After contacting woodyrat, the last user to have this travel bug, he informed me of this:
"Sorry, my guess is that your TB has gone the same route as all three of mine. Just mysteriously disappearing as I have checked everywhere and it is not to be found."
This says to me that it is OK to take a travel bug and then lose it instead of put it in a cache. This is not acceptable, and no way to play this game.