Blue Cross Blue Shield Vermont: Letterboxing: Make a Hike Into a Treasure Hunt


			This article is republished from our Summer 2006 issue of Vigor. Letterboxing: Make a Hike Into a Treasure Hunt By Beth Lewis It's a late Spring afternoon and my son Sam is booting up for a hike. No, I don't mean donning his boots. He's booting up the computer to launch our first experience with letterboxing—a hobby that began in Victorian England and was reinvented in America during the last decade to include modern tools and a grass roots approach. The clues we'd find on a web site would lead us through the woods and over three streams to net a small plastic box, a rubber stamp and an hour of healthy, active fun. Our letterbox is just one of the thousands hidden all over Vermont and across North America by volunteer enthusiasts just like us. Sam, who was born with a computer mouse in his hand and, at 10, spends far more time in front of a screen than he probably should, easily finds a letterboxing site using a search engine. The home page of the site displays antique stamps, maps and tools—images befitting a treasure hunt and exciting to kids of any age. By clicking on "clues" and then on Vermont, Sam retrieves a list of letterboxes that have been hidden in our region. To Sam's delight, he finds one in nearby Mills Riverside Park, a beautiful land conservation and outdoor recreation spot just minutes away from our home. Hiking Sam, his sister Josie and I reach the park and follow the route Sam found on the web site, beneath the covered bridge, then up the hill. Josie, age 8, pays slight attention to the clues and runs ahead, enjoying activity for activity's sake. As with most families, my children are very different: Sam, the cerebral, deliberate planner; Josie the active, in-the-moment free-spirit. Letterboxing seems a perfect way to combine thinking with movement to excite them both. Several raindrops fall and I ask if we should turn back, but Sam is undeterred. "It's not really raining," he says. "Follow the dirt path past the picnic pavilion . . ." He reads each clue with great authority—down a hill, past a clearing. On the way, we find perfect pieces of white bark that have peeled away from trees; we find light green shoots of new growth and multi-colored flowers; we even spot a small salamander— so orange that we can't believe it's not a plastic toy. Our walk is just 35 minutes. (Letterboxing hikes vary in length. Web sites usually tell you what to expect in terms of duration.) We reach the last clue, which asks us to sit on a bench near a stone wall and look down the wall to the right. Peaking out from the bottom of the wall are a few loose-looking rocks. Sam pulls them from the wall and finds our treasure. By this time, Josie-the-drifter has caught the letterboxing bug and she hovers over Sam as he opens the box. There they find an information sheet about letterboxing, a small notebook, several pencils and a rubber stamp. Josie pages through the notebook, where other letterboxers have signed their names, stamped with their own homemade stamps and made comments about the hike. She remarks that the box found its home under the rocks more than a year ago. Each child signs the book with pride. Next, we pull a bronze-inked stamp pad and our own notebook from our pack. We take the stamp from the letterbox—a beautiful hand-carved stamp featuring MRP (for Mills Riverside Park) and made by the anonymous creator of the letterbox. We stamp our notebook — the first stamp of many, we decide. On the hike back, Sam states that he will find every letterbox in the world someday. I hand him the information sheet I found in the letterbox. "It says there are 1,300 just in one national park in England," I say, referring to the birthplace of letterboxing, Dartmoor National Park in England, where an 18th century gentleman left his calling card in a bottle and started the hobby of letterboxing. Smithsonian magazine published a story on Dartmoor letterboxing in April, 1998 and started the craze here, where letterboxers share clues almost exclusively via the web. "Wow, there are almost 20,000 letterboxes hidden in just the United States," Sam notes. "Okay maybe I won’t find all of them. But when we go to Maryland, can we look for some there?" The next morning, Sam and Josie wake me at 5:30 in the morning to find another letterbox in our town. If you go If you go Be sure to remember you’re going on a hike. Bring water and snacks and also be sure to wear appropriate footwear. Flip flops don’t handle well on wet rocks or steep slopes and even easy hikes can include some uneven spots. Bring your own stamp pad and start a special notebook just for letterboxing. Some of the boxes contain these items; some don’t. You may also want to bring a pencil along to sign in with the box. Consider carving your own stamp to mark the notebook you find in the box. You can find instructions for doing that online at a number of sites. If you’re letterboxing with children, emphasize that following the clues and enjoying the hike are the fun parts. Our second attempt at letterboxing ended with no box. Weather, animals and unknowing humans may carry the boxes off. Consider planting your own letterbox. You can communicate your clues on www.letterboxing.org. Information About Letterboxing Many letterboxers have their own web sites, where they give clues and information. Browse the web for some really cool sites. For our first foray, we found everything we needed on www.letterboxing.org. This site, created by land conservation and outdoor recreation, gives clues for a variety of hikes and links to many other sites about the activity. Check it out.