This weekend I took a trip to my brother’s house in Wabash, Washington, near the Green River. On Saturday we took our kids down to a favorite fishing/relaxing spot on the river, and I brought my Spot Messenger along so I could check in and let my wife track my whereabouts from home. When we got to the river I checked in, sending an automatic update to Brightkite and on to Facebook. I then set the Spot to tracking mode.
After spending the day at the river, we were preparing for the mile and a half hike back up out of the gorge, and I attached my Spot to my nephew’s backpack. Spot dutifully tracked us up the trail to the trailhead, but by that time I’d forgotten about it.
When I got home from my brother’s house, I realized I didn’t have my Spot. I pulled up my Spot page and took a close look at the track it had uploaded. Oddly, the Spot was not at my brother’s house, but at a house a mile or two away.
I hoped that maybe my nephew had gone to a friend’s house. So this morning I asked my brother to check whether my nephew had the Spot, and sent him the Spot tracking map.
Turns out my nephew didn’t have it. This evening I got a call from my brother. He had printed out the Spot map and a picture of the Spot, and drove to the house shown on the map. He knocked on the door, and asked the woman who answered whether she had found something that looked like the photo. She said she had, but how did he know?? He showed her the tracking map, and she happily handed over the Spot. She had been riding her horse in the park, and found the Spot near the trailhead. She’d had no idea what it was, nor how to return it. Turns out she needn’t have worried!