Sol seaker

Welcome home!! Sounds like a whole lot of fun!!! Glad you made it back safe!

Well it looks like at least a couple of people are interested in hiking to Monte Cristo before it temporarily closes. Perhaps we can have another event next year. Maybe a "Monte Cristo" road temporarily closing event. I wonder if any of the caches will be in danger when they build the new road.

Your seem to have lost track of where you are. By "the forums", you actually mean threads such as The Stands in Off-Topic. Why would you expect anyone other than the people you hang out with there to get your so-called "new joke"? Out here in what you guys call The Dark Side, your insider jokes aren't going to quite so obvious, or amusing, and we find most doughnuts to be overly sweet and greasy. I've known a lot of people in all forums everywhere to have a sense of humor. And you do seem to have hung out there long enough to get any "insider" jokes. I've also known people in all forums everywhere to accept a hand outstretched in friendship, which is what we in off-topic consider extending a doughnut to be. Even gluten-free people can appreciate an electronic symbol of kindness.

I've run across a couple of caches lately that have some great berry picking next to them, and I was only able to get a small percentage of them, so I wanted to pass the information along so others could get them while they're still good. This one is not far from Deception Pass, if anyone reading this is up that way, or going that way soon. This cache has a whole lot of berries nearby that are ripe right now. They're pretty good too!! Probably best to ignore those on the other side of that road. Private property. There are plenty right next to the cache though. The Honey Pot There are more on that road too. I was just there last Sunday. This one is in south Seattle near the I-5 and 405 interchange. The cache is either missing or difficult to get to because of all the, yes, BERRY BUSHES. Tons of them. Take clippers to get to more of them. There may not be a cache there though. It was a couple of weeks ago, at least, that I went to this one though. Blackberries. GC2BX6W There's an Organic Blueberry farm near this cache: Lights out Look for the hand written signs. You can pick your own for 2.00 a lb or buy some already picked for a bit more. They have some berries for sale cheap too. Also good honey. Not free, but really cheap. I may see you there. If you know of any more great places to find berries and caches, let us know.

I was more referring to Bill Lider's self-serving, breathless prose that prompted you to start this topic. Perhaps you'd care to enlighten those of us who don't play report button tag team exactly what is wrong with post 10. Lighten up. It was a joke. There are standing jokes in the forums about threads going downhill as soon as people say a certain word, such as entitlement or many other things, so I was just making a new joke about how the further along the thread is, the more the opening post gets twisted. I chose 10 arbitrarily. It is very often true though, the further a thread goes along the more the opening post gets twisted. No it doesn't happen exactly at post ten. It can happen anywhere, anytime. Have a donut

I believe reviewer Antheia has been lumbered is dealing with this contact her thru her profile http://www.geocaching.com/profile/?guid=58f91f8f-f9c7-4427-97bf-890e464b7bb1 But feel free to message me a GC number (if only to satisfy my own curiosity) Let us know if there really is a cache by a shooting range. We're dying to know if there really is a cache right there. But then caches are put a lot of crazy places inadvertently.

I walked onto a military shooting range- FROM THE WRONG SIDE when I was very young and foolish. I had no idea it was there of course. We had gotten onto this deserted beach, and then walked through the dunes to leave and found ourselves on the wrong side of some pretty large targets. Luckily they were not shooting. We would have heard anyway, had they been firing. You have never seen anyone leave quicker!!!!

A ladder should would make the one in the Snoqualmie tunnel easier! It's up really high.

I'm happy to wait until whenever you're ready Ambrosia. It was great meeting you at the block party! I'd love to go to Monte Cristo with you. Whenever you're ready is a great time for me!

I wasn't saying the sky was falling, I was asking if there was a problem. I knew someone would take it that way. Hard to not get one's words twisted in here, especially anywhere after post 10. Isn't there a rule on that one? (No I didn't look, so don't get your socks in a twist if you posted in on post 11) Is there anyone else planning on going out to find them before it gets cold? I'd love to find some other people to cache up there with. I found a whole lot in that area, and did the hike to Monte Cristo about five years ago or so, but recently looked at a map and there are tons of new ones. It sounds like we don't have to be in any big hurry though, if nothings going to happen until 2014. I'm glad for that because I'd love to go up again before it all starts. Thanks all for posting all the information. I knew you guys would have it!!! Keep the updates coming!!

I'm really sorry to hear this is happening. There are a whole lot of nasty people out there these days. As far as Groundspeak giving you help, their hands may be more tied than you think. My place was robbed recently. My expensive computer was stolen, along with all my jewelery and a lot of other things. The thing is, I know who did it. It was a neighbor who sat in front of my place in his car for many days before it happened. I've got other evidence too. When he broke in, he also stole the keys to my van. I tend to store stuff in my van, and now he takes things out of my van. I can't put anything in there I want to keep any more, and I've disabled the vehicle so he can't steal it too. Yet this means i can't drive my own car. I talked to the police again last week and the officer said that WA State protects the criminals, not the victims. She said there's nothing they can do. I said I wanted support. I wanted to plant a GPS device that can be tracked in something they would steal out of the van, and then follow it to their place. She said they can't get search warrants that easily. That easily????? They would have some pretty strong evidence this guy took it because we've got a GPS reading leading us there. She said we won't be able to get a search warrant for that. She said WA state protects the criminals. So this guy took a whole lot more than some boxes in the woods, thousands of dollars worth of stuff, and is still taking from me, yet supposedly I can't do anything about it. For those who will reply to my situation, please do so on the thread on this subject in Off Topic Forums so as to not derail this thread. Cameras and all sorts of things were discussed on that thread. If you wish to add anything you can do it there. Unless you're just offering to blow this guy away then PM me for my address.

Some people steal them because they think geocaching is not environmentally friendly, then they steal the caches, thinking it will stop people from coming there, when in fact what it does is create a situation where people are more likely to trash the environment because they try harder to find it when in fact it's not there. Other people do it because they are sitting on a mountain of anger and don't have the balls to deal with it and the situations in their life head on. They'd rather take it out on some strangers because it's easy. Other people do it for the attention. They know if they steal a string of caches there's going to be fireworks on the forums so they steal them then come in here to watch the show. There are probably more possible scenario's I'm missing here. It was probably a rhetorical question anyway.

I'm sure there are more that aren't coming to mind at the moment... Here's one in the Snoqualmie tunnel. The tunnel is under ground, so the cache is also. http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?guid=51afef6b-da65-473f-99d0-560cde81eb45 This one is not located underground, but you've got to go underground to find it. To find this one you've got to go through a one mile long lava tube. Awesome cache!!!! Great experience even if it doesn't quite fit your criteria. http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.aspx?guid=e54c5880-d8d2-4aac-a72b-1682322f38b5

Is it cruel of you? No, but if you want to know what cruel is, just wait til cachers start finding it round the clock, and wait until the neighbors get tired of if.

I'm not worried about this coming to pass cause it won't. I'm worried people might actually believe its just newbies taking these. We seem to have an old timer.in our area who has quite a large collection I hear. I quit logging bugs because I got sick of bug owners contacting me every day after 3 days, telling me to drop their bug. If it means that much to you, don't send it out. Peroid. Bugs disappear. I don't like it either, but its a fact of life.

I apologize if I misunderstood you, but "such as no caches on commercial property, period" made me think you meant "no caches on commercial property, period." I was merely trying to point out the futility of trying to implement that kind of a policy. If you state the policy the way you did, it empirically eliminates massive areas where people can currently geocache. When you modify it to start adding words like "clearly" you're introducing a judgement call that makes it pointless, what you think is clear and what I think is clear aren't the same, clearly. Areas where people can currently Geocache, while the hider checks the two boxes saying they've read the guidelines, and are in compliance with them, and the reviewers publish the caches without question under what I've described 1,000 times as a "look the other way policy". They could have nipped this caches on commercial property thing in the bud early on. I predate such caches in my area. We got an "Off your Rocker" cache on a Cracker Barrel front porch in very late 2004, and the parking lot micros started a comin' in early 2005. Earlier in some areas, of course. But that was the time to say "whoa, none of this stuff". That didn't happen, and I agree, it's probably too late now. Of course it's to late. Anyone who thinks that Groundspeak is going to archive half it's active database is not living in the real world. This is their bread and butter. You don't sign up an advertiser by telling him you have 2 million active caches and then come back a month later and tell them, well, it was a hard decision, but these five guys on the forum made a good argument, so we deleted a million listings. BTW, I have no idea the percentage of caches that are clearly on commercial property without explicit permission. 50% is probably way to low. I really like what someone posted in another thread. They called it the "Frisbee rule", that is, if you would show up and play frisbee there and not be bothered, then it's okay to place a cache (as long as they don't have a policy in place). Of course this is a loose guideline rather than a hard and fast rule, but it's interesting. I would not expect to be allowed to play Frisbee in a parking lot. The lot is for other purposes (parked cars) that I would interrupt.

I've been in a few situations applicable to this thread. One, the really tough cache was in a parking lot of a mall. The security did not like it there. I was new and just left. Others had complained on the cache page that the security had hassled them. In retrospect I would at least email the local reviewer if not put an "NA" on the cache. Now I know that an NA just alerts the reviewer to a cache. It does not archive a cache. Once I put the "NA" on the cache, it is up to the reviewer what to do about it. It's in their hands, not mine. Another situation we were looking for a cache in the parking lot of a skiing store. The owner came out and asked us what we were doing. Red-faced we explained. I told her that if she did not want the cache there I would be happy to report that. I expressed to her that her feelings about this were important. She considered the situation. She asked some questions. I told her (among other things) that the cache will draw people to her store. She asked me not to report it, that it would be fine there. A big part of the reason she said we could leave the cache there was that I expressed that I felt it was really important that if she wanted it gone to let me know and I would see that it was taken away (I would have reported to it the owner and the reviewer that she had asked it be removed, if she did). I think that was important to her. We need to be making a good impression on people about geocaching. If we're saying, "We can put our caches here whether you want them or not" it does not give the public a good impression of our game. If they want them moved, find out and tell the reviewer and the cache owner. There are whole lot of other places to put them.

Yes, you do have to click on the button for it to be an auto renewal. I've never clicked on that button, because at the beginning I didn't know if I'd get into the game or not. Almost 2000 caches later, and 3.5 years into the game, I do seem to have taken to it. I still don't have it on auto renewal though, because as you, I like to be aware of what is happening with my money when. Next year I'm likely to hit the button though.

No, that's just the camo.

I do agree with 4Wheelin Fool. We need to be smart about it. Just because Groundspeak doesn't have safety rules (and can't have them) doesn't mean we should ignore people's safety when placing them on public roads. We need to do this to keep our sport safe as much as for the safety of the participants. In WA State caching was outlawed in Olympic National forest, and I think the State Parks were having problems with it for a while. Our WA State geocaching association jumped on it and worked with the agencies and got caching reinstated at Olympic National Park (at least on a limited trial basis, and they have also got caches at a major Seattle Park again. The state parks now have a permit system for the caches. This makes them allowed in the park still. I wouldn't get too discouraged. If Virginia caches work with the agencies in question they might work out a working agreement between them. For one park (Cougar Mtn with something like 70 caches in the park) the agreement is to keep the caches within reach of the trail among other things. We just have to work with the agencies and find out what their concerns are and what they want. Many will work things out with us. Discovery park took years to get caches back in the park, but every year cachers did a CITO that eventually had an effect on the management. They came to some agreements there too. They did a trial cache, and now we have a few caches there. This game has gotten big enough where we just can't pretend we're invisible anymore. We are here, and we are big. We just have to start acting like we're here and we're big.

I don't think "giving" a FTF to the child would be very valuable at all. What would she learn from that?? There's a radio advertisement in my area that talks about "dedication." It talks about how things are achieved through being dedicated to doing it. We have these fast-food lives and expect everything to be handed to us, when in truth the best things are things we work for and achieve. This girl could learn a valuable lesson that good things come to those who are dedicated to making them happen. What fun would it be if everyone just stepped aside and let her have it, vs. her planning (putting the things needed by the door, setting up the notifications, etc.) and making the attempt many times, and then finally getting it? The latter example would make her feel like she had accomplished something. The former? Not so much. Boring. No accomplishment.

Great! Thanks so much! If you happen by the ranger station, maybe you can get some dates for us so we know how long it will still be open for hiking. (or I guess we can always call)

Thanks so much for keeping this going for this long!! I know these challenges are a lot of work!! Thanks for doing it and for creating this great challenge! I agree with Lamoracke's idea. Adopt it out with the new owner moving it to a new location. Challenge caches aren't about the location, so it can be anywhere. It's about the challenge. I hope someone takes it up. Caching in all the counties has been a long-term back-burner goal for me, but one I've enjoyed adding to from time to time when I can. I've hoped someday to have the time to travel to the far corners of the state to get the ones I don't have. I'd love to still do this. Thanks, also, for announcing this on the forums so someone can pick it up. I really appreciate that, rather than having it just quietly disappear. This has been a great challenge and I can see it having a long life into the future, maybe being passed along a few times, because these do take a lot of work!!

I hadn't seen this site before. I assumed it was no longer happening, but found out I'm wrong. This is obviously not manually updated as it includes the caches I found today!!!! This is more up to date than "cacherstats.com" check out the TOP OF THE PAGE on cacherstats.com It says, "Rankings for Geocachers with 200 or More Finds" There is a reason why it doesn't include all those cachers. There are TONS of them!!! Just start looking at logs when you log them online. It is far from 4% I've been paying attention to this off and on for some time. It does vary a lot depending on where you are. When I cache in cache dense regions the percentages are higher for sure.

:laughing: :laughing: Once I was walking in a park with non-cachers who would have been annoyed had I been paying attention to my GPS instead of their conversation. I discreetly looked around as we walked, knowing there were a number of them in that park. Found one. There is no requirement a GPS be used. I logged it with the story. Another time I found a multi on accident. It was disabled; the owner thought it was missing. I went to log it, and then discovered it was a multi. I asked the CO if it was still okay to log it since I hadn't found the other waypoints. He was so excited to get his cache back intact, I think he would have let me log it twice (no I did not ). A lot of people find them without a GPS at all. What's the difference?