Team MamaLlama

I've been stopped by the police a couple of times, but only once when it was more than, "Are you looking for something?" Once my daughter and I were trying to find a cache that was hidden in a big outdoor sculpture installment, but it happened to be located next to a small airport. Police stopped us, took our IDs and made us wait in the squad car while they ran checks on us. A middle-aged woman and her daughter don't look like your typical terrorists, but the cop said it is a bad idea for anyone to be snooping around the perimeter of any airport. I explained what geocaching was, and he asked if I had a way to get this cache removed from circulation. I told him I'd send a note to the CO to that effect. I did, and the cache was archived. I've gotten my fair share of scrapes and scratches, but nothing serious, UNTIL THIS PAST WEEKEND! I think the t-shirt on geocaching.com of the cacher staring at his GPS while stepping off a cliff (and the shirt says "Focus") was made for me. Boy do I feel stupid. I was going for several caches that were along our town's bike trail. One part of the trail runs through some big fields, parallel to the interstate but down from it (the interstate is elevated). I had my GPS on my bike, and as I approached GZ, I got off my bike and walked the 60 or so feet through the field to the cache site. It was obviously going to be somewhere on the bottom of the legs of a big billboard that was there. I was staring at my GPS as I walked, trying to determine which end of the billboard I should approach, when I stepped right into a very deep gopher hole with my left foot and fell (to be fair, the grass was 6-8 inches tall and even if I had been looking down, I wouldn't have seen the hole as it was perfectly hidden by the grass). As I fell, with my foot and lower leg wedged in the hole, my body turned sideways and I completely twisted my knee in about a 180 degree turn it was not meant to take. Yowzie! Talk about pain! I rolled onto my back so I could extract my leg from the hole. It hurt, but didn't seem to be broken, and I was able to put weight on it. I was not at a place where a car could get to easily, so I got back on my bike and rode the trail about 1/4 mile to a gas station (pedaling only with my good leg). I called my husband and asked him to pick me, and my bike, up in the car. Went to the ER, small town ER only staffed by a physician's assistant. He said the knee was sprained and should be better in a week or so. Gave me a referral for a physical therapist to maybe wrap the knee as I was supposed to travel the next day for work and I was worried about all the walking I would have to do. Saw the PT right before leaving on my trip. PT's assessment was very different. I was having trouble walking not only because of the pain but because my knee would just buckle. PT said my MCL appeared to be completely torn, and maybe the meniscus as well, leaving my knee very unstable. He recommended I not travel and see an orthopedist right away. But I had to travel, so the PT fitted me with a huge knee brace that goes groin to ankle, to provide stability for my knee so I didn't wrench it further while I traveled, and said he'd contact my regular doctor and get a referral for me to get an MRI as soon as I got back. I got back last night (traveling on an airplane, squished up in those economy seats, was not very fun with a big brace on and pain to bend my knee) and had an MRI done this morning. Now I'm just waiting to hear the results. The PT, though quick to point out he's not a doctor, said he would suspect I'll need surgery to fix the damage. And I was doing so well with geocaching lately! Well, hopefully this will only be a temporary set-back. But yes - FOCUS! That will be my new mantra.

Did you make it to the trail? Not yet. I'm in Philly now, did some caches around my hotel on Tuesday a.m. when I had an hour or so free, but haven't made it to the trail yet. I was going to just walk part of it (probably the southern part, starting in the park), but am trying to figure out how to take SEPTA to at least the lower end of he trail so I don't spend all my time just walking to get TO it! (and then take it back to my hotel). I hope I make it today, as tomorrow is pretty busy and I leave on Saturday.

Thank you much for this information! Hmmm...I was hoping to get out at like 7 am on Monday. I have to be back at the hotel by 2:30 pm on Monday. Maybe I'll look in my schedule and see if there are any other holes where I could sneak in a cab ride to the bike rental place, a bike ride along the trail, turn the bike back in, and cab it back to the hotel. Oh, I hate it when work conflicts with my geocaching! Team MamaLlama from AZ

I'm going to be in Philadelphia next week for a conference. I would love to do part of this trail, but don't have a whole lot of time. Since I'll be flying in, I won't have my bike with me. Is there anyplace nearby that rents bikes for a day? And are there other areas around downtown that I should definitely explore for caches while I'm there, any must-sees? Team MamaLlama, from AZ

Oh, you'll have to tell me where! We ran it by a music teacher, and musicians have solved it correctly as written, so no one has said anything yet about it being incorrect!

OK, so it does seem to be a combination of the two. But the difficulty of the puzzle itself is pretty subjective, no? I mean, a difficult hide, like the example with all the yellow balls, is pretty obviously hard! But for puzzles, it depends on a person's own background knowledge. So for example, one of the caches in our series is based on music. You have to transpose some notes from a C flute piece to a E flat alto sax piece, and then use a key provided to assign each of the sax notes a numerical value. . For someone who knows music, this wouldn't be too hard. For for someone who doesn't know music, it would be very hard, though with a little help on where to start and some googling, even a non-musician could solve it eventually. Another cache is based on calculus-based physics, so if you're a math/science person, it's pretty doable. If you're not, then forget it! I gave the music cache a 4 difficulty since it seems to be more specialized knowledge (it's a pretty tough hide as well) and the physics one a 3. BTW, I didn't write the puzzles, and wouldn't be able to solve them myself! My 16 year-old daughter did... Team MamaLlama

When rating the difficulty on a puzzle cache, should you primarily consider how difficult the puzzle is to solve, how difficult the actual cache is to find once you have the coordinates, or some combination of both? We have just listed a series of puzzle caches, and I don't think I was real consistent about rating the difficulty. I'd like to "fix" that, but am not sure what the general consensus is about this. Team MamaLlama

edit to delete double entry

Thanks again everyone for your feedback. Based on what everyone said, I went ahead and submitted the listing for review. It was published on Friday evening. The response so far has been positive, so looks like you all were right! (see the listing for "Great Start" at GC1G3CH). My daughter is already planning her next hide, and I have a feeling she'll never be content to do a "simple" "cache under a bush" hide! We'll see what she comes up with next... Team MamaLlama

Except I've seen the phrase "talking stick required" in more than one cache. It has always meant a pen/pencil in the cases I've seen. I know the original meaning is an actual stick that gave the person holding it the floor to speak. But I definitely think it's a term that's been co-opted by geocachers, like "muggle" and others, at least here in the southwest. Team MamaLlama

That's a good point. I'll change the description to add that the house and fence the cache is adjacent to is my own, so people won't feel weird being so close to private property. If fact, if we spot anybody trying to find the cache, we might just pop out and say hello. We had a big thunderstorm last night, with wind and rain, so we want to check to make sure that the cache can withstand the weather before we publish it. But then I think we'll just go for it. Thanks everyone for your reassurance! Team MamaLlama

I have been geocaching less than a year officially (account started in November 2007) but really less time than that in earnest. Of course, I love it, am getting addicted, and have formed a "team" with my teenage daughter. It's a great way for us to spend some time together, and we both love a challenge. So what am I nervous about? Well, making a mistake in general -- in logging a find, moving a travel bug, etc. I've read some rather harsh replies and comments on these forums, and don't want to be the newbie everyone complains about! But more specifically, my daughter is keen to hide a cache. I guess I am too. We have it all ready, I've written the posting, checked the waypoints numerous times, etc. But I haven't activated the listing yet so it can be reviewed and then published. I just don't know if it will be considered "lame" or too goofy or something. My daughter planned the placement, which is a bit unconventional (involving pulleys, wire and a cache that is stored high in a tree and lowers down when you move the wire --she's taking AP Physics in school this year, can you tell? ). The cache is located at the end of a neighborhood park, along our back fence, so we can watch it carefully and make sure the mechanism still works). We only have 28 finds so far, so we certainly haven't seen it all (or much at all!) in terms of cache placements. But I haven't seen one like this before. She wants me to activate the listing, but I don't want her to be disappointed if we get a bad response. Am I being nervous for nothing? -Team MamaLlama