When you build a home in the wilderness, even a cabin is a mansion, and even a homestead is a grand estate.
Even so, the home built here over a century ago, known today as the "Ashford Mansion," was in a category by itself, and today has a spot on the National Register of Historic Places. It was built in Colonial Revival style out of solid-grain Douglas fir, with a porch enclosing three sides of the main floor and a covered veranda on each end of the second floor.
In its early years, three trains made daily trips to the town of Ashford with tourists, who then traveled up to the new Mount Rainier National Park in Mr. Ashford's horse-drawn buggy. Over the years, the home has also served as a hotel and an English-style bed-and-breakfast.
Today, the "Mansion" is again a private residence, though you are welcome to linger here a few minutes to take pictures and gather the information you need for the final coordinates of this two-stage multi-cache. You'll find the cache container a mile or two down the road near another historic homestead.
Final location: N 46 45.ABC W 121 59.DEF
To determine the coordinates:
- A = Total number of words and dates on the Ashford Mansion sign embedded in the brick wall.
- B = Number of letters in the name of one of the creeks on this property.
- C = Fourth digit of the year this house was built.
- D = Number of letters in the name of the woman who first lived here
- E = Number of letters in the name of the other creek on this property.
- F = Number of letters in the original name of this estate, minus 2.
Remember the buggy road Mr. Ashford followed to Mount Rainier? Today it's called the "Mt. Tahoma Canyon Road," and provides a scenic alternative to the straight, wide modern highway a little further south, and is your best route to the final cache location. Along the way, you'll see many more "mansions" and "estates," some of them palatial, some of them modest, but all of them grand in their own right for their own residents. Enjoy the trip through the canyon and down memory lane!
You can't tour the Ashford Mansion in person these days, but you can take a virtual tour on its website at www.ashfordmansion.com. The property is quite beautiful and worth a look!
2016 was the 100th anniversary of the National Park Service, and to celebrate, Visit Rainier and the Washington State Geocaching Association (WSGA) hosted the Visit Rainier Centennial GeoTour - 100 caches placed in and around Mount Rainier National Park. The geocaches highlighted the rich history, scenic wonders, quaint communities, and hidden gems of the Rainier region. The caches were released in four series of 25 caches each during 2015 and 2016.