Every year I take my Mother to do some Christmas shopping in York on or about the first Saturday in December, normally for me this means a few hours mooching around the shops, but as this year it promised to be such a nice day I took along my GPS loaded up with York City Centre caches and went caching

3rd December 2011 – York Bridge #4 Lendal Bridge GC1FANP – cache #138
The GPS reception was a bit dodgy around this cache because of the proximity of buildings, so I had to go by the hint… which said behind the bike… not too helpful when you are outside a bike shop ! Eventually I found the right one.

3rd December 2011 – York City Walls Trail #1 GC23VTC – cache #1386
This cache is at a bench on the corner of the city wall… during normal working hours it would be in full view of people in the office  block nearby, as it was I had to sit on the bench for a while as people walked past before I could have a good search around for the cache

3rd December 2011 – York City Walls Trail #2 GC23VTD – cache #1387
This cache caused me no difficulty at all, because as I was crossing the road from one bit of the wall to the next I saw a chap up above me with a GPS, Pen, sheet of paper and a Film Cannister in hand… so I hung about until he had finished what he was doing, saw where he hid the cache and then as he walked off I went over and retrieved the cache… I then saw him a few yards further along the wall and was going to have a word with him, but there were too many people about to stop and chat without blocking the footpath

3rd December 2011 – York City Walls Trail #3 GC23VTE – cache #1388
A magnetic Nano stuck on the railings where the wall goes over a road, some people have found this a difficult cache as it’s a small cache on a lot of railings, but the co-ordinates were spot on and I found it straight away. The previous finder had written that the log was full, so as there were lots of people about I didn’t bother trying to open it and unroll the log to find nowhere to put my name, I just photographed it and put it back !

3rd December 2011 – York Micro #14 City Wall GC1N5WM – cache #1389
This cache is behind a low stone wall on a residential street, and I was there leaning over, bottom in the air, trying to reach the cache when some local resident parks his car a few yards away and he and his family get out and stare at me wondering what I am doing… I made a quick getaway !

3rd December 2011 – York Micro #13 St Martin cum Gregory GC1N5VX – cache #1390
There were surprisingly few people about on Micklegate which meant I had little trouble doing the shoelace tying trick to retrieve the cache from it’s hole in the wall… and tying the other lace to put it back

3rd December 2011 – The Stonegate Devil GC4762 – cache #1391
A ‘Virtual Cache’ where to log it you have to find the devil and upload a photograph of you with it… now I was by myself so I had to upload a photograph of my GPS with the Devil, which caused some strange looks from the shoppers in the busy shopping street as I stood there with my GPS at arms length taking a photograph !

3rd December 2011 – York City Walls Trail #8 GC23VTN – cache #1392
The walls around the Minster are very popular with tourists as you get a good view of the Minster and the Bishops Residence and so on… and this cache is hidden at the narrowest point of the wall where there is only room for one person to pass at a time, so I had to wait around for about 7 or 8 minutes until there was nobody about and I could go feeling around in the wall for the cache… then I took it away to sign the log and then had to wait a while for another gap in the tourists so I could put it back !

3rd December 2011 – York City Walls Trail #7 GC23VTK – cache #1393
On one of the corner towers of the wall there are five benches, fortunately the co-ordinates for the cache are spot on so looking at the Satellite View before I set out told me exactly which bench to sit on to find the cache stuck underneath

3rd December 2011 – York City Walls Trail #6 GC23VTJ – cache #1394
One of the easier caches to find as there is only one feature along this stretch of the wall for it to be hidden in… a sign board telling you all about Roman York, and a magnetic cache behind it