儿童英语读物 The Box That Watch Found Chapter 3 Treasure Found and Lost

“All you have to do is enter a zip code and the website will show you all the caches that are nearby,” Violet told Grandfather and their housekeeper 1, Mrs. MacGregor, that evening.



The children had spent some time exploring ***. They had tried to tell Grandfather and Mrs. MacGregor what geocaching was during dinner, but everyone agreed it would be easier if the children could show them. So after dinner they all gathered around the computer. Jessie sat at the keyboard and Watch curled up at her feet.



Mrs. MacGregor squinted 2 at the screen. “All of those are names of … what did you call them? Caches?”



“Yes,” Jessie said. “A cache is a sort of treasure box. And look.” She pointed 3 at a number on the screen. “This tells us how far away each cache is from our house.”



“These two, ‘Walk in the Woods’ and ‘Edge of the Forest’ are the ones we found today,” Henry said. “You can read what we wrote here.”



“But if you wrote in the notebook that you found the box, why do you need to go to the website and write it again?” Grandfather asked.



“You don’t have to,” Jessie said. “But it’s fun to read about the cache before you try to find it.”



“And if there’s something wrong with the cache, if it’s missing or damaged in some way, you can let people know that by leaving a comment on the website,” Henry said.



“This is all very interesting,” Mrs. Mac-Gregor said, peering over Jessie’s shoulder.



“All we need is a GPS unit and we can go geocaching on our own,” Henry said. “Mr. Robertson told us the local geocaching club has a few to lend to new members.”



“Hmm,” Grandfather said. “I believe I have a little handheld GPS.”



“You do?” Benny asked.



“Yes. I bought it a couple of months ago,” Grandfather said. “I thought it would be useful for hiking.”



“Could we see your GPS, Grandfather?” Henry asked.



“I’ll go get it.” Grandfather got up and went to the closet. He came back with a small canvas case that looked like a camera bag. Grandfather unzipped the case and pulled out a rectangular object with buttons and a screen.



“Hey, that looks just like the Robertsons’ GPS!” Benny cried.



“Do you have a cable to hook it up to the computer?” Jessie asked.



Grandfather reached inside the case and pulled out a black cord. “I’ll bet that’s what this is,” he said, holding it up. “I think there are some instructions in here, too.” He looked inside the case again and pulled out a sheet of paper.



“Looks easy enough to set up,” Henry said, looking over the instructions.



“Can we borrow your GPS for geocaching?” Violet asked.



“Sure,” Grandfather said.



“Can we go geocaching tomorrow?” Benny asked.



“I don’t see why not,” Grandfather said.



So the children got everything set up. Then they decided 4 which caches they wanted to try and find next.



“ ‘Squires 5 Point,’ ” Jessie read the name of one of the caches in the list. “Isn’t that the name of one of the hiking trails in the Pine Ridge 6 Recreation Area?”



“I think it is,” Henry said.



“Then I’ll bet the cache is hidden somewhere around that trail,” Violet said.



“I wonder if there are other caches hidden in the same area,” Jessie said. “If we go out to Pine Ridge, maybe we can find several caches at the same time.” She glanced up at the computer screen, then clicked on “find other caches nearby.”



The Aldens downloaded the information into Grandfather’s GPS. And the next day, after a good hearty 7 breakfast, the children loaded up their pockets with small trinkets for trading and set out for the Pine Ridge Recreation Area on their bikes.



They locked their bikes to the bike rack in the gravel 8 parking lot, then Henry got out the GPS. He turned it on and set it to find the Squires Point cache.



“It says the cache is four-tenths of a mile north of here,” Henry said.



The Aldens turned toward the north. They saw a dirt trail at the edge of the parking lot. A brown sign read, Squires Point Trail.



“That’s it!” Benny cried. “Come on, everybody. It’s down that trail!”



The Aldens started down the Squires Point Trail. Benny carried the GPS.



“I don’t know if we want to stay on the trail,” Benny said when the path curved to the left. “The arrow is pointing straight into those trees.”



“How far are we from the cache?” Jessie asked.



“It says .14 miles,” Violet read over Benny’s shoulder.



“Then let’s stay on the trail for now,” Jessie said. “This trail curves a lot. I’ll bet in a little while the GPS will be pointing straight ahead again.”



So they stayed on the trail. And sure enough, after a little while the trail curved back the opposite direction.



“How far are we now?” Henry asked.



“We’re 133 feet away,” Benny said. “And it’s straight ahead.”



The Aldens kept walking. The path curved again toward the lake, but this time the Aldens followed the GPS and walked off the path.



“The GPS says it’s 82 feet straight ahead,” Benny said as they made their way through the brush. Dried leaves crunched 9 beneath their feet. “Now it’s 67 feet … 42 feet … 30 feet.”



They could see the lake through the trees.



“It’s got to be around here somewhere,” Henry said, looking around.



They checked logs, tree hollows, piles of brush, the same sorts of places they’d found the Walk in the Woods and Edge of the Forest caches.



But they weren’t able to find the Squires Point cache.



“It’s not here,” Benny said sadly as he sat down on a log. They’d been searching for fifteen minutes.



“Maybe this one is harder to find,” Violet said.



“Why don’t we look for another one nearby,” Jessie suggested.



“There’s supposed to be one called ‘Muffy’s Hideaway’ right around here, too. It’s over that way.” Henry pointed back the way they’d come. “Let’s see if we have better luck finding that one.”



So the Aldens set the GPS to find Muffy’s Hideaway. Then they turned around and headed back to the path. As they walked, they watched the numbers on the GPS get smaller and smaller.



“It’s probably over here,” Jessie said, leading the way to a stand of trees.



The children searched every tree and rock in the area. But once again they came up empty.



“It’s not as much fun when we don’t find the caches,” Benny grumbled 10.



“There’s one more we can look for,” Henry said. “I think the ‘Chipmunk Challenge’ cache is going to be down that other trail across the parking lot from where we parked our bikes.”



The children tromped back to the parking lot, then crossed over to another dirt trail.



Henry peered down at the GPS. “It looks like this one is about a quarter mile straight ahead.”



The Aldens followed the trail up and down a hill, over a small wooden bridge, and into a thicker part of the woods.



“It should be right around here now,” Henry said.



The children split up and checked various trees. While they were searching, a boy and a girl came charging down the trail. They wore matching denim 11 jackets and looked a lot alike. They were the same height, same weight, and they had the same shade of brown hair. The girl wore hers in a long braid down her back. They looked around Jessie’s age.



The boy held something in his hand that looked a lot like a GPS. Were they geocachers, too? Henry wondered.



“This way!” The boy stared at the gadget 12 in his hand. The two veered 13 off the path and headed straight for Benny.



“Hello,” Benny said to them.



They ignored Benny, their eyes fixed 14 on the gadget in the boy’s hand. Then the girl walked around behind Benny. She bent 15 down and pulled a metal container out of the hollow in the bottom of the tree.



“Oh, you found it,” Benny said.



“Looks like we were looking for the same thing,” Henry said cheerfully as he, Jessie, and Violet joined them.



“We’re the Aldens,” Jessie said. “I’m Jessie. This is Henry, Violet, and Benny.”



“That’s nice,” the boy said absently. He and the girl knelt down on the ground pried 16 the lid off the container together.



“Is it in there?” the girl asked once the lid was off.



“Yes!” the boy exclaimed. He pulled out a stuffed armadillo and the girl squealed 17 in delight as she took it from him.



“Hey, that looks a lot like the armadillo we found in another cache yesterday,” Violet said.



The girl looked up at Violet. “Was it the ‘Walk in the Park’ cache?”



“Yes, I think so,” Violet said.



The girl rolled her eyes. “Then of course it’s the same armadillo. It’s a travel bug 18!”



“What’s a travel bug?” Jessie asked.



But the mysterious boy and girl didn’t answer. They stood up and the girl put the armadillo in her pocket.



“We got what we came for,” the girl told the Aldens. “You guys can put the cache back.”



Then they left as quickly as they’d arrived.



“That was odd,” Jessie said.



“They sure weren’t very friendly,” Henry said.



“They didn’t even put anything in the box when they took the armadillo,” Benny said.



“I wonder why they wanted the armadillo so badly,” Violet said.



“They said it was a travel bug,” Jessie said. “What’s a travel bug?”



“I don’t know,” Henry said. “But I think I know where we can find out.”