Pilgrim, Rhubarb, & Sweet Pea

Rain? What's rain? I vaguely remember something called rain.... It rarely rains here in the summer - it's just dang hot and sunny all the time. Early morning or night caching is our best bet. I may do some caching today, and we have a local get-together this evening, but Pilgrim is in the middle of his work week, so I don't do a whole lot of caching without him. Unless of course there's a new cache that I just can't resist!

Ouch! Making me wince just looking at the pictures! Best wishes for a speedy recovery! And even though the initial reaction from some was a little harsh, I understand their skeptisism. There are far too many scams out there! But what your brother wants to do for you to get your bike fixed and a new GPS is really sweet I applaud him for wanting to help out in any way he can, and to want to do something nice for his big brother. I spend most of my early teens just wanting to punch my big brother. ~Rhubarb

Did the cacher's username start with a B? If not, maybe his/her real name does, and they just sort of signed their post with an initial? -R

Sheep and dirt! Too funny - too bad I had the volume up too high and the music almost woke up the kiddo! Here's our desk - relatively clean at the moment, but it's gets crowded quickly in such a small space.

Hmmm...if it's an area frequented by raccoons, it's possible one of them did it. The little hole in the baggie seems like something they would do. They are smart little buggers, and even without the smell of food in the container, if they are accustomed to campgrounds or picnics, they probably recognize the container as something that usually has food in it. They're pretty good with their little 'hands' as well, so moving the rock and opening the lid would have been no problem.

Great idea! We've spent the last two nights 'night caching' just because it's been so hot during the day! We finish dinner and head out around sunset with flashlights - it's been great! We've only found regular caches as there aren't any specific 'night caches' with the reflectors, but I think it's a great idea, not just for short winter days when you have less time, but for hot summer days when you don't want to go outside until after dark!

I've had a little Leatherman on my keychain for years and use it all the time. I think I use it most often to trim super long straws for Sweet Pea when we get sodas at restaurants! Saves her from jabbing herself in the eye (she can be klutzy, takes after her mom ). We've also used it on caches for sharpening pencils, used the screw driver to open a cache (could have used our fingers I suppose, but it would have taken a lot longer). I always carry it, never know when you might need it! ~Rhubarb

To link webpages, just copy and paste the URL from your browser and paste it into the post. If you want it to show up as just a word, like this: Geocaching, then you need to use the http:// tag. Paste the URL into the window that pops up and hit ok, then in the next window, type whatever you want the link to say, then hit ok again. It will look like this: [URL=http://www.geocaching.com/]Geocaching[/URL] And show up like this: Geocaching It's much less complicated than I've made it sound, really!

Our (actually Sweet Pea's) Tinkerbell bug completed her mission in just a few days shy of a year. She managed to visit both Disneyland and Disneyworld, and she even made a trip over to Europe! No stops there, but the cacher carried her on his journey. We are sad that there are quite a few gaps in the logs of her entire journey, but we're happy to have her back home. Wish we could say the same for her compainion TB, Peter Pan, who had the same goal. He has also made it across the US to Disneyworld and back, but has been MIA since the last log six months ago in the Disneyland area. Attempts to contact the cacher who last logged him have been unsuccessful.

Haven't had a run in with any law enforcement ourselves, just with ordinary curious citizens a few times. We usually show them the print out of whatever cache we're hunting for and explain a little about geocaching. But thanks for that link up there - that would come in handy! As for getting stopped by cops or rangers - sounds like most have pretty good stories to share. More than likely it depends on the cop and his mood. Most would be ok with it, some might just be negative about everything and have a bad attitude, who knows. Like the park ranger a few posts back - it must be nice to come across a cacher rather than a drunk, or other mischief maker for a change. This does remind me of my funny cop encounter many years ago - I had been caving with friends (we went after work all the time in the summer), and by the time we came out of the cave it was past sundown. We got back to our cars which were parked just off the road, and a sheriff deputy pulls up, obviously suspicious of this group of people in muddy coveralls and helmets/headlamps. We explained what we had been doing and he commented, "Caving? Isn't that dangerous after dark?" We all suppressed snickers and giggles and answered that it's dark in the caves pretty much all the time - sunlight makes no difference!

I don't necessarily want the hint to tell me right where the cache is, I just want a dang hint, a clue, something to help me out if I'm stuck! If I didn't need a hint, I wouldn't take the time to decrypt the dang thing.

Never stumbled across the remains of a meth lab or into a pot crop, but while hunting for a cache in a remote area I did find a small box. I knew it wasn't the cache, but opened the box and realized I had found someone's stash. There was all sorts of paraphernalia in there, little baggies and what not. We considered removing it and either giving it to the police, or flushing it down the toilet or something, but considering that Pilgrim was in the hiring process of a new job, we figured if we happened to get pulled over on the way home, trying to explain the box of goodies would be tough, and not look good for those doing the hiring! So we left it.

Here here! Ugh - I was just grumbling about this very thing yesterday, only it wasn't in freezing rain, it was dang hot and dusty! We don't every use the clues until we are really stumped, and then to take the time to decrypt the dang thing out in the field and get a smart comment is really frustrating.

The Rhubarb (that's me) and Sweet Pea part of this group are both female! Hubby (Piglrim) got a GPS back in 2002 because his buddy got one for Christmas and insisted that Pilgrim had to have one too. There was much eye-rolling on my part, but we got one, and I pictured the two of them standing in the middle of the woods on a backpack trip looking at their GPSs and saying, "Yep, here's where we are!". Dorks. Then Pilgrim showed me the Geocaching site. I read through it, realized what it was....and was hooked even before hunting for my first cache. I demanded a lesson on how to use the GPS and we were off! Now the 3 of us love to go out caching together - Sweet Pea (6 yrs old) loves the hunt and trading stuff, Piglrim and I just enjoy getting out of the house, or finding new fun places in other towns when we visit/find caches there. We have some other friends who recently tried it - the mom made fun of me for a long time whenever I talked about how fun caching is.....but once they did it themselves, she realized how fun it was, and her two boys had a blast, naturally. I still have friends who think I'm a dork though for caching, playing video games, etc. But I can live with that!

One of our favorites is a local 'geo-tag' cache. It looks like a rock and has a film canister with a log and pencil inside. It's a moving cache - when you find it, you take it, log that you have it and then post the new coordinates when you've hidden it again. The trick is to be the first one there once it's hidden again! We've found/hidden it many times over, but we still end up looking and looking when we hunt for it - it blends right into it's surroundings. You can view the cache and pics of the rock here.

Informative and entertaining thread here, with lots of different points of view. Pilgrim does sometimes carry his gun when we're out caching in rural areas, but mostly for protection as someone else mentioned, against the two-legged type of snakes. And for mountain lions as well. As for rattler bites not always being fatal, even if it's not a fatal bite, it can really screw you up for a long time, if not permanently. I had a friend I worked with who was bitten on the arm - he was on a fishing trip walking on the edge of the river next to a steep bank and never saw the rattler coming. He was bitten on his forearm and rushed to the hosptial, but he was in there for weeks. His arm turned all black and he lost a lot of tissue, movement and feeling. He never did make it back to work. That was probably 7 or 8 years ago, not sure if he ever regained the full use of his arm or not - but it shows that a bite can be quite debilitating. As for shooting the suckers - I'm not for killing every snake I see, even though I can't stand the critters. But if one is posing an immediate threat to me, Pilgrim or Sweet Pea, his days are over! I don't think I'd want to gamble with trying to keep a cool head and waiting for the snake to back down - if he's coiled, rattling and within striking range (especially as was the case in the first post of this thread), well, there'd be one less snake out there. ~Rhubarb

We're in the same boat with one of our bugs - it's supposedly in the hands of a cacher, but he's been holding it for about 6 months. I've emailed several times, asking him to please either place it or mail it to us, or at least respond so we know he still has it. Never have gotten a response. His profile says he's recently visited the Geaocache site, but no luck. Kinda takes the fun out of a travel bug.

Ok, so it's been awhile since we had been caching - life got in the way, etc. So we've started up again, and the other night picked up a TB from one cache and dropped it in another the same night. Got home, tried to log it, used the number at the top of the bug page where it says 'Use TBXXXX to reference this travel bug'. Entered my log, submitted it, and got a message saying there was no match for that number. Oops, was that number different than the one actually on the bug and we were supposed to have written that down? So I emailed the owners of the bug and admitted out mistake, asking if they could please send me the number so I could log the bug and keep it's progress going. No answer. So I emailed the cachers who placed it before we found it - success! They emailed back with the code they used. So I happily went to log the bug this morning using that number - got the same message - no match. I don't get it - what number do I need??? Am I doing this wrong or is there a glitch in the system? Any ideas? Thanks! Rhubarb Edit: Nevermind! Good grief, I have really slipped back to rookie mode - the number from the previous cacher had a space in it, and I had just copied and pasted it right out of my email. Took the space out and got it logged. Ignore my post! Lesson learned!

Ugh, nothing like having your TB held hostage for months at a time with no word from whoever has it. Another pet peeve of mine is missed logs. Half the fun of the TB is to see the logs, the names of the caches and cachers, and seeing the distance it's travelled. We have two bugs out there and the distance shown for either of them is way off. There have been many, many times they have changed hands and either the pick up or the drop off never got logged. Drives me nuts.

Ah, so it's not just me then? Trying to view any cache I get this message: Server Error in '/' Application. -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Object reference not set to an instance of an object. Description: An unhandled exception occurred during the execution of the current web request. Please review the stack trace for more information about the error and where it originated in the code. Exception Details: System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object. Source Error: An unhandled exception was generated during the execution of the current web request. Information regarding the origin and location of the exception can be identified using the exception stack trace below. Stack Trace: [NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.] Microsoft.VisualBasic.CompilerServices.LateBinding.LateGet(Object o, Type objType, String name, Object[] args, String[] paramnames, Boolean[] CopyBack) +96 Geocaching.Functions.chkMail(String fString, String fTestTag, Int32 fType) +424 Geocaching.Functions.FormatStr(String fString) +52 Geocaching.Functions.chkString(String pString, String fField_Type, Boolean IsHTML) +328 Geocaching.UI.cache_details.BuildCachePage() +4767 Geocaching.UI.cache_details.Page_UserNotLoggedIn(Object sender, EventArgs e) +59 Geocaching.UI.WebformBase.IsLoggedIn() +1074 Geocaching.UI.cache_details.Page_Load(Object sender, EventArgs e) +24 System.Web.UI.Control.OnLoad(EventArgs e) +67 System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +35 System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain() +725 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Version Information: Microsoft .NET Framework Version:1.1.4322.573; ASP.NET Version:1.1.4322.573 ***********

Is anyone else having problems viewing caches on the new boards? Every time I click a link to view the cache info, I get a "Server Error in '/' Application" message. The page also includes this: Object reference not set to an instance of an object. Description: An unhandled exception occurred during the execution of the current web request. Please review the stack trace for more information about the error and where it originated in the code. Exception Details: System.NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object. Source Error: An unhandled exception was generated during the execution of the current web request. Information regarding the origin and location of the exception can be identified using the exception stack trace below. Stack Trace: [NullReferenceException: Object reference not set to an instance of an object.] Microsoft.VisualBasic.CompilerServices.LateBinding.LateGet(Object o, Type objType, String name, Object[] args, String[] paramnames, Boolean[] CopyBack) +96 Geocaching.Functions.chkMail(String fString, String fTestTag, Int32 fType) +424 Geocaching.Functions.FormatStr(String fString) +52 Geocaching.Functions.chkString(String pString, String fField_Type, Boolean IsHTML) +328 Geocaching.UI.cache_details.BuildCachePage() +4767 Geocaching.UI.cache_details.Page_UserNotLoggedIn(Object sender, EventArgs e) +59 Geocaching.UI.WebformBase.IsLoggedIn() +1074 Geocaching.UI.cache_details.Page_Load(Object sender, EventArgs e) +24 System.Web.UI.Control.OnLoad(EventArgs e) +67 System.Web.UI.Control.LoadRecursive() +35 System.Web.UI.Page.ProcessRequestMain() +725 -------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Version Information: Microsoft .NET Framework Version:1.1.4322.573; ASP.NET Version:1.1.4322.573 *********** Is it just me?

quote:Originally posted by Stan&Ruth:Maybe it would be a good idea to always print out a copy of the Geocache posting and bring it along while hunting for a cache. Showing the page to the person who is asking what you are doing there may help explain what you are up to. We always bring a copy of the post of whatever cache we are looking for (might need it for hints!), and have several times showed it to curious people who wonder what the heck we are doing. The Yankin' cache was also clearly labeled on the outside of the container with the name of the cache and the website, and the Geocaching letter was visible throught the clear plastic of the tube it was in. Since it was sort of pipe-shaped, we made sure that it was a clear container so the letter could be seen. Anyone who wondered what they had found or wanted to know what it was all about could easily have figured it out, and it would have backed up Trellan's explanation. Oh well, win some, lose some.

quote:Originally posted by Stan&Ruth:Maybe it would be a good idea to always print out a copy of the Geocache posting and bring it along while hunting for a cache. Showing the page to the person who is asking what you are doing there may help explain what you are up to. We always bring a copy of the post of whatever cache we are looking for (might need it for hints!), and have several times showed it to curious people who wonder what the heck we are doing. The Yankin' cache was also clearly labeled on the outside of the container with the name of the cache and the website, and the Geocaching letter was visible throught the clear plastic of the tube it was in. Since it was sort of pipe-shaped, we made sure that it was a clear container so the letter could be seen. Anyone who wondered what they had found or wanted to know what it was all about could easily have figured it out, and it would have backed up Trellan's explanation. Oh well, win some, lose some.

LOL Pilgrim and I were saying the same thing about how much better we could have done at the GPS game! Just follow the arrow, how hard can it be? When you have to go across county, go! LOL And Dorothy was the only smart one who was still following the GPS when she got to the building instead of just randomly checking doors, although it didn't help her get to the right door before Bill. Yeah, Bill looked like he had quite an adventure! That would have made a great cache log! Can't wait for next week to find out who the mole really is! We are stumped here, it could be any of those three, and they have all done a great job (even though Heather is no good at all using a GPS!)

LOL Pilgrim and I were saying the same thing about how much better we could have done at the GPS game! Just follow the arrow, how hard can it be? When you have to go across county, go! LOL And Dorothy was the only smart one who was still following the GPS when she got to the building instead of just randomly checking doors, although it didn't help her get to the right door before Bill. Yeah, Bill looked like he had quite an adventure! That would have made a great cache log! Can't wait for next week to find out who the mole really is! We are stumped here, it could be any of those three, and they have all done a great job (even though Heather is no good at all using a GPS!)