(Warning: This post contains photos that may be disturbing to some people, but are essential to the story)
I started the hobby of geocaching in 2001. It is recommended that people find at least 50 geocaches before placing their own. In 2001, I decided it was time to place my own. I looked for a location that was scenic and did not have any geocaches nearby. I happened to be hiking the Pacific Palisades Conservation Area recently. It is mostly flat, right next to the Meramec River, contains some farmer fields, and some brush. Not many people know about it, except hunters. There are many whitetail deer that roam the woods. There are no official trails, but contains some interesting bluffs not far from the parking area. Bluffs have many places to hide a geocache, so that was going to be where I would put my first geocache.
The day I decided to place the cache and get the exact coordinates so I could publish its location on geocaching.com, I asked if my wife, Elaine, wanted to join me for the hike. We parked at the conservation area parking lot, then walked about a mile before heading toward the bluff.
Just as we were about to enter the woods, I spotted something dark on the ground in front of us, abut 30 yards away. I was startled and told Elaine to be quiet. It looked like an animal that was big enough to hurt us. After a few seconds, I realized it wasn’t going to move. We cautiously walked up to it. It was a large, black dog laying on the ground. After initial examination, it looked like it had been shot in the chest by either a bullet, or arrow. It was hunting season, so we surmised the dog was shot by a hunter and left to die. The wound was still somewhat fresh, but the body was starting to smell. He couldn’t have been there more than a days. I made note of the coordinates of the dog. Rather than place the geocache at this time, we walked back to the parking lot to head home.
While I was packing up the car, Elaine was reading the bulletin board. She said someone posted they were missing a dog named Jake, fitting the description of the one we saw. There was a phone number. We drove a few miles to a gas station that had a pay phone. I dialed the number. Someone answered. I said something like, “This is Paul Konopacki. Did you put up a post of a missing dog at the Pacific Palisades Conservation Area? If so, I think we found his body in the woods.” I heard a sob, then the person immediately hung up. I was taken aback, but decided to just walk back to the car thinking I had done what I could. Suddenly, the pay phone rang. I picked it up. It was the owner. She said she was cautious about who was calling because she was a bounty hunter and did not want to be lured into a trap. I told her my wife and I were walking in Pacific Palisades and stumbled upon the body of a dog. I gave her the description and she started to cry. I said we could meet her at the parking lot and walk to the place where we spotted it. We agreed.
Elaine and I drove back to the parking lot and waited. When the woman arrived in her pickup truck, we walked to the location of the body. When she saw it, she immediately broke down. She wanted to take the body back home wither her. I had an old army blanket in the trunk of my car. I ran back to get it. We wrapped the body in the blanket. We found a long branch and put it through the blanket so she and I could carry the body out. The dog must have weighted over 100 lbs. We had to stop many times to rest. The blanket was getting soaked with blood.
At the parking lot, we put the body into the back of her pickup. She thanked up for our help. We gave her our contact information and went home.
A few days later I went back to the conservation area to place my geocache. I decided to call it, “Jake Memorial Cache” in honor of Jake. Later that year, we got a thank you card in the mail from the bounty hunter for helping her retrieve her loved one from the woods.
