So last weekend found us without a car. By Sunday we were all climbing the walls and in need of some serious exercise and fresh air. A lovely warm summers day but we were lacking in inspiration of where to walk. Luckily a new Geocaching circular had been recently published and could be accessed from our home town so we decided to give some of it a shot, if anything to just get outside! The trail is 5 miles long and about a mile away from home so we seriously had no expectations about completing it all, we figured we would walk as far as we could before the kids started to flag and if we crossed off a few caches, great!
So we set off from home and started the cross country trek to the neighbouring village of Wicken. Once we had reached the start of the trail Geocaches were regularly spaced and varied so the kids were kept interested, motivated and happy to cover the ground between caches.

Geocrazy hugs a tree at a cache site!

Gadget boy explores a geocache he found.

So several caches in and the children are just beginning to show signs that we need to think about heading back, we stop for a drink and take in the view and using landmarks come to the conclusion that we are pretty much half way around the trail, we ask the kids if they want to head home or carry on to the a nearby Pub in the village for a bite to eat, a rest and then walk home. It’s a glorious day so we were thrilled when they chose the pub option…..a nice cold Cider – bliss!

Views across the fen at halfway point. We live just beyond the church you can just make out. Blown away by the fact the children happily
Walked that far!
A lovely pub meal, rest and drink and we were ready to set off home again, the kids had heaps of energy still and the day was still glorious…..you’ve read the title right? You know where this is going….
So we head off home, stopping to claim a cache or two and taking in the arable landscape.

Skipping past cornfields, I love how happy and energetic she is after such a big trek!

Who knew fields of crops could be so exciting!?!

So we are about a third of the way home when huge black clouds roll in from seemingly nowhere with the loudest thunder clap. Oh crap!
The youngest is terrified of thunder so this instantly throws a huge challenge, along with what on earth are we going to do? We are in the middle of nowhere with an approaching storm. We run through the options; head back to the pub and sit it out then will still have to walk home, or we carry on and outrun it, home. Assessing the clouds they seem to be running parallel to us not towards us and given that we have not had lightening (ok inaccurate title, I know…) we decide to head home.
I was already impressed by the walking the children had done, turns out they could run the 2 odd miles easily. They never fail to amaze me my children! Obviously we abandoned the rest of the geocache trail and just got home as quickly as we could, turned out that we didn’t even get a drop of rain on us but the company of ominous black clouds and rumbling thunder didn’t make for a pleasant trip home.

Stay safe out there!