e1eventh

Almost always this:

You could certainly do this. As others have said it's mostly about the challenge of communicating. I mean, normally if you really just wanted to find a cache you could read all the logs and the hints right away, right? But that's no fun. We've found though that it often takes a lot of back-and-forth. Just one aerial photo doesn't usually work. It'll take multiple aerial photos (yahoo, bing, google), maybe some measurements (e.g. "10 meters from the tree"), and use of Google Street view to reliably find a cache.

If we played it higher in the air, would it be a strato-cacher? (and indeed that was terrible, so I had to respond as badly) What if we were searching for a cache in a junkyard? Perhaps in the fender of an old truck?

Haha yeah, that's exactly how it feels some times. You certainly have to be ok with nerdy.

You haven't been around the forums much, I see Threads about playing the game an "alternate way" usually generates a lot of controversy. The controversy, of course, comes from how the find is logged, not that you're not using a GPSr. If only the person signing the find logs the cache online (or of it is a "team" account), no big deal. If he signs it for the person on the computer as well, please don't ask for acceptance here. Some wouldn't care, others would. Personally I find this more trouble than it is worth, but then again most of the time I cache alone and don't even use Phone A Friend. Gotcha, thanks for the clarification. FYI it's a team account we're using here. Not that I expect anyone to care, but the only reason we even log things online is so we don't got back and accidentally refind a cache. A quick look at our stats will show that we're not exactly competitive cachers. Probably done 3 in a day at most, no FTF's, etc. Anyhow, just thought I'd share my twist, don't even particularly use it that much myself. But if no one else likes it, that's cool. I'll just go back to enjoying the game, thanks = ).

Why, exactly? I don't really see the problem.

Recently my friend and I have been "telecaching" a term we coined to describe the following: One person heads out to hunt for caches *without* a GPS - the "hunter." The other remains at home (in our case, across the country, actually) at a computer - we'll call this person the "base." The base will look up a cache and using geocaching.com overhead imagery, Google street view, and other tools, will attempt to guide the hunter to the cache. It typically requires a lot of coordinating, along the lines of "ok, do you see that tree due East of the awning? It looks like it's about 20 feet North of that tree, about even with the fire hydrant." Or whatever. We've found this to be really fun as it requires a lot of good, clear communication between the two people. Really challenges our spacial intelligence. It's also a way for us to cache together while living 3000 miles apart. As a bonus, we get to "experience" caches we wouldn't otherwise be able to, since it's unlikely we'd cache in eachother's cities. Anyhow, just wanted to share the idea with you all, in case you want to give it a shot.