PAL Day 2019

Indiana Military Museum, Vincennes, In

This year is the 14th Annual International Plant a Letterbox (PAL) Day.  PAL was May 25th but Lil Ewok, Daddy's Favorite Princess and I, went out May 18th and planted 7 boxes.  We went camping in the area back in October and thought some of the cities that we went thru on the way home needed letterboxes.

We started off in Vincennes, which is about an hour north of us.  We planted our box in a cemetery near the Indiana Military Museum.  We have not been to this museum but my husband keeps talking about it.  My husband works in Vincennes a lot.

Inside the birdhouse paradise, Loogootee, In

Then we headed east to Washington.  They have a huge park and we panted a box there.  This one may not last very long.  The park was very nice and busy and I just have a feeling that it will be found.  They were having an event the day were there but there were no people in the area that he hid our box.

The next box we planted was in a cemetery right on the highway near Montgomery.  This is Amish country and this was an Amish themed box.  We have eaten at a few of these Amish restaurant and they are very good.

Outside the birdhouse paradise

We discovered the next location when looking at geocaches in the area.  The place is called Birdhouse Paradise in Loogootee.  He has 6,000+ hand painted birdhouses.  His property also has painted rocks, statues, painted trees, bridges, steps, etc.  He says that people come from all over to see his birdhouses; school groups, geocachers, tour buses, etc.  Everyone who stops by gets a free birdhouse.

Fire tower at Martin State Forest

When we left the Birdhouse Paradise we went for lunch at Bo Mac's in Shoals.  We had stopped here in October and thought it needed a box.  We hid a small box in fence and enjoyed some burgers.  Bo Mac's doesn't have a restroom, we used the one at the gas station next door and got some snacks for the road.

We like climbing fire towers and we knew there was one at Martin State Forest just down the road.  It was a short walk from the car to the tower.  We planted the box at the base but had to climb the tower.  Lil Ewok only made it half way but the princess and I went to the top.  I think this fire tower is taller than the ones we have closer to home.  We enjoyed the climb, the view, and the breeze at the top.

Jug Rock, Shoals, In

Because we stopped for lunch we missed one of the placed we wanted to plant at.  We went back and planted a box at Jug Rock in Shoals.  This is an interesting rock formation that the kids liked trying to climb.  We should have did this box first because our legs were so shaky from climbing the fire tower I wasn't sure if I was going to make it.

On PAL Day itself I planted a box in a Little Free Pantry/Blessing Box.  There are no Little Free Libraries on my side of town but I drive by the Blessing Box every day.  I hope to stop by regularly and leave some canned goods.

We had a great time planting our PAL Day boxes.  The weather was beautiful and kids were pretty good.  Unfortunately, my leg muscles ached for 3 days after climbing the fire tower. I also got a small patch of poison ivy on my leg.  My 8 boxes were the only boxes planted in Indiana for PAL Day :(  There was a total of 106 letterboxes planted on PAL Day, which is the worst PAL Day count ever. 

PAL Day 2018

Last week was the 13th annual, international Plant a Letterbox (PAL) Day.  I planted one box this year.  I wanted to test out my new Staedtler gauge so I designed a stamp with text.  Between the new gauge and horrible allergies the stamp didn't turn out very well.

E is for Everyone

Another local boxer planted 5 boxes on PAL Day.  We have a new slogan in town, "E is for Everyone."  E = Evansville.  I got one Saturday morning, one Sunday afternoon, and the last 3 on Tuesday.  The stamps are all E's and they are magnetic.  The kids found some of the new boxes with me and really enjoyed the new stamps.

E is for Everyone

PAL Day 2017

Wednesday was the 12th Annual International Plant A Letterbox Day.  I went out on Saturday and planted a series of 3 boxes at the Eagle's Bluff Overlook and Park in Cannelton, Ind.

There is an old letterbox there.  It was planted in 2007 and I have looked for it at least 3 times before and never found it.  Other people found it but I could not.  I decided that before I planted my boxes I would look for this old one again.

Like the times before, I walk the trail that the clue says to walk.  Just like all the times before I count out 100 steps and I end up at a tall rotten stump on the right.  The clue is vague but says to look in the tree on the right.  I search the stump again and don't find anything.  We go back to a tree with a hole (80 steps?) and find a geocache like the last time we looked.

All the other times we looked we went ahead just a bit looking around a few other trees but turned around a went back.  This time we decided to continue on.  After a while we come to a tree on the left with a big hole.  The kids say I should check it out and there was the box.  We started looking for the box in 2011 and after 4 tries finally found it.

When we were done stamping we counted from the tree to the end of the path and it was about 100 steps.  So it appears that every time we looked for this box we were walking the path in the wrong direction.  You don't start at the trail head with the signs, you go up a grass hill to end of the trail that you can't even see from the paved path.  

We checked out the overlook when we were done with the old box and then headed off to a different trail to plant our new series.  The park is about an hour from where we live and I bet it will take a while for anyone to find our boxes.  But it was a nice day, we finally found the old box, and we had fun exploring the park.

PAL Day 2014

PAL Day was Saturday and I sure hope someone somewhere enjoyed it.  I planted two boxes and only one counted :(

Tin Man Brewery/Restaurant 

The first one was the Tin Man Brewery box that I made LTCs for.  It has already had it's first finder.  I am running an experiment with this box and it is going commando.  We will see how it goes.  Double bagging is big here.

 As for my second box, the clue was too old.  I started the clue and carved the stamp back in the fall but forgot about them.  I found them about a month ago and decided to plant them on PAL Day.  I made the logbook and spray painted the box the week of PAL Day.  Then planted it on Friday and listed it on Saturday.

Boehne Camp TB Hospital just before it was tore down. 

I planted it where an old TB hospital used to be.  It had been torn down several years ago but I think the location is interesting.  Also, back in the fall we had some TB drama in the Christmas family.

My oldest son was getting ready for middle school and had to get vacations.  He also had a TB skin test and it was positive.  We had the whole family tested and I was also positive.  He and I also had blood work and another skin test and they were all negative.

This was such a long, drawn out ordeal.  We had to deal with the pediatrician and health dept.  We ended up leaving the pediatrician that we have been with for 11 years because of how she treated the people at the health dept and her refusal to order a blood test for my son.

So, officially Indiana had 2 boxes planted on PAL Day.  I could have deleted my old clue and started another but with our number so low I choose not to.

My questions is, what happened to PAL Day?  Was everyone to busy with the holiday weekend to plant?  Did everyone boycott because of the new stricter rules?  I know Indiana normally has low numbers but the whole country is low.  According to the PAL Day widget it is the second lowest turn out ever with only 297 boxes.  The first year is the only one with a lower number at 269.

Lost a square or miscounted :)

I have been blogging and boxing less simply because there is nothing around me to find.  I started the quilt that I talked about a few posts back.  This summer I would like to box in Paducah, Ky (about 2 hrs away).  They have a quilt museum there and I hope to plant a box near by.  My kids are so excited about my quilt that I will make them all one too.  Not this design though.

I hope everyone has a fun safe summer :)

Letterboxing Staycation

This week 3 of my 4 kids are out of town.  So the baby and I have been letterboxing like it is 1999.  Well, letterboxing didn't hit my area until 2006 but you know what I mean.  On Monday we went around to several cities around Evansville; we looked for 6 boxes in 6 different cities.  We found 3 and 2 hitchhikers.

Cemetery in Patoka

The first box we looked for was in Princeton.  We had looked for this box before but come to find out we were looking in the wrong cemetery.  But we easily found it this time.

Our second box of the day was in Patoka.  It was supposed to be in a tree on the edge of a cemetery but we couldn't find it.  That was frustrating because someone had just found it in April.  I guess I will have to try again another day.

Covered bridge in Wheeling

The third box was at a covered bridge in Wheeling.  It was up high and hard to get to but I got it.  This box is part of a series of old bridges in our area.  We have looked for 3 of them and found 2 of the boxes.  I plan to try that one we couldn't find again.

For box four, we left Wheeling and got a little lost.  I missed one of our turns and it took us a little longer to get to Petersburgh.  We took the scenic route ;)  The box in Petersburgh was also in a cemetery.  This box was easy to find in a large stump at the back.  But the box was sharing the stump with a geocache and the stamp was missing from the letterbox.  The logbook for the letterbox was clearly marked but the box was not.  By looking at the logbook we could see that it was a beautiful stamp.  We sent a message to the geochachers but I doubt that we will hear back from them :(

Cemetery in Petersburgh

(Now, we were supposed to get another box in Petersburgh but my clues were jumbled and we missed it.  So we went back on Tuesday.  It was also in a cemetery on the way out of town.  It had been there for a few years but only had 2 previous finders.  I was excited to find this one even thought we went out of our way to get it.)   

10 Commandments at St Peters Church in Stendal

The fifth box on Monday was at a church in Stendal.  This box was planted in 2008 and was attempted in 2010.  I didn't plan on finding it but since we were out that way we stopped.  We couldn't find the box but the church was nice to look at.  

Box six was a brand new box planted in Birdseye.  The planter had 3 other boxes here but 2 went missing.  We were lucky and got them last year.  This one had a similar theme as the others.  It was planted inside the local general store and the guy actually knew what we wanted when we asked him for it.  That doesn't usually happen.  The last time we had to ask for a box we were at a restaurant and they looked for 15 minutes before they found it.

When we were done there we stopped at Ferdinand State Forrest.  We planted a 4 part series here for PAL Day.  The first finders sent me a message that one of the trees referenced in the clue had been cut down.  So we went to check it out and ended up moving the box and changing the clue.

Finally we came back to Evansville.  I had planned on plating 2 boxes at our county fair grounds.  We hid the first one with no issues.  This was a stamp that we has gotten thru the GAQLBE2013 (Letterbox Exchange).  Then I wanted to plant the stamp of my niece with the pig at the picnic area near the playground.  But there was guy mowing the grass there.  To pass the time we used the restroom and played for a little bit.  It goes down hill from here!  The guy cutting the grass runs out of gas and another guy brings him more.  And they sit around and talk for what feels like forever.  So we pack up and go home.  

New Harmony, In

Tuesday was a wet day but I was determined to get out and letterbox.  We searched for a box in New Harmony for the 4th time!  I can't find the blooming thing.  I give up, you can't pay me to walk back there again.

Next stop is a rest stop.  I have told you before that someone posted on AQ that they would be traveling around and wanted to plant boxes as they went.  I sent them a stamp and they planted it close to me.  I recently got a message that it was missing.  I went to check and it is really gone. 

Then we went to Petersburgh and got the box that we missed and came back home to plant our fair grounds box in the rain.  Nice thing about planting in the rain is that you don't have to worry about other people being around :)

PAL Day 2013

This is my second year to participate in Plant A Letterbox Day.  Last year Indiana had 2 boxes on PAL Day, they were both here in Evansville, and I planted one of them.  This year Indiana had 10 and I planted 6.  I planted one the day before and listed it on the actual day but the others I waited until the day to plant.

The box I planted the day before PAL Day was at a local library.  They are celebrating their 100th birthday this year and planted a box in every branch.  We have a letterbox at one of the other libraries in town that looks just like this one.  So we had to plant one here too.  It is in the park outside the library.  My kids really enjoyed playing on the playground here.

This creek bed is at Ferdinand State Forest.  We camped here for Spring Break and decided then that we would plant some boxes here for PAL Day. I planted a 4 part series from stamps that we carved last year for a Phineas and Ferb LTC swap.  I hope people enjoy the trail and our stamps.

These photos were taken at Hemlock Cliffs in Crawford Co, Indiana.  We drive by a sign for the cliffs several times a year while visiting family in the area but I had never stopped to check them out.  It was beautiful and I will have to bring my husband and kids back to see it sometime.