wenestvedt

knowschad, that's kind of what I was thinking. But if I am in fact over-thinking this, should I go with the flow and up the Difficulty to 1.5? Is our perception of the situation the exception to how most cachers will think? - Will P.S. I am a native St. Paulite. Yay, Twin Cities!

I hid a cache last week. It's on a flat piece of ground with ramps and no stairs, but it's a looong reach past a barrier. (I.e., from a chair or walker *I* don't think it would be accessible.) Was I right to give it a one-star rating for terrain and deliberately leave off the Wheelchair icon? I thought about mention this in the notes but i didn't want to give away too much on what's already an easy cache (that I sue to draw attention to the site, not for the challenge).

Wow, that program looks great! I just sent an email to our Disctrict Commissioner, asking him what we're doing. Thanks for pointing it out to me.

Check out the web site for the Collings Foundation, whose WWII & Viet Nam-era planes tour the country: http://www.collingsfoundation.org/cf_schedules.htm Last year their B-25 came over my house and I thought it would tear off the shingles -- the roar was wonderful!

Last spring I spent only $146 on a DeLorme PN-20 and I didn't cut any corners.

But... But... But.... If you're using the lack of legal access as a reason to archive the cache, then doesn't that also bar any new hides in the same area? *boggle*

What about the knock-off Pelican cases at Wal-Mart?

For hiding caches in the city, micros put a lot more areas "in play" than if you had to use only larger containers. I'm thinking about a couple of places for my first hide, and I will use a micro since getting people to the site is the main attraction.

A painting technique called "dry brush" might work here. The short version is, you dip the brush in the paint and then wipe off most of the paint from your brush. When you paint with just what's left on the bristles, it usually results in light streaking of that color over your base coat. Start with silver, rough it up some, then dry brush on the white. Why not use something like Rustoleum primer, which is already a nice brown, so it'll more closely match the post?

Well, there's a puzzle cache near here with coordinates built on clues. However, most of the logs say that GPS reception is bad, and that the coordinates are as much as 100' off! So after my third day, I started to wonder: am I even in the right area? I emailed a previous finder and asked about the coordinates I was using, and for confirmation that I was near the right building. The answer I got included more details than I wanted, but I covered the screen with my hand. :7)

I do a lot of caching in downtown Providence, RI. Given that, I fully expect that most caches will be micros. So what? I *also* expect that many of these caches will take me to a place I have never been before, or at least will tell me something I didn't know about a place I already know. I THINK that a good cache has as much to do with its environment as it does with the container, hint(s), and hide. Also, I've lived a few places and it's become evident to me that most people don't visit as much of their area's "must see" attractions & historical sites as do visitors. Urban caches have the power to open our eyes to places we ignore due to over-familiarity. - Will

...or into a piece of threaded rod. Hmmm......

(Sorry, duplicate post.)

Hey, i never thought of asking for help! (Sometimes I am dense.) I bet my dad has a drill press -- I know I don't. And somehow I doubt this would be the argument that convinces my wife it's time for me to get one! Hmmmm, now to think about who I know has the Right Tool For The Job. Thanks for the idea. :7)

Is there any alternative to a drill press if I want to make a hollow bolt cache? If I switch over to using a cast resin, I suppose I could make a casting and paint it silver, right? Are there HOWTOs anywhere online for this? Thanks for any advice or URLs. - Will

My DeLorme keeps a Track of where I was and overlays it on the map. If I can't directly backtrack out, I can always zoom out a ways and then find my way over to an earlier part of my Track in order to follow it out.

Your last two caches are micros, which can be containers as small as a gumdrop. Also, painted flat black. And with a magnet in their base which allows them to be up in the channel of a Stop sign post, or on the bottom of a lamppost's flaring skirt, or up inside a Walk/Don't Walk signal, or masquerading as a bolt head. Get the idea? Little caches are hard! :7)

Asking for help isn't a no-no -- I did it today, in fact, and the cache owner responded in a couple of hours. Make sure to ask only question you want answered (mine was, "is it in that nasty garbage can?"). In other words, if you want to preserve some of the mystery then be clear you don't want it given away. Last week I sent a message to the last person who'd found a cache that was confusing me. (The GPS reception was *terrible* on a sidewalk between three buildings.) They were helpful enough to confirm I was in the right area. You might also just need to get used to the way caches are hidden. I always look around the area, and try to figure out what is *outside* my line of sight? The back side of a fence post, or the underside of a bridge beam, or the bottom of an overhanging flange -- these are all places where a cache owner might stick a magnetic container. And larger containers often are "visible" when you look for the Suspicious Pile Of Rocks/Logs. Last, be aware of an item that's mentioned in the cache's name. And don't be too proud to mine the Logs for information! Many other finders will leave an oblique hint in their Log, or mention places that the cache is *not* hidden.

Oh, it was funny once I knew that I was the only one with a bad reaction. The kids forgave me, and I realized that everybody has a bee sting story that they can't wait to tell again and again.

My own humble contribution: http://www.geocaching.com/seek/log.aspx?LU...9d-3917b13ccd34 I am pleased to report that the swelling is easing and the red patches are much lighter today; I have been moving the ankle freely since Wednesday. My bee-keeping brother, however, is still laughing abut his escape. - Will

knowschad, I'll bite: an appropriate hide is something you won't damage to check. Up inside the curve of a "2-Hour Parking" sign's post, on the back side of the sign -- that'd be OK since you only have to slide your fingers up there to check. But under an electrical box's lid -- which you have to unscrew -- that strikes me as close cousin to the digging that's forbidden for any new caches. I've only been doing this for a while, so maybe I don't get a vote, but I think a cache owner should either explicitly state in the notes what could be the hide but isn't (and thus what not to damage), or give a Hint that makes it clear what to steer clear of. That might take some of the mystery out of the puzzle at the heart of most caches, but it'll also preserve the sport's reputation and the cache locations themselves. - Will

I checked recently, and I don't think that "three-month sample" membership is available any more. (I would love to be wrong, though!)

nan, think of it this way: imagine the site is dark, and that you're wearing a headlamp. Everywhere you turn your head, the light falls. Now, in real life you're not caching in the dark, but those areas where the imaginary light fell are the places you can see while you search. Concentrate on the areas that were dark -- those are locations out of your line of sight, and perfect places to hide something small and magnetic. Micros and nanos will be on the back side or underside of things, or will be taking the place of something that appears in a group (like one bolt head in a long line of railing handles or on a bridge), or will be stuck against something of the same color. I started out caching in a downtown area, and looking for nanos made me crazy until I went out to the country and found a good sized container in the woods. :7) - Will

I really like the idea of keeping a flattened paper bag in the bottom of my little lumbar pack: it takes minimal room but it's always there. A few pieces of glass aren't a big deal because I can wrap the plastic shopping bag around them, but when a whole bottle breaks it'll do in that plastic sack in no time! - Will

What do you bring along to CITO glass or other sharps? I saw a lot of glass shards from broken beer bottles yesterday while caching with three of my kids. I wanted to set a good example and take it out, but how could I carry the stuff without cutting up my hands or pockets or pack? I usually end a day's walk with at least one pocket full of rubbish, which I expect, but I never thought of how to safely carry more dangerous things like sharp metal or something nasty. (Canoe trips, where I cut my teeth, are easy since you're basically paddling a giant aluminum or fiberglas trash can. :7) Any thoughts from more experienced cachers/outdoorspeople? - Will