niraD

I already ignore Groundspeak's Message Center because other tools that I already use work better. If Groundspeak added some multi-user chat feature, then I would continue to use other tools that I already use, tools that work better.

I grew up in California, and keeping an eye out for poison oak became second nature. Now that I'm in Tennessee, I have to watch out for poison ivy. I'm still working on that myself. The last time I had poison oak, I found that topical Benadryl helped me the most. My brother has been fighting the poison oak on his property for years. As soon as he comes in from working with it, he heads straight to the laundry in their garage, strips down and throws everything into the washing machine, and then slathers himself with Tecnu. He seems happy with that routine. Yep, the urushiol (the irritating oil) in the plants remains in the bare vines/branches. Plus, the leaves are no longer there to help you identify the plants.

The Help Center article EarthCache logging tasks says that you can't ask geocachers "to quote information from a sign." That isn't quite the same thing as "must not rely on signage".

One of my caches was muggled, along with several others in the area that were all probably muggled by immature adolescents. I left it disabled for a few weeks to give the bored kids time to find some other amusement, and when I replaced the cache, I used a different container with different camouflage, and moved it to a slightly different spot (but still in the same corner of the community garden). That's perfectly normal. If the essential experience of finding the cache changes, then I think it's better to archive the old listing and create a new listing. For example, if my cache had moved from the community garden to the nearby church parking lot, then I would have created a new listing, even if the new location was within 528ft/161m of the old location. On the other hand, churning cache listings by archiving and relisting for every little change is annoying. If the essential experience is still the same, then leave the listing in place and just edit it to reflect the changes.

What does that mean. Search a large area for any likely hides? He was generally much more focused than that on his searches. He would use information in the cache description (including the theme of the puzzle, if any), information in the logs, and knowledge of where other caches were (and thus, where there might be openings for the puzzle cache). Then he would search specific locations that matched the information he had.

Back in California, I knew someone who routinely brute-forced puzzle finals. If the puzzle looked interesting, then he'd solve it and find the cache using the solved coordinates. But if the puzzle looked tedious, then he'd brute-force the final. To him, brute-forcing was more fun than solving a tedious puzzle.

I once found a trailhead cache, but I didn't experience it as a trailhead cache. I rented a pedal boat from the marina across the lake and experienced the cache as a D5 boating cache. And then there's the D5 puzzle cache that I know was solved in a few different ways by the first dozen or so finders. I guess I don't worry much about whether my experience finding a cache matches what the CO "intended"...

Welcome to geocaching! And welcome to geocaching with other geocachers. It doesn't have to be a solo activity. I've gone geocaching in groups, and some of those groups have included the CO. And sometimes we've come to a stage that needs to be repaired, and the CO has described what we should have found and/or given us the coordinates for the next stage. And usually, different people have contributed in different ways, like a multi-stage puzzle night cache that I found with a group. One person climbed a tree to retrieve an elevated stage, another found the mechanism to lower another elevated stage, another solved a puzzle, another had a UV flashlight to read a clue that used fluorescent ink/paint, and so on. Also, there are two main method for groups to operate when it comes to the final container location. I've heard the most common method called the Three Musketeers method ("One for all, and all for one!"). As soon as anyone spots the cache, they declare victory and everyone logs a find. I've heard the method I prefer called the Huckle Buckle Beanstalk (named after an old children's game). When you spot the cache, you walk a few steps away and declare that you've found it. When the last person spots the cache, everyone logs a find. That way everyone gets the experience of figuring out the hide. And yes, people usually start giving hints ("warmer", "colder", etc.) if the last person is really not finding the cache.

Is the Black Sea considered a marginal sea of the Mediterranean Sea, and thus a marginal marginal sea (a marginal² sea) of the Atlantic Sea?

I don't know... I can think of some adolescent boys who might really enjoy trade items like that...

All hail the great and powerful algorithm!

The codes used for geocaches and trackables use the digits, plus all the letters except for a few that are easily confused for digits. So when in doubt, it's a digit: 0 (zero), not O (oh); 5 (five), not S (ess); 1 (one), not I (aye); and so on.

Does Australia have anything similar to South America's piranha? How true is it that all the wildlife in Australia is trying to kill you?

As explained in the Help Center article HTML in cache pages, you need to "Toggle the Source button in the description field editor to add HTML to your description."

Personal signature items like that are trade items, not a substitute for signing. Some of us trade for and collect personal signature items left by other geocachers.

Or you could just ignore the message center...

I've found nano-caches about that size. Some have been made from pet ID tubes that are designed to hang from a pet's collar. Some have been custom made. Either way, they can be fun.

Well, at least the rest of the thread is still here. For the record, the post wasn't met with hostility. It was met with discussion, with various participants taking different views. Not the same thing at all.

A lot of low-difficulty caches have low difficulty ratings because they're hidden in "the usual spot". Of course, for new geocachers who haven't learned where "the usual spots" are, such caches are much more difficult to find than the rating seems to indicate. Caches that are hidden in high-traffic areas (picnic areas, a beach, trails, lawns, etc.) don't survive unless they're small, well-camouflaged, high-difficulty caches. Some of us really enjoy such caches, but they aren't for everyone. And they certainly aren't the kind of cache that most kids/families enjoy. Caches placed off the beaten path though (300 feet into weeds and brambles) can be larger and easier to find, and yet still survive.

That's not what the log you quoted said (emphasis added): "I will check back in a few weeks to make sure the cache is available for cachers to find. If there is not a log on the cache page that you have checked on the cache I will have to disable it at that time." Or you can look at it the other way: Remote caches are getting the same treatment as urban caches. And that's a problem.

Fine. But if the cache hasn't been logged in five years, then why the rush for the CO to visit it within the next few weeks? As barefootjeff mentioned, some locations take a lot of time and preparation to visit, and it may take more than a few weeks for the CO to arrange a maintenance visit. I would expect a cache that hasn't been logged in five years to be one of those caches. I would also expect a cache like that to be in a location that isn't very saturated, so it isn't blocking any new caches. And I would also expect that it isn't inconveniencing any lightweight geocachers who can't stand the possibility that the cache isn't there. What's the rush?

You can put whatever you want in the field note draft. No one but you will see it until you turn it into a real log. My process is to put a shorthand reminder in the field note draft. Later, when I'm using a real computer with a real keyboard, I use the shorthand reminder to write a real log. If you want a note to yourself that no one else ever sees, then the Personal Cache Note would be an appropriate place. I use the Personal Cache Note for information about how I solved puzzles, as well as any hints provided when I confirmed my solution on Certitude. But that's completely different from field notes drafts.

Welcome back! The Help Center article Archive or unarchive a geocache explains, "Archiving a geocache is meant to be a permanent action." The main reason a volunteer reviewer might unarchive a cache is when it was archived by mistake. And while your caches weren't archived by a volunteer reviewer for lack of maintenance, they were archived intentionally four years ago when you decided to leave geocaching. I commend you for archiving your caches four years ago, rather than abandoning them so they would eventually be archived by a volunteer reviewer for lack of maintenance. But as Max and 99 said, at this point, you'll need to create new cache listings. If you want to preserve the history of a cache that is the same as a previous one, then you can add a link from the new listing to the archived listing.

To expand on geoawareUSA9's point, according to the Help Center article Waypoints and stages, a physical stage is one where "the cache owner has placed an item". It doesn't matter what kind of item the cache owner has placed (container, tag, fake rock, whatever). And a virtual stage is one where "the cache owner has not placed an item." That means that a virtual stage has to use information from item(s) that already existed, that the cache owner did not place.