Joypa

Hey RPW, have we got anything going in our neck of the woods (Lafayette)?

Hey Dad O Nine. I was just up in the Montecello area last weekend. Found 8 caches. The reason I bring it up is, it seemed like every cache we found, you had been there an hour before. I think we followed you around!

Hello from Lafayette. We've been at this for 3 1/2 months and have pretty much cleaned out the area. Put out two of our own so far. Be nice to meet some of you and "talk shop".

My nearest 20 not found range from 10.1 to 33.7 miles. Four are DNF, one is describes as "thorny" so I'll wait till fall, one is a five star difficulty--- the rest, I'll go after. I have found 61 to date (57 local) and I'm already looking at a 26 mile jaunt to get more. This part of Indiana needs more caches!

Let's see... One is called "Thorny". I'll wait till late fall. Two are on Interstate rest stops. What's the point? Four were DNF. One is a 5 star difficulty and I'm too dadgum old. Two are mine. The rest, I'll get to next month.

I guess I'll add my 2 cents worth. If a cache hasn't been found for months, I'm not going. If the cache has a terrain difficulty of 4 or 5, I'm not going. I'm too dadgum old. I'm starting to hate micros, too. On the plus side, I've seen some ingeneous hides and some wonderful areas.

Man, that's funny. When I saw your topic I LOL. I can't believe anyone would be such a jerk as to take your ammo box--and then leave all the stuff that was in it. It's funny cause it's so stupid.

Shoot. I guess I'll take it back, throw it back in the mud and leave a note in it. Doesn't this guy ever check his email? Nothing wrong with that. An empty container laying in the mud? I'm sure you did the cache owner a favor. Look at it this way, hHe needs to make a trip out there to replace it, or retreive it before archiving it. If he wants to do the latter, you saved him the trip out there. If he wants to replace it, you can just mail him the container, or drop it off for him. A local geocacher did the very same thing for me last week. Found an empty container, took it home and e-mailed me. He saved me the trip out there if I had decided to archive it. I wound up replacing it, but his taking the container didn't make things any harder on me. I thanked him. As long as you mentioned that the cache is gone in your log, you're fine I'm glad somebody thinks I did the right thing. I went back and checked. I can't be 100% sure but I think the cache was abandoned. Lots of Purdue students leave after the semester, loose their email account and are never heard from again. That's a new topic---abandoned caches.

I went back and checked my geocache success rate. I have 8 DNF's and 51 finds. One DNF was archived about the time of my search, one had a multi-cache micro container missing (actually had two of the eight DNF's on this one) and I found two later on second tries. Not bad... and I had an eighteen cache streak going until this past weekend. I guess you have to count it all so I'm 51 for 59.

Shoot. I guess I'll take it back, throw it back in the mud and leave a note in it. Doesn't this guy ever check his email?

Glad to see the enthusiasm. We started three months ago and have a blast.

I always log my DNF's. Not because I want the abuse, but because I want to know what my find rate is. I have to check, but I believe I have found 51 and not found 5 or 6. Has anybody else kept track?

Well, alright! Thanks.

How does one get a specific quote at the head of a response in this forum?

I found an empty cache in the mud near where it was supposed to be. I picked it up, took it home and emailed the owner. Never heard back. I still have it. Is this the right protocol?

Well, I'm a "newbie" since I've only been at this for three months. There is a lot I don't know. I do not frequent these forums, but when I want to know something I post. So far, this has worked. I just have to sort through some wise guy comments but someone usually helps. I don't care if the old timers have seen it all before. There's always someone out there that just can't wait to tell you how mighty they are and how like an insect you are.

So...not much enthusiasm for categories. Well, I could care less. I just wondered why I am called a tadpole and I found out. I also found out there are a lot of sarcastic clowns out there.

I wonder if there are any general categories for geocachers. I was initially thinking that you were a tadpole until you had 50 or so found, then, a frog til 100, etc... But you could also have other categories like-only looks for travel bugs or number hound, etc...Has anybody come up with a system?

Well, thanks to all of you. I believe I have the info I need.

I've been at this now for three months and I just read about travel bug hotels. I find plenty of travel bugs but I have never encountered a TB hotel. What is the symbol for such a cache? How do you know if you found one?