Geobun

Here's mine. I'm looking forward to seeing this one published.

Very cool idea! I think I might qualify with Hawaii to Alaska to Svalbard to Switzerland, Antarctica, Ecuador, and back to Hawaii. I'm local for you so you can use my name.

If it were by date placed, I could see it being published. But it's by date found, and we've seen denials on that even if it's not a streak. The cache doesn't explicitly state Feb29 is required, though the image indicates it. Hopefully they have loosened on the 2/29 thing. It was just disabled because of the 2/29 thing.

You got further than I expected. At least the Bi-Polar Challenge seems acceptable in theory. It failed the reasonably attainable guideline but appears to have gotten around the user-defined polygon guideline. It was easy to change the requirements from latitude to country/county/region. What wasn't so easy was finding people who have completed the challenge. I realize it's a difficult one to complete, but what's a challenge for, anyway? I hope GS continues to revisit the challenge cache requirements and tweak them as needed. Latitude and longitude are not user defined polygons. They're geometric lines and planes forming the backbone of GPS navigation, and the foundation of geocaching.

I like the idea of a "Bonus" cache after completing the two Polar challenges. Using the non-challenge Mystery/Puzzle type makes the most sense since it won't be restricted by difficulty. But it will take some thinking to come up with a "legal" puzzle that screens out people who have not visited the Poles. Alternately, if I publish the two Polar Challenges, it may suss out enough Bi-Polars to meet the accessibility requirement.

I think the challenge cache guidelines definitely are pushing in the direction of easier challenges. A few years ago, the brakes were applied with the adoption of a guideline that all challenges must be attainable by a reasonable number of geocachers. The most recent guideline changes state that even that isn't easy enough in certain cases. Even if a reasonable number of geocachers could attain a streak longer than a year, Groundspeak deemed that challenging geocachers to do this is too hard. Streak challenges are now capped at 365 days...and one find per day...with no restrictions on the types of caches. Is finding 10 caches in a single week too much of a strain? It's not a problem any longer. Challenge caches can no longer be time limited. Even if a reasonable number of geocachers have completely filled their "Finds for Each Day of the Year" calendars, Groundspeak seems to believe that requiring a find for Feb. 29 is too hard since some geocachers might need up to four years to qualify for such a challenge. There appears to be a new hidden guideline that forbids challenge caches from requiring a find on a Leap Day. Don't want to solve a puzzle to determine a challenge cache's final coordinates? Let's require all challenge caches to be at their posted coordinates (or as a visible additional waypoint). Even if lots of geocachers already have found 10 percent of the virtual caches in your state/province/region, don't even think about creating a new challenge cache that has such a requirement. Some people don't want to make the effort needed to verify that they have completed a challenge cache. All new challenge caches must be accompanied by an automated challenge checker, so you can simply click your mouse to determine if you qualify. Even with those easy checkers, is it still too much bookkeeping for you to remember which letters you need in order to find cache titles that begin with every letter of the alphabet? Let's get rid of any challenge caches that are based on cache titles (or cache owners, GC Codes, publishing Reviewers, or listing text). GS's desire to make all challenges less challenging has successfully squelched the Bi-Polar Challenge too. All criteria were met, except there were only 6 locals cachers that I could find who already completed the challenge and GS requested that I find 10. I may resort to Plan B and publish two Polar Challenges. What do you all think?

That'd make Antarctica a tad difficult since there are no countries in that continent. GS lists Antarctica as a country on their statistics pages. If in doubt, look at my statistics, specifically the maps page.

Strange, especially for a challenge that involves traveling veeeery far. No one is obliged to share their home location, it is for good reason not allowed to have challenges based on home coordinates. Thinking of visiting patterns I know there are many cachers from elsewhere that cache here regularly and of recurrent cache raids in my town by non-local-groups also from abroad. And for special challenge caches Austrians visit them if they can include it in travel plans. I find it strange too. I know there are cachers who come from all over the country to sign the log for the Jasmer Challenge, which is less than a mile from my Bi-Polar Challenge.

I could probably come up with 20 half-dones but that might not fly. What is 'in California'? Having found caches there? That would seem reasonable to me as they also can find your cache even if only visiting for holidays. For special caches there will be a target audience even from far away. For example there was a planned package tour of 25 German Austrian and Swiss geocachers to visit APE in Brazil. And California is a popular destination for people from all over the world. Maybe you could try to convince some north american cachers that seem to live outside California to find caches in California? iceweed MooseBob dunezilla STNolan polarnav Or look through all finders of the few Antarctic caches, I would think quite a few of them have also cached in the Arctic and in California. AnnaMoritz, Thank you for all your help with this. As I understand, GS wants the 10 names to be cachers whose home base is in California. I will look through the popular Antarctic caches and see if I can find more names.

I could probably come up with 20 half-dones but that might not fly.

Thank you AnnaMoritz! I just have a few more to go :-)

Once your Geochecker is tagged to your cache page at Project-GC.com, you can run names of local cachers through the checker yourself. Anyone can test up to ten times per day. Paying supporters of Project-GC have no limits on using checkers. Tip: Help your reviewer by saying "I ran a bunch of local cachers' names through the checker, and the following 12 accounts all passed: " The Challenge Checker that I have tagged for the unpublished cache won't run when I enter another cacher's handle with the error that the cache doesn't exist. **never mind, it just worked***

Does anyone here know how I can identify 10 geocachers in California who currently qualify for my Bi-Polar Challenge? that seems to be the last hurdle before publication. It seems the only way to be sure is if those cachers could run their stats through the checker on the not-yet-published cache page.

I'm curious how regions and country breakdowns help. There are no regions/countries in the vicinity of your Southern Arctic latitude. I can think how it might be done for the Arctic circle. Antarctica is a region and a continent. Per Progect-GC it is considered a country.

I am the CO of the Bi-Polar Challenge and I submitted a proposal to the reviewer that breaks down the regions into countries and counties. I'm waiting to hear back. The volunteers at Project-GC have been a great help.

That is more than I thought. That doesn't surprise me at all. Not too few people that travel (especially from Germany and from neighboring countries) travel a lot and far, some are very 'well-rounded' geocachers across almost everything. Example: I know of two Austrians (maybe there are more) that even would be successful for a challenge that combines (numbers for geocachers from Austria for reference where easily available) finds on 6 continents more than 30 countries (78 Austrians) minimum 15 cache types minimum 1500 caching days (153 Austrians) minimum 115 souvenirs (17 Austrians) minimum 2 DT loops (125 Austrians) (real) caches above 4000m or below -70m (real visit) Antarctica (1 Austrian) OR Scandinavian counties N > 66.5° (ca. 154 Austrians) APE in Brazil (21 Austrians) OR > 800 find on one calendar day (4 Austrians for one day, probably more for the allowed one calendar day) Groundspeak Blockparty (22 Austrians) GIGA-Event (473 Austrians) There would be enough audience from Austria and neighboring Germany and Czech Republic for such a challenge as it directed at geocachers that travel a lot. Like Jasmer, which is connected to traveling far for Europeans. Or like the Bi-Polar-Challenge, which is also connected to traveling far.

As of 8:00am pacific time, I'm still getting the 500 Server Error when I try to log into my profile. I logged out, rebooted my browser, and logged back in. Problem remains.

Since I was there on Saturday I thought I’d add my 2 cents: Hollister Hills opened to 4x4 vehicles in the Upper Ranch area before the geocaching event started. The folks who went after the new caches paid the entrance fee for the Upper Ranch and proceeded to the Hudner Property instead, which is only available for use by organized groups, and was to be used for the geocaching event later that morning. The gate was probably unlocked early so the organizers could be at Area 5 to register the geocachers and give their orientation before everyone headed over. I’m sure the last thing they expected was to have cache bandits come in before the event and sign all the logs. I don’t know if the FTF hounds deliberately trespassed to get to the caches or if they didn’t know what they were doing, but in the end they paid a hefty price for the mere privilege of having their GC handle first on the log book: They neglected to register at the event and sign the waiver, which might be against state park policy. They missed out on the fun game with the cards and logbooks, the free lunch, and the raffle with some very generous prizes. I think they also burned a few bridges in the geocaching community.

I have received nothing from GC.COM since 4:00pm yesterday. Could we please get some kind of acknowledgment that it's them and not us? a status report or just a "sorry?"

Same here. Does GC.COM even know there's a problem???

Yahoo!! (literally) Thank you.

Those maps were an essential feature of the cache page. It showed WHERE the cache was located. A quick check, and we knew the general location. Now there is an extra mouse click and wait until a new page loads. This is NOT saving time.

I'm planning on hiding my first cache soon. I found a good location, but before I do anything else I would like to make sure there aren't any puzzle or multi caches hidden within .1 miles that aren't showing up on my maps. Is there a way to find out?

I have an interesting photo that I would like to submit to Groundspeak for their home page. How can I do that? Thanks!