2022 Fall Picnic
2022 SLAGA Christmas Party
Bellefontaine CITO November 2022
Cachemas 2022 Bonus Day
SLAGA at GeoWoodstock 2023
2024 SLAGA Spring Picnic
2025 New Year's Day Hike, Fort Bellefontaine
Cachetur 101 Class - March 2025
2025 Winter Potluck
2025 Spring Picnic
2025 Spring Picnic
2025 GigaStock in Morgantown WV
2025 GeoWoodstock, Morgantown, WV
SLAGA at Ted Drewes 2025
2025 Christmas Event
2026 NYD Hike
Crazy Beards!
2026 Winter Potluck
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Since SLAGA no longer has a MODot clean-up site, due to the program being dropped, the SLAGA CITO at Minnie Ha Ha event in Sunset Hills, hosted by Candyce54 on June 30, 2024, became the group's quarterly clean-up project. Of course for those there, it was fondly known as Trash à la CARTe, thanks to TheLegoPharoah and bobclassic's find and GeoWench78's witty input!
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To sit on the shore of a beautiful lake that reflects the landscape and sky above, or paddle your watercraft smoothly across its cool rippling waters is a completely satisfying and peaceful experience. It puts you in the center of nature and "carries you into recesses of feeling otherwise impenetrable." (Wordsworth) But...what if the shoreline of that lake is littered with garbage and debris?
Dumped debris along the shoreline and trash that floats into the lake with every high water event or from littering needs to be removed periodically, and who better to give back to the community and to nature than geocachers who enjoy the many caches in community parks. Events like the recent St. Louis County CITO - with canoes!! (GCAQ5KY) hosted by SLAGA's own StormRider22 (Laura MacLeod), on May 22, 2024 at Simpson Park lake, are essential in helping clean up our waters.
About fourteen geocachers attended the CITO, on the gorgeous May evening, and collected numerous bags of trash full of plastic and glass bottles, cups, straws, cans, styrofoam pieces, balls, bags, buckets, fishing bobbers/line, and more. A tire, a chair, some wood planks, and other large debris were also collected. A few cachers helped clean up the shorelines on foot, while the majority took to the water in canoes, a kayak, and a paddleboard. Surprisingly, what has always looked from afar to be a clean shoreline, across the lake, soon was discovered to be heavily littered, when approached by watercraft. While the removal and collection made a significant difference, there are still larger items, like a tin drum and a turbine engine, as well as other unreachable debris, that still need removal.
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Although we see Leap Day once every four years,
Cachers still got excited as the day drew near.
It was an unofficial geocaching day in 2024,
At least in SLAGAland cause there were events galore.
There were CITOs, lunches and happy hours too,
Besides other smileys that folks decided to do.
So February 29th was quite a big day,
As cachers in SLAGAland got out to play!
Many thanks to the hosts of all six Leap Day Events: paulgracie, stevendede, bluedaisy, rocksusan, nan-d1955, and RebelPenguin. You helped make the day fantastic with the CITO opportunities for community clean-ups, and the event gatherings to enjoy company of geofreinds old and new. Many cachers had personal goals to fulfill, so the stories of the day's caching were exciting to hear from event to event. Leap day was a lot of fun this year, but it makes you wonder what 2028 will bring!?
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It's the most wonderful time of the year.
With cachers just 'gelling'
And everyone telling you be of good cheer.
It's the most wonderful time of the year.
It's the hap-happiest season of all.
Food and toys were collected and all felt connected
When geofriends called.
It's the hap-happiest season of all.
Geo-parties for hosting,
Hope you saw the posting,
Cause Nan planned a really fun day.
There were sweaters so ugly,
But they were still snuggly,
And raffle gifts given away.
It's the most wonderful time of the year.
The event smiles were showing
And hearts were all glowing
with geofriends near.
It's the most wonderful time of the year!
(Parody of original song "It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year," written by G. Wyle and E Pola, 1963.)
The SLAGA-land Christmas Bash Event (GCAFWP9), hosted by nan-d1955, was held Saturday, December 9, 2023 in Arnold, MO., and was a smashing success! There was a tremendous turn out of nearly 75 geocachers, with a few muggles scattered here and there. Attendees brought charitable donations, enjoyed delicious food, had fun conversation, laughed at some pretty ugly sweaters, and crossed their fingers for raffle prizes.
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Our St. Louis Area Geocachers Association (SLAGA) is a fun and active organization, whose mission is to "improve the family-oriented activity of geocaching while encouraging responsible stewardship of public lands in cooperation with land managers." SLAGA accomplishes its mission by holding a variety of events from social picnics and gatherings, to community land clean up projects, to educational classes and workshops for both members and those just learning about geocaching. The past few weeks have seen SLAGA proudly exercise its mission with two CITO (Cache In Trash Out) events, a Food Truck social, the annual Spring Picnic, and two geocaching classes.
On the cold and windy morning of Saturday April 22, 2023, more than 45 geocachers participated at two clean up events. The CITO at Bellefontaine Cemetery (GCA458T), hosted by LFrank and Denmother (John and Laurie El Frank), involved trash pick up around the perimeter of the cemetery. But LFrank commented that, "the wind was blowing the trash in as fast as we were picking it up," so the 35 attendees literally had their hands full accomplishing their task. Some new geocachers and geocachers from California and Massachusetts were there to help as well. Light refreshments were provided and the attendees received a special gift from the cemetery staff.
While trash bags were being filled at Bellefontaine, about 13 miles away a different kind of clean up was underway. The 2023 CITO - Imperial Crown Pet Cemetery (GCA45WD), an annual spring event, was hosted by Hobbit Taz and CribbageWitch (Mark and Shirley Derr). Due to overlapping times with the other CITO, this clean up started with about 10 active SLAGA members working to raise and level headstones, mulch garden areas, cut and remove hanging and dead branches from trees, and pick up debris, downed limbs and previous cut tree pieces throughout the cemetery. A nice refreshement spread was provided in the warm cemetery office where workers could take a break from the cold and wind. Later in the morning about 5-6 additional members, who'd already cleaned up at Bellefontaine, came to lend a helping hand. Both CITOs were a success and everyone had a good time while providing clean up service.
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When the announcement was made, at the closing of 2022 MOGA, that this year's event would be held in Flint, Michigan, many folks thought that it would be way to cold, and rightly so. Temperatures during mid April in Flint average 29* to 54*F and rarely above 69*F with frequent rain and snow. But as geocachers rolled into town for this year's 20th Anniversary event, they were met with four gorgeous days of sunshine and temperatures in the 80*s, with a high on competition day reaching 89*F. Ironically, the day after the main event, Flint temperature dropped to 31*F and it snowed. It's obvious the MOGA 'Gods' were smiling on this 2023 MEGA Event.
Despite the driving distance and what could have been cold weather, there were 24 SLAGA members (plus one 4-legged caching buddy) that participated in this year's MOGA. All those who competed also placed and earned medals, which is an awesome accomplishment and a wonderful representation of SLAGA at the event. Strider and Bluebeadman were honored for having participated in every MOGA since it's inception. Strider won 1st place individual competition in his age/gender group. Crowesfeat30 took 3rd place individual competition in her age/gender group. The team of Jerry2554 and ZLA placed 2nd in the puzzle solving competition. Geokid12 competed twice and won 1st place individual and 3rd place in the 2-person team competitions in his age/gender groups. And the 4-person MonkEBarrz team of Monk-e-Arms, barrz duo, and Paulgracie took 1st place in their age/gender group. Way to go SLAGA Competitors! The rest of us absolutely enjoyed finding local Adventure Labs, geocaching around the state grabbing webcams and ECs, visiting Canada, and participating in the numerous activities arranged by the MOGA Team.
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