Highpointer

In the past four months, I have found two caches that had been presumed missing, the container was replaced, but I found the original container. Thus, the replacement container should not have been placed, because the cache never went missing. Several cachers couldn't find these caches, so the cache owner requested that another cacher replace the container, but it was unnecessary to do so. These caches were Purgatory (GCK149) where I found the original container on Sept. 10, 2016, and Where's My Keys (TB Hotel)? (GC156AR) where I found the original container on Jan. 2, 2017.

Regarding GC24K9Z: 50,000 Feet Elevation Challenge – I am looking for hikers and climbers with whom to hike up to geocaches to complete this challenge. Since I moved to Washington in January 2014, I have done many peaks with geocaches atop them, including Mount Adams and most of the famous peaks along the I-90 corridor (i.e. Mt. St, Teneriffe, Mailbox Peak, Mt. Washington, etc.), and others elsewhere such as Snoqualmie Peak and Guye Peak. Unfortunately I didn't read the rules of this challenge until earlier today, so all my hard work has gone to naught, so I have to start from zero and I have to begin climbing again tomorrow. If you are going on any hikes or climbs to geocaches, can you please invite me to join you? Whenever I go hiking or climbing with people who are not geocachers, such as people I meet through Meetup.com or The Mountaineers, they don’t look fondly on my desire to geocache and appear that they don’t want for me to look for geocaches. This has led me to go on most hikes by myself. Therefore, I need to hike and climb with geocachers. I need to let you know that I am not fast, and I often fall behind hikers who are in significantly better shape than me. This, in addition to my passion for geocaching, has resulted in tension between me and non-geocaching hikers. However, I am very persistent and I will usually reach my goal unless I have to turn back due to conditions beyond my control (i.e. bad weather) or the climb is technically far beyond my current level of expertise. I completed peaks such as Mount Adams and Mount Daniel (highest point of King and Kittatas counties) in one day, so I prefer long day trips but I will backpack if necessary, as I did to ascend Mount Shasta in northern California, July 4-5, 2014. I am also open to winter ascents as I have an ice axe, crampons, and snowshoes. Therefore, will you consider letting me join you whenever you are considering a hike or a climb to geocache? You can call me at 480-628-5575 (cell) or 303-800-4545 (Skype). My direct email is Ken.Akerman@gmail.com. Thank you. Ken

Why do so many geocachers have the misconception that you can't take a travel bug or a geocoin unless you have something to leave in return? I left a travel bug in a cache on Sunday, Sept. 6, and another geocacher visited that cache the following day, but did not take the travel bug. I sent a message to that geocacher to find out if he or she had seen the travel bug, and that person replied, "Yep - it was there. We didn't take it as we had nothing to trade...but were soooo tempted." Therefore, this geocacher had the misconception that one cannot take a travel bug unless they have something to leave in return. This is totally wrong. Geocachers, if you see a travel bug or geocoin in a cache, please pick it up and log it properly, and move it to another cache. Travel bugs are not regular trade items. You don't have to leave anything in return. Please not let travel bugs and geocoins languish in caches.

Make all of your caches "Premium Member Only" caches, and that should reduce the fake log entries.

But you don't know they're forever lost, and Trackables have plenty of inscribed information that may return them to the game. It's too soon to replace the Trackables, if the originals could turn up. If someone finds the bag, they can contact Geocaching.com or some of the owners. Unfortunately, geocaching is still not widely known or understood by people who are not geocachers. Therefore, most people won't know what to do with the bag if they found it.

I do not "collect" travel bugs. I was intending to move every one of these travel bugs to a distinct cache. I also wanted to move these travel bugs to quality caches, leaving only one travel bug or geocoin in each cache.

Note: I posted this on the discussion forum of the Washington State Geocaching Association, http://www.wsgaonline.org/forums/index.php?showtopic=1105&pid=6258&st=0entry6258: On either Sunday or Monday earlier this week, I apparently lost a Ziploc bag containing approximately 20 travel bugs that I had been collecting from caches. I feel very bad about this, and I returned to the sites of the caches that I visited on Sunday and Monday to see if I left the bag near those sites. I did not attempt to put a travel bug in any of those caches. I can't figure out where I could have left this bag of important trackable items. I visited the following caches on Sunday, May 24, in the southeast part of the Renton area: Blueberry Leftovers (final location of a multi-cache, not found) NCIS Series - Timothy McGee (puzzle cache) Stepping up through time Just another neighborhood park (not found) Mamacats' Spring Cache Home Town Oddity: Forgotten Transportation (multi-cache, not found) On May 25, I visited West Seattle to meet some non-geocachers at a cookout on Alki Beach. En route to that site, I drove along the east side of the West Seattle peninsula, and found these two caches: The Kid Is Back ! A City View The closest cache to the location of the cookout was Whale Tale, located in a tree in a small park, and I don't believe I had any travel bugs with me at that site. Therefore, how can I find these travel bugs and geocoins? I have posted an advertisement in the Lost & Found section of Craigslist: http://seattle.craigslist.org/see/laf/5048968675.html Do you know what I can do to replace those travel bugs and geocoins? I feel very bad about this, because I am a strong advocate of properly moving and logging travel bugs, and never losing travel bugs. I am willing to spend a full cost of replacement to replace all of these travel bugs, with the same item attached and same tracking number. Please call me at 480-628-5575 or 303-800-4545 to let me know what I can do to make things right. Thank you. Ken (a.k.a. Highpointer)

My longest time between a DNF and a subsequent find on the same cache was nine years, ten months. This was at cache Ball Three: Safeco Field in Seattle that I attempted but didn't find on July 25, 2004 during a visit to Seattle. I found this cache on May 30, 2014 several months after moving to the Puget Sound area and becoming a resident of the greater Seattle area. Here is my log entry describing both geocache visits.

A "travel bug hotel" at a highway rest area is not a good idea, since such a cache has a high risk of being found by non-geocachers and thus becoming lost or stolen. When this happens, all of the travel bugs in the cache at that time become lost.

I have noted that I am seeing a higher percentage of relatively easy caches with inaccurate coordinates - off by more than 20 feet. It seems like caches are being recorded by less experienced geocachers. Could this be because many of these less experienced geocachers are using iPhones or other smart phones instead of dedicated GPS units, and thus these phones with GPS applications are less accurate than dedicated GPS units? If this is true, should we require that cache coordinates of new caches be recorded using dedicated GPS units to avoid these inaccuracies? It is important that geocaches have accurate coordinates. Geocache coordinates need to be measured and recorded accurately with a high quality GPS unit. Highpointer

I can't understand how anyone who is a geocacher can't afford the Premium membership. That is $30 per year, or $2.50 per month. That is less than a gallon of gas or a cup of coffee at Starbucks. Visiting geocaches does require some driving. If you can't afford to pay $2.50 per month, then perhaps you shouldn't do any geocaching whatsoever.

I agree - I do cringe - I do cringe when I see a cache listed as a "travel bug hotel." I wish the cache administrators to not approve any cache with "travel bug hotel" or similar name (i.e. motel, resort, spa, bed & breakfast, hostel, etc.) in the title.

My opinion, which I have stated numerous times before, is that "travel bug hotels" should not approved. Such caches, because they are too easy to find and have a high risk of being muggled, present a great risk of travel bug losses.

On Jan. 6, 2011, I parked my SUV in a parking garage on the ASU campus to work at a basketball game. I noticed that the vehicle parked next to me had a geocaching sticker on it. After the game, while I was preparing to leave, I wrote a note with my contact information and left it on the vehicle. However, just before I was preparing to drive away, the owner of that other vehicle returned. We chatted and exchanged our geocaching names. I told him about a few caches on the ASU campus, including one under the statue of a former coach near the football and basketball facilities, and I gave him three travel bugs and logged them into that cache. That other geocacher told me he would go looking for that cache and would move the travel bugs. After a couple of days, that geocacher had failed to log that cache nor the three travel bugs that I gave him, so I sent him a reminder to ask him to do that. He failed to respond. I sent three more e-mails over the next week, but he never responded to any of them. After waiting another two weeks, he still never responded to any of my e-mails, nor did he ever log the travel bugs. I sent him another e-mail earlier today and I am still waiting for his response. Looking back at my e-mail logs, I noted that he had taken a travel bug from a cache during the summer of 2009, and noted that in his log entry but he never logged the travel bug. I sent him an e-mail in November 2009 to ask him to log that travel bug, but he never did that and the travel bug owner marked the travel bug as "Missing." What can I do about this geocacher who fails to log travel bugs, and fails to respond to e-mails that I have sent to him? I have included my phone number in e-mails and have included the link to the information on how to log trackables, but this person appears to be irresponsible and does not care about proper geocaching procedure. I have asked the owners of the trackables I gave him to contact him, but he ignores e-mails from other geocachers as well. If you want more information about this geocacher, please respond and I can send you that geocacher's name. Ken Akerman (a.k.a. Highpointer)

The "discovered" option should be eliminated for travel bugs and geocoins. The "discovered" option makes the process of logging travel bugs and geocoins more confusing, and it reduces travel bug movements by allowing a way for people to earn credit for a trackable "find" without actually taking and moving the item. Thus, the "discovered" option encourages more geocachers ignore trackable items and to let trackable items languish in caches, increasing the risk of such items becoming lost. Geocachers should pick up and move all trackable items that they see in a cache, and not let them languish in the cache.

There is no type of cache as a "travel bug hotel." Some geocachers call a cache that they own a "travel bug hotel," but many of these caches are actually among the worst caches to leave a travel bug or geocoin, due to the high probability of travel bug and geocoin losses.

This happens far too often in the area where I live. I thought it was because people in the state where I live, Arizona, are not as smart as people overall, but I am finding out that this problem happens all over the USA and likely the rest of the world as well. I enjoy geocaching, but one thing that discourages me about geocaching is that it appears to attract many people who, in my opinion, are not very intelligent . For example, I just completed writing and sending out a long e-mail to a geocacher with nearly 500 finds who in the past six days had picked up at least five trackable items without logging his finds, and he included the tracking item in each of his log entries. He is not a geocacher local to my area, but he visited my hometown and found several caches in or around the city where I live, and found travel bugs in several of them (without logging them into his inventory). Ken Akerman (a.k.a. Highpointer)

I recommend making all caches "Premium Member Only" caches. I doubt such a cache thief would pay for a membership, and even if he did, geocachers who have had their caches stolen could view the audit log for the muggled caches to see if there are any suspicious geocaching names who could be the potential cache thief. When writing the cache description, please put a check mark in the box before "Check if you only want Premium and Charter Members to view this cache."

It appears that these new stickers have been appearing recently, in the hot months of August and September, and during early October with daytime highs still well over 100°F. I have seen two identical stickers this week that declared the geocache to be "geotrash" and has been removed. One cache was in northeast Phoenix and the other was in north Mesa. Here is my log entry for GC2A6T3 in northeast Phoenix with a picture of the sticker. (The cache was attached to a support beam for covered parking spots in an office complex parking lot). I found this same sticker at the site of GC188K8 in north Mesa two days later; my smartphone's battery power was too low to take a picture. Mesa resident Team Evil Fish apparently has had many of his caches stolen this week, including the large cache Still Friends, located unsecured behind a bush in the parking lot of a scuba diving shop. Ken Akerman (a.k.a. Highpointer)

You could ascend the highest point of every state in the USA. While some states, like Alaska, Washington, and Montana, require specialized equipment and mountaineering skill to reach the highest summit, most state highpoints can be ascended by most people without extraordinary effort. You can ascend the highest point of approximately half of the states of the USA within a mile of parking your car. For more information about state highpointing, consult the Highpointers Club or America's Roof. For example, this weekend you could consider a short trip to the highest point of Delaware, Ebright Azimuth. It is located about 44.7 miles from Tour De Parking Lot, according to this map. Ken Akerman (a.k.a. Highpointer)

I saw this sticker at the site of cache GC22JRK. Ken Akerman (a.k.a. Highpointer)

"Travel bug hotels" are not a good idea, in my opinion. I have addressed this topic in other forum entries. "Travel bug hotel" are usually poor-quality, unsecure caches that have a high probability of becoming lost or muggled, and cause many travel bugs to become lost. Caches should not be placed in highly-exposed locations such as near airports or highways. Please consider the probability of such a cache being found by non-geocachers. If a cache is placed in a location that has a high probability of being found by non-geocachers, then please seek a more secure location for the cache.

Another "travel bug hotel" lost - after only TWO DAYS of activity! Come Fly With Me - - Airport TB Hotel This cache should never have been approved. The loss of this cache resulted in the loss of three trackable items. While reviewing caches on my watch list, I saw that this cache, located west of Phoenix, has also become lost, resulting in the loss of seven trackable items: Buckeye's TB Rest Area Geocache reviewers, please do not approve "travel bug hotels" like these that are easily muggable. These caches should have been REJECTED!

In my opinion, this is an easy cache attached to playground equipment that should not have been approved. What do readers of this forum think about this cache? GC1TMXE Tic-Tac-Toe

There is no advantage to travel bug hotels, in my opinion. I have detailed in many previous postings why I believe that "travel bug hotels" are a bad idea and such caches should be eliminated from Geocaching.com. Can we stop the geocache approvers from approving any new "travel bug hotels"? They are the worst thing, in my opinion, for the safety and security of travel bugs. "Travel bug hotels," in my opinion, are the greatest cause of travel bug losses. Too many "travel bug hotels" are in unsecure locations that become muggled, resulting in the losses of many travel bugs. Geocache approvers, please stop approving travel bug hotels. Thank you.