2009-04-25 40 -92

From Geohashing
Sat 25 Apr 2009 in Kirksville:
40.4809778, -92.3527699
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About

The hash was in a cattle field a little ways north of US-136 just outside of Downing.

Expedition

excellentdude: I was in the graticule for work this weekend, and my girlfriend came up from St. Louis to visit me. At about 4:30pm I was done with my work, and we were both a little bored. Geohashing isn't really my girlfriend's thing, but I suggested it as something to do. To my surprise she said "Let's do it!" and mentioned that the idea of geohashing was growing on her. So we took off on the 35-mile drive to the hash.

As we drove toward the hash, the nice weather that had been in place all day slowly but surely became more threatening. When we arrived in the neighborhood of the hash it was not clear whose land the hash was on. We tried knocking on the door of the house just east of the hash, but no one was home. Not discouraged, we turned back and tried the house just west of the hash. At first, we tried to find someone on the north side of the highway since there was a semi and trailer there that appeared to be in the process of loading cattle. No cattle were being loaded, though, and there was oddly no one around. I say "oddly" because getting a semi to haul away a lot of cattle at once is not cheap, and we did not understand why they would be wasting time.

We then went to the south side of the highway to see if anyone was home at the house that appeared to be associated with this farm. The windows and even a door were wide open, and the Cardinals game was being played quite loudly by a radio. We knocked a couple of times, but no one came to the door. We looked over at the side of the house where some cars were parked, but still no one. With the house wide open and the radio on, this absence of people combined with the declining weather was a little eerie. We crossed the highway once again and noticed the name on the semi was the same as the name on the house. We then saw another with the same name on it. So these farmers actually owned a couple semis of their own. Still, though, no people. With a novice geohasher and not wanting to trespass on land with livestock, we decided we should be on our way.

We continued on to Memphis, and as we started out I took the picture below out of my car window. The hash is over the hill, near the trees. Although unrelated to the hash, we had some high hopes for Memphis. We had both heard of different good places to eat there. When we got there, we could not find either place, but were amused to find that the local high school was situated on Lovers Lane. We then headed back for Kirksville. When we went back through Downing, it appeared that no one had arrived at the house near the hash, so we just continued. A great thunderstorm began soon thereafter, and we enjoyed watching it from my hotel room in Kirksville.

Achievement

Notrespassing.gif
excellentdude earned the No trespassing consolation prize
by almost reaching the (40, -92) geohash on 2009-04-25.

Photos