Fall brings beautiful shades of reds, oranges, yellows, and browns into the fading greens of nature. SLAGA was blessed with hints of color at our Fall Picnic at Cliff Cave Park on Sunday, October 15, 2023. While the day started a bit damp and chilly, it changed quickly as the sun started peeking through the dynamic cloudy sky. Everyone in attendance enjoyed the gorgeous afternoon, the delicious shared food, the fun and games, and good conversation with fellow geocachers. The new SLAGA board members and game winners were announced, and geocaching milestone winners congratulated!
Hosts StormRider22 ( Laura) and jray131 (Jim) did a terrific job organizing this fun afternoon gathering. Lunch was a feast to behold, indeed. SLAGA provided the buns, hamburgers, brats, and hotdogs, which were perfectly grilled by volunteers Turtleladi1020nHubbs (Lynette and Mark), and the rest of the food was brought and shared by all the attendees.
The new SLAGA board looked a lot like our past with President Michael Smith (cootie_man) still at the helm, assisted by our vice presidents Robert Klemme (GeoKid12) and John Layman (vorlon40), and our treasurer Nan Dabler (nan-d1955). We bid farewell, with tremendous thanks, to our outgoing secretary Melissa Pierce (socibutte), and a big welcome to our newly appointed secretary Susan Adams (Treasure Isle).
Susan has been caching since 2012 and has over 5000 finds in 12 countries and 32 states. She's not adverse to trying all kinds of terrains and enjoys finding Interesting caches. In a brief interview, Susan stated that her one sister (from Virginia) introduced her to geocaching while on vacation in 2012. She said, "Initially I cached only when I was with her, so I picked up maybe 4-6 caches per year. After I retired, the 'Mystery at the Museum' game by Geocaching HQ in 2019 caught my eye. I had so much fun doing it, that I’ve upped my game since then. I enjoy hiking with my local muggle sister, and she lets me pick up a cache or two when we’re on the trails. I’ve also enjoyed the friendships that I’ve made through geocaching." We are thankful and lucky to have Susan on the SLAGA board this term.
Geocaching milestone recipients this Fall included the amazing geocaching feats of the following:
AF BEE with 25000 finds, whose accomplishment earned him his milestone jacket
With 10000 finds each, Geokid12 and Mixed Breed got their coveted milestone 'directors' chairs.
Earning his 5000 milestone coin was deancmeredith, while Alika53 has found her first 100 geocaches and received her milestone coin.
Besides area geocaching, there were picnic games offered for anyone that wanted to participate. As always there was the Premium Member Drawing also. The three winners of the $25 Gift Cards included MrsTrekto, Dave DeWitt Of Team_State, and Swelgus.
The Closest to the Pin is the classic geocaching game where participants use their own gps units to stick their flag in the ground as close a pre-determined coordinate GZ There were several close contenders, but this year the honor went to TerriBikes+, who used her iPhone, who knew! She walked away with a $10 Starbucks gift card, and proceeded to treat herself to a pumpkin spice latte on her way home. 
The Geo-BINGO is always a fun and social interactive game. The champs at this Fall picnic were CartoEd, HobbitTAZ and BMD Moritz who all won and chose $10 gift cards each. And finally, we had a 50/50 raffle and the winner, Strider, filled his wallet with an extra $57.50! WooHoo!
As always, we had a group photo taken. It's easy to see, we had a nice turn out (and that Geokid12 was still sporting shorts).
