Inconspicuous to Ikea

The first time Diglett and I went geocaching was in the mountains near Yao, where although we still had the difficulty of the treasure to contend with, there were no other people around to encumber us. The other day we decided to up our caching stress levels and attempt some urban caching, in some rather populated areas.

Now the trick to urban caching is stealth, speed and looking as "I'm totally meant to be here" as possible, which, as a very obviously western girl in Japan is down right impossible. So instead I went for the Little Girl Lost tourist look, not blending in but appearing completely harmless whilst standing out like a sore thumb.

We began with a cache that Diglett had already found at a previous time, that I still needed to retrieve to warm up. We then moved on to the magilla of populous caches.

Right in the middle of an overpass that probably has more people traffic than anywhere else in Tennoji, it sits, out in the open, visible to anyone looking, but unseen by the multitudes of muggles passing daily. Appearing to find the photos Diglett was taking exceedingly interesting, but also needing a drink, I dropped the Mini-Turtle to mask my movements and snatched the cache, impressing both Diglett and myself with my lightning hands.

If only the rest of the day had been as successful, we had a pot luck kind of day, finding about half of the treasure we were after, but once again the trail lead us around some strangely beautiful destinations which otherwise would have remained unseen. We caught cable cars and ferries, we traversed bridges, ramps and man-made mountains. At the end of our travels we toddled over to nearby Ikea and helped ourselves to a well earned hot dog and a shuttle back to Namba but not before discovering the awesomeness that is the Ikea Gingerbread House, which like all other Ikea products are purchased flat-packed.