Princess Ronkonkoma Traditional Geocache
New York Admin: See previous note by owner.
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Difficulty:
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Size: 
(small)
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Located at Town of Islip Lake Ronkonkoma Beach
Princess Ronkonkoma was a beautiful Indian girl whose father belonged to the Setauket Sachem tribe. According to historians, the Sachems were one of four tribes bordering the lake in the mid 1600s, a time that witnessed the increased presence of settlers to Long Island.
Ronkonkoma supposedly fell in love with a settler named Hugh Birdsall, who worked as a woodcutter and lived in a log cabin on the banks of nearby Connetquot River. On moonlit nights, Ronkonkoma would steal away into the forest and make her way to Birdsall where she would watch him from the cover of the trees.
As legend goes, Birdsall was unaware of her presence until one summer night when the moon was full, and he, unable to sleep, he paced back and forth in front of his cabin. It was then that Ronkonkoma, clad in colored glass beads, caught the light of the full moon and revealed her presence. Birdsall fell in love with Ronkonkoma immediately. Her father, however, forbade the marriage and refused his daughter to see her lover ever again.
For seven long years, the two lovers continued their affair, sustaining their love on the messages they were able to get to one another. Everyday, the princess would paddle her canoe to the middle of the lake and gently float a patch of birch bark, safely embedding a note of longing. Everyday, for seven years, Birdsall would wait at the edge of the water for the piece of bark he knew would eventually surface.
In the last month of the seventh year, however, Ronkonkoma, bursting with the pain of her solitude, sent a cryptic message to her lover, saying only that she would join him in the morn. As dawn broke, the woodcutter, waiting faithfully by the riverside, say a canoe suddenly rise from the depths of the river and come rushing toward him as if guided by a magical hand. Inside was his princess, nestled amidst boughs of pine, with a knife piercing her heart. Without uttering a word, the heartbroken Birdsall leaped into the canoe and cradled her lifeless form as the two were carried out to sea to a life beyond the grave.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
Ubyr va onfr bs fgnaqvat gerr