DanOCan

I'm in the "I don't even bother looking for a challenge cache or signing its log if I haven't qualified" camp.

Really? Why not save the effort for when there is an actual problem? My Zephyr Creek cache was hidden eight years ago and gets found less than twice per year. It's an ammocan in a fairly remote location with a big enough logbook to last a century at this pace of finds. The cache very likely will outlive me. Checking in it every year "just because" isn't really worth it if you weigh the cost vs benefit. If someone reports a problem with it, THEN I'll invest the gas, the energy, and the time to do maintenance, but the once per year minimum you promote doesn't make sense in this case.

Agreed. Having met the OP a few times, I know his motivation was to preserve these caches and I have no doubt he'll maintain them as time permits. Some of the caches certainly appear to have issues that justify a disabling but Groundspeak's approach of disabling remote caches after 1 or 2 DNFs and stretches of inactivity is very troubling to me.

I'm becoming a much more selective cacher now. My current pace means 2016 promises to be my lowest year in terms of Finds in a decade. What kind of caches do I select now? Typically they fall into one or more of these categories: - Some sort of hike involved - Old caches / first caches in various jurisdictions - Caches which allow me to clean out my radius around home If there is a nice day outside and my meeting schedule allows it, I'll also try and pick off a cache or two if they are conveniently located near my office, but that's about it. I used to always be checking "Hey, is there a cache near here?" while out and about during my daily life, but that seldom happens now. Like VP said, too much chaff.

Not much. I'm an old school cacher. I care little about leveling up, joining a guild, or anything that pushes more competition between players in the game. Give me a decent container in a nice and/or interesting location and I'm happy.

I didn't look at any of the previous posts but my answers were all pretty close. 3.5 2.5 2 2 1.5 1.5 1.5 3 After further review (and peeking at the other posts) I'd be willing to revise my answer for Location 8 to a 5 because of the lack of branches to climb.

Naturally, your reviewer would have the final word on the matter, but I see nothing wrong with simply removing the challenge and leaving it as just a puzzle cache.

Double post but this one had a spelling error.

While you can't use the cache page to promote an agenda, nothing says the swag inside the cache can't contain information which would promote the shelter and its programs.

This is a perfect summation of how I feel. Really, the name in the log is pretty useless. CO comes along and doesn't see my name so he/she deleted my online log. I appeal to Groundspeak saying "I signed in so I want my Find reinstated." At that point, it's a "he said, she said" situation where I'm saying I signed it, the CO says I didn't. Meh. Unless I take a photo of my name in the log, there's really no proof one way or the other. In the end, it's a game -- not a notarized document. I'd much rather someone not sign the log in my cache than see them compromise the container, or writing in the log with mud/blood/whatever. As long as the finding of the log isn't an integral part of the cache (climb a tree, solve a field puzzle, etc) then I don't care.

I based my decision off the description of the cache, the location of the hide, and the reputation of the original owner.

What I do is pick off a couple when in the area and don't treat them as a power trail.

I find the preview window below the box where I am typing my log to be very distracting. Something about seeing two characters appearing for every key stroke throws me off.

It never made sense to me either. I once DNF'ed a cache that was part of a series and the CO sent me a message saying "Sorry, it was missing but someone else did maintenance for me so now that it's in place feel free to change it do a Find." Naturally, I didn't modify my DNF since that would be falsifying my caching history and being as accurate as possible is important to me.

I started hiking because of caching and dropped about 80 pounds over the course of three years or so.

I dislike any cache that I am able to locate, sign the logbook, and then be told that I am not eligible to mark is as Found because I failed to meet some arbitrary criteria. It has nothing to do with difficulty. I certainly don't complain about caches that require scuba gear or a three day hike so difficulty is not a factor. I simply believe the Found It log is a statement of fact and not some reward to be handed out for achieving some arbitrary goal. They should have been eliminated with all the other ALRs. My opinion and nothing I have read or heard from other cachers over the multiple years on these forums has yet convinced me to change it. These old quotes sum up my feelings perfectly: On the original topic, I think Souvenirs would be a great way to acknowledge an accomplishment without the need for a physical container to somehow earn credit for the achievement.

Just this week I had a Travel Bug (the tag anyway) resurface after nearly nine years and a fire. http://coord.info/TBKC3J

Sadly, that is the best advice. People will always try and find caches in the way that is most enjoyable to them, whether that means working for months completely on their own to solve a puzzle, working with a small group of friends over a few beers one night in a pub (my preferred method!), asking the CO for some gentle nudges in the right direction, going out with someone else who solved the puzzle, or turning to a spoiler site and not doing any puzzle work at all. Once a cache is out in the wild, it's pretty much out of the hands of the owner how someone gets the final coordinates and worrying about it will not help.

I barely can remember to bring a pen to sign the log; I don't expect I'll be carrying spare logs with me any time soon.

I agree 100%. I work to keep my caching history as accurate as possible and doing these sorts of things to "earn" a Souvenir would violate that principle.

I have had a couple of interactions with suspicious muggles who were not happy about my activities, but none have ever threatened to phone the police. I think a lot of people just can't wait to be the next "Internet hero" and get on social media to brag about how they stopped some sort of terrorist plot.

Heh, that's my thought too. If I DNF a cache there's two possible outcomes: I decided I never want to visit the cache again and Ignore it or I come back some other day because it shows as just another unfound cache. If it were optional I'd support the idea, but I'd hate to see the rendering of the map slowed down for a feature I can't see myself using.

Yeah, I know that's why I don't do many Earthcaches. Some of them have pages and pages of information to scroll through, just to find out what it is you're supposed to do and then some of the questions almost require an essay answer. I think it's great people are trying to share their knowledge and passion for geology, but if I'm standing at a great waterfall or canyon or some other geological feature, I want to enjoy the location and not spend all my time scrolling around on my GPSr reading. Of course, in our local area we went to the opposite extreme for a period of time where every glacial erratic around was being posted as an Earthcache and often required nothing more than "estimate the size". We used to joke erratic caches had become the lame urban micro of the Earthcache world -- cheap smiley but didn't really teach you much.

That's where the site's user interface falls down. It is quite possible to ignore the entire category that features your local Wal-Mart so you never need to see them, but it takes a long long time to do so, especially with more than 1000 categories to consider. The site requires a lot of tuning to make it tailored to your interests. I think the key to Waymarking is to not treat it like many treat Geocaching. When a Geocache is posted, many people feel the urge to find it whether it is specifically interesting to them or not. Waymarking isn't really designed to be the sort of game where you find every single one posted. I think you can apply a Waymarking mindest (find only categories that interest you) to Geocaching but it is much harder to go the other way (find every Waymark around me).

To me, the success is in the number of Waymarks more than number of Waymarkers. For example, some of the Waymarking categories I have listed as Favorites are: Ghost Signs, U.S. National Register of Historic Places, Covered Bridges, One-Room Schoolhouses, Classic BBQ and Sandwich Joints, and Abandoned Cemeteries. When I visit a new area, I can be pretty confident the local items that fit into those categories will be well covered and listed. Whether those listings were created by one person or 1000 people, the fact that their documented and searchable is the success.