LetterboxingJuly 21 2008

As I have said so many times, our children can be out best teachers. Today we decided to let my 20 year old lead the way on an adventure called letterboxing. She learned about it from a friend who learned about it from a friend… you get the idea. You can check it out on many sites, but this one seems to be very complete (http://www.letterboxing.org). After she explained it all to us, we decided what to use for our personal stamp. If you like the adventure and decide to keep going, the stamp you choose becomes your identity… and keeping your identity secret can add to the mystery. I almost used my Happy Monkey stamp, but decided that was too obvious. 

My daughter had researched the letterboxes in our area and chose two that were nearby. We printed the directions, some are like puzzles and some are straighforward using landmarks and natural markers. Ours were the straight-forward variety. We set off to find the box with anticipation…
From the split in the road, we counted off 70 paces. There we saw the multi trunked tree on the left side of the road. Dan and Sarah climbed the bank to the back of the tree. Dan reached into the middle, lifted the rock, and there was the container. We all smiled ...

Mission Accomplished… almost.

Opening the container, we found a notebook that had been stamped by many other adventurers, so we sat and took our time reading the other names and admiring their stamps.

We stamped our notebooks with the stamp found in the container, and added our stamps to the notebook for future adventurers to see.

Above you can see a page from the notebook dated 3-2-08 and stamped by someone from McEwen, TN. There were stamps from people as far away as California. Letterboxing takes you to places you would otherwise never see. This particular place is right in my neighborhood, but I have never taken the time to go there…
and on the way back to the car, I saw something else I would never have seen…
The Letterboxing Trio

Wow…

You can go Letterboxing all over the world. Check out their website for a city near you… I have already printed clues for my upcoming trip to Chicago. Have fun!