Find 20 special caches... Meet the challenge!
Adams County lies in the central part of Wisconsin. It is bounded on the west by the waters of the Wisconsin River and the impoundments of Castle Rock and Petenwell Lakes. The southern edge of the county reaches to Wisconsin Dells, while the northern end is almost to Nekoosa. The eastern edge of the county doesn’t quite extend to Highway 39/51... but it’s close! Highway 13 runs the north-south length of the center of the county, while Highways 21 and 82 cross the county in an east-west direction.
The major industries are agriculture and tourism. Parts of four school districts are located in the county (Nekoosa, Plainfield Tri-County, Westfield, and Wisconsin Dells), while the Adams-Friendship School district is located entirely in the county in the central part.
Adams County is made up of seventeen townships and two incorporated areas. The townships are shown on the map to the left, while the incorporated areas are the City of Adams and the Village of Friendship. That’s it. The City of Wisconsin Dells has annexed some southwest Adams County land in recent years, particularly certain resort areas; however, the bulk of the city lies in Columbia County.
In 2001, Mr. Sandlanders got into recreational bicycling big time. He had a few routes that would take him out of town and on the nearby country roads, but he wanted to see more of the county. That led us to discover and research our own personal “Tour de Adams County”. Each day I would drive him and his bicycle to a certain township where he would ride a designated 10-12 mile route that we had laid out on paved roads, and then we would load up and go back home, repeating the process the next day. For the City and the Village, the routes stayed within the corporate limits, and parts of the courses were ridden more than once to get in the 10-12 miles.
We have made up other “tours” since then, but this one was our favorite, which is why we are making a geocaching “Tour de Adams County” for you to enjoy. To complete the challenge, you must find one cache in each of the seventeen townships and one cache each in the Village of Friendship and the City of Adams. You will also have to find this challenge cache (which counts separately and not as a township cache) and sign the log sheet to complete your “tour”. To make it easy for you, we have listed the eligible Adams County geocaches in a bookmark list to the right on this cache page. We have identified where each cache is located, and those will determine the units you will have to make one find in. You may send us a list of your qualifying caches, you may list them with your “Found It” log for this final, or you may put your qualifying finds in a public bookmark that you will share here.
If you are in the area without having found all of the required caches, but you want to make the find of the final, you may do so with a “note” log to the cache page stating that fact, then write a “found it” log on the date that you have completed the challenge requirements. All current caches as of the publication of this challenge cache are eligible, and you may count your previous finds of these eligible caches. Caches you own do not count as finds for you unless you found them before you owned them (as in if you adopted them). The list of Adams County caches will be updated as new caches are published, and any caches that are archived after the publication of this challenge cache are still eligible if you found them before they were archived. Determination of cache locations are by the given coordinates for all caches, including multis, puzzles, and letterbox hybrids. If you have questions about the challenge or about any caches that may or may not be listed in our bookmark, feel free to contact us.
How much of Adams County have you discovered in your caching travels? Have you traveled its sandy roads (two of them official Wisconsin Rustic Roads), its irrigated acres, its jack pine forests, its glacial rock outcroppings, its watery western border? Have you celebrated the City of Adams/Railroad Centennial, visited Roche-A-Cri State Park, walked on the Van Kuren Trail, pulled up to a boat landing at one of the many lakes, wandered its rural cemeteries? Have you found puzzles here, multicaches, letterbox hybrids, EarthCaches, virtuals, park and grabs? Have you bushwhacked? Have you found any caches placed by area legend The Lil Otter (now adopted and maintained by sadowskifamily)?
We are fortunate to live in Adams County and to have had some excellent caches to search out in our early caching days. Geocaching has grown since we started in late 2007, and so has the number of caches in the county (we’ve added a few ourselves...). We love living and caching here, and we love seeing photos of places cachers have visited while they are in the area. We would also love to hear about some of your favorite Adams County caches and caching memories here, so please share them in your log for this challenge cache.
This cache is in a public hunting area,
so wear blaze orange and take precautions
if you search for this cache during hunting season.