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Robots in Disguise LbNA #35316

Owner:Adoptable
Plant date:Sep 20, 2007
Location:
City:Manchester
County:Hartford
State:Connecticut
Boxes:2
Planted by:Troll and Goats
Found by: Hez, Grumpy and Mona
Last found:Aug 2, 2015
Status:FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFF
Last edited:Sep 20, 2007
When I was growing up, back in the day when MTV actually played music videos, children’s cartoons witnessed the invasion of anime; cartoons from Japan the likes of which we had never seen before. They were dubbed in English, and sanitized, but cartoons such as Battle of the Planets, Robotech, Star Blazers, Voltron, and others burst onto the scene in a beautiful fury.

One of my favorite cartoons was The Transformers. For those of you who are unfamiliar with this series it was about two factions of intelligent robots from the planet Cybertron who crash landed on Earth and continued their war here. The good robots were known as Autobots, and led by Optimus Prime. The evil robots were known as the Decepticons, and led by Megatron.

The robots were able to transform into various objects as they were “robots in disguise.” Autobots mostly took on the forms of automobiles, and other ground vehicles. Decepticons usually took on the form of some aircraft such as F-15 fighter jets.

This past summer Michael Bay and Steven Spielberg teamed up to bring one of the greatest cartoons to life as a live action movie. This letterbox contains two stamps; one representing each of the robot factions.

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The letterbox is located along the outer loop of the Laurel Marsh Trail along the Hockanum River Linear Park.

The parking area is located along route 44 in Manchester just south of interstate 84, and the East Hartford border.

At the small gravel parking lot there is a map at the entrance of the trail. It shows the inner loop, which is only .75 miles long. It also has a map of the 3.5 mile Laurel Marsh outer loop trail.

At the trail entrance take a right. You will pass the boat launch, and just past that will be a bridge on the right. You want to take a right and go over the bridge to begin the outer loop.

The Nevermore Series is supposed to begin but the first box appears to be missing.

I decided to place this box on the outer loop as the inner loop is getting crowed, and there is only the one other letterbox in the outer loop, but parts of it appears to be missing.

My clues don’t start until well after the Nevermore series, so relax, and enjoy the walk. The loop will take you under the highway at which point you will go up a set of stairs, onto the paved bike path, which will bring you over the river, and wind down the other side.

At this point the loop breaks off from the paved path, and you will again go under the highway beneath three overpasses.

At the last overpass you begin to hit the woods again, but the noises of the highway are unavoidable, and you will see a chain link fence to your right heading off into the woods.

Follow the marked trail. After a while you will see the fence again. This time it is right in front of you as the path leaves the woods, and makes a sharp 90 degree turn to the left.

As you come up to this turn you will see a large oak on your left. On the right side of the trail across from the oak you will see a large birch. Some vandal carved the initials IBM in it, but more importantly you will see two orange blazes on it to indicate the trail turns to the left. As you face the tree, the box will be at the base of the trunk to the right side of the blaze.

Here is the logo of the Decepticons. There is only the stamp, and an ink pad. No logbook or pens, and I ran out of boxes, so it’s all just in a freezer bag. After replacing the stamp you are ready to move on to find the Autobots, which is if I estimate correctly about a mile away.

Again, the trail is well traveled and well marked. As you continue, the trail will make another sharp left as indicated by a large boulder. Eventually you will come to another boardwalk, not the many “pallet type” crossways thrown around, but a large boardwalk like the one you crossed over at the beginning of the trail.

This is a nice section. You can see all the beaver activity in the area including their mound. I didn’t see any beavers today, but I did see several turtles, and a group of mallards. Earlier in the trail I came across a deer. I got about 50 feet away from a doe before we saw each other. We both froze, and she stayed there for about a minute before moving on.

Halfway through the boardwalk it breaks where there is a bench, and a small dock going out to the river. Continue on the boardwalk. When it ends you can take a left to a platform where you can get a nice view of the area.

At the end of the boardwalk the trail continues to the right. Shortly you will come across a large maple in the middle of the trail with an orange blaze trail marker. You will see a second blazed tree behind it on the left side of the trail.

Continue on the trail and just around the bend you will see another large tree on the left side, but it is leaning over the trail to the right.

Go to the tree, (to the immediate left is a clearing to the river) and look over your left shoulder. You will see a tree with about a dozen small trunks sticking out of the ground. The Autobot stamp, logbook, and ink pad are here.

**I was going to name this box "More Than Meets the Eye" as that was one of the slogans. That's what I wrote in the logbook but it seems that name is taken.I guess I'll know to do a name search next time"

I really don’t like using trees as landmarks. They get blown down, or can be moved. I’m more of a boulder guy myself, but as you will see there aren’t too many around.

From the last stamp you have about a mile to go to the end of the trail. When you come to the intersection of the outer and inner trails just remember to bear right.

Happy hiking, and letterboxing to all. It will be interesting to see who finds this first. I’m betting on one of the usual suspects; Rubaduc, Gizz, Party Guy, or Confederate. Don’t forget your stamp this time Rubaduc.

****Update. Well that didn't take long, and I sure called it. I got this e-mail from Rubaduc and Gizz the day after I placed this.

"With a challenge like that we HAD to be first, right :-)
Rubaduc (with her stamp) and Gizz"

Nuff said.



*****4/12/10 update. Well my buddy and I hiked the loop yesterday, and I was surprised that the last box, with the logbook, has gone missing. We did have record flooding last week, but the box was several above the river level. The first stamp is still here, so enjoy that one for now. I'll carve a replacement, and get it back out ASAP.