Korichnovui

I found one in the front yard of one of the premier cachers in our area. Fun hide. The cache description page did lay out some rules (don't come at night, don't get too close to front door because our dogs will start yapping). In this instance, at about 8:30 in the morning, after me and my kid found it right before I was to drop him off at school, I noticed that a neighbor across the street was watching us intently. Once we made eye contact, she waved and called out, "Geocaching?" I said, "Yep." She nodded, "I thought so." A few more remarks and she went inside. The #1 most favorited cache in our area is in a front yard. My thoughts: it's fine, especially with certain reassurances from the CO in the description. A few ground rules given (such as "don't check the sprinklers" "you don't need to get too deep into the property" etc) can boost the confidence and making a cache on private property, I've seen, can allow for some greater flexibility for something fun.

I got all 3 of my drone puzzles published! GC7R4M3 GC7Q663 GC7PZBQ It took some work. I had to get special local authorization for the rogue drone one. For the Pasco neighborhood one, my initial vision was to show a nonmoving birds-eye view of the whole neighborhood but the altitude restriction prevented that, so what you see is my plan B. Really the same with the island video - a bit more height would have looked nicer, but I had maxed out the altitude again. My big mistake was posting the videos as public instead of unlisted. One enterprising new cacher figured out that he could watch the videos and solve them before the later ones published. Live and learn!

So I attended the mega and did the challenge, 28/32 caches spread out across the 4-City area. It was a lot of fun! It’s true that I was never alone at any of the caches, and only once did I (and 2 other groups at the same time) have to look for one. But it was great. It felt like an extensive social event spread out all across town, which was really different, neat and enjoyable. Was it like normal geocaching? No. But was it enjoyable? Absolutely! I’ll be looking forward to this event next year, for sure.

It took a basic member with only 27 finds to log/say the correct thing, that's depressing: ~ ~ ~ Member 27 Didn't find it 5/30/2018 Construction zone needs to be rechecked Premium Member 1337 Found it 5/28/2018 Thanks for the stop. Our fam is in getting ice cream while we’re getting smilies. We found ground zero, but are obeying fence line. Premium Member 148 Found it 5/28/2018 Be hind the offense but thanks for the stop love the cheese Member 3 Found it 5/27/2018 Counting as found but, it is behind the construction fence. Will try again later in the summer Premium Member 1850 Found it 4/14/2018 Stopped for ice cream on our way to .... Claiming the find even though it is in the construction zone. Premium Member 62 Write note 4/14/2018 I have found this one previously and the area it was in is gone. Member 568 Found it 4/5/2018 Have to count as found, even though couldn't get to exact spot due to condition. Premium Member 155 Found it 4/4/2018 It’s in the construction zone so I’m saying we found it Premium Member 476 Found it 3/30/2018 I’m logging this as found because it’s inside the construction zone Premium Member 2873 Write note 3/22/2018 .....Before leaving the lot on this rainy day I decided to drive as close as I could to GZ. About 150 into the construction zone my gps directed me. Lmk if virtual is available.! Photo of visit posted Premium Member 62 Write note 3/7/2018 Is this cache still there after the digging going on?

Yep, check out that Prague cache, he’s the last person to make a comment before it got locked. He remarked that he owns a cache where a friend of his died (of a heart attack) while going for it. Geocaching is a life-or-death pursuit for this guy!

That’s odd, I recognize that cacher from a different situation, like I think they had posted on that Prague cache where people died, something like that

So on the website a basic member can do everything? Solve mysteries, write down coordinates to whatever, see and find everything? I had no idea.

website

So, I'm not new, but I made a new account for hiding purposes, and I noticed something strange. This new "basic" un-upgraded account was able to see all information in all caches. What gives?

Thanks to everyone working on my puzzle (a few have PM'd without posting publicly here) Even if you're stumped, it may be interesting/helpful to send a message about your thought process or ideas, not to try for a hint (though I can possibly nudge you a little if you want), but to help me gauge the difficulty

Sent as an in-website message, thanks for your time.

I certainly will not. I'm not going to reveal who was or wasn't able to solve it. Sent as website message.

I sent the puzzle out to 2 people. Any other takers?

Hit a snag. My hide is just a tad too close to a community airport and the drone refuses to fly in that area. I admit that I somewhat nefariously looked into flying the drone without GPS enabled (so it doesn't know it's in a restricted area) and that looks kind of risky, like the drone relies on GPS for some of its stabilization abilities. Besides, that would be breaking rules and I don't want to cause any trouble. I'm researching getting authorization from the airport (it's small enough that it doesn't even have a control tower).

Thanks Geopunx, I sent as a geocaching.com message

I really appreciate your (and earlier people’s comments) feedback and I'm considering how to apply this advice to my hide. I think that in this instance, those reading my description and hint, given the general area, will understand quickly why it is a terrain 5 without solving the mystery. But this is good advice to consider in the future, as well.

When you look at a cache you see 5 terrain but no explanation of why it’s rated that way Once you solve the coordinates it would become clear, like the coordinates are right over a large tree, or in the water, or in a canyon or something

Hey guys My area does not have any 5/5 caches, so I wanted to make one. I have a pretty good idea for a cache but I’m not sure it’s “worthy” of the 5 star difficulty rating. I shared it with my brother (also a geocacher) and he solved it in about 20-30 minutes. On the other hand, I shared it with a couple of other geocaching friends and they were not even close to on the right track. If you were willing to look at my mystery idea, I could message with you the posted coordinates, cache description, and hint text. Then you could try to solve it and give feedback on how difficult you think it is. I realize I could make up the difference in the difficulty based on how tough the hide is. I’m still working on that part. I’m wondering how hard the puzzle part is.

I’m glad to read these posts. Not too long ago I visited a “hotel” and didn’t realize they had asked for this “rule” of exchange and I took several TB’s. Not long after, someone made a post grumbling about how some people just take take. But I thought that we didn’t trade for TB’s, we just move them along.

Mavic would be pretty awesome but I'm using the Spark, a bit more affordable and works great. But your video would exceed the range from the controller, so I'm guessing someone drove you around in a car while you flew it around?

Cool! This isn't how I was going to make my puzzle but I like yours. I may want to make one like this, too! My idea is more firmly rooted in the notion of coming up with coordinates to go to. I will have a coordinate checker. I have several spots picked out. I could have done the first spot already but I crashed my drone and am impatiently waiting for the replacement to arrive later this week. I hope to have the cache published before the end of the week. The second spot is.... more difficult to get to but hopefully I'll be able to take care of it within 2 weeks. Now I'm wondering where I could make an "aerial tour" video of my own. What drone did you use? Clearly you were flying it from a car while someone drove you around?

I totally agree with you I recently solved a puzzle and went to the geozone. It was a rocky hill with short many-branches trees. The cache size was micro but I thought a regular cache could still have been well hidden in the area. After half an hour of fruitless searching, I left in disgust. Some guesses I have as to the shift in smaller size: - more people are urban caching because it’s easy, and urban caching generally lends itself to small containers - smaller caches are easier to obtain or are more affordable, also easier to replace if muggled - smaller caches are easier to hide well

Thanks for everyone's thoughtful replies, this is an interesting topic that should always be approached with a lot of thought and with intent to "do the right thing for the right reason" To make some things clear: 1. The CO is inactive (but was messaged anyway just in case they get an email or something) 2. The landowners CLEARLY don't want people leaving the trail 3. The cache definitely shouldn't be where it is So I asked one of the reviewers what their opinion is on the situation. They looked into it and disabled the cache for 1 month to give the CO a chance to either move the cache or provide proof of permission. I have no qualms about this result because the intent is to keep geocaching in a good light to landowners and the public. In this area, people will notice you stomping way off the path, goofing off in the bushes, then coming back. They will ask you what you were doing out there and why you left the path. If you then tell them about geocaching (many honestly would, there's a whole other thread about it in this forum) then their impression of geocaching will be, "Oh, geocachers don't care about rules. They do what they want." It's not the sort of impression we want to send out.

The steal comment was sardonic proactive = actively seek/hunt them, not just randomly come across them

I was wondering if anyone out there is proactive in the area of trackables. Do you search them out purposefully to find them and move them along? (or steal them, but you don't have to confess) It seems that, in my area, trackables get taken and not logged, even the less attractive travel bugs. I've lately been interested in finding some. I have created some pocket queries and sifted through logs, and it seems like essentially 100% of them are missing if they were placed more than a few days ago. I figure the strategy to finding more trackables would be: 1. find lots of caches in general 2. prefer to find larger caches (avoid micros) 3. prefer to find caches with more favorite points any other strategy points?