The Elves Won't Shop at Fall-Mart Traditional Cache
The Elves Won't Shop at Fall-Mart
-
Difficulty:
-
-
Terrain:
-
Size: 
(micro)
Please note Use of geocaching.com services is subject to the terms and conditions
in our disclaimer.
For years, Dixmont State Hospital in Kilbuck Township was a local landmark along Route 65 (Ohio River Boulevard). I always thought that the abandoned former mental institution would make a cool spot for a spooky cache. But for liability reasons, the local officials explained that they could not allow people onto the property to poke around the crumbling buildings. Oh well.
Then along came a NDRWSRN (a National Discount Retailer Who Shall Remain Nameless). They acquired the site to build a new store, and dozens of earthmovers and bulldozers showed up to knock down the hospital buildings, remove all the trees, and level the hilltop. I resigned myself to hiding some sort of creative "parking lot bingo" cache at this site once construction was completed.
But then, on September 20, 2006, my morning commute was blocked by a landslide:
More than three million tons of dirt needed to be moved in order to level the hilltop, and I guess they moved it too quick and too sloppy, because on this day, a half million tons of the hill now covered all four lanes of the highway and one rail of the adjacent main Conrail freight line. Commuting times doubled and rail traffic was backed up all the way to the Midwest and the Atlantic Coast. Here's what the landslide area looked like during cleanup efforts. My former drive past a pleasant wooded hillside now takes me past what looks like a strip mine:
Development efforts by the NDRWSRN were halted, all the construction permits were revoked, and efforts at the site have since focused on stabilizing the hillside. To this present day, years later, they're still pushing dirt around and measuring how much the hillside is moving.
Little Lep and I were not happy with what happened. To vent our frustration at the long commutes and the ugly eyesore, we took to calling this location "Fall Mart" because of the landslide, and we vowed we would never shop here if they ever built the store. Thus, a cache name was born.
We wanted to show you the effects of a NDRWSRN's sloppy work close-up, so we hid a cache that will take you right to the edge of where you're legally allowed to go. To find this cache, do NOT park along Route 65. Your car may be covered by a landslide when you return! Instead, use the parking coordinates provided below as an Additional Waypoint. These will deliver you to a nice paved parking lot for a very pleasant Ohio Township baseball field and park. Stroll behind the park to hunt for our cache. You'll find it in an area that will show you one of the few remaining traces of the old Dixmont hospital -- a pathway that people followed when getting off the train to walk up and visit someone at the hospital. Here is the view from near the cache:
You are hunting for a pill bottle. There's not much room for trade items, which is just as well, since there is no NDRWSRN nearby where you might purchase cheap swag. Enjoy the nice little park, and shake your fist and curse at the scar upon the landscape.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
jnyx npebff gur cvpavp gnoyr oevqtr, tb guebhtu gur ubyr va gur byq srapr, naq fgneg frnepuvat nybat gur byq fvqrjnyx jnyy.
Treasures
You'll collect a digital Treasure from one of these collections when you find and log this geocache:
Loading Treasures