This is my other Friday the 13th story to tell. For those that haven’t seen my first story see Having Breakfast with Mr. Coyote. I had a hard time trying to decide whether this cache should be titled “Keep Your Hands where I can See Them”, “Where’s the Gun?” or “Friday the 13th”. They all seemed to fit the following true to life story.
Last Friday the 13th, we set off to do am411’s Doomed Cache? #2. We park at the funeral home located on Chapel Drive between Division and Sanford. I’m on a leash and Hikeaday has his GPSr in his hand. When we approach Sanford Street, Hikeaday picks me up and we cross the street and head into the grassy area where the Doomed Cache is. Find the cache with no problem and head back south to Sanford Street. From there we head east to my cache Too Obvious. I’m on a leash and Hikeday’s GPSr is in his back pocket. A police car approaches from the east and passes us. We get to the concrete trail that leads into the park and head north on the trail. We’ve gone about 20 feet up the trail and a siren sounds behind us. We turn around and there is a police car parked with lights flashing and a policeman half in and half out of the car. His door is open but he’s standing behind it like he’s using it as a shield. He gestures for us to come his way and he hollers, “Keep your hands where I can see them”. He obviously is referring to Hikeday and not me. We approach him and close the distance by about half and he tells us to stop and again warns to keep your hands where I can see them. He asks Hikeday if he has a gun and of course Hikeaday replies, No. The cop asks him what’s in his back pocket and Hikeday says a GPS and starts to reach for it. The cop screams, “Stand still and keep your hands where I can see them”, followed by a more calm quiet command of turn around. The policeman tells Hikeday that he’s going to search him and asks Hikeaday if I bite. Hikeaday thinks immediately about a Pink Panther episode but decides just a plain no will do. The cop takes the GPSr from Hikeaday’s pocket and then searches his remaining pockets. He then asks Hikeaday for ID and when Hikeaday hands it to him I notice that the policeman’s hand is shaking. His adrenaline must have been really pumping. He wasn’t a young man. I’d guess he was in his late forties or early fifties. Anyway he began interrogating Hikeaday: Where do you live? Where’s that located? How’d you get here? Where’d you park? What are you doing here? Geocaching, What’s that? Are you sure you didn’t have a gun? Then he say’s, “Stay right there and keep your hands where I can see them.” He goes back to his patrol car and gets on the radio. After a short time he comes back and says someone reported seeing a man, carrying a dog and a handgun, cross the street. Hikeaday says, “Well that sounds like me, I crossed the street carrying this dog and that GPSr”. He says, OK you can go and then adds “is stuff hid around here?” When Hikeaday says yes, he wants to know who’s hiding all this stuff, who gets the money, etc. People like me, no money, just inexpensive small stuff, says Hikeaday. The cop shakes his head like not understanding. Hikeaday showed him the cache sheet he was carrying and asked if he’d like to see a cache and that there was one just a couple of hundred feet from where we were. But he declined and drove off leaving us standing there under the watchful eyes of all the people behind the fence on the other side of the street.