little, uh, clarification. You're like this is actually the first one and the last one. Tell us a little bit about that.
Speaker 3:So when I picked up the van, I'm like, okay, I'm going to make a video. I could have proved to myself that I can make a video in one day, four hours, because I usually take a lot longer than that. So I did that I can do this.
Speaker 3:And then I went ahead and on my first travel day I'm shooting video and I'm doing the all that and everything's going and it's really an interesting section if I get done and I get into the van and I punch out for four hours and I get done and I'm like that's. You know that sucks. I mean, I use stronger language than that.
Speaker 3:I can never post this yeah and so I and at that point I just kind of took my cameras, hit them in a little place in the camper and never bought them out again, and and that was a good decision for me- you know that was a great decision because, well, I learned. You know, like I learned when, when we did the uhPSS and Lompoc GeoTour together, I watched you guys.
Speaker 3:And you know when we went to the winery and picked up our geocache and then sat around for I don't know how long did you pet that kitty and sat there and talked to the owner and, uh, that was just fantastic and that's kind of kind of what I decided.
Speaker 3:This is the more important. You know I'm gonna. You know, one of the places was talking at one of the locations in new mexico is talking about. There's all kinds of uh indian trading posts here, but this one is owned by a Native American, yeah, so I went in there. They had Indian flatbread, which I have no idea. So I'm going to have an Indian flatbread taco and I went into the store and got my wife a really nice Dreamcatcher and I was there for an hour and a half nice, uh dream catcher, and I was there for an hour and a half. I could have done six, maybe even seven or eight uh locations in that hour and a half.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I'd rather do that, I think. I think that's very true. Uh, scott as well, and a lot of people don't realize this, and and josh knows this himself as well and that is you we do this, we do videos, because we enjoy the filmmaking, we enjoy taking the videos, we enjoy editing and sharing the videos, et cetera. Once that becomes a chore or work, we don't want to do that anymore. At the same time, like yourself, when you're on a time crunch as well, you're like well, hang on a second.
Speaker 1:Am I going to spend more time in my camper van doing editing, as you said, like four hours every day? That's a lot of work. People don't realize sometimes the amount of effort it takes to make these videos. So am I going to do four hours every day in the camper van editing with my head in a screen, or am I going to utilize those four hours by seeing more or enjoying more or relaxing more? And uh, and yeah, as, as he just said, josh as well about the uh, the cat on your lap in the winery, again, link to that video is going to be in the description as well. Am I just saying so?
Speaker 2:yes, I loved. I love that wine cat you know he loved you it's.
Speaker 2:It's such a double-edged sword for me because when I do route 66, I'm I've gotta film it because and you're right, guys it is work. It's work, yeah, but on the other end of it I'm so off. I'm often so glad that I have it because at some point in my life I probably will forget things. And you know, you said, craig, we're going to be in the old folks home and we're going to be like I'm going to ask the lady, put on some of some of my videos and people will be able to see. Put on my YouTube channel. I'm the geocaching blogger.
Speaker 1:That's what he's going to say. That's exactly what he's going to say. Scott, speak English.
Speaker 3:I asked this question years ago on the geocaching network, on the GCH, the geocaching network. Who is more a geocacher who vlogs and who is more a vlogger who geocaches? Yeah, and this is a good example. Yeah, josh and I have been doing YouTube videos about the same amount of time, about 13 years or thereabouts. Yeah, yeah, he has a lot more content. He has a lot more content.
Speaker 2:He has a lot more videos.
Speaker 3:I found a lot more geocaches.
Speaker 2:Yeah this is true.
Speaker 1:This is true, that is true. And Josh always says you know quality of a quantity.
Speaker 2:But I will say this, scott, would you believe that my average geocache has over 70 favorite points?
Speaker 3:That's awesome, isn't that?
Speaker 2:great. That tells you what kind of geocaches I'm finding Absolutely.
Speaker 1:Well, here's one for you. Then, Scott as well. So if you slowed down and you put your camera away, et cetera as well, what was five things? I'm going to give you five. What was five things that you saw that actually surprised you on your trip? Do you remember any of those? Maybe there's probably more, but yeah, what's?
Speaker 3:five. I think the number one thing that surprised me was when I would go into a location, how many people were doing route 66 like I went into oak oatman, arizona. Oh my God, there's motorcycles all over the place, there's cars all over. There are older cars all over the place. There are people all over the place and they're doing Route 66. There's no other reasons to go to Oatman except to do routes if you're on Route 66.
Speaker 1:All the donkeys mate the donkey's in open.
Speaker 3:Yeah, the donkey's in open. And then you'd go into places and the number of foreign languages that were being spoken about half the people were speaking foreign languages or they were speaking English with accents that let you know that they were speaking a second language.
Speaker 3:So that was amazing. Some states. What also amazed me is some states are really taking advantage and really upping what they do with Route 66. Illinois is a great example. Illinois, josh, when you do Illinois they have signs that make it real easy to follow Route 66, or Route 66 1929 routing.
Speaker 2:Oh, interesting yeah it's really fun.
Speaker 3:And then there's other states, and I'm going to just count California as one of them. Just kind of don't care. There's a section of Route 66 that's been out of commission for seven years, because some bridges are are flooded out and so, but there there were sections where where you were like am I still on route 66?
Speaker 2:like, can you get lost? Can you get lost at like, or can you just follow the signs?
Speaker 3:you cannot follow the signs and you can't follow your Nuvi. Okay, good to know. And if you were to ask me, well, I'm going to be really glad to have my wife aboard because she can be the navigator. You know and I mean you guys know that I use the Nuvi all the time. Anyways, you commented that oh my God, how old school is this? I loved it. I loved it. I loved it.
Speaker 3:But on route 66 it's almost mandatory that you have a nuvi or some gps that's going to give you the directions, because the app if the app, you cannot use the app and directions at the same time. If you're using, you know waves or whatever it's going to kick off the app and if you're in a location where you don't have internet access, you're done. So the Nuvi was very, very important. What was bad about the Nuvi is I couldn't tell immediately. Is the Nuvi telling me that I should get on the I-40 because that's the fastest way to get to the next location? Or is it telling me because that's the only way to get to the location? And for people who are going to be doing this, stop and find out.
Speaker 3:That's what I didn't do. I made a snap decision oh no, this route 66 continues up this way. I'll just follow that For 10, sometimes 20 miles. I'd be on the wrong road. And then I would realize I'm on the wrong road and I learned this a long time ago. If you go 10 miles the wrong direction, you have gone 10 miles the wrong direction, 10 miles that you have to go back and you've lost the 20 miles that you lost. So as soon as you make the wrong turn, you're 40 miles behind and that's time, and yeah.
Speaker 3:I would say there were at least five times where I spent an extra hour or more not on the right road.
Speaker 1:It's a wonder, josh as well, some of these navigational systems, you know Google Maps and Apple Maps and all these different types how they don't actually have you know a suggested route. You put in there Route 66, you know, and it will give you the exact route. And, as Scott just said as well, by not diverting off the area, and if you need to go on the highway every now and then, you go on the highway every now and then you go on the highway every now and then. But yeah, so you're never thinking, oh, is this the right turn or is this the wrong term? Come on google, come on apple. You can do better, surely so?
Speaker 3:or come on an individual who wants to do this and create a gpx file of the route and that would. Uh, you know, there are books. There are several books out there that give you turn-by-turn directions.
Speaker 1:It would be really good to have somebody in. I don't know.
Speaker 3:Maybe somebody should do it. Somebody should do it, scott. Oh, never mind.
Speaker 1:Do you have a Scott?
Speaker 3:Do you have the GPS phone? I do not.
Speaker 1:Oh, I'm hinting. You could sell that man. You could sell that Absolutely. You could Absolutely. You could sell that man. You could sell that Absolutely you could, absolutely you could.
Speaker 3:So let's see what else did I? That Route 66 is actually coming back. You see a lot of abandoned stuff, but you're also seeing you're going to some gas stations where there is somebody who is reinventing, and not as a gas station but as a location to stop on Route 66, turn it into a little gift shop or something, and that was really, really exciting.
Speaker 1:And then just, oh, go ahead. I was going to say. I did see exactly that, scott, as well. I was in a little town coming back on my way back and I was going on the interstate. I jumped off the interstate to go into the actual rest stop and then I thought, oh, I'm going to have some dinner. So I went into the little town to have some dinner, not realizing actually that's Route 66. That town is in the middle of Route 66. And so I'm a meal there across the road. It looked exactly like a gas station, but flowers were coming out of the petrol pumps and the gas pumps and everything else as well, and it was actually a flower store now. So an old gas station turned into a flower store. But they still kept the Route 66 signage on the side, the neon as well. Some of the neon is still there as well, which is really nice to see. Some of it has gone here and there, but, yeah, predominantly the ones that keep it up. Looks really really good, mate, yeah exactly right, they really do.
Speaker 3:And it's interesting what they've done to some of the hotels. Some of the hotels are absolutely abandoned, but others have been turned into apartments. One has been turned into low-income housing, so it's great what they're doing. And then, joshua, you were talking about doing your routes for route 66 and making decisions on motels. Yeah, do some research because, all of them are like 80 years old or something like that. And some of them have been kept up, and some of them are not being kept up.
Speaker 1:Josh, you don't want to show you. You want to stay, josh, in the, the one that designated as a clown, spooky one. You don't want one that's. That's not designated as that, but it's just naturally that you don't. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Just random clowns showing up. That would not be good.
Speaker 1:You're like oh, this is part of the show, oh, no.
Speaker 2:Oh, this is so whimsical. Speaking of clown hotels, scott, I'm sure you saw some neat stuff out there as far as like roadside attractions statues, statues, strange and interesting things, maybe world's largest things. Uh, are there any roadside attractions that that really stuck out to you that you enjoyed?
Speaker 3:tulsa is one. Tulsa oklahoma is one of the towns that really has endorsed and is continuing uh route 66 and on each end of the town they have a whole entrance, you know tulsa coming in tulsa route 66 and so forth. On the east end of those they have a little art public art structure, a public art. You know, sculpture. I think it's made of uh, I think it's made out of tile. I don't quite remember it and I don't know who the artist is, but they embedded a root 66 geocoin that is discoverable oh, that's cool, isn't that cool?
Speaker 3:that's really cool that was really cool. Um, another another really interesting one was the ap Death Cave. You talked about your cave, 60-foot waterfall. Apache Death Cave is in Arizona, just east of Flagstaff, and the story behind that is that's Navajo territory but there were some Apaches there and they raided a village, killed a lot of people and then escaped, and the Navajos looked for them and couldn't find them. Then the Apaches raided another village, killed some people and then escaped, and the Navajos were out looking for them and they noticed this cave and there was heat coming out of the cave. So obviously something's going on in there, heat coming out of the cave, so obviously something's going on in there. And apparently it was a large cave because there were 42 Indians with their, with 42 Apaches with their horses, and so rather than attack them, rather than the Navajos attacking them, they started a fire on the outside of the cave and, and when it was done, there were 42 dead apaches in the cave and many horses actually, yeah, I mean okay, this is, this is factual.
Speaker 3:What the what the apaches were doing is to prevent the fire from coming in, they were slitting the necks of their horses and stacking them up, and that was well. They were probably going to be fatal anyways, but yeah, wow, wow. Yeah, so that was interesting.
Speaker 1:See again. Just the history alone. You know what I mean. This is what we're talking about, and the ordinary person, like the average Joe Blow, as we say would be there and have a look and go, oh, this is a pretty site, look at this, this is a beautiful area, and stuff as well, not knowing the cultural and historical significance and what happened all the many, many years ago at that exact site, which they're standing at that point in time. Wow, yeah, that's incredible. And, again, that's just one of the things we love, though, isn't it? As geocacher, slash, adventure lab people, you know that sort of thing. So, mate Scott, is there anything else that you would actually want to have time for? You said before that you ran out of time. Is there anything?
Speaker 3:you would go back and do you know a little section of it or whatnot. You know, I wish I had more time to do everything and I wish I had less time to do any of it. 19 days was long enough to be home. 19 days was long enough to be mainly in the camper.
Speaker 3:I was ready to get home. I think one of the more interesting ones and probably one of my favorite adventures was downtown, the old section of Santa Fe, because the person who did that just hit all the check marks Interesting locations, well-researched information, well-written information. The questions were related to what we're looking at, not some utility pole exactly, and they were challenging but doable.
Speaker 3:You know, so and and that was probably one of my favorite now, probably also in contrast to the other one in santa fe, which and the person did the best they could they're just going down a busy, you know 11th Street which has a lot of old hotels but it also has, you know, the best buys and everything else, and they were just kind of taking it into the hotels and, you know, didn't hit all the checkbooks, but they did a good job. They did the best job that they could do.
Speaker 1:Yeah, and that's one thing as well, josh, that I love adventure labs. As you said, scott, they tick the boxes. You know that is nothing worse than going to getting to an adventure lab and going, oh my goodness, look at this beautiful site, this is beautiful mural, or this beautiful building, and then it says, you know, oh, what's the numbers on the on the grate, on the ground, or something I'm like, come on, like, give me something better, even let me count windows more than actually numbers on a grate or, as you said, a utility pole, something like that. Give me something. That's actually about the Adventure Labs too. So there you go. One more thing, scott. This isn't on the show notes, by the way.
Speaker 1:I recently did an Adventure Lab in Montreal. It was above, on top of a lookout area beautiful lookout, looks out, above all, montreal itself as well. It was a sequential adventure lab, which there was a reason for it too, which is, I like, reasoning behind sequential. But each of them you had to watch a YouTube clip. Now, the YouTube clip was talking about the squirrels in the area losing their nuts in the actual city, and so it'll show you a squirrel pointing to a building, and then you had to find out which building that was and which marker points to that building, et cetera. You did all four of those and the final then puts you inside the big commercial building behind and it said look up. And if you looked up in the rafters, there's like 15 or 20 squirrels in the rafters and you had to count the squirrels.
Speaker 1:But then the best part about it, because they had a, uh, a bonus cash. You know what I mean, and there's nothing worse than having a great adventure level that and having a bonus cash where it's just a pill bottle under a lamp skirt, right, right. No, this one here was on the way back to the parking lot, was a magnetic hide like well, hidden as well, but it had all the nuts all over the. The actual cash container itself was full of nuts. So I was like this is ideal, this is perfect. You know what I mean. So definitely a big favorite point for me for that one, and that's in my upcoming video too. So, as you said, scott, the research into adventure labs, not just putting an adventure lab in a place for the sake of numbers. You know what I mean. And yeah, very, very true, mate, and I do believe you are one of the best people to talk about adventure labs, not just in the US but worldwide. Mate, you do a great job with them too. Just saying.
Speaker 3:Thank you, there you go. So if I could take two minutes to share Bella's Adventure Lab, which is also sequential, but did something a little bit different. When you break the geofencing, you're not where the answer is. Instead, you have to go to a YouTube channel where you are following her doing left and right hand turns, and then that takes you to where the answer is.
Speaker 1:That's ideal.
Speaker 3:It really works out well. And then, of course, it has a bonus, and the bonus isn't particularly great, but you have to pull up a dog leash to get to it.
Speaker 1:Oh, yes, love that, See it gets themed, though Sounds like a little bit more letterboxing-style Adventure Lab Scott. I like it.
Speaker 3:Yep, it was great.
Speaker 1:All right.
Speaker 3:Back to Route labs, kind of like it. Yep, it was great, scott. All right back to route 66 several did.
Speaker 2:Several of the route 66 adventure labs have bonus caches a lot of a number of them.
Speaker 3:I think about 33 percent of them now have bonus caches. Um, being limited to time, I just I was not able to do a lot of geocaching. I just it wasn't as important to me. The Adventure Lab was the focus and anything else extra that was just extra. So I did some bonuses and when they originally came out, about 50% of them had it.
Speaker 1:But a lot of people don't live where they put their permission to place because you, yeah, you live away from the actual location and, as we know, hq rules.
Speaker 3:You know so right so, yeah, so about 30 of them have and, uh, you know, and and I got a few of them, but not too many.
Speaker 2:You said you didn't do a lot of geocaching, but were there any geocaches along Route 66 that you had to stop at?
Speaker 3:Had to stop at Cache Across America, Oklahoma. It was right on.
Speaker 1:Route 66.
Speaker 3:We'll talk about this in a minute. I was on a plan to meet Casey 11 in Joliet and I did not get an opportunity to cash across America in Illinois but cash across America in Illinois. After my wife and I do Route 66, we're going to go up to Michigan, which is in 22 miles, so we'll get to it.
Speaker 1:Scott, I was going to say the ones I did on Route 66, I did the Cash Across America one as well, as you said before but also the halfway point, scott, that halfway mark on Route 66. And, josh, it's actually a full halfway point. It tells you halfway there's a big line across the road and it tells you you're halfway from the start and halfway from the finish, or vice versa.
Speaker 1:And there's a gift shop across the road and etc. As well. So, again, that's just one of the places that you know. It's amazing to me and so many, as you said, scott, there's so many bikers were there at the time, from when I got there, and they're all getting their photo taken. They're having group photos with the markers, you know. So it's not just these people, it's not just geocaches or all that, it's, it's other people, the tourism that route 66 still has to this day and age. So, yes, that's pretty cool and I did get that one, by the way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you did, yeah, I knew you had to.
Speaker 3:That was too easy not to.
Speaker 1:That was too easy, and even I thought to myself that would be a perfect virtual. Is the car across the road, Josh? Because there's a car parked across an old car and everyone signs their name on this old car, oh that's cool that would be a really cool virtual too.
Speaker 2:Wait, is that a virtual? You said it's a virtual.
Speaker 1:No, it could be a virtual oh there, virtual, oh, there you go. I still have my credit. You do well, scott, in in your travels, as you said before. Like you know, if you got a little bit of burnt out or whatnot, uh, you'd find somewhere to sort of stop and have a rest, etc. Um, but was there any other challenges that you found going across the route 66, mate?
Speaker 3:I and we. I knew this was a challenge, going in that there would be places on Route 66, there would be no internet access, and right now, the Adventure Lab does not play well when you don't have internet access. As a matter of fact, if you were to answer a question and not be able to communicate with the servers, the app doesn't freeze, but you can't go on. So that was a challenge, and I knew it was going to be a challenge, so I prepared. I took two phones.
Speaker 3:I planned on using two phones, but I actually wound up using three phones one active phone and then the other two are old phones that I didn't trade in, and so what I had to do, what I did, is I had the adventure I was working on on two phones and that way, if one of them couldn't communicate with the server, I still had the other one, and my rule was don't answer a question unless you have 5G or 4G with a lot of bars, and don't answer a question if you only have one phone. The reason I had the third phone was I had the next adventure on the list, and the reason I did that is there were three places where I got to the end of one adventure and there's no internet access to load the other adventure, so that was a challenge. One of the great things about the escape camper vans it had two 12-volt outlets and they were active, 100% of the time.
Speaker 1:Yes, yeah, yeah, because it's solar, solar, see Right, and it's kind of 100% of the time.
Speaker 3:Yes, yeah, yeah, because of solar. Solar, see, right, and it's kind of like one of the best is I didn't have to use all these chargers. One of the worst is I had about $250 worth of chargers that I had purchased that I wound up not using.
Speaker 2:Oh, wow.
Speaker 1:Scott again, that's a good point and headquarters. If you're listening, maybe you can do something about this. But you can't even prepare, scott, either. If you don't know about Adventure Labs, you have to actually get within the geofence before the question pops up, and so you can't even prepare by going through for the next day. Okay, I'm going to do these Adventure Labs what are the questions and print them out or have them saved or whatever.
Speaker 3:You can't even do that you know what I mean until you actually get into the geofencing. There is a workaround If you use a GPX file and bring it into CGO. I know that for sure. It works. I don't know about Cachely or anything else, but if you bring the GPX files in, you can read the questions. You can't see the answers. You can't see the answers, you can't see the final things, but uh you can get the gpx in there you can.
Speaker 3:There's a workaround, but there's a worker but it doesn't help you if you can't if you don't have the internet access true.
Speaker 1:Well, that's some. That's some good advice there for adventure labs. Do you have any other advice or tips in regards to people doing their adventure labs?
Speaker 3:I do. One of them is we. We just have, we just got our route 66 adventure lab Web page backup. So, it's, it's route 66, a L dot net, and when you go there, there's a list of all the adventures with clickable links to them. There's GPX files for your GPS, which have truncated names. And there's GPX files for your apps which have the full name, or for the app which have the full name. So go there. There's a lot of good information and there'll be more information as we come out.
Speaker 1:And Scott link in the show notes, just saying Link in the show notes, just saying Absolutely, saying absolutely.
Speaker 3:Uh, one of the other things, uh, that I learned is they have those links in the on our list. Click on them. It'll bring up the cache page on your computer which has a qr code. Print all those pages out and put them in order, because sometimes, like in oklahoma city, when you're trying to find, you know, this adventure lab. It's just a lot easier to scan your printed out QR code.
Speaker 1:Because, as we know, adventure Labs cross over each other quite constantly because there's no review process, so you can have two or three Adventure Labs answering the same question almost at the same location.
Speaker 3:So you want to do the one that's like related to route 66 perfect yeah, and, and they're easy to spot because, uh, you know, we put certain branding on them. They all have the same type of logo, they all have the same type of name. Uh, but it's just easier, you know, even if you bring up the list view, it's just easier to use the q QR code to bring them up.
Speaker 2:So outside of Adventure Labs, do you have? Any advice for anybody that wants to experience Route 66? I do.
Speaker 3:We've talked about some of them, and one of them is have at least two phones. Another one would be bring someone with you, have somebody to navigate, help you navigate. If you don't have somebody with you. Stop when you have those questions of? Or is it taking me on there because it's the fastest?
Speaker 3:or if it's the only Do have to have a Nuvi or some GPS that can help you with guidance, because you can't use Waze or Google and the app at the same time. And then let's see. Oh, and then the power banks, as you and pretty, much everybody knows, the Adventure Lab app uses battery power like crazy.
Speaker 1:So, yeah.
Speaker 3:So if you don't have a car that has two 12 volts that are turned on all the time, have a lot of power banks and yeah, and you really need them.
Speaker 1:I think as well, josh Scott just pointed to a topic Now we're talking about, obviously, if you're a geocacher, but if you're a non-geocacher as well and you want to experience Route 66, wait, scott, you just said, like you know, have someone with you, and not just to navigate, but also to share, share the experience of what you're doing, where to go, where to stop you know what I mean and just really enjoy the locations which Route 66 takes you beyond. I mean, I know myself personally. I've done a lot of solo travel and there are some times as well where you look and go. This is really really brilliant. This is so nice and, yeah, you can share it on social media and stuff as well, but sometimes you go, you know what. I just really like someone here with me to share this with, and I've done that with Josh a few times on our travels as well, where we've done something.
Speaker 1:Josh has said something off topic as well, not even geocache related. We could be riding go-karts, for instance. We could be playing put playing on the pinball machines and stuff as well. All random things have happened like that because we were together at the time and you know something and we looked at each other. Should we do this? Yeah, let's do it. You know that sort of thing, so that, yeah. So having sharing uh root 66 with someone, um is one of the things I think personally, whether you're a geocacher or not, you know it's, it's a must, you know, even if that's a dog josh, even if it's a must, even if that's a dog Josh.
Speaker 2:Even if it's a Goliath. Oh, I'm taking him, I'm taking him, he's coming.
Speaker 1:But, scott, going back to what would be your one big highlight, do you think out of this last trip, what do you think would be one?
Speaker 3:Before I get to that, I'm going to give one other piece of advice.
Speaker 1:Oh, of course, Give it to us.
Speaker 3:Whatever your pace is, whatever you want to do, do that. If you want the numbers and you want to go fast, if that's the way you geocache and that's what you want to do, do that. And if you're like me and you guys and you want to go slowly and stop and eat at this restaurant because it's an old restaurant, do that. And then, for geocachers who are doing the ALs, read everything, especially that first section. If I was to have any influence with the programmers there, this is what I would recommend that start button. You can leave it there. It can be huge, but gray it out and tell someone has at least rolled through the entrance.
Speaker 3:Because even me who I think I've disciplined myself pretty good when I see that start button, I frequently hit that start button and I've missed a lot of information, and sometimes I've missed critical information. Speaking of my adventure labs, I'm going to force you to at least look at the description, because all of my adventure labs have two questions. One question is at the location and the other question is in the look in the description description and if you haven't read that on the first page, you're gonna be looking around an awful lot for something that is there in your hand, but yeah, let's be honest, josh, as well you and I just recently did this too.
Speaker 1:If If you're driving along, for instance, we weren't driving, but if you're driving along, they can. Now we were just talking about it you can now play record not record voice so you can actually have someone talk you through the description as well. Which you think about it. If you've got a five to ten-minute drive ahead of you, why not click that play button? Why not sort of say, okay, what am I getting myself in for? And let someone talk you on your radio, whatever, through through what you're about to see and what you're about to do? That's a great idea. So, yeah, that really is.
Speaker 3:So, yeah, you don't have to read the, you don't have to rtfm, but at least listen to the rtfd.
Speaker 1:I'm sorry that's the one, that's the one. Um, all right, mate, what would be your one highlight, the one big highlight that you talk, he's got two, he's putting two fingers up, josh, what would be your two highlights?
Speaker 2:We have time for two. We have time for two.
Speaker 1:We've got time for two.
Speaker 3:Okay, I'll make them quick. Okay, I'm showing you this.
Speaker 1:Oh yes.
Speaker 3:And they're both related to K the idea of wouldn't it be nice if scott had something to recognize this, uh, this what he did? And so he bought this historic us 66 sign and he organized where people were he lives near chicago people were signing it or putting their names on it and then putting it to the next person to the west, putting it to the next person to the it to the next person to the West, putting it to the next person to the West, putting it back first into the West. So this basically has done half of route 66. Wow, just like that.
Speaker 2:Then it got. So go ahead. So for the, for the people that this is an audio podcast, you're holding a sign, a metal sign, of historic route 66. There's signatures on it. These are signatures of the people that created the Adventure Labs.
Speaker 3:Yes, they are.
Speaker 2:And that traveled west.
Speaker 3:That traveled west At some point. I got a little bit lost, but there are 65 of the 84 people their signatures are on this, and this was presented to me at Geo Woodstock on the stage Completely unsurprised. It completely surprised me.
Speaker 1:And.
Speaker 3:I was touched to tears literally, and the more I've learned about this, the more touching it is.
Speaker 1:We'll have a photo of that, Josh, too, by the way, for our social medias as well. That's really cool. Yeah, that's really cool. And what's the other one, Scott? What's the other big thing that you like to tell people about?
Speaker 3:KC11, as I'm approaching Chicago, contacts me and says hey, why don't we meet? I'd love to. We had actually met at Geo Woodstock in Kentucky for like two minutes. He said why don't we meet? And let's meet at the intersection of Route 66 and the Lincoln Highway, which is in Joliet Illinois. So we met there, took a picture, went out and had ice cream at a historic Route 66 location and that night I, like you, josh, had a virtual 4.0 uh credit. And that night I'm like I know where I'm going to use this nice and so I.
Speaker 3:There is the lincoln highway and route 66, g-c-a-j-f-k-c or G-C. Alpha, juliet, foxtrot, kilo and Charlie. I believe it is, and it's there, it's there it's available for everyone to go and find it's available for everybody to go, find it's an interesting. It gives kind of a history of it's in two different columns one with the history of lincoln highway, one with the history of route 66, one with his involvement with the lincoln highway, my involvement with route 66 and uh, yeah, it's uh, I love that. I love that too.
Speaker 2:I love that's awesome scott, thank you so much for creating this experience for geocachers and, I would say, even beyond geocachers people. This is a travel podcast, it's not a geocaching podcast, and I don't believe there's anything like this on Route 66. So the ability to sort of gamify and force people to learn about route 66 is it's just a really unique thing and the fact that you brought it together it's it's amazing. It gives another reason to visit it and I'm just going to say, to having you actually doing it, it's inspirational to me and others to say, hey, I want to do that too, I want to experience that too. So thanks for the inspiration, thanks to you for the hard work. It it is much appreciated.
Speaker 3:And thank you for letting me talk about it. It's something that I love, and I appreciate sharing it with all of your listeners.
Speaker 1:And just before you go, mate, as well, as I said before in the podcast that you are the man in regards to Adventure Labs, where can people find you in regards to your social media, like YouTube channels, things like that find you in regards to your social media, like YouTube channels, things like that? Or if they want to reach out to you personally to say any hints or tips in regards to them putting out good adventure lives like you do, how can they do that?
Speaker 3:My YouTube channel and it's not like Josh's YouTube channel. That's pretty small, but it's just do geocaching with GSM times two or geocaching with GSMX two. That'll get you there. I really like the GCHQ message system. There's a way to contact me directly, so just contact me at GSMX2.
Speaker 1:There you go and again, as always, links are in the show notes. Meanwhile, josh, you asked for this before previously. I did so you have. You've asked for people to sort of. You know how can people talk to us, how can people reach out? They can. Now we have the ability of fan mail, josh, on our Buzzsprout site people can again, links are in the show notes. Yeah, links regards to links, regards to reaching out, and having saying what they like about this particular episode, this, that the other. We've got fan mail now attached to our Buzzsprout site. Or they can contact us directly through Patreon how they can become a patron, josh.
Speaker 2:Yes, if you're enjoying our podcast, we really would appreciate your support. By supporting us, you're helping us create even better content and keep it free for everyone. No annoying commercials, but escape camper vans. If you're listening, miller High Life. If you're listening, miller high life. If you're listening, or anybody else, consider joining our Patreon at patreoncom. Backslash treasures of our town. We have golden nuggets on there that we've. They got to see me on on that roller coaster.
Speaker 1:No that's wrong.
Speaker 2:Yeah, because the patrons yeah, so no one else, just patrons no one else.
Speaker 1:Yeah, because the patrons, yeah, no one else, just patrons, no one else.
Speaker 2:So join us over there at Patreon.
Speaker 1:Otherwise, Josh, how else can people reach us or contact us?
Speaker 2:Well, you can send fan mail on the Buzzsprout site or you can contact us at treasuresofourtownpodcast at gmailcom, or you can follow us on social media Facebook, instagram, twitter and X and YouTube and so that's it for our show today.
Speaker 1:Please subscribe, rate and review on your favorite podcasting app. And, as always, josh, I just want to say that.
Speaker 2:Scott Miller, you know what he's proud of Route 66. He is, he's proud of it. That's a rare thing these days. I got to get it in there. May your travels always lead you to the most unexpected and amazing hidden gems, like everything on route 66. See you next time, bye, bye, see you, scott, thank you. Thank you, bye thank you bye.