This cache is the third of three Pine Forest caches placed over three-tenths of a mile in the beautiful Haugh Family Preserve. Kudos to Patton Township for speaking for a magnificent stand of pine trees in this area between Circleville Road and Valley Vista Drive in State College. In its Haugh Family Preserve, the township is conserving and restoring the forest to a more "natural" forest found in Pennsylvania.
The Pine Forest caches are placed near established trails. There is no need to bushwhack between caches. To give you more time to look up and admire the trees, the caches are intended to be easy to find. Please be gentle in your search and bring a pen or pencil. Because of the tree cover, my GPS was bounding around. The hints are giveaways.
These caches have been placed with the permission of Patton Township.
The red pine trees you see were planted by the Boy Scouts in the 1930s. The cleared areas between the stands of trees are encouraging the growth of white pine trees and deciduous trees to constitute a more natural forest for Pennsylvania. Be sure to also notice several giant spruce trees and maple trees as you walk the trail.
Pine Forest 3 is a camouflaged pop top set into a pine tree which has fallen to the ground. The cache is accessible on the top side of the fallen log. I've given it a difficulty of 2 since the hide is more difficult than others. As a guide, look for several fallen logs from the trail and look at part of a fallen tree about 18 feet from the trail.
The parking coordinates take you to the parking lot for the Patton Woods/Game Lands across Circleville Road from Pine Forest 1. If you're visiting with children, be aware that Circleville Road is heavily traveled.
After doing the three Pine Forest caches, you can do a loop with Gnome Friends 2 which is child-friendly. One can do all 4 caches in about one hour.
"UNLESS someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better, It's not."--Dr. Seuss, The Lorax
(Though my husband, JBT, knows nothing about this cache, I have asked him to be disqualified from the FTF lest anyone think he had advance knowledge.)
Congratulations to TheGeoSleuth for the FTF!!! and to Koppenhavers for the STF!!!