A nice starting point is the refuge at N44 05.735' E007 21.383'.
From there it is a 1.5 - 2 hours hike to the lakes. The walk is not
extremely difficult, but it is also not a walk in the park. Do
prepare yourself: bring good shoes and whatever you need depending
on weather conditions. You do not need climbing gear or ropes. Not
for the cache.
It should not be too difficult to locate the cache. Maybe the
challenge lies more in being inconspicuous. Still, there is a hint
and some spoiler pictures at my website.
The cache name refers to a specific point in space, called
"Lagrangian Point 2" or L2 for short. It is a bit of a funny place:
there is nothing there but still you can make satellites orbit
around it. That's what the European Space Agency has done with the
Herschel
and Planck
spacecrafts.
Launched in May 2009, these satellites are now in L2 doing
measurements in the far infra red to learn more about the birth of
planets, galaxies, and the universe at large.
After a week-long progress meeting, part of the H-P project team
decided to explore part of the route towards "our place space".
Hiking to the cache location brought us a little closer to L2.
Okay, 2200 meter does not make a lot of difference on 1.5 million
kilometers, but you have to start somewhere. Some of us went even
higher, not me. But I am flatlander, so am I excused. Instead, I
hid a stash.
The cash is a flat tupperware box. The original contents are all
space related. And while it would be nice to keep the space theme,
don't feel too obliged.
- a copy of Stephen Hawking's "Brief History of Time",
(registered with Bookcrossing)
- a Space pen: writes anywhere also on earth!
- an ESA keyring
- some Envisat pins
- two entrance tickets to the Space museum located at N52 12.905'
E004 25.289' (please only take them if you plan to go there
sometime)
- a CD on American Space Exploration
- a "thriller" book evolving around Ariane V and this time not
about software bugs
- a pair of Delft Blue clogs (nothing spacey but these are my
signature item)
Note on cache maintenance: As you can read in the
cache description, I work for a space project. Our prime contractor
sits in Cannes, which is in the area of the cache (not by
coincidence). I anticipate to travel often to that contractor. For
example, the last 6 months, I have been to Cannes 7 times. This
will continue until the launch in 2007.
In addition, in emergency cases I can ask one of my Cannes'
colleagues to check out the cache. He is not (yet) a geocacher but
he was very interested when we talked about it during our
hike