BryanFamily4

Thanks so much for the ideas! I really like the world coin and the garage sale hunt suggestions. I'll definitely do a better job of keeping an eye out for swag. I've taken other families geocaching with us, and even though the hunt is always exciting for the kids, there's a certain letdown when the cache is full of garbage. It's not that they're expecting anything in particular, it's more like it would be better if it were empty and just had a log book. The rocks, business cards, and random junk really detracts from the experience.

Granted, I'm fairly new to geocaching, but we've purchased and put out several trackables, and tried to put something valuable in every cache we come upon, and what we see time and time again are business cards, rocks, and coupons. Every now and then we come upon a half-broken toy the kids might have liked but you can tell it's been there a bit too long and has been passed over by others. I'm not complaining, don't get me wrong. If the geocaching community thinks pebbles and cards are swag, so be it. But I'd like to try to find some relatively cheap things to put in caches that are also wanted by kids, so I'm looking for suggestions. I've browsed the Oriental Trading Company catalogue, and had some ideas from my kids, but was wondering if there were any popular swag sites for the veteran Geocachers. I'm looking for things that are fun, but also relatively inexpensive. Thanks, BryanFamily4

Signing up for this. Looks like fun!

Oops, double post.

I'm interested in the Massachusetts Geocoin. How do I get in touch with you for payment, etc?

1453

I've got an order on the way for over $50 in trackables, so I'm already diving into it head first, and the kids are excited as well. Again, though, where does the $50 go? And where does the $30 yearly membership go? What does Groundspeak do with the funds?

Thanks for the replies so far! I understand that some trackables will get lost, and I also understand that geoproxies aren't as good as the real thing. I guess I'm wondering where exactly our $5 or $10 (or more) money goes any time we shell it out to buy a trackable. And to follow up, if we want to create a trackable on our own, is there any way we can track it on the site? I guess we're hoping to go beyond dropping cheap toys from Oriental Trading in Geocaches if we can avoid it, but at the same time not breaking the bank in the process. Thanks!

Hi there! My kids and I are new to geocaching, and have had a blast so far. We ordered some travel bugs and trackable coins already but I was a bit discouraged at the number of geocaches listed in our area that have MIA trackables. The kids are excited to plant some TBs and even make their own geocache, but it can be costly (and disheartening) to buy $5-10 items only to see them disappear. I get the sense that it's frowned upon to make DIY trackables, but is there a happy medium? And are other geocachers coming across the same problem? Any insight is appreciated.