nonaeroterraqueous

Lots of good posts here. I started clicking the "quote" button but realized that I was going overboard, so I'll leave it at "same here." If it's in a natural setting then make it a regular. If it's in a busy setting like a mall, then feel free to make it a micro (just don't put it in the parkinglot, and do something to make it earn its right to be there). Always challenge yourself, and always be creative. That's my two pesos' worth.

I'm sure there's got to be some way to whine with fewer words.

All no-finder's caches we've encountered so far have been missing, except for one which was such a bushwacker I wish it had been missing.

Every day you're not at work you're walking in the woods ? Would that I could. Maybe you could find me a job in your neck of the woods. All we've got over here are brush fires and city gangs.

Just move the flippin' things along, people.

We haven't lost an ounce since we started, thankfully. However, we do tend to find ourselves eating more junk simply by being on the road longer than we expected and getting the munchies. We both lost quite a bit of weight before we discovered geocaching, and I'm doing my best to get my wife to gain some of it back.

Then I guess it's time to get an eTrex Legend or Vista with a ten digit waypoint, or something comparable. I somehow suspect Geocaching.com won't be stopping after six digits.

Assuming that people aren't actually keeping the travel bugs, we can only conclude that these travel bug hounds are releasing them as quickly as they are retrieving them. I don't see how being eager to move a travel bug does anything to limit the supply for others, because there's no net loss of travel bugs in the process. Seems fortunate to have people so eager to help a bug along. I hate to see some of them sit around for months with no takers. I know what it's like to own a bug like that.

Our first cache was published five minutes after submittal, before I'd finished editing. We submitted the second one at about six in the morning on a weekend, so the reviewer got to it when he rolled out of bed a couple of hours later; due to the timed nature of the cache the FTF finder had to wait all day before he could get to it, anyway.

Pardon me for elbowing past the flame war and getting back to the topic. I like what BlueDeuce said. If I keep my posts habitually objective and without emotion I find that most people see what they want to see in my intent, and they usually see a positive response. I try to limit direct criticism to things that can be reasonably changed about that cache, and I try to present it as a note of helpful advice, not as an attack. I only state things in a subjectively positive way if I feel that the cache was significantly better than most. Having said that, we did once find a cache that required us to log online with whatever word was next in a list of vocabulary words inside the cache, and our word was "jeremiad." We logged a jeremiad. I followed the log with an apollogy. And, then, sometimes I just have to break my own rules. Our first of two caches got a homeless-muggle-type criticism that we were thankful for. The homeless person came and went, but we were better off for having been able to move the cache in the meantime, and prospective finders emailed their appreciation for our having moved it.

Looks as though said person just edited his log today. Makes it harder to follow this thread.

That may be so, but after having looked at the profile of the hider I'm more inclined to go with the "took his ball and left," theory. If this person ever found a cache, then he deleted all of his own finds too.

About one in ten give me a 0 to 6 ft accuracy. Most get me within 20 ft. One in twenty are worse than 40 ft off. Anything over 70 ft and I'm not going to find it. The more stable the readings, the more accurate the coords I'm using are probably going to be (hilltops are excellent, and dense forests are bad), but there's a few hiders that habitually post about a hundred feet off for no apparent reason.

"Discovering" a coin or travel bug is also useful in the event that one disappears from a cache. Occasional notes by passing cachers can help to pinpoint the time at which it disappeared. Also, it helps to confirm that they are still around if the owners are worried about them. I'm trying to get myself in the habit of "discovering" more often.

I love using stickers, primarily because I don't expect anyone to actually remember our name. The symbol on the sticker provides the clearest form of name recognition in our case. If the micro log is too small for even a return adress label, then I'll write it by hand, but it doesn't help much with a name like this, and I feel cheated out of a satisfying sign-in. I love to see other people's stickers, too, and I'm far less likely to remember or even notice the hand-written ones. That's just the way I like it. I guess I'm just a visual learner. Colors! Give me colors!

It's a formidable argument, for sure. My only point of contention would be that certain caches have the appearance of having not been placed with much thought or care. I know it's subjective. Micros seem to be the easiest to place, so it does bear consideration that they are more likely to appear that way. However, your point does hold true even then, because we never really know what the hider was capable of. A "badly" placed micro might be the best that the hider is personally capable of (mentally or financially), or it might be what that person likes. When we publish our caches we put ourselves in a bit of a public spotlight, so it's hard to imagine why someone would publish a cache that they thought they had to be embarassed about.

...or if a muggle got a hold of a cache (hopefully one that he wasn't really ticked-off about) and read the logs. Now that I think of it, I'm sure it must have happened lots of times by now. I can see why a muggle would google the list of names found in a cache. On another note: realistically, I don't see why geocachers are necessarily a safer lot than the general public. Correct me if I'm wrong, because I really want to be.

It's like that which makes a plant a weed. It all depends on where it is and if it's wanted.

pencil pen I.D. stickers laminated I.D. for wet log books potential trading items water food sunscreen printed clues in intended searching order my best friend

That is not my attitude. You're not listening. If other cachers want to place dangerous caches for other cachers to find, then that's their own business. I will not place a dangerous cache because I am not interested in being an involved party to someone else's injury. If you want to play it tough, have fun! Break a leg! I don't care! While you're at it make sure you film it so you can sell it to prime time television. I'm not interested! That's not my cup of tea! I want to place caches that parents can bring their kids to. I'm not going to place a dangerous one to make you happy. I don't care if you're happy. I want to make a safe cache and that is what I will do, if I can. How do I ensure...what was that? I don't ensure anything. I use my judgment, same as you!

Sounds to me like you got exactly the sort of caches you were hoping for. Not everyone is going to like any one difficulty level or another, so you can't please everyone. My opinion is that it's up to you, but keep in mind that people who DNF usually walk away from the experience regretting having wasted their time on your cache.

Pardon my ignorance, but having never traded a coin I'd like to know if they're all the same size and weight, because that could make such a machine feasable. If not, then I have trouble seeing a way through this one. For the most part geocaching is anonymous. You'll never see my picture posted on this website, so if your camera photos me at the cache you may not know who it is. I find that people often target a specific cache just for the geocoin, which leads me to believe that if they've grown to expect a camera, then they might come prepared . You'd almost need something with a wireless internet connection to connect with GC.com so that the person could enter their name and password securely, then have the recieved coin photographed to verify that it isn't just a slug, should some future individual discover the false swap. Then, if it does turn out to be a false swap, there's the question of who's going to play the role of geo-cop?

Are you sure your coords are accurate? Is there anything substantial to block a good reading? Do you want it to be a hard find? I'd say we'd need to know the answers to these questions first before we can know if additional hints are needed.

You need to read more carefully. I never suggested making rules to override peoples' judgment. It is MY judgment not to place a dangerous cache, and I don't have anything against other cachers who place dangerous caches. I never said anything about restrictions. I only said that I (as in, me, myself and I) will not do that sort of thing. I'm not stopping or trying to stop anyone. Clear?

Hardly. If you have a riot that kills millions, then people have to be strong and smart to survive. Stupidity runs its course much faster than normal. More hurricanes would also up the ante. People really have to be smart and strong to survive then. Why not have an impossible cache designed to kill people so that only the stupid will go for it? That really skims the scum off the ol' gene pool, doesn't it? Gives new meaning to the concept of an "evil" cache, doesn't it? I'm not saying that a finder isn't responsible for their own decisions, mind you, but to flippantly not care if someone dies trying is...well, evil.