Escanaba

I believe that only a small minority of cachers like to spend the time to solve puzzle caches. When a new one pops up, they go for it. This accounts for the initial surge and then the tapering off in hunting enthusiasts. I think that you would get more cachers looking for the cache if you would let them know if there would be travel involved to other sites. I worked on one puzzle cache only to discover the final cache location was over 50 miles away. I never finished the cache and feel it should have been logged as a multi-cache. Minimizing travel distance (and time) is important to me.

The use of handheld GPS units will make a big impact on the genealogy community. There are many of us who do family research who would like to record the locations of family cemeteries or burial plots. My first waypoint was the logging of the gravesite of a Revolutionary War Ancestor. By determining and recording the burial locations we can assist future generations of family members in finding these sites. If you are not interested in family history, this topic is probably not of interest. If you are a genealogist, you are excited about the GPS technology and see it as a great way to mark family and historic sites and pass this information along.

Sometimes when I am looking for new materials to build a cache, I have to explain why I want them. I have two options, explain geocaching to someone who does not know what a GPS unit is or tell them that I am an art student and need it for a project. Often the art student can get stuff donated. So now I'm an art student.

My two favorite hobbies are genealogy and geocaching. Ocasionally these two hobbies intersect in a cemetery. Treating the cemetery and its long term residents with respect is the first priority. However I have seen some very tasteful geocaches in cemetery conditions. One example is the Chinese Cemetery multicache. There the seeker is guided to several points of interest within the cemetery but the final cache point and log book are located just outside the cemetery boundaries. Other cemeteries lend themselves well to virtual caches and often hold points of high interest for history buffs and genealogists. - Escanaba