Our First Boxing Adventure

Saturday mornings are reserved normally for errands. We live on a farm in a very rural area. There is no just running out to the store. Our normal stops include the feed store, the library, the grocery, the bank, and what ever else has made it's way on my list on this day and since my list includes letterboxing. :O)

Saturday, July 7, 2007 (07-07-07) was the day we went in search of our first box. I remember the day like this:

We made our weekly appearance at Travelers Rest Feed and Seed, had our weekly visit and got our supplies. Then we ventured over to our favorite coffee shop, Leopard Forest, one of the best treasures of Travelers Rest ! There was a box here called Leopards in the Forest, planted by dtandfambly and it had a blue diamond. Ok, well I thought, this should be a good way to start.

I parked the car, very surprised that it was not very crowded for a Saturday morning. We read the clue (5 more times) in the car, preparing ourselves for our first adventure. Excited, scared and not sure what to expect, Sean (5 years old at the time) and I went in. I got a coffee and he a hot chocolate and a cookie. On the way outside to the back porch, we stopped at the bookshelf and OMG there it was, just like the clue said!!!! Quite honestly I never expected it to be there. Sean grabbed it, looked at me with this HUGE smile on his face and RAN outside. We sat at a table, SOOOOOOO excited, HUGE smiles on our faces. We opened the box. There in lied a beautiful hand carved stamp of Leopard Forest's logo, a log book, AND another clue. We were beside ourselves, not only had we found our first BOX but there was ANOTHER CLUE ! We high fived each other (now that I think of it that was not exactly very discrete.... HUH ?) . We stamped in to the log book with our little initial stamps and made the first entry into our log book with that beautiful Leopard Forest stamp. We read the bonus clue what seemed like 100 times, placed it back into the box and headed back inside. We looked around, hid the box back on the shelf and headed back to the coffee section. At first we did not exactly get it and we were looking on the shelf where the flavored coffee beans are. Finally it clicked and we found it. Outside we scooted. WHAT FUN and what a uplifting start to our adventure.

I remember thinking THIS IS GREAT. We went back to the car and I pulled out the other Travelers Rest clues I had printed. Sunrift, hummm, that is doable, I thought. Right down the road and on the way to our next stop, the Library. Sean said, "LETS DO IT MOM!" We parked and went into Sunrift, again to our amazement there was the box, just like the clue said. This time we walked outside sat on the bench and logged in.

We finished our errands and headed home, I was right THIS WAS FOR ME, I was hooked instantly hooked. I logged onto Atlas Quest logged my finds and finally I could call myself a letterboxer !

Letterboxing, WOW, this is perfect for me !

The Greenville Library System does a wonderful Summer Program for the kids every year, and in their newsletter and on their website they talked about this thing called Letterboxing. I followed the links and read all I could and decided that THIS WAS FOR ME. I did what I always do and researched it as much as possible, got a log book, decided on a trail name, Talley Valley Farm Clan, decided that we would use initial stamps and log each person in under the trail name, and printed out clues. WOW, there were so many boxes all around us.

This my friends as I remember it 6 months later was the beginning of the end ! I am hopeless, hopelessly addicted!

Our first signature stamps were just our initials (Holly, Sean and Glen)