Sol seaker

So I guess it really is about what you want out of caching? Do you want to go for numbers? Then i'd suggest Spokane WA. They seem to have one every 500ft. Going for beauty? HIkes? To see new incredible places? Then I recommend caching in the islands in the Puget Sound off of Seattle. I've just begun discovering them. There are incredible places and experiences to be had. This is one of my logs from a recent trip to one of these islands. http://www.geocaching.com/seek/log.aspx?LU...10-49d50643515a There are Ferries to many of them that your car can drive onto. Some islands have islands off of them which have caches. you have to rent kayaks to get to those. Speakign of water caches, there are also tons of lake caches in this area too. There are more than I can count within 10 miles. Small boat caches are my favorite of all caches. Takes half the day to get one cache and you are left with an incredible experience. Once we sat in the middle of a lake for two hours, eating lunch and watching a bald eagle feed its young. It was active the whole time, diving into the lake. So many places to hike and cache here. I haven't even gotten the tip of the iceberg. We've also got the famed Ape cache from the planet of the apes movies. my Partner recently said, "so people come frmo all over the country for that cache?" I said "no. they come from all over the WORLD for it. "

We've got a lot of sadistic cache owners in our area. I try to log as many DNF's as I can because I know it helps the cache owners and it helps future cachers. If nothing else, it helps others feel better about not finding it too. BUt most important is all the caches that come up missing. If people aren't logging DNF's then we don't know if it' missing. Lot's of people are out there searching for something that's not there. I'm not perfect about logging DNF's just simply as a time thing. It takes a lot of time to log finds, and logging DNF's is a hassle. I try to do it but forget sometimes. I've gone back and logged old one's I've forgotten and written in the dates not accurate, but I want them to know I didn't find it. I don't care about the statistics. I don't know anyone in this community so I've got no one checking my statistics but me. And I've never checked my DNF's. Attempts are not failures. Hey I got out and tried. That's a success in itself. As for the sadistic owners, one in my area gloats. He says, "Please let me know how evil I am. I like to revel in it". I did not, and will not log DNF's on caches like that. Generally I wont' even look for them. A friend wants to put a second cache on evil sites like that so suddenly everyone is logging a find. I think that's pretty funny.

OK, I've got a good one to add to lighten this thread up. I went geocaching yesterday. I told my geopartner that i wanted something different. I just didn't want to go chasing caches in the city for numbers. I wanted to go somewhere for the great place, some different place for a different experience and find caches at that place. So we went to an Island. It's about an hour and a half away. We hiked down to a beach, catching a couple caches along the way. As we were getting a letterbox hybrid on the beach, a ten year old came up and asked us what we were up to. My partner decided to explain the game. So the kid followed us to the next cache and his mother followed him. My partner took the wrong way and headed up a path into a lot of nettles. The kid and the mother got into the nettles. I stayed behind to doctor them up, as my partner went ahead to find the general location and then wait for me. After finding the cache and having a nice lunch on the beach we headed back. We passed the family we had interacted with eariler on the way back. The mother kept saying to her husband that I was the one who helped them with their nettle stings. He offered us wine and beer, which we said no thank you to. he seemed to be looking for some way to thank us. "Why don't you go for a spin on our jet-skis?" It was almost a demand rather than an offer. I said YES. My partner was slower to want to go, but I pushed him. He had just an hour earlier seen their jetski's and wondered what it would be like to ride on one. So off we go onto their jetski in hiking pants, me in levi's and hiking shoes. I left my shirt on shore so I'd have a dry shirt when I got back. The tide came in while I was gone and got it wetter than if I had of been wearing it. We drove around in the surf for some time. We came back, and the owner said "Let me show you how it's done. Here, climb on the back." My partner said you go ahead, so off I went. The guy drove that thing like it was a bucking bronco. Being out in the Puget Sound, like a bay off the ocean, there were plenty of waves to fly off of. We went flying!!! He wanted to get the thing up to speed to be skimming on top of the water. To do so it meant we were flying off the waves!! At one point he executed a turn at high speed on a wave and we almost dumped. I was hanging on for dear life to as strap meant for the job. He yelled, "Are you still back there?" It was a great day that never would have happened if it weren't for geocaching!! Thanks geocaching (and thank you to some strangers on a beach)

Just by chance today I came across an article written in 2000 on GPS's The guy who wrote the article actually went to the heads of military in their top secret bunkers to learn about this for his article. There is some of the history on the Groundspeak website. Here's some more. The Global Positioning System, which was developed after the Vietnam war was not intended for civilian use from the start. It began because of all the soldiers who got lost in the jungle in that war. The first GPS satellites were launched in 1978. In 1983, after the Korean Air Lines Flight 007 was shot down by the Russian air force, when it passed over the Kamchatka Penninsula, President Reagan decided to make the system avaible without charge to everyone in the world. The Korean flight would not have been shot down if they had better access to better navigation systems. GPS system got it's first large scale usage in the Persian Gulf War in 1991, when 9,000 GPS units were distributed to soldiers. GPS guided missles began being used in 1999. In March 1990 our government installed "selective availability" to make their access more accurate then anyone else's, so they would still have the advantage in times of war. This made civilian use not very accurate. By Spring of 2000 US researchers and also foreign governments had become so good at correcting for the errors of selective availability, that on May 1st 2000, Pres. Clinton announced the signal would no longer be corrupted. Then, as we know from the Groundspeak website, a man from Oregon decided to test the new capabilities and hid a 5 gal bucket in the woods for his friends to find. The article says the very first GPS unit was five feet tall, weighted hundreds of pounds, had antenna and many cables coming off of it that led to a generator. Back in those days, it was hard for people to believe that there would be a day when they would be handheld and owned by millions. The stop of selective availability was one thing that lowered prices of the GPS units. It was cheaper to not have to include the methods of getting around this. OK, so there you have it. The full article may still be available, I don't know. It is the Nov 27th 2000 issue of the New Yorker. this article by Michael Specter, is called "No Place to Hide" Little did they know this would open up millions of places to hide!!!!

I actually think it's quite funny you've entitled your post "spoiler". A "spoiler" is when someone shows exactly where the cache is. In geocaching the coordinates are SUPPOSED to show exactly where the cache is. If the newly posted coordinates posted show exactly where the cache is, then they are correct to post corrected coordinates. If the newly posted coordinates are not correct, what have you got to lose by leaving them there? No one is obligated to use them. If other cachers do use them and they lead them astray, then that is up to them for using them. If they help someone find the cache, this is not a spoiler, because the coordinates are SUPPOSED to help you find the cache. Some may not realize it, but the point of this game IS finding things. Although many who hide caches, especially the evil micros around my house for instance, do not want their caches to be found. Even in those cases, they need to post the correct coordinates.

Well I for one, don't blame you. I suppose this is easy for many, I guess.... but I'm new to puzzle caches myself and have the most trouble with ones that dont' tell you what you need to do to solve the puzzle. I'm new at this too. I've got many that I've got on the back burner and will go back to and do as soon as I figure them out. I've just done a couple easy ones where the question is clear, but I have yet to do one where the question is not clear.

I'd say, they should call their local geocaching rep and see if THEY want to contact the cache OWNER and have them come pick it up. I actually DID contact my local police and tell them i'd be happy to be a local geocaching rep and that I'd be happy to come talk to them about geocaching, etc. . The woman said she'd get back to me but she never did. I guess they want the bomb squad to have something to practice on. They've got to get some excitement somewhere. (Perhaps we could get them to find caches for exctitement instead?)

Just be sure it's a good container. A book cache near here had just one book it in, and it was sopping wet and moldy!!! YUCK!!!! I could have rung it out!! It was a hike in cache, so I packed the book out. And even if it's a good container, please do regular mainance checks on it. THis one was in an area that got a lot of snow, which seems to do in caches that are not quite watertight. In the proper container in a good area, it's a great idea!!!!

The one I saw (actually there was more than one) where the guy logged Belgium, Texas, Germany, Italy, mississippi and north carolina in one day. (or something like that) THAT was a geocache run!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Try to top that one!! These were all virual caches by the way. Look at it this way, We are the first to know of the coming alien invasion. Who else could be getting all those caches in one day but someone with a space ship? Now come on, really? So we are the first to really learn about their presence here on our planet because we all happen to be geocachers. It's an honor really. If you don't like the honor, then delete delete!!

http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_detai...98-a6982beba763 This is the White River History Cache. I don't need to do any research on this one. Or, I could site the book I just read: "Black Elk Speaks" Awesome book!!! This site has two monuments that lament the loss of settlers to the Indians. the "wrong" part is that the whites were always playing "victim" of the indians. They were doing US wrong. And who was taking over who's space? Who made treaties and broke them continuously? Yes those savages are out to get us all, when in fact they were for the most part pretty peaceful. Black Elk Speaks talks about how much they tried to keep away from the white men and only responded with violence after significant injustices were done to them. But history is written by the victor, so the white man can say anything they want.

Well I didn't think of that one. And all this time I've been finding other people's caches. I've always thought the cause of logs like that (three states in one day, or better yet, 2 countries and 3 states in one day, on one i saw, beatss yours!) Were all the cause of the aliens finally joining in on our game and using space crafts. I think that's what it really comes down to. So if you want to piss off a bunch of aliens, be my guest. Just don't mention my name!!! I actually just found one today myself. Interesting way people play this game. He logged "found" and then wrote in, "sorry didn't sign the log because I couldn't find the cache." Not sure what exactly it was that he did find. This cache happens to be one I've been bugging the owner to replace It's got a huge list of DNF's and the owner said to me in an email that it's not that hard. He's probably in conjuction with the aliens no doubt. I wrote as nice of a letter as I could to this new cacher and provided links to pages on HOW TO PLAY THIS GAME. (which states you have to sign the log before you can log it online) But aliens probably can't read english anyway, or the other languages listed, so until we get these sites translated into off world languages, we'll just have to put up with them not knowing how to play the game. Oh well. I guess that leaves me to just focus on my own game.

My favorite was a fire hydrant--- yes a real one-- -but no it wasn't hooked up. The entire top of it, where usually there are huge bolts holding it together, the bolts were missing. The whole top slid off to reveal a large cache contanier inside. The fire hydrant was up by someone's house, in a weird place to begin with. Well it was student dorms really. You can find anything at student dorms I suppose. Library hides are strange. Some are in books on shelves. I've come across electrical boxes a few times. I had heard of them, but when I checked in the first one I found my geo-partner thought I'd gone nuts and was getting into stuff I shouldn't have. It was on the side of an electrical box, a large one that was real. I've come across two small electrical cover plates. These are just metal covers the size of an electrical outlet cover but without any holes. THey are kept on magnetically. One was on the roof of the glass museum, the other was next to a boat that was on display at the dock. The boat is out of the water, it's a historical boat, and it's got you searching all over and under this boat, when the cache is in the electrical box nearby. The nano caches that are the size of your fingernail are getting popular around here. We came across two cachers in a local park that were pulling their hair out. We didn't know they were caching at first and just thought we'd walk around to check things out. I saw the GPS and started a conversation. They had been looking for 45 min. and were about to give up. I told my friend to go back to the car and get his GPS and we'd give it a try (he's got the best one). As he started to walk off I looked down at the base of the park bench through the metal grill. "Oh nevermind" I called to him. "I've got it". It was a super small magnetic nano next to the bolts, masquerading as a bolt. We'd seen them before so I knew what to look for. The newbies' were amazed anything could be that small and still hold a log. the fake bird house was pretty cool. I hated the micro under a rock in a drainage area that was like a long driveway filled with rocks. There's one I haven't gone for yet that has to be found at night. There is a path of reflective tabs on trees in the woods. You have to follow them with a strong flashlight. That one sounds cool but I don't cache at night. Another night one is on a wall that is plain in the day, but they light it up at night to be a work of art. My very favorites are all of the lake caches around here. There are TONS of lakes within ten miles of my house and within 15 miles there are probably some 20 lake caches. Probably more that I haven't found yet. These are ones that you HAVE to get by boat. I have an inflatable rubber boat so we go out on these small lakes to find the caches. That is definately a good example of the journey being more profitable than the find!! We've had some marvelous times. Of course we always take a picnic lunch. This area specializes in tough micros. I haven't found all of them yet. I'm sure there are many more stories to come.

I think your using this discussion as a back-door to advertising your website. This was my first immediate impression. I'm sure that's advertising for his website. My second impression was that cheating used to really get me going. really got me mad. Now I don't care so much how others play. I spent 3 hours getting one boat cache last weekend, rather than driving down the road and going the for the numbers. That's my choice. My third impression was I wondered whether a couple particularly evil caches in my area were on that list. (Especially one where only a couple of people found it and they are friends with the cache owner.)

We just found one very similar to that here in Washington State. My geo-partner found it and practically jumped out of his skin when he looked in a stump and it was peering back at him!!!! I was sorry I hadn't taken a picture of it, then I saw yours and was glad someone posted one.

The ones I've seen have either been secured with a hole drilled into the fence cap, and a wire put through it to a nut on the outside (obvious only if you are looking for it) or better yet, what looks like "Liquid Weld" which is a really good epoxy that works on metal, plastic and many other materials. I found one that stumped me for a moment because the cap was on tight. A motorist drove up to a screeching halt in the middle of the street, blocking traffic and asked if I was geocaching. I said yes. He said, do you want a hint? He pointed out the one cap was different than the others. I had tried it already, so was glad to learn you had to really yank on this one!!

dern double posts

Hot water is the WORST thing to do after an exposure to poison oak or ivy. This opens up your pores and let's it get in much better. They talk a lot about this in advanced wilderness first aid class through the red cross. Most people start out not reacting to poison oak/ ivy. The reaction is an allergic reaction to the oils, not the oils themselves (thus this is why deer can eat it, they are not allergic). This is an allergy that builds with time. In other words, the more you are exposed to it the worse your reaction. I've heard my story a million times: I used to run through it with no reaction (or in the other person's case who posted on this thread: they used to be able to take hot showers after being exposed to it without catching it). But the more you are exposed the worse it gets. Finally after not worrying about it for years, and never getting it, one exposure spread all over my entire body so badly I had to take steriods to recover. So the moral: don't take it for granted when you cant' get it. Don't take people's word for good remedies who never get it. Carry a small piece of fels naptha soap with you (lighter, cheaper, safer and at least as effective as technu) and wash RIGHT after exposure to it. (I just use my water bottle and drop everything right there and wash)

Usually I hate to reply when someone else has my reply, but I've got to this time for emphasis. and some additional info. Fels Naptha soap is the best, not only for gear, but for your body. You need to wash the oils off of you RIGHT AWAY when you come in contact with the poison oak or poison ivy so you won't get it. I carry a small chunk of this soap in my first aid kit. I also, by the way, use it for nettles and anything else I get into. It is also SSSSOOOOOOO much CHEAPER than Technu!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It can be found in the laundry soap section of most good stores in a bar form. It only comes in bar form, so, as someone else suggested, to put it into your laundry just shave it. You can also wet the bar and rub it right onto clothes items. this soap is the ultimate oil-cutter soap, so it also works on many stains (which is it's intended use) The other thing about this soap vs. Technu for your body... read the ingredients and warnings on Technu. I bought a bottle when it first came out, then after reading the label would not use it. I've still got that full bottle floating around somewhere some ten years later or so. Fels Naptha soap is MUCH safer to use. It's ingredients will not build up in your liver and cause you long term damage when mixed with all those other great chemicals you are storing up in your liver. If you care about your health, use Fels Naptha. If you don't, then spend a lot more money and go out and buy Technu.

I am madly in love with my Hennessey Hammock!! Pro's If you sleep in it like you're supposed to, on a diagonal, then it's the best sleep I've ever gotten. You don't have to carry tent poles, worry about rocks on the ground or a flat sleeping place crawling bugs, sand, etc. You don't have to worry about tent stakes. Tent stakes don't work in sand, unless you get sand stakes,which won't work in hard dirt. Metal stakes bend. They add weight to a pack. Con's In colder weather the cold does come right up through the bottom. A pad inside the hammock helps. I've had trouble with the pad staying underneath me so in very cold weather I put my lightweight summer sleep bag over my warm sleeping bag and put the pad in between. Stays right in place. Not the best if you're claustraphobic. (see below) I've got the one person, and so don't get to use it much because I've got a partner to camp with now. I first bought a cheaper lighter weight hammock. The first time I tried it in (luckily) my back yard it tore out. Rather than return it, because I sew outdoor gear, I modified the heck out of it so it wont' happen again. The Hennessey Hammock I did not have that problem with, but I cant' deal with the floor entrance because of my severe claustraphobia. Before I could even get in mine for the first time I had to install a zipper on the side. I've left the velcro floor opening at this point because it's easier to enter that way, get into your sleeping bag first and then slide in through the bottom. However, after not sleeping in it for a while I tend to need to sleep with the zipper open a foot and my hand sticking out at first so I know I'm not stuck in there. I have the same problem with any small tents too, so my claustraphobia is by no means limited to hammocks. After I acclimate once more to the hammock, it's the best night sleep I get!!

the heck with caching then, tell me about where to get on this metal detecting forum!!!!

The cache in question was just put there six months ago and the owner logged onto this site this month. It is rare for a cache to need maintaince that often, but if it does the proper response is to put a Needs Maintaince request on the cache. If the other cache was missing and the owner hadn't shown up online in five years, then you could put a needs maintaince request on it, and then after a while they might archive it. This might take months, and just isn't the case in your situation. But never would it be proper to boot another cache because it happens to be where you want to plant yours. This sort of thing happens all the time. (people submitting a cache and finding out it's too close to another) Especially people without paid memberships will not know where the member only caches are so they hide near those often. With the game getting more and more popular this will become a problem more and more often. Just check the maps next time before you plant a cache. So just find another "perfect spot" for your cache and if it happens again, just move it, and know that lot's of others have the same challenge.

The cache in question was just put there six months ago and the owner logged onto this site this month. It is rare for a cache to need maintaince that often, but if it does the proper response is to put a Needs Maintaince request on the cache. If the other cache was missing and the owner hadn't shown up online in five years, then you could put a needs maintaince request on it, and then after a while they might archive it. This might take months, and just isn't the case in your situation. But never would it be proper to boot another cache because it happens to be where you want to plant yours. This sort of thing happens all the time. (people submitting a cache and finding out it's too close to another) Especially people without paid memberships will not know where the member only caches are so they hide near those often. With the game getting more and more popular this will become a problem more and more often. Just check the maps next time before you plant a cache. So just find another "perfect spot" for your cache and if it happens again, just move it, and know that lot's of others have the same challenge.

Perhaps some cachers want to have fun, not kill themselves at this game. There are some pretty nasty one's around where I live. Really nasty ones. I am here for the find, not the endless search. There's an adreniline rush I get from the finding, not the search. Having said that, I must say that if I found them all it wouldn't be so much fun when I did find them afterall. But still being new at this, I do need to find a few of them!!!! So, yeah, I look at the clue. The ones that need the clues the most are the ones in sensitive areas. i've seen forest areas totally trashed due to lack of clues. I've got one hidden in a sensitive area and the clue is a spoiler. But the area won't be distroyed because of us. In fact, because it's such a good clue, I've had many new people, including children have this be their first find. I wondered whether I should make it so easy or not, and then the new finders logs started pouring in. Someone talked about the joy on their child's face when they found it as their first find. Now That is worth a million "evil" finds.

Sorry for the double post, it told me it didn't take the first one, honest.

OK, just this weekend I got: "Keep your feet on the ground" as a hint. The cache was up in a tree. My TALL geopartner couldn't reach it without climbing on a bench. another one: "park at north end of blacktop. Walk road up the hill". What blacktop? Where? The cache was in a campground so we assumed it meant the blacktop pavement inside the campground. Only after finding the cache did we realize they meant you to park OUTSIDE the campground on the busy highway. I don't think so. Glad I didn't understand that one to start. And one, "not a film canister" and that's supposed to be a hint? Doesn't even narrow it down. "Don't think you'll need anything except let your GPS settle." Well mine settled for giving me the complete tour of the entire forest. And I loved the one, "under a stump" We got there and it was an area that had been logged. Imagine nothing but stumps as far as the eye could see. It was only after we found it did we realize someone had put a big X on the stump with branches. I guess they thought a better hint was in order too!! There is one near here, "under a rock" in a field of rocks. At least the guy has the decency to respond to e-mails with better clues, so I'm not complaining. What I hate the most is the ones with no clue at all while the cache is in a sensitive plant area. One really difficult one says, "don't step on the plants" and has no clue at all. No description, no clue. I think the guy has no clue. The area is being trompled. If you are looking all over for it with no clue you are going to have to step SOMEWHERE. How about "page 74"? Ok, what the h..l? If you left a book for me to look the cache up in, you'll have to let me know where that is. BTW, this is not a library cache. "when you see a huge rock you will know you are in the area." how big is huge? I searched for a while around a huge rock the size of a pitchers mound to no avail. The only big one I saw in the area. Walked off into the woods a little more, and there was a rock bigger than a school bus. OH, THAT huge rock. There's one called Bridge with a view. I found the cache. I never found the bridge. No idea where the bridge was. The cache was in a lawn. I've seen entire areas of the forest trashed because of lack of clues or bad clues. I e-mail the Cache Owner when I see this. Sometimes they care, sometimes they don't. Much good fortune to those who care and take steps to stop the destruction. To those who don't care and just send nasty e-mails back, may all the clues that they find be meaningless.