Cow Spots

My team name is The Cow Spots --- for various reasons, but one side benefit is that my son (3 years old) loves cows. On the way back from Swamp Land in Arizona (GCEFA6) we passed a huge cattle ranch, where literally thousands of cows were mere feet from the car. I rolled down the window to get a shot of the cows peeking in to see CowSpot Jr. As I noted in my log, my favorite part of this picture is the cow towards the back who looks like he's desperately craning his neck trying to get in the shot.

How about "¡Mama! ¡Otra vez, Papa huele!"

I recently flew back from Minneapolis to Phoenix on Sun Country Airlines, a regional airline based in Minnesota. They made announcements at least twice during the flight that GPS equipment was not allowed to be operated at any time during the flight.

This is exactly what many of us in Southern Arizona have started doing. If we come across a Yellow Jeep, many of us have promised NOT to leave it in a roadside quickie. Out here, we place 'em on mountaintops or killer puzzle caches. There are 2 Yellow Jeeps in Tucson right now, but they must be earned. We haven't seen the White Jeeps yet out here, but I intend to treat them the same way. Get em, log em, and put them back out in the wild where the next cacher's going to have to earn 'em, instead of some out of town yahoo cruising through and stealing it. --Dave, The Cow Spots

Here's one where the cache survived though the logbook's a little worse for wear : that's the plastic pen melted into the logbook.

You could easily post the hints as ROT5, ROT8 (any ROT but ROT13) --- tell people which ROT you used, thus forcing them to do the decryption manually.

I got a fully functional Eagle Explorer GPSr as a first finder prize on a puzzle cache.

Well, one thing I'm planning on dropping there is a Washington State Geocoin. Nice enough? And, of course, several TB's I've collected from around here. Thanks to a Christmas present from an aunt in Bellevue, I've actually already got a Washington State Geocoin (they're the most beautiful coins I've ever seen in person) I'll probably leave one of my sig items in that cache also. Oldest existing cache on the planet? Oh yeah, I'm so there.

I'm making my family vacation drive starting in about a week, and I'll be hitting Mingo as well! Unfortunately I will miss you since we're probably not going to hit Kansas until the 31st of May or so. Leave something nice in Mingo for me.

I'm totally bummed that I'm not in a happy place in my life that would allow me to join the "Show me the CACHE" team that will surely whoop a** on the competition on that new NBC show. Jeff is still incommunicado in Honduras, I hope he gets back in time. In other news.... ... if you want to hear what a complete bozo I made of myself ... next week I'm the guest co-host on the internet geocaching radio show at GeoRadio. My show (episode 4) should go on the 'net on Sunday, May the 22nd. I even threw out a little plug for the San Diego area. Lemme know what you think. --Dave, The Cow Spots aka TT the Elder

I know there's a puzzle cache in here somewhere...

I saw this 2 or 3 weeks ago, and if I were in a position in my life to take 4-8 weeks off from work I'd be all over this. C'mon.... puzzle solving, world travel, and treasure hunting? I'd be so there. Good luck to anyone who has the ability to go for it.

Of course you can, but the accuracy will stink. Better to convert your coordinates to UTM (metric units for precise x-y distances) and do the circle math.

My two cents worth: The reviewer needs: 1) The false coordinates and the final coordinates, to make sure that neither of them encroach too closely upon another cache, and that the placement of the actual cache meets the GC.com guidelines. 2) Proof that it is logical, from the information provided on the cache page, that it is possible to solve the puzzle and proceed to the final cache coordinates or to an intermediate waypoint of the puzzle. This should be able to be done without having insider info or information which is not generally available. For example, I could design a puzzle cache in which you must know the order of books on my bookshelf -- inherently unfair since the information is not available to you. Or a puzzle where you have to email me to get coordinates --- which lends itself to problems since I could be selective on who I give that information to. I could also design a cache which is virtually impossible to solve. Case in point : suppose I make a "Beale cipher" code [one that involves picking numbers out of certain pages of a specific book] but I provide absolutely no information or hints whatsoever regarding the book involved. Unfair and unsolvable. This is why I believe that reviewers want at least enough information to satisfy themselves that a person can, with reasonable effort, find the cache because they were given enough info to proceed in SOME direction. If you're not willing to provide that, or not able to figure a way to prove that to a reviewer in such a way that doesn't compromise your puzzle, then I seriously doubt this cache will ever see the light of day. Regarding 'intellectual property' of this puzzle : Hrm. I'll just say that I've looked at nearly a thousand or more puzzles on GC.com (habit of mine, solving 'em from afar) and I wouldn't be surprised in the least if your 'grand idea' hasn't been done by someone else before. Many times I thought I had a great and original idea only to find that someone else came up with it too. Nothing wrong with that. Anyway........... What I'll say is that many times the hardest part of designing a puzzle cache is NOT making the puzzle itself, but assembling the framework of the puzzle and crafting the hints/guidance in such a way that it is not immediately obvious, but makes sense in retrospect. Some of the puzzles I've enjoyed most and had the most respect for were crafted extremely well to disguise the method used while still giving assistance, even if you couldn't see it at first glance.

Yeah, we should start sending TT's stuff to SVU for an instantaneous solution..... If the show last night was any indication, the Law and Order team wouldn't have any luck with puzzle caches, or for that matter any caches in general. I mean, come on.... it takes 12 cops to find a tupperware container? CowSpot Jr could have knocked that down in 5 minutes flat, and he doesn't draw municipal overtime pay. They managed to get almost everything about geocaching wrong. Some other 'highlights' from last night... * Buried cache, 'nuff said. * Cache description sounded more like a letterbox. * Cop was looking at the Etrex upside down The story, such as it was, could have been told just as easily without the geocaching angle. It would have been nice if they spent 5 minutes actually talking to a cacher before grafting that into the story. All told, I kinda wanted my hour back once it was over.

Have a crack at some of mine: The Cow Spots' Mystery Caches I'm particularly fond of Maybe I'm A-Mazed , Good Evening, and Channel Surfing for fun value, and for pure brain-busting pain, try Matryoshka

Little known facts department.... --- During the production of the movie Office Space the production designer Edward T. McAvoy had to solve a problem. How to make a stapler that was so special that the film's character Milton would absolutely not allow his stinking boss Bill Lumberg to steal it from him and keep it. How would one said production designer do so? Well, by giving Milton a fire engine red Swingline stapler of course! With this idea in head, he called up Swingline and asked if they made such a stapler. They unfortunately did not. McAvoy then asked: "Well, do you mind if I use your logo on the side of a stapler I'm going to paint red?". Swingline did not mind. So McAvoy took 4 staplers down to a local auto-body shop and told them to make them perfectly painted, just like you'd paint a car." Their handy work can be seen changing hands throughout the movie. Office Space was released in 1999 and it was not until 2002 that after many requests from movie fans, Swingline decided to create and sell a red stapler. It was in July of that year the company began started selling the Rio Red 747 Business Stapler (SWI74740). Since then, the stapler has begun popping up on desks in offices around the world. When someone see's a red Swingline on your desk, and they are quote unquote, "In the know", it really says something about you. The only thing bad about having one, is keeping people from stealing it.

There are quite a few good multis in Balboa Park, as well as a great puzzle cache (The Artist's Secret)

Yeah, good job on your 2K little bro. The obscene cost of gas prevented Jeff from driving out to Tucson to join us on our caravan of death to reach this cache: The Window We are all so tired and sore today, but it was well worth it.

Ever since they changed the log type for an event from a "found" to an "attended", I've felt that even the event planners would feel more comfortable with the "attended" option.

Phoenix area geocachers are holding one on CITO day : CITO 2005 #2 It is along a stretch of highway adopted by Arizona Geocachers :

Having recently cracked the Kilo mark myself, I want to pre-congratulate Flagman on reaching a Kilo and a half --- since you're at 1499, I'm sure it'll be in no time at all! --Dave, The Cow Spots P.S. Had to share this pic --- CowSpot Jr got to commune with his brethren this weekend.

A few months back I got 9 FTF's in a 2 hour period.

I couldn't resist pointing out this cache.