TheWeatherWarrior

At its SIMPLEST, yes...a power trail is nothing more than a string or grouping of caches. THAT'S IT! Now, geocaching of course has many different ways folks play. YOU have the power to play as you wish so long as you do not violate the rules of the game or break the law. - do it as a time trial - do it as one per day (if you want to do a string of consistent days caching). - do it as it is convenient when you are in the area - do it on foot, do it on a bike, do it from a car. Do it from a pogo stick (I don't think that's been done before). - complete it or not (all the caches from the grouping/string). - DNF's are fine. If you didn't find one, it is a DNF. Whatever the normal rules of geocaching are for that, it applies. Trails don't change the rules. A DNF does NOT negate the finds of each of the others in the string/group. Most important.....NO ONE can tell you how to do it. Geocaching allows for that, and even the cache owners have to respect that. They, have their own rights too.

Hiding a cache in an old stone wall which does not belong to you shows disrespect and apathy to the property which will now cause others to show the same disrespect and apathy towards our sport. With the NA being deleted, the property owner probably will be contacted, and by ignoring a small problem it now will fester and get larger, as well as inspiring a maggot who may remove other caches which cause no problem. I was only speaking directly of factually based assessment of damage. I'm not speaking of apathy, respect, rights, etc. It is well established that the sport/hobby/game of geocaching MUST respect reasonable or unreasonable desires of the property owner (we're talking private property here of course, public is a different animal).

The very nature of having thousands of visitors tramp through a site in itself is a 1000 times more destructive. Don't believe me, talk to any person in charge of historical sites (like civil war battlefields). Geocaching is a NON ISSUE.

I'll note that in the app, it still shows "Cougar Mountain CITO 2013". Maybe they'll just wait till the next update though. I don't really car much myself. I'm still pretty much "meh" about the souvenirs.

Plug the coords into Google Earth and take a look at it. Not always accurate either. However, most (if not all) rails to trails have a website and can easily be searched on Bing/Google. Also, some jurisdictions have access to property records online (like Maryland, where not only can you look up the address, but also a basic plat map). Reviewers (despite all the issues otherwise mentioned by members) usually are pretty good at knowing all that kind of stuff. What they don't have is intimate ground knowledge of every site and cache hide.

definitely in the right place...the forum and website. Look around for Intro areas, and How-to areas. Also start looking and deciding how much you want to spend on a GPS device. If you have a smart phone (iPhone, Galaxy, Droid, Thunderbolt, etc, etc.) you actually can download the app and use the phones GPS to start. Look around a bit. On your profile page, you can set the coordinates of your home (or as I recommend, a spot near your home, but not exactly, for security reasons) and from there map out caches near you. Don't know much about where you are, but if near a town, should be a number of them not so far away. Read the logs and such. Also, if look for an event with other cachers. They'll likely be more than happy to show you the ropes. One or two might even take you on some hunts with them before you acquire a GPS so you can see if you like the game before investing $100 or more on the GPS.

HAhahaha

Considering Geocaching has been a topic even on a Bruckheimer crime show....I doubt it can be argued it is "secret". The story of such is funny as hell though. Thanks for sharing it.

likely to save bandwidth, search resources or some other silly justification that they can afford, but rather see profit over value (hey I had a cache named that, and they published it..hahahahah). But either way...agree, I really would like to see the app have the ability to include disabled caches. Heck, I don't always trust disabled caches. I've found a couple (and even my own ARCHIVED cache) still in 100% condition.

That is true...the geocaching background maps are terrible for such things. Hell, my (now adopted) cache for the northern most corner of DC actually showed it was in Maryland because the lines were way off. I mean the official corner stone was right there, and I know I placed it in DC, but it kept insisting it was Maryland. Luckily the cache page you can override the state designation.

It's been a tough week at HQ. Yup...ad revenue is way down....likely due to Boston situation. They don't make the money, the site suffers....hahaha.

Never said it was less important, I was saying if one is a diehard preservationist...this isn't the best hobby for them...cause your mind will wonder to the worst, rather than understanding the reasonable very little if ANY effect occurs. I'm not talking a little moving of loose mortar or a few rocks in a loose (aka dry fit) wall. I'm saying I highly doubt a cache would bring down a structure or completely compromise the historic nature of said historic wall. I would also note that we are likely talking about border walls, fences, etc. Not buildings themselves. Though I still don't see too much impact. I would welcome any photo proof that geocaching itself caused damage to historical structures.

2013 is the first time a souvenir has been awarded for attending a CITO on Earth Day weekend. The Project APE souvenir was actually only for Mission 9: Tunnel of Light. That souvenir has the opposite problem of the CITO one, in that the name of it should specifically state the cache it's awarded for. Ah, OK, didn't realize that (the APE thing). Makes sense. Appreciate the info there.

One lonely cache in an entire wall is not gonna "destroy" anything. Let's remember the hundreds if not thousands of caches of such and lets see how many walls or buildings have come tumbling down because of a cache! If a person is a diehard preservationist...I suggest NOT being into Geocaching. The "can't do this, can't do that" of this hobby is getting out of hand.

A throw back map.....late 2002 Keep in mind, most of the icons within the DC limits are virtual caches (many still exist) on The Mall. One of the ones (toward the middle of the group) is a Project APE cache. Snagged it as only my second find. The red circles were my finds after a few months of caching (I started in March 2002).

There are plenty of caches within 150 feet of a Railroad. You just have to make sure you clearly define restrictions on your cache page, and be communicative with the reviewer upon submission. In some cases, fences, walls, etc. can reduce the needed 150 feet as preventions for RR property trespassing. I'd also wonder about active RR versus barely used RRs. Not sure a reviewer would even know the difference, but I'm thinking of some RR lines out in the central US that see maybe two or three trains a month, and are out in the middle of field. Now, granted, why one would bother with a cache in such a featureless spot, don't know, but it is just what pops in the head at the moment.

Same here (just for the record). Had a CTIO before (2010) but no souvenir. I guess souvenirs and other things are not grandfathered for older finds (like my Project APE find in 2002)?

Just the opposite for me: I would love to meet my future wife via Geocaching. Unfortunately, here in FL the catcher demographic tends to skew toward retirees twice my age (31). Seems like the few that are near my age are already dating/married, usually to another cacher. Well, Stuart isn't exactly hottie heaven either. The overall situation isn't any better here in the DC region either.

Thanks. But I didnt mention anything about temp caches, so lets keep it on topic please. (BTW, an event *IS* an "actual cache" otherwise it wouldn't count towards your finds, now would it) ;-) It IS part of the topic and you don't get to dictate what someone else can post on the forum.

Lol. Cacher chicks too nerdy for ya or what? You just tempted fate BTW. Hahahah...nah, I was just thinking that it would be TOO much geocaching going around. Need some variety. Nerdy is fine with me.

Never argue with love when you find it....but god, hope I do NOT find my wife via geocaching.

Bottomline, GS needed more bandwidth to run more ads, make more money....:-P

For legitimate reasons is fine, but many do it for forum posting that gets them in trouble. IP address are always tracked/recorded. Yeah, you can hide/rotate fake IPs, but it's more trouble than it is worth.

I'm going to use the term every time I get a FTF....granted I never get them. ;-)

Adding some thoughts & comments. There is differences in talking about trees that are in forests, or are landscape features, are on private property, public accessible private property and the various kinds of public property (from forests, parks to unimproved streets and other right-of-ways). I certainly see NOT doing anything to trees on a tree farm or that effect a business, but in the context of geocaching...I doubt that .0001% of caches are placed or even considered in places where harvesting is done. Good points on the chemical part of liquid nails. I'm not super worried about some catastrophic effect much in the same way nails don't do significant damage. However, the mention about various aspects as not to do so are good ones. Yes, nails are not that harmful to trees. I've had multiple treehouses throughout my childhood. At one point, one of them was the tallest in Maryland (floor was 45 feet high in a tulip maple). It was large too. In the same area there was an old treehouse that had many of those 2x4 steps from the bottom to the top. The 2x4s were rotted but the tree was fine (still stands today...probably 30 years). Our treehouse got cut down for new housing. Ours even had a huge bridge that used nails, screws, straps, chains, etc. Was up for 10 years, zero sign of damage. Remember, this is mostly just for discussion, ideas, tips, suggestions, etc. Heck....a little off-topic relation is fine (the bushwacking tangent). It is a forum, not a debate competition with points and awards on the line.