"A lonely stillness, so
like death,
So touches, terrifies all
things,
That even rooks that fly
o'erhead
Are hush'd, and seem to hold
their breath,
To fly with sullen, muffled
wings,
And heavy as if made of
lead.
Some skulls that crumble to
the touch,
Some joints of thin and
chalkdike bone,
A tall black chimney, all
alone,
That leans as if upon a
crutch.
Alone are left to mark or
tell,
Instead of cross or cryptic
stone,
Where Joaquin stood and
brave men fell."
- Joaquin Miller
The life of a “49’er”
was a tough one. The
work was long, hard, and dangerous. In
spite of the hardships, thousands of would-be adventurers thronged
to California in the mid 1800’s to try their luck at striking it
rich. Fortune seekers that found their way to California were also
followed by a more unsavory crowd.
Gamblers, crooks, thieves, and murderers were also immigrating to
the Golden State in large numbers. One
of these individuals was Joaquin Murietta.
Joaquin’s story is a
sad one. That
is, if you believe the legend that has grown around his
exploits. He
immigrated to California from Mexico in the hope of finding a
better life. He
staked a claim and began to work it. The
claim was jumped so he was forced to leave. When
he returned to his family, he found his brother murdered and his
wife (or sister depending on which account you read) was
raped. From
that day on, Joaquin vowed to, “Live only for
vengeance”.
He fell into a bad bunch of ruffians, and rode up and down the
Sierra preying on the miners during the day, and drinking and
gambling at the saloons at night. 
The situation became so
bad that the fledgling California State Government passed a bill
offering a $1,000.00 reward for Joaquin, dead or alive.
They
dispatched a former Texan Ranger, Harry Love, to lead a posse
to capture the notorious Murietta.
It took a few months, but Love finally tracked down his man
outside of Fresno.
A gun battle ensued and Love claimed that his men killed
Joaquin, his first lieutenant (“Three Fingered Jack” Garcia),
and the band of men that followed them.
Love had his men take Joaquin’s head and the hand of Jack to
preserve them in a brandy barrel as evidence of their
success.
Thus begins the strange
story of this cache. The
remains of Joaquin and Jack were paraded around the State for
public viewing (at a $1.00 a piece, of course). Love
and his men claimed the reward, and the head of Joaquin and the
hand of Jack were sent to the State Museum in
Benicia.
The Great San Francisco Earthquake destroyed the
museum and the remains of Joaquin and Jack. Or so
people thought.
At the coordinates
above, you will find a very curious and disturbing artifact, which
I found in my wanderings of Ft. Ord.
The missing digits could lead me to only one conclusion: it was the
hand of the notorious “Three Fingered Jack”
Garcia!
His mutilated hand lay there on the ground, pointing to the
dense brush, as if beckoning me to crawl forward.
I could see a passage, but I wasn’t dressed for such a messy
adventure that day.
I’ve left instructions at the location above on how you can
hopefully find Joaquin on this clue based hunt.
I heartily recommend a couple of items not usually found in
most cachers packs: knee-pads and gloves.
Themes? Every
Great Cache Needs a Theme.
Well, this cache has a
theme to fit the grisly story above. If you have a small
munchkin like we do, then this will probably be a no brainer for
you (if not, don't sweat it). You see, it's like this.
Jr. T is kind of tough on toys. So at our house we have the
"Action Figure Graveyard". You may have something
similar. You know what I mean; parts of toys that have broken
off during some rough play, or what may politely be called,
"experiments". If you have a spare arm, leg, or torso to
donate to the cache, that would be great. You'll find in the
cache container a small ziploc with a few pieces that I donated to
start the collection going. After we get a few more parts
I'll retrieve them, and in Dr. Frankenstein fashion, morph the
pieces into something bizarre and release it as a Travel
Bug.
Now For the
Letterbox Part (or DON'T TAKE THE
STAMP!)
This cache is a
Letterbox Hybrid. That means that in the cache container will
be a rubber stamp (more about that in a minute). The stamp is
attached to the lid of the cache container. In other words,
LEAVE THE STAMP WITH THE CACHE CONTAINER. The stamp is not a
trade item. It's what Letterboxing is all about. You
stamp the logbook with your personal stamp (if you have one), and
you have a personal logbook that you stamp the cache stamp with.
It's what Letterboxers do instead of trading trinkets. There
is an inkpad in the cache container as well, but if you really want
an impression of the stamp I'd suggest bringing your own inkpad as
a backup.
OK. Now that we have that out of the
way I'll tell you about the stamp. The stamp is a tribute to
that Central Coast Geocacher that seems to be everywhere at once
(he has over 100 caches hidden in CA): Just A Short Walk. If
you've been caching for any length of time you've probably run
across one of his excellent caches (it's hard walking around here
without tripping over them). JASW moved out of our area last
spring and I thought it would be nice to honor his efforts in
spreading the gospel of geocaching in our area. On nearly all
of JASW's Cache pages is a nifty little logo that was designed by
Raygun_88 a few years back. Several other Geocachers have
also adopted this logo and it seemed fitting that the first
Letterbox Hybrid in Monterey County should sport the logo on it's
first stamp.
Have fun, and post some pictures of
your adventure!