Bernhard (Bernie) Ver Hey
AKA: Happykraut
This cache is placed to honor Happykraut. One of SLAGA’s original members who started out caching in the St. Charles Missouri area. As a matter of fact, his first find was My Little Hercules GCB713. This was, interesting enough, my first hide. I got a note from him saying that he found the cache, it’s on someone else’s property and they want it removed immediately. He went on to say that the person is a friend and he hunts on that property. Well, it was at Weldon Spring City Park. My thoughts were that no way he found the cache because it was placed with permission by the city. It turned out he was right. A small portion of the park is in fact on private property and since then, they put up a fence that comes in 2 feet from the property line for about 5 feet. My cache was, in fact, on private property.
That was February 1st, 2003. I had started caching in November of 2002. From that point on, we chatted back and forth and soon discovered we both lived pretty close to the cache. I asked him if he wanted to go out caching and he sorta declined. OK, well that’s that! In March 2003, Happykraut hid his first cache, Magic Number (GCDC9A). This was a complexed multicache that Konapapw and I set out to do. It was in the Weldon Spring conservation area. We were stumped on WP2. We looked for hours. I emailed him and asked him if he double checked his cords. He said he would meet us out there so we quickly headed back to the spot of the first waypoint.
His description in the cache originally had said, head x number of feet in a SW direction. We showed him WP projection and he was amazed. He had no idea we could do that. Instead, he hid the 2nd WP using a laser rangefinder and a compass. It was clearly 60 feet or more from his description. Once we get the corrected cords, he walked us through the rest until we found the final. Making the right adjustments was key to the longevity of that cache which lasted until August 2007.
After meeting him that day, we became caching buddies and went out constantly finding caches all over the state. We started caching on the road and planning road trips. Happykraut loved a challenging cache. He was not the greatest with puzzles, except crossword and Sudoku. He loved his Sudoku.
In 2003, we officially formed the St. Louis Area Geocaching Association (SLAGA). *gln and rgs approached me to help organize and quickly we recruited several others to be on the committee. I was excited to get Happykraut involved and he simply said, Hell no! LOL… Well, that was Happykraut. He was always very direct and to the point. If he didn’t like something, you knew about it.
In 2004 We hosted the first MOGA. Happykraut was thrilled to help with this one and we learned a lot from placing tags in the woods in a serial type course that would really mess things up if just one tag in the line was missing. Happykraut had some great input and enjoyed being a part of staff. He was always quick to volunteer but never wanted to lead anything. He once said, “I don’t mind being a member of anything but don’t want any responsibilities.”
I continued to cache with Happykraut and others up until I started getting burned out. I camped all over the place with Happykraut and he is the reason I still have a camper today. He taught me so much about the camping life, travel tips, places to stay and the list goes on and on. Happykraut made some tokens, more like wooden nickles only made out of plastic. The smiley face was his symbol. He used to place them in caches all over as his signature item. One time, he went camping up in the Upper Penninsula of Michigan a week before JC_Geo and I were going up there to do some caching and a backpacking trip on Isle Royale. We discovered that every cache we did in the UP, we found the HK Token. We decided to pick them all up and create a cache close to his house and call it HK Recycled. I just never got around to it but you can see, this cache is full of them. Heck, people were collecting them everywhere they could and giving them to me to place in the cache. One of the reasons we did not make the cache is that Happykraut started spending months on the road camping.
Soon Happykraut found another game to pass the time and his caching days were numbered. Eventually, this would also fall by the wayside and he really just camped and enjoyed playing Bocce Ball.
Happykraut, Bernie, and his wife Judy have been excellent friends to me and BWAT (Bridget). We have spent many holidays together. As I write this tribute to one of my best friends, I miss him dearly. I miss the old days. His laugh, his constant banter and teasing, his smile when he laid eyes on the cache and most of all, his generosity. There wasn’t a kinder sole than Happykraut. If you needed something, he was the first to offer. His health failed him in the last few years. We drifted apart some because I have a brewery and a day job that takes a lot of time. I went and sat with him when he was released from the hospital. He told me was released to die at home. I remained strong in front of him but broke down when I was alone. I hate death and how it slowly takes us from this earth.
No matter your beliefs, I like to think there is something better for us when we pass. I know Happykraut is somewhere playing Bocce and hunting geocaches. I will always remember his 2 best lines when we were caching. “We’re Burning Daylight!” when we were at a cache just standing around talking and “I Got an Idea.” When we would meet before a group cache.
RIP my friend!
Mike G.
Brawny Bear
You are looking for a regular container holding another container. Daylight hours only. Have fun.