784. Rockville, Montgomery County (MD05)

Completely ignoring the advice of Mr. Stipe, we rolled into Rockville with both happiness and regret. We were all happy to be one step closer to our ultimate destination for the evening, but at least a couple of us, myself included, were sad to reach town after sunset. One of the caches on our agenda was a Multi-cache that started at the grave of F. Scott Fitzgerald. That would obviously be unwise at night out of both respect and superstition. My spirit was somewhat restored by the courthouse. It reminded me a lot of the square-towered ones dotting the Midwest. But then I noticed a historical marker that reduced it again. I get that Maryland is traditionally the South, but it stayed with the Union, so I really didn’t need to know what Jeb Stuart or (especially) Jubal Early did in the area, especially since it wasn’t particularly salient. At least they moved the old statue, so there’s that. As a strange-statue aside, there’s a terra-cotta statue from the army of the First Emperor of China in Rockville. Had it been daylight, I would have wanted to see that. Of course, if wishes were horses, beggars would ride. Besides, the constantly inconstant drizzle over the course of the day had taken a toll on us as the night wore on. We needed our cache, and we needed it soon.

We pulled in behind some strip mall restaurants, wondering what cache lay ahead of us. We stepped into the grass to find a chain suspended on poles, marking off the back of the area. The GZ led us to one of the corner poles, so Godot reached inside. He felt something and started pulling at it. And kept coming and coming until …

… he had revealed an entire katana with a bison on the end! I laughed! Very clever! I gave it one of my stingily hoarded favorite points. We cracked it open and put our stamp on the log. Our work there was done, and we began to liven up as we got back on the road, bound for our final destination for the night…