allenite

It can vary a lot, but nearer to the end of May it should able to be accessed. Last year several cachers went out at the beginning of the month. The bay will be cold. When I went after it in June many years ago, it was still in the high 40s. The challenge of Power Island is that you can not dock on the island's dock (on the east side of the island) and leave the boat there while hiking around the island. Several people use a local charter boat captain, which is very pricey. I know of a couple of cachers that took a jet ski over years ago to the west side of the island and drug it close enough to beach it and went into the cache from there. The approach from the west side is shallow for a ways out and very rocky, while the dock side on the east is much deeper. Keep in mind, Grand Traverse Bay is large and deep (over 300 feet in the west bay) and its conditions are easily be affected by the weather. The closest launch is Bowers Harbor on Mission Point Peninsula, NE of the cache. Many people also launch from the ramp by Elmwood Marina in the SW portion of the bay.

The county seeker in me is hoping someone is able to find a way to get one into Kalaupapa NPS. This would finally get a cache into that elusive Kalawao county in Hawaii. As for my own, I am looking to follow the same format as the one mentioned above, though my downtown is very much smaller, it is dominated by the courthouse green. Much of the rest of it is plate glass windows with its only public green spaces being the aforementioned green and a plaza outside the police station, city hall, and the post office. Not really an area that is good for hiding my style of cache.

The 2010 version did double duty as a "10 Years!" event. My colleague just beat me to it.

Just saw this thread and though I would add a couple from my corner of the caching world. Michigan - MiGO Winter Social GCB2AD (2003) --> GC5GTMP (2015) MiGO Fall Fun Day GCG8K6 (2003) --> GC614ER (2015) Ohio - (all under username: NWOGEO) Holiday Shindig: GCKMP5 (2004) --> GC64QFB (2015) They have a running spring picnic in May as well that started in 2003 (GCG45R), but it was a summer picnic in 2004 (GCJKR2), before returning to a spring picnic again in 2005. GC5P28A (2015) Indiana: Indiana Spring Picnic: GCED89 (2003) --> GC5GDZJ (2015)

Like the previous poster stated, taking a canoe or kayak into Grand Traverse Bay can be a risky endeavor. The closest launch (GCT7Z9) is 3 miles from the island with a mile or so of open water. If using a larger boat, keep in mind, you can not stay docked to the island. I have seen a couple of ways used to get there. One is to go to the marina located around GC14EWP and try and hire a boat ride from one of the fishermen (usually $20-30). Others have rented a boat, though I don't remember the name of the rental place. One of my friends used a jet-ski to get to the island, which works if it is calm. This allowed them to get right next to the caches and beach it without hiking around the island itself.

Silas Doty is in my neck of the woods and would be considered high terrain for the area, but not bad. In the LP, check out some of the Menstown1 caches up in the Presque Isle County area. They get pretty lonely, but several will be 2-5 cache a day hikes. On the west coast, there are several dune hikes, which rank up there on the severity scale. The park on the end of Mission Point Peninsula by Traverse City also offers some great hikes. Sleepy Hollow Park, SE of St Johns has a pretty good hiking loop as well, especially the south end. I heard that Soy Based Biodegradeble Pixie Dust is a good terrain cache (GCCE91) offers a hiking experience as do many of the victorymike caches. The UP will offer the highest terrain caches as a whole. There is an event on Drummond Island around the first of August that offers a relaxing retreat with some nice caches from what I have been told. Pictured Rocks has some great hikes

I would love too see this as well.

I would recommend going to MiGO, http://www.mi-geocaching.org, and asking there. I do not get over that way too often, but there are a few cachers in Warren that would probably be willing to do so.

I have found myself on more than one occasion when trying to either do a quick search or log for a cache is typing in the name of the town (may have 60-70 caches) or using my home coordinates in the main page's search box. For larger batches, I usually use field notes or running through a list of codes I've wrote down. As I have found many or most of the caches in that area, sometimes it takes several pages of scrolling or using the maps to find the exact cache I am looking for. If finds were excluded, it is many times one of the first caches in the list. I believe it would be a useful feature to include a checkbox or radio toggle near the search box to exclude your finds/hides from the search results. I know that adding a 'f' variable to the resulting address bar will accomplish the same task (as is done from the private profile page link) and this is what I find myself doing many times. It would just be nice to have the feature available in a quicker motion.

The site is back up http:///www.nwogeo.org

Michigan has one main state-wide organization, MIGO, with different chapters for the different areas around the state. www.mi-geocaching.org There are a few other groups in the northern parts of the lower peninsula such as Northern Michigan Geocachers and Straits Area Geocachers (SAG). Best place to meet cachers are at the monthly Meet & Greets held around the state. There is a monthly evening event in Grand Rapids, and a monthly breakfast event in Kalamazoo.

Just got a post from the NWOGEO Facebook group. It sounds like they had a bad RAID controller in the server and that he is heading over tomorrow to bring it back up.

I just heard from another member in the group that server went down over the weekend because of some hardware issues. The administrator is working on bringing it back up.

One of my caches cost me $80 for the container and probably the near the same amount to prep it and have it ready for use. It is an extremely heavy container and I shouldn't have to worry about somebody taking off with it. I have a spare in case it were to happen, but I don't anticipate it. I have never regretted the investment (except when I had to move it) as it is a cache that I get a lot of compliments on and have overheard several people recommending the cache as a must-do to friends. Next to that my most expensive cache is around $20, though I have another cache in the works that will cost me over $100 easy, but that will be a very large container.

I am having the same error, using Firefox 3.6.12 and Chrome 7.0.517.44 Here is the error that my browsers are getting. POST http://www.geocaching.com/map/default.aspx/MapAction 500 Internal Server Error Response: {"Message":"There was an error processing the request.","StackTrace":"","ExceptionType":""} The PQ Map does work for some of my PQs: Bookmarks, Date Only, Queries center at home coords, restricting type (Virtual and Webcam/Wherigo), My Finds style query (Caches I Own in MI, OH, IN) Also any PQs limited to 500 caches are working.

Is it an ideal tool? No, but can it be used? Certainly. It also depends on what type of caching you primarily do. For urban caching, it will work fine. When I am urban caching, I use often use it even when my 60 is present. If I have a distance of less than 150 feet and a general direction, I can many times judge where to go. I used mine in Alaska after GW8 and got 33 caches with it, when I lost my 60CSx. When I was out, I had no access to power, so I quickly learned to conserve my battery. My 255 was purchased in April 09, so it is not new, but I still got around 4 or so hours of battery with it allowing me to cache for 6-7 hours on a charge by turning it off when it was not needed. When I looked at the next cache and saw it was a quarter mile down the way, I turned it off until I got closer. Also lock your screen when you are not using it, it will dim the screen. When you are closing in on the location of a cache, give it time. It takes longer than many of the handhelds to settle down. Under tree cover, the accuracy will degrade much more than a handheld as well. Also when approaching the cache, click on the top bar where it says arriving at [insert cache name] and click on it again in the page that comes up. This will give you a 2d map with a better updating distance than the main display.

Sure Moldslug, I'll go caching. Your area or mine.

Although I know that many of these remarks are canned responses, there is some difference. Nomex did archive another cache that same night in the Grand Rapids area. I received both of these archive notices at 11:45 PM on 11/5/2009. "For GC171MH: Super Fly #30 "Jiendo" (Archived) (Traditional Cache) Location: Michigan, United States 9.7mi W (15.6km W) Nomex archived Super Fly #30 "Jiendo" (Archived) (Traditional Cache) at 11/5/2009 Log Date: 11/5/2009 As there's been no cache to find for months/years, I'm archiving it to keep it from continually showing up in search lists, and to prevent it from blocking other cache placements. " "For GCGWAM: Tango and Cache (Archived) (Traditional Cache) Location: Michigan, United States 12.4mi SW (20km SW) Nomex archived Tango and Cache (Archived) (Traditional Cache) at 11/5/2009 Log Date: 11/5/2009 As there's been no cache to find for months, I'm archiving it to keep it from continually showing up in search lists, and to prevent it from blocking other cache placements. " I received the Jiendo notice first, followed by the notice for "Tango and Cache." "Tango and Cache" was disabled in June and had not been found since March. No response from the cache owner in between notices. In the case of Jiendo, he did add "/years" to the response. Although much of this response is a canned response, I feel the addition of years does seem uncalled for.

It was briefly mentioned earlier in the thread that Superfly previously cached under a different name, TEAM DESERT EAGLE. (Member Since: Thursday, November 25, 2004) edit: to add join date

Good points, jhauser42. The cache owner lives around five miles from the cache. October 4th was on a Sunday, so quick maintenance would be possible. As to the height of the river on that date, I have no idea, because I was not in Grand Rapids at the time, but I do know that in the spring it can be six or seven feet higher in many areas than its normal level.

The bridge is an old rail bridge, though I believe it is now used as a pedestrian bridge.

I am sadden to hear this. I never had a chance to add my name to the list of those who attempted this cache. The only times this summer I was in Grand Rapids, I did not have caching clothes or was unable to find adequate time to search for it. My post to the cache page last week was more aimed at a general explanation, which I guess we have now received the answer to. All I wanted to know was why it was archived with no apparent communication after an owner maintenance was posted. If indeed there was no further communication between October 4th and November 5th to the CO, then I still feel that the ball was dropped on this. If from the onset it was a suspicion of a container never placed, then it should been asked for a description to be sent to the reviewer of the container and placement. (Note: This may have happened, but it does not appear to have by the confused response from the CO). This does explain the very poignant archive note as well. I will stand by the CO and take their word. I have never seen a case with this CO to not trust them. Other of their caches have received quick maintenance (many times on the same day) when needed, why should I not assume the same on this one? I can see where this can stifle creativity in cache containers. My multi-cache has several people that have been unable to find the second stage and it is only a difficulty of 3. Many have asked for help including a couple around 1K or more finds. Only a fraction mention it in the logs. The stage has never been missing, but it is something different than the ordinary. The creative hides are what helps to keep this hobby interesting. How many times have any of us run across one that should be easy to find (That stubborn 1/1 down the street that is so many people's first find) and could not locate it? Should it not surprise us when we come across a cache from time to time that most people are unable to spot. Think of the first time one of us saw a well-placed custom container that seemed to fit the location so well that we assumed it was real, then look at the picture on the cache page for Jiendo. I could see where it could take a lot of manpower to track down a well-placed container. I hope the action taken on this particular cache does not become precedence or this could take a lot of the fun out of geocaching.

I will jump in as another MiGO member. I have talked with some involved with the Rescue Mission in the past because of seeing a few listed in my immediate area, one of which is on private property and I know the land managers of that particular property. Many of the caches in the Rescue do have a note published to them upon inclusion to contact the owner. I have not been around long enough to know when that may have started. The Rescue Mission is also updated in batches, it is not real time by any means. Several of the rescues are performed off the official Rescue Mission as well. Many of the cachers I have spoke with wait for six months or better before going out after a cache to rescue. One of the caches I retrieved was a cache in the Ann Arbor area. I was asked to get to the container by another member from the other side of the state who dropped a TB (the main reason for getting to it) in it without knowing it had been archived. Looking at the cache page, the owner had been contacted several times through various members over a 6+ month period of time before the cache was archived. When I picked it up, the cache had been archived for seven months. I logged it and told them it had been removed since it was archived. I also sent a message telling them to contact me, if they wanted the container returned to them or the site. I have checked the other sites occasionally to see if anything is in the area, so I have an idea if one is present. This was an old cache, but the owner has not logged in for a couple of years. I did not report this one to MiGO as it was not listed as a cache up for rescue. Concerning the case of state land, MiGO has worked with the DNR to be able to use the land. These permits are only good for one year. Some of the cachers have worked to establish exemptions for particular caches. When an archived cache is spotted on state land after being archived for several months or longer (especially with the big green MiGO sticker on it), I feel it is better to remove it than chance losing our access to state land again. Another common theme among the older Rescue Mission caches is to see on the archive note by the user is something to the effect of: "I placed while on vacation and now realized it may not have been the best place to put a cache." It was found up until then, but never again and in many cases the owner never returned to the area.