Congratulations to MrsSpongy, Carolyn Halladay. She won the May SLAGA Adventure Awaits Monthly Challenge, which includes a $10 Gift Card for finding and submitting five geocaches each in a different county, one being an event cache. When asked why she chose to participate in Adventure Awaits, Carolyn replied, "It's a challenge I can look forward to achieving each month." She chose her May 2024 challenge geocaches because they were the nearest 5 caches in 5 counties to her home, and she had already planned a caching day with her friend, TerriBikes+, to complete it in one day, including two Illinois counties. Carolyn's entries were:
GCAGG20 BYOL? (St. Louis City, MO)
GCABBGZ Clues then a Smiley (Monroe County, IL)
GCA743K HAPPY LITTLE BIRDS IX (St. Clair County, IL)
GCAJP10 CREEPY CRAWLER #18 (Jefferson County, MO)
*GCAQ1JR SW STL Happy Hour - Untitled Editon (St. Louis County, MO)
Carolyn started caching with her late husband, Harry, in October 2009, while on a trip to Texas visiting their son, when he introduced them to the game. Upon return to St. Louis, they "could not believe all the caches in the area and what [they] had been missing!" They were then known as Spongy163 and joined the local caching organization, SLAGA. They went to many events, met and befriended dozens of cachers and started accruing hundreds of smilies. They accomplished huge challenge caches together with groups of new friends such as 'The Architect' and 'Mysterious Treasure,' and participated in Cachemas year after year with an FTF on Day 6, 2017. They set a goal to get their chairs for 10,000 finds and amazingly accomplished that task in spring 2017.
Sadly in November of 2018, Harry lost his battle with cancer. But Carolyn found and continues to find comfort from the SLAGA community and says, "My geocaching 'family' has been a big support group for me, and I now cache as MrsSpongy. Geocaching is my therapy!!" She now has 16,750 geocache finds. Her latest achievement was during her GeoWoodstock adventure with her friend Nan to and from Flagstaff, AZ. She added 3 new states to now total 30, found the oldest cache as well as an FTF in New Mexico, and finally found the oldest existing physical cache, MINGO, in KS! Many more adventures await Carolyn, as she continues to enjoy events, local caching and geotrips with friends.
