2024-09-02 35 -78

Location

Durant Nature Preserve in Raleigh, North Carolina, United States

Participants

Plans

I had heard about geohashing many years ago on xkcd but had never ended up doing it. I recently remembered this activity and decided to give it a try. I downloaded the app on Friday, and due to the three-day weekend for Labor Day, there were four days of geohashes visible. I figured that of these, I was most likely to try this one (Monday's), as it was geographically the closest to me, was in a nature preserve I'd never been to, and was close to a trail. I ended up deciding to find it, coupled with some birdwatching.

Expedition

I drove to the parking lot for Durant Nature Preserve. It is a forested area with a couple lakes and some streams. I didn't see as many birds as I had hoped to, but there were a few, the highlight of which was a great blue heron. I followed the trails to get as close as I could to the geohash, which was about 100 feet off the trail. That area had a lot of pine trees and minimal undergrowth, so it was pretty easy to walk through. I wandered around trying to minimize the distance to the geohash until the app told me I was within the accuracy margin of error. I took a few pictures and continued the hike.