Mare & Care

nevermind if figured it out. how dumb was I.

Hi Everybody. I'm sorry if this subject has been discussed to death but I was unable to find a thread that answers my question. I am new to geocaching on the iphone and I was wondering what app I need or how I go about doing multi caches on it. I'm not sure how to enter and plot the next stage's co-ords. Any help would be greatly appreciated.

We have 100 FTFs for 10 months of caching. It has been allot of fun especially with all the other hunters in the area.

This is kind of my point / concern, I'm worried that if the terrain was higher than a 1 1/2 it will totally give away the cache. You will get to GZ and say "that's not a 3 terrain, oh wait a min... there it is!" Secondly my wife and I are starting to use geocaching as a form of exercise and it is starting to get a little annoying when we use our 3.5 + terrain PQ and we get a 50m walk to a tree.

I can see most feel that climbing a tree would effect the terrain, so here is what I was tossing around : What could be the physical challenge mentioned in the 5 difficulty rating?

I was giving some thought on how to rate a cache I'm going to put out and I began to start to have mixed feelings on how to rate it. So I thought I would get some other view points on the matter. First off the example I'm going to give is not what I plan to do however the principle behind it would still apply, now that being said here is a scenario for you: Lets say a cache takes you down a flat trail no elevation changes or anything like that, just a nice easy short walk but once at GZ you notice that it is high in a tree. Now the fact that it is in a tree, should it effect the terrain rating or the difficulty rating? I have always felt that it being in a tree should impact the terrain rating but now I am having second thoughts. As I was looking at Groundspeak's guidelines for a 5 star difficulty rating and it says the following : ***** Extreme. A serious mental or physical challenge. Requires specialized knowledge, skills, or equipment to find cache. I am starting to think that climbing a tree would fall under that physical challenge aspect of the rating or perhaps the fact that some would need a ladder would fit the specialized equipment statement. I would love to hear your thoughts on the matter. Thanks.

Congrats on the find! Now get to work on the other two.

I'm sorry, but I have to call el toro on this one. We've been seeing more and more cachers using that excuse to not log their DNFs. If you looked and didn't find it... you DNF'd it! What constitutes "real effort"? Finding the cache, I'm guessing. DNF means Did Not Find. You didn't find it. Until we have a LRE (Lacked Real Effort) log type, that's a DNF in my book. Wait a minute, did you just prove my point? []

LOL! Which one did you try?

I see that now Keith and have since removed the PMO status. I didn't mean to insult anyone. A friend of mine at the time was being harassed by another local cacher about his listing being PMO only so I put that up to prevent any e-mails from him.

Let me guess when you did that cache you didn't log any DNF's just the find, right? Wrong - I log all my DNF's - about 1 for every 6 finds is my average. That's excellent to hear, you are among the few out there who do log DNF's. It was meant to be a joke but I realized this wasn't the forum I thought it was. I'm sorry if I offended you.

Let me guess when you did that cache you didn't log any DNF's just the find, right?

because i don't log all my DNFs, especially not on high-difficulty caches. i log a DNF when i have a feeling that it may have gone missing, but if the cache description/rating tells me that it's well camoed and hard to find, i don't log a DNF unless i have been very thorough with searching, which in this case we weren't due to the weather. I must be mistaken then. My understanding is if you go to a cache and you Did Not Find it (aka DNF) that is exactly what a DNF log is for. If you have gone to a cache and feel it is gone then you could alway use the needs maintenance log, but I guess the DNF log could serve that purpose as well. The irony in your above statement though, is that I have actually had other cachers say I should drop the difficulty on this cache because people are saying they are finding it in a few min and there is only one "DNF". The only reason that they are finding it in a few min is that it is their second,third,fourth time there and they have already eliminated other hiding spots, also they have had time to mentally dissect GZ before their next visit. Then they try and make themselves feel good by saying "this one only took a few min", which in my mind is an insult to the previous cachers who had some sense of humility and actually said things like "this one took me a while ..", "we searched for 20min ...", "we searched and searched but after receiving a clue we were able to find it.." If I were those other cachers I would be pissed. And to answer other people's thoughts or claims that some people get lucky, well this isn't one of those caches that you accidentally put your hand on without realizing it. I just wish people were more honest in this game. I guess Gregory House is right ... That is my rant.

Just out of curiosity dfx if you came to find the cache and didn't find it, why haven't you posted a DNF?

Glad to hear from the CO. Well, your first statement disproves the second part of the quote, especially the last bit. I can truly empathize with you and your frustration, but if you want to make this truly idiot-proof, you might need to reconsider either the hide method or your expectations. Sorry, but I've gotten just plain lucky before on tough caches. The CO was amazed at my skill, but the truth was, it was dumb luck. It is well within the realm of possibilities that the logger in question found the cache that quickly. Of course, it is also within the realm of possibilities that the 3 min find time falls back under my theory about them stating that they hated the cache: They are messing with you. I sent you a PM Tall John. However I'm not sure it came through o.k. Could you let me know if you got it? Thanks

Even if 3 minutes to find it is an exception with 17 finds and only 1 DNF it looks to me that the cache is way overrated for difficulty. I have no idea what the actual hide is like but I'm not sure I would even consider 3 minutes an exception. Sometimes you just get lucky. There was a cache I sought a few years ago in an area where I've often gone for vacations. The first time I looked for (after geocaching for only a few months) I probably spent 20 minutes searching for it before I gave up. I was back in the area a year later and this time, with a years more experience geocaching and a lot more geosense I found it in less than a minute. Yes there is only one posted DNF, however one thing that I have learned while geocahing is that this sport/game has a weird effect on some people. They loose all sense of humility, they feel that logging a DNF is giving them self an "F". If you could only see GZ, people are definitely having a hard time with it. In fact one cacher even started a forum page dedicated to trying to find this one as they have been back several times. And for the record this cacher has not logged a DNF, however that being said I don't think he falls into the category of those with a lack of humility as he went even to the point of starting a thread.

The problem is not with the logs, you are correct, there has been only one negative log. The problem lies with he fact that 8/10 of the cachers (with the exception of the first 3) have left the cache in disarray. They failed to put it back as they had found it. And before you say that caches migrate, this one is idiot proof (or so I thought) you cannot get it wrong or migrate it. There is only one way to put it back. The problem is some of the people just don't put the "effort" needed in putting it back the same way they found it. I have had to perform maintenance after nearly every find. Also saying that they found this one in 3 min is very hard to believe, unless they were told where it is by a previous cacher who found it. And that is fine however the log should read "with the help of a previous cacher we made the find in a few min"

When we were there we left it exactly as we had found it so I resent the fact that you are pointing at us or our caching buddies as possible ones who had left it a mess. Don't know what it was like when it was first placed as we were not there. OK I think it's time for me to clear this up. First off Flintstone5611 was not directly accusing you of anything. He said, he/ we were not sure who left the cache in disarray as I was unable to check on it since the last three finds were made. Secondly the reason for his comments is based on my frustrations with some of the cachers. With the exception of the first three finds (JG,Jack Family & Avenar - the cache had been "tweaked" since then) 8/10 of the cachers have not been putting the cache back with the same "effort" that they used to get it. (I hope you realize what I mean by "effort", I don't want to spoil the cache for anyone who has not found it). After almost every find I have had to perform maintenance because when some of the cachers have found it have not put it back in a way that maintains the difficulty level. So when I went back to check on the cache yesterday morning it was in the worst shape I've found it yet. If you would like to see what I mean I can send you a picture. I have since sent out a request to a fellow cacher who also apparently had problems with cachers and his custom caches, and I have asked for some advice. I just don't understand why after people see that considerable effort was put into creating a cache they don't try and do everything possible to maintain it's difficulty for the next cacher. This must be the reason that we have so many light post caches (LPC's), experienced CO's know there is no point to putting effort into making caches because for the most part it is a maintenance nightmare.

I couldn't agree more with you! I like the way you think.

Hi Mare & Care, perhaps you didn't see my question I left earlier. I'm really interested to know if there really were keys to a "brand new car" in the cache? Yes there was an old key to a car in there but we left it.

Hello everyone. Am I to understand that all you other cachers have never crossed a fence before? I have run into tuns of caches where the wire fence has been trampled down outside a woodlot and in order to get to the cache you had to walk over it, "off leash" (GC1HHND) and "mattamy west quest" (GCNJKN) just to mention two nearby. Both these caches have a suggested entry point and guess what the fences are there. If we were wrong to hop one fence and go between fences / property lines then I apologize. Also the CO did say to enter from Walkers line.

I see the cache reviewer has un-archived the cache. Does anyone know why? J&D, B&B and others went this morning to find a new way in and they told me they couldn't find one. Just curious, I would love to take another stab at it.