When Irishrover007 and Cache S King started taking a Maryland Master Naturalist course, the ranger from Cromwell Valley Park lamented that many of the caches in the park were missing. They asked us to replace them, as part of our class project. Since the original CO is no longer responding to requests for maintenance (or emails), we requested the the original be archived so that Irishrover007 could maintain it as his own.
This is what the original cache description read:
This cache is part of a series named after various Greek and Roman deities. In the ancient mythology, each god had a distict role and personality. Each personality also represents a particular part of the geocaching experience. Hermes was the god of travel. This series of caches in Cromwell Valley Park allows you travel like an ancient Greek or Roman - on foot. The cache is hidden near the major intersection in the park - several trails pass within a short hike of ground zero. The fleet of foot will get the FTF on this simple cache. Hermes, the herald of the Olympian gods, is the son of Zeus and the nymph Maia, daughter of Atlas and one of the Pleiades. Hermes is the god of shepherds, land travel, merchants, weights and measures, oratory, literature, athletics and thieves, and known for his cunning and shrewdness. Most importantly, he is the messenger of the gods. It was Hermes who liberated Io, the lover of Zeus, from the hundred-eyed giant Argus, who had been ordered by Hera, the jealous wife of Zeus, to watch over her. Hermes charmed the giant with his flute, and while Argos slept Hermes cut off his head and released Io. Hera, as a gesture of thanks to her loyal servant, scattered the hundred eyes of Argos over the tail of a peacock (Heras' sacred bird). Hermes also used his ingenuity and abilities to persuade the nymph Calypso to release Odysseus, the wandering hero, from her charms. She had kept Odysseus captive, after he was shipwrecked on her island Ogygia, promising him immortality if he married her, but Zeus sent Hermes to release Odysseus. Legend says that Calypso died of grief when Odysseus sailed away. Hermes also saved Odysseus and his men from being transformed into pigs by the goddess and sorceress Circe. He gave them a herb which resisted the spell. Hermes also guided Eurydice back down to the underworld after she had been allowed to stay for one day on earth with her husband Orpheus. Known for his swiftness and athleticism, Hermes was given credit for inventing foot-racing and boxing. At Olympia a statue of him stood at the entrance to the stadium and his statues where [sic] in every gymnasium throughout Greece. Hermes was a popular subject for artists. Both painted pottery and statuary show him in various forms, but the most fashionable depicted him as a good-looking young man, with an athletic body, and winged sandals and his heralds [sic] staff. His Roman counterpart Mercury inherited his attributes, and there are many Roman copies of Greek artistic creations of Hermes.
