HoboCoastie

It's Croatan National Forest, not Croatan National Park. Permits are required for caches in National Forests in NC, but are fairly easy to come by. There's probably two dozen caches in there already if not more. Yep! Thank you, that's it. I did see quite a few on the side of the forrest west of Route 70 and some at the North and South trailheads, but none on the central more desolate part of the Neusiok Trail.

Really?!? I'm a noob, but I really love the hobby. When I make a cache, I intend to maintain it meticulously. That surprises me to hear that they don't last that long. GeoCaching is a bi-product benefit of my other recent hobby of hiking, camping, and just plain getting my arse off the couch and into the outdoors. I got out of geocaching a few years back and when I recently got into hiking I remembered Geocaching and was like "Doh! I could've been logging tons of caches on all the hikes I've been on!". So now I'm doing them all again and a lot of new ones in areas I had previously not known about until I saw caches there. In NC, I'll be living in Newport right in the middle of the Croatan National Forrest and there's a trail called the Neusiok Trail that's 22 miles long. I plan on doing a lot of camping in the area and I'm chomping at the bit to put a cache out there as there doesn't appear to be any.

I suppose I could do as you described and just name them similarly and sequentially (GoGuard1, GoGuard2, etc.) with a description of the caches' history, geographic movement, etc. They would technically be different caches with different names and accomplish what I'm trying to do.

Sorry, but traveling caches are no longer allowed. On the other hand, 3 to 4 years is a long enough life for a cache, if you don't want to, or can't, adopt it out when you transfer, so I would say don't let that time limit stop you from placing a good cache or two or a few. And thank you for your service. Thank you Nancy. I'll probably make one when I get to NC then. We're looking at buying a home there and maybe putting some roots down when I retire.

Howdy all. I'm active duty USCG and I'll be transferring this summer from Yorktown, VA to Atlantic Beach, NC. I've always wanted to host a GeoCache, but I didn't really want to count on having someone adopt it when I transfer. That's why I never created one 4 years ago when I was stationed in New Orleans. I know you can update the location of a cache. Would it be bad etiquette to create a cache and then re-locate it each time I transfer? I transfer every 3 or 4 years. I think it'd be fun to have a cache that has been found in multiple states. Thanks, Hobo

Wow. Great conversation here and an excellent problem that needs fixing. I've been Geocaching since 2008, however, I've only just gotten back into it and only have 10 found caches to my name and I would consider myself one of those "Noobs"...albeme a RESPONSIBLE Noob. I went to the website. I read the rules and treat all caches with the utmost respect and try to leave them better than I found them. I started geocaching with the free intro version, which I later purchased the full version of, and yes, I used a smartphone. I got back into the hobby due to my recent purchase of a Garmin GPSMAP 62ST. I discovered that when sending the geocaches to my GPS, the descriptions and logs were not available without a premium account. Most times I don't need this information, but I found I could use my C:Geo on my smartphone in tandem with my GPS to get that information without a premium subscription. Currently, I'd agree that I'm abusing the system in this manner (even though I behave myself), however, I intend on subscribing here directly as I like Groundspeak's easy interface with my GPS and I'd like to phase out the need for the smartphone in the event there is no cell service where I'm hunting. The problem is with Groundspeak's eas of access. Their database is available to all of these third parties who offer the services and apps for free. Why buy the cow when the milk's free? That being said, I understand Groundspeak's dilemma. Lock up the system too tight (become a paid only service) and you risk phasing yourself out completely. The database is already out there and other sources are popping up. Included with my Garmin was direction to their Open Caching website which features user-submitted caches. This site looks to be innocent of database-robbing as it is devoid of most of the caches in my area that are listed on Groundspeak's site, however it's not that far of a leap for a less reputable third party to use the database and build it's own user-base where it would no longer need to sync with Groundspeak. It's an honor-based hobby in the first place and no matter what your pleasure, there's always DB's that are going to taint it when left alone to do the right thing when nobody's looking. I'm quite sure that there's probably a paid member or two that are guilty of the same crimes mentioned in this thread, and it's not fair to say that ALL Intro users are bad and don't care, but what we can agree on is it's the people that make it bad and that's what needs fixed. What about an official GC.com weather-proof rule/etiquette card affixed inside the cache to increase awareness? Sure it wouldn't fit in micros, but there's not enough room to pervert a micro in the first place. I think Groundspeak has done all they can to try and improve the sport with PMO caches and their wealth of information on their site including proper etiquette and so forth. Sure there's a disconnect between GC.com users and the rest, but they all come together at the cache itself, so the cache is where the information to fix the problem needs to be IMHO.

Of these posts, I really don't see anything in here regarding Cache Maintenance. I'm pretty new at this but just going out today, I found that two of the three caches I visited were almost destroyed from water intrusion. Things I would have liked to have had with me to nurture these caches were perhaps: -Ziplock sandwich-sized bags to put cache items in to protect them. -A few log books to replace destroyed ones. -A box of small pens/pencils to ensure every cache has a writing utensil. -A small container of Silicone Sealant. This would work great to apply to the seals of the Cache containers to better water proof them. That's just some things off the top of my head. I'm not really sure if it's proper etiquette to do maintenance on someone else's cache, but someone has to do it so that others can enjoy them. Am I right?