Hedgerock Traditional Geocache
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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
(small)
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A peculiar legend is whispered among the locals about this monstrous boulder along a skiing path, even though few publicly admit they´ve ever even heard about the story, let alone believe in it. The 0,25 liter container is easy to find if you believe in your gut feeling. There are some suitable spots for a car along the narrow road. Thick snow may cover the cache completely. It´s recommended to bathe in mosquito detergent before heading our for the hunt in the summer.
Near the boulder there´s a small lake or a pond called Huosiuslampi, Huosius Pond. The history, or rather the legend, of the pond is entwined with that of the ominous Hedgerock boulder.
In the late 19th century there was a small sprawling settlement called Siivolöf just a mile away from the site of the rock and the pond. The town was established by three brothers from a faraway Karelian Isthmus village in the hope of hiding from a curse bestowed upon them in their childhood. The brothers, called Aleks, Robert and Kalle succeeded in setting up new lives in the new lands, free of the strange incidents which had haunted them as long as they could remember.
Everything was seemingly well until they decided to expand their swidden lands to a small, untouched vale some way northwest from the town. The day of the burning had started fair and clear, but immediately after the first ancient trunks fell down in flames, the sky darkened beyond what could be explained by the smoke from the burning forest. The ground rumbled and started collapsing in the middle of vale. The brothers fled to the north, their feet slipping on the tilted and ripping bed of the forest.
When they had reached a more solid ground some way up the hill, they looked back to see what on earth had happened to the ground. A smoke belching chasm stood where they had just been guarding the burn-clearing, and something was climbing out of it. A light red, spiky and mean looking creature around the height of a church boat standing on its stern threw itself out of the abyss and started stampeding at the three awe stricken brothers.
The speed and agility of the creature as it squibbed through the trees woke the brothers from their paralysis and convinced them to drop their intuitive urge to run. By chance or by another kind of intuition they had fled near to a spot on the hillside where they had stashed their axes and longsaws for preparing the forest for the swidden. They had little time to think when picking their weapons as they could almost feel the demonic sniffle of the creature on their necks. Kalle grabbed an axe while Robert and Aleks took a hold of a heavy manual saw for truncating large trees.
The creature seemed to focus its attack on Kalle, who was standing alone with his axe between two thick pines. It jumped at him, tiny red eyes blazing and the spikes on its head, back and sides pointing to all directions - even towards the pines. While mid air, just inches away from its puny prey, it stopped with a sharp thud. Its spikes had been stuck on the pines, sunk deep in the old bark and wood.
Seeing their opportunity, Aleks and Robert stormed to the help of their brother and immersed their longsaw in the soft exposed neck of the helpless monster. They sawed relentlessly, until the head of the creature dropped face down on the blood-sodden hummock. In this instant the carcass stiffened, lost all its color and all distinguishable form. It had turned into a large boulder. The brothers left the boulder and the cursed vale with an empty feeling of victory, silently knowing that their curse would not be abandoned by walking away.
The scene of this macabre display was slowly concealed by the surrounding slopes filling the dark chasm with water and oblivious mould covering the stony corpse of the diabolic spike creature.
Until one day it is woken up by someone sticking her nose in the wrong place.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Qba´g rira guvax nobhg n oveq, ohg vg´f abg n svfu rvgure - n onqtre, znlor, be n fanxr? Whfg fgvpx vg va.