Totem Clan

As long as could see mine and my Friends I would be happy. I like keeping up with my friends numbers just to congratulate them when they reach a milestone of any kind. As for all the other cachers' numbers, I couldn't care less.

A solve at home puzzle is something that would only appeal to the local cachers or cachers that are visiting family in the area. So, I'm not sure that would be something that is appealing to the traveler on the go. Now a puzzle cache where you gather information from a plaque at the rest stop; something that is quick and easy, something that a kid can complete, would be very cool and would definitely be something I would do. The Tridoku is pretty cool, I haven't seen those yet, however, that is something I would have to print out and solve, so I don't think I would catch that if I was traveling. Nor is it unlikely I'll have my portable ink-jet printer with me. I have done a couple or three of those and I do enjoy them. Just don't make it too complex and it will get plenty of visits.

When I do a PQ for caches outside of my area I don't even include Puzzles caches so I would never see your cache.

Picking the right disguise is critical. The other day I disguised myself as Knowschad. Shop owner came up behind me and asked what I was doing. I answered "Meow". I don't think he bought it. I like to disguise myself as a mean-looking 6' 200 Lb. 49 year old man with a military brush cut. Hasn't worked out for me so far though. I think the Knowschad disguise might be better. LOL Yeah, my disguise is a breaded 200 lb man with a pony tail and Special Forces tatoos. It's worked great so far. Except at playgrounds where I have to add the standard issue pre-teen child to the kit. Too bad the ones I have are getting to old to work that way anymore.

+1 I caching at the speed of my enjoyment. Today that meant 150 miles of nice backroads with my daughter. Some very nice veiws and few history lessons. Yet only 12 finds. I had a great time and would have done it for 0 finds.

Your only failure is in reading comprehension. I wasn't talking to you or anyone else. I was talking about my own personality flaw... But you're lack of logging DNFs affect us all.

100% perks Tell me about!! Retiring under the age of 50 is even better. The disablities that let me do so kinda suck though. Ever worse when they kept me from caching for 2 months. Here's some numbers for you. In my first 6 years of caching I found only 504 caches. 200 of those were in the first 3 months. I moved to North Dakota and had found EVERY cachs within 60 miles of my house in less than a month. My wife retired just as I had I few years before. We moved here and I have found over 500 more caches in less than a year even though I was laid up for over 2 months due to some of my injuries. By laid I mean I could barley even walk to the bathroom much less go caching. Location and the time to cache changes everything, which means one cacher's stats mean nothing compared to another's. (If we had moved to OKC instead of way out in the country I might have found 1,000 or even 2,000 this year.)

100% perks Tell me about!! Retiring under the age of 50 is even better. The disablities that let me do so kinda suck though. Ever worse when they kept me from caching for 2 months.

Who said the cache isn't there? The OP is about "hard to find" caches. I must not be expressing myself properly. I don't cache for any reason except my own personal enjoyment. I enjoy the challenge of the hunt. I have a hard time admitting when I am unable to make the find, so I will keep coming back until I find it instead of logging the DNF. Logging a DNF feels like a little badge of shame, but I've been doing it anyway because I know it is helpful to the CO and other cachers. That was the point of my first post. I log a DNF on a 'hard to find' cache today. In fact it was the second time I've logged a DNF on it. the CO went and checked on it. Sure enough it was gone. It was muggled the first time too. Now tell me how I'm failure if I log DNFs on hard caches.

Wow that tells me a lot about your character. It also answers a lot question I've had about you.

If you made numbers invisible to everyone else and there was no way to compare yourself to other cachers geocaching would not exist. Alexa Traffic Rank 1,533,113 That's a couple of thousand visits/day, all seeing how they compare to others. Do not underestimate peoples drive to be better than the next person. I'd still cache. My family would still cache, it actually would make my mother more likely to cache- although she has us log online for her (I use the data to make sure we're finding new places for all of us). I'm not sure I know anyone who caches purely for bettering their numbers over another cacher. Now personal bests and goals are a whole different matter. I'd probably keep track of my finds in a spreadsheet, but the nice handy map and dbs does it for me. The built in stats are new (ish), used to be more basic. I'm not saying no one would cache but i'm sure much fewer people would sign up, more people would lose interest and Groundspeak would not be a profitable company thus the game would fail. It worked fine without all the new cachers and caches. Why would it fail if they left. They workload would go down. That's for sure.

How is it a failure if the cache is not there. It's only a failure if you fail to help the CO and other cachers. YOU fail only when you DON'T log you DNFs.

I've been geocaching 1 1/2 years and one thing I have learnt, there are very many people looking at my numbers. How do I know this? Having found 3.5k caches in my short career I have been a topic of discussion at events even though I have met none of the people discussing me. Make no mistake your numbers are being watched. Because you mentioned it, I looked. You live in a cache dense area, very neat. I'm glad you've had the chance to do lots of caching. But so does my competition and they still watch me. Also, geocachingly speaking I am handicapped, I live in North Vancouver, on an extreme end of the density and to get to the dense area I have to cross two bridges which generally are a nightmare. This is roughly my area. Based on the area you showed, you have over 8,000 caches within 50 miles of you. I have only 600. That means you have 13 times more caches to find than me. Multiply my finds by 13 in order to compensate and I have over 13,500 finds. That's means I'm better than you. Right? Bet you don't like those numbers. Numbers mean nothing because from one cacher to the next they are like apples and oranges.

Done http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?showtopic=304403

I'm going to have to say that, for me, the proper way to dispose of it is to take it to a gunsmith, then. I'm sure not going to be pulling any bullets in my living room. I've never heard of this sort of thing, before, and you're the first one to mention it, here, so I hope you'll forgive my ignorance. If I did find a live round in a geocache, could I really walk it into a gunsmith's shop and hand it to him with the expectation that he'd dispose of it for me? I mean, is that standard business for them? Is there typically some kind of fee involved? Will he laugh his head off if I walk in there with just one bullet? Can you tell I get really nervous in unfamiliar situations? I've never had anyone bring me just one bullet. I have had folks bring me old boxes of ammo they found the Grandpa's old stuff, or some old forgotten chest in the attic or shed you what-have-you. It's not common but it does happen. As long as you're not talking about a large amount that would take a lot of time away from paying jobs, no I don't charge for the service. Keeping the brass is payment enough for me. If you find that much ammo, call the cops. As far the laughing part, no, if you tell them you found it wherever and just wanted to dispose of it they shouldn't think anything about it. Anyone that reloads ammo should have a puller. They don't have to be a gunsmith to have one or use one.

The same ones you did. I'm sure when you become a reviewer you have additional guidlines or rules you need to adhere to. Oh, like a code of conduct? Why not ask Groundspeak directly? (contact (at) geocaching.com) You beat me to it. Ask them if there is anything in there about the FTF. You people need to get off the FTF thing that's not my point. Why are you dodging my question? If the reviewer stood beside every single cache he published then logged it as FTF would that be OK? I already answered that. I think it would improve the game.

The same ones you did. I'm sure when you become a reviewer you have additional guidlines or rules you need to adhere to. Oh, like a code of conduct? Why not ask Groundspeak directly? (contact (at) geocaching.com) You beat me to it. Ask them if there is anything in there about the FTF.

First of all let me say I'm an FTFer. I love go after the FTF. Now.... The FTF has nothing to do with Geocaching (notice the big 'G'), or Groundspeak. It is a side game made up by people who geocache (notice the little 'g'). How is a reviewer who is doing everything by the guidelines of Geocaching and Groundspeak (notice the big 'G') doing something wrong when then only thing he has upset in any way is our little side game? Could you please answer that? Edit: Also it wouldn't really bother me at all if my reviewer stood by and watched every hide. In fact I would think it might improve some parts of the game.

I don't know what it was like before 2006, but I saw cache owners automatically archiving any cache with a problem when I first started, 6+ years ago. +1

The same ones you did.

If it is not about the FTF then what did he gain from this?

Never fire ammo that you find. It could be a reload with the wrong type powder or anything. Sorry. I know that point was made earlier, and it was a good one. What I meant is simply that a round purchased and used properly is fine, but having stray rounds lying around and ending up in random locations represents a safety hazard. I don't mean to imply that we should accept ammo from strangers. I have found live rounds in caches a few times, and the only thing I could think to do with them is ditch them away from the trail. As a gunsmith I take in old ammo from time to time. I use a bullet puller to take the round apart. I dispose of the powder the primer. The bullet is put aside for recycling. The casing is inspected and reused or recycled as needed. That is the proper way to dispose of ammo.

When I first started caching in 2006, in Alaska, as a hiker, 39 of my first 100 finds were micros. Many of those were P&Gs. As of this week 516, or 50.1%, of my finds are micros. At least half of those if not 3/4 are P&Gs. Just some raw data. I'm sure both sides will draw their own conclusions from it.

In March 2006 my first 3 caches that I ever found were all LPCs. I think many cachers see the past through rose-colored glasses.

How would some of todays caches and cachers fit into the Geocachers Creed?