The Holy Grail of Gedney Cemetery

It was extremely satisfying, finding that first hidden cache behind the grave of Alithea Gedney. There was 3 of us as we searched through what are the remains of an old stone wall that encircles the Gedney Cemetery near I95. Geocaching is a high tech treasure hunt where using GPS devices you must find hidden caches scattered around the globe. You follow a series of hints and coordinates to find the location of these treasures. The hint was encrypted with the simple algorithm of substituting one letter for another, not clever at all but annoying actually. We walked around the cemetery trying to read the weathered gravestones until we found the one we were looking for,

Alithea Gedney daughter of Gilbert & Mary Gedney
Died June 30, 1900
Aged 65 years

We then proceeded to search the stone wall directly behind it. We looked through every crack and crevasse, searching for any kind of misplaced container. After about 5 minutes, Eric lifted a conspicuous looking rock and there it was, the Holy Grail of Gedney Cemetery! It was a medium sized plastic hermetic container painted black. Upon opening it we found an assorted curiosity of small objects; business cards, toy soldiers, bouncing balls, yo-yos, foreign coins, discount cards, it was an incredible find. There was a small notebook with a log of names, dates and items from other Geocachers that have stumbled upon this cache. We proceeded to write down our names and date, and left small items for the next hunters. I took one of the “bugs” which is a traceable item with serial number that you can track using the website. This specific item had traveled 187 miles from cache to cache to find its way here.

It was such a fun little adventure. Just to think that dozens of people have come by this very container to leave little souvenirs for others brings me so much excitement. I now have taken it upon myself to find all the local caches. I encourage anyone to join the website and start Geocaching in your area, its so much fun! It’s real life treasure hunting without the danger of getting attacked by pirates!