I’ve been boxing RI, MA, and CT for 20+ years and I wear blaze orange from Sept 1 til roughly the end of April every year.

I know how to follow rules. I distrust others’ ability to do so.

Warrior Woman
puts it on the dog, too

Thank you for the reminder B60

Yep. This time of year, I wear a blaze orange vest and hat even on Sundays or when I’m hiking in areas that don’t allow hunting. Better safe than sorry, plus my vest has awesome pockets for holding stuff!

Ryan and I have these vests!!

https://www.atlasquest.com/gallery/view-photo.php?photoId=163699

-Amanda from Seattle

Dumbest rule ever. Basically giving hunters carte blanche to shoot anything that isn't wearing fluorescent orange. The responsibility to know what the $%^& you're shooting at should rest on the hunter, not the rest of us.

Hunters don’t have carte blanche to shoot at anything that isn’t blaze orange. They are often criminally and/or civilly charged if they shoot someone…as they should be.

But since I really don’t want to put the legal system to the test, I wear blaze orange every time I’m in the woods this time of year.

Here is an interesting video for folks who might want to learn a bit more.

Another safety measure is to purposefully avoid hiking quietly. Make noise. Be obvious. This also helps to avoid the uncomfortable situation of walking up to and startling a squirrel. Or a very large bear. With teeth and claws.

However, if you are also birding, this strategy may be a detriment. Although birds seem oddly unimpressed by many human based noises except cannon fire and stuff like that.

I have it bookmarked here and on the the site. I share it often to make sure hunters know how to dress properly too!

What I don’t understand is, they want people to wear blaze orange, yet, there are hunters out in the woods roaming around wearing green or brown camouflage to blend in with their surroundings. It just doesn’t make any sense to me.

The crazy thing is I read once that deer, at least, are color blind and so blaze orange and green (camo) look pretty much the same to them.

If deer are color blind, how on earth do they manage to read the deer crossing signs which are essential for safe highway crossing?

😂😂😂 I wonder that too, how do they know Where to cross when they can’t read the deer crossing signs.....,,😂😂😂😂

Totally agree, I hear gunshots on Sundays. I’m like that when I drive a car. Just because someone’s blinker is on, doesn’t mean they are turning. 😂

🤣🤣🤣🤣

Well apparently deer in Massachusetts are not color blind. Almost clocked a deer tonight, right after dusk, who was crossing the road exactly at the sign! The stupid deer was NOT wearing orange so I am blameless. Even if I was driving a bit too fast.

I have been asked to do a Letterboxing event for The Last Green Valley (TLGV) next October. This would be an introduction to Letterboxing. I have done this many times before, but this time TLGV wants to hold the event in one of the towns in MA. Can anyone give me a lead on a good place to hold an event like this? The towns being targeted are: Holland, Brimfield, Sturbridge, Southbridge, Charlton, East Brookfield, Dudley, Oxford, and Webster. I need a place that has a pavilion or picnic tables for us to make our wood-block stamps and learn about Letterboxing, with easy access to trails. The spot does not have to have letterboxes already, I can plant, but I would also want decent parking. Any leads would be great, TLGV has many contacts with land trusts , towns, parks, etc up there and can help me make arrangements, I just need to have a few good ideas of sites that would work.

Thanks,
Lowland Lass

I have never been there but the pictures on line look beautiful and they have a pavilion and campgrounds. Might be worth looking into.

Wells State Park is a popular 1,400-acre woodland park. The two principal activities are camping and hiking. The campground has 60 attractive sites. Walker Pond provides a peaceful setting for fishing, canoeing, and swimming. The swimming beach is for campers' use only. During the summer, Wells has an interpretive program available which provides guided walks, hikes, recreational activities and evening campfire programs.

More than 10 miles of trails cross the property, which are for hiking only; off-road vehicles may not be used. A popular route leads to the scenic vista at Carpenter Rocks from which the eastern section and Walker Pond can be viewed. Wells is only five miles by car from Old Sturbridge Village.

Buffumville Lake in Charlton would be another nice place to hold an event.

Thanks for the ideas - I'll submit them and see what they say.

LL

Just Make it Moxie for Mine!

This box has a slightly updated clue image as of March 1 for all you early solvers!

Mass??? Consider me shocked... and appalled... great clue though :)

Stamp should be in Lisbon, ME... just sayin'

what a great way to make my poor brain even more confused!
smile

A number of boxers have inquired about when The Killer Rabbit of Caerbannog! would be available again. A big thank you goes out to Mim that it is!

I was wondering if anyone had any tips for navigating Harold Parker? I started the Da da da da, da da da da BATMAN! https://www.atlasquest.com/showinfo.php?boxId=307338 series but every clue references number markers and more than half of them are missing :/ Any tips? anyone know where the markers used to be? I've been using the map as I go but there's just SO many unmarked trails and SO many little ponds (I counted 5 on my last trip) that it is VERY tricky to find precisely where the markers were supposed to be. Cheers.

I have an android phone and the Open Street Maps app (OSMand) and that map has the markers AND uses the phone GPS so you will know exactly what intersection you are at.

We found the GAIA app helpful our last excursion.

That series was planted in 2019, and the official map is also from 2019 so markers should be similar https://www.mass.gov/doc/harold-parker-state-forest-trail-map/download

If actual trail markers are missing then printing the PDF map should help sort things out, especially if you also use GAIA or ALL TRAILS (both are based upon Open Street Maps) on a portable device and match up current location with the PDF map.

Thanks RIclimber! This tip helped A LOT! This time, I saw all the markers I was looking for so far. (didn't make it all the way around). Now I'm having the sneaking suspicion most of the markers ARE still there but just that the trails are so twisty and windy that I looked in the wrong places last time. Blush. I was just navigating with a paper map so it was much harder to find the intersections where the markers should be. Open Street Maps app helped SO much. Man, this place is tricky. I'm over 200 boxes and I've never been somewhere where I needed a GPS to help me.