chaosmanor

As it is obvious that this is a "no win" situation, I'm not going to waste my time listing the dozens of reasons why this is a stupid worry. Archived caches are in the system; they can be called up by anyone willing to take the time to do so. There would be nothing "accidental" about that. Those who are nefarious will find a way to do what they want, whatever TPtB might want. The rest of us, nice boys and girls who know how to play by the rules, and don't ask for much, are always going to be the ones punished due to the actions of the few jerks and ne'er-do-wells. So It Goes. And some people wonder why I don't come out of my cave to post more often. What's the point?

I would really like to have the ability to do a search that would include *all* caches, archived or not. On occasion, I want to look for caches on certain topics, but any that have been archived won't come up. So what I would like is an option to so a search that would include archived caches. This could be an "either/or" thing: "Active (and disabled) caches only", "Archived caches only", or "All caches that have been active at some time." There really should not be any technical problem with this. All cache listings are in the system. All this would do is allow for us to add archived caches to a search. The default would be a search as it is now; we would have to push a radio button to include archived caches in the search. I coded a number of database programs when I was an active programmer, so I know that the code isn't all that tough to do; the trick is in how the fields are laid out and how they are called up. Another thing that would be useful, and which might make the drain on system resources less of a problem, would be the ability to search on one particular type of cache: Event, Mystery, Traditional, etc. Thanks for giving this your consideration.

The e-mail address given has been rejected as "unrecognized" by two e-mail systems, so I'm going to post here what I was trying to e-mail... "Sorry, but no red balloons to be seen from our house in Camarillo, CA, a few miles northerly of Degree Confluence N34-W119 :-(" I should add, however, that we will be driving to Escondido, near San Diego, later today, and if we see a balloon, we will certainly do what we can to get the details.

Groundspeak is also competing; an e-mail went out to everyone on their weekly update list. If they win, they plan to donate the winnings to schools for GPS-based equipment, and will add $10K of their money to the pot.

As someone who has not once (not once!!) in 3,401 cache-Find logs, over nearly nine years of geocaching, ever repeated myself (although I will admit to using a one- or two-line "opener" for a string of caches on a road trip or long hike, but each cache has then gotten something unique after that opener), and who has *NEVER* used TFTC as a log report, I have only one thing to say: those who believe that TFTC is always appropriate, or that cut-and-paste logs are always enough, if you would put just ten-percent of the effort that you have expended into defending your position here, into your actual logs, those of us who try to make our cache Hides interesting would have no reason to complain. It *isn't* all just about the smileys; if the experience doesn't move you in some way, then something is wrong, either with the cache or with you. You are free to disagree, but I am free to think poorly of your attitude; that's the price we both pay for living in a democracy, and most geocachers do live in a democracy of some form or other.

Appreciate the two responses so far: thanks I guess the thing to do is go ahead, and if it looks like we lost some time, we can write to TPtB about it. But it *does* help to know that others have had success with this method We used to use PayPal's subscription service, but we canceled the card it was attached to, and so needed to do something else.

I've searched through this sub-forum, as well as the "Geocaching Topics" one, and can't find that this has been asked. If it *has* been asked and answered, please post the link. Our membership comes up for renewal in a month. I was going to pay for the renewal now, to get it out of the way, and also sign up for auto-renewal. I planned to use a credit card. After filling out the on-line form, I clicked on the button to get to the review page. On that page, it stated that the renewal would start today. I don't want it to start today; I want it to start next month, on the date that our current membership expires. Nowhere on that page was I able to find information about this discrepancy. I was logged into our account, so the system should know that it is dealing with a current Premium Member. I can't believe that this is the way the system is set up; there should be a way for the system to recognize that it is dealing with a current Premium Member, so that the membership is extended from the end of the current membership term. So, I am asking, How does one tell the system that I want our membership extended? What button do I need to click? What page do I start on? Or do I just have to wait until the exact date that our current membership expires to do the renewal? I appreciate any info you can give me thanks!

We had a streak of 54 days, from 16th April to 8th June, 2007. Haven't come close to that since, and not sure that we would ever want to try That streak took a lot of work, as many of the days it was just me, not both of us. My wife and I have a joint account, which suits us, as Sharon hates writing logs, detests almost all micros, and rarely looks at puzzles; I enjoy writing logs and doing puzzles, and I tolerate micros as a "necessary" evil That streak might have lasted longer had there not been some late rain that June; I DNFed three caches in the rain on the 9th, and gave up for the day. Sic Transit Gloria

Now that is really funny We geocache and letterbox, often combining the two on the same hike or trip, and have found letterboxes and geocaches that were within 20 feet or so of each other, but never two literally side-by-side, obviously living in harmony Thanks for sharing this! To the OP: thank you for putting that LB back where you found it, and for respecting it. Letterboxing is older than geocaching, by more than 100 years: it started in Britain. In the US, it started in the 1990s, in Connecticut. As an active player of both games, I have often found myself defending each game to some players only of the other. I won't go into some of the discussions, but a lot of them revolve around philosophy and approach. The bottom line, for all geocachers, is to treat a letterbox as someone else's property, just as we treat (or should!) a geocache. The stamp and logbook inside must stay inside the box, just as a logbook must stay inside a cache. If you want to sign your name in the LB log, you may; please add a nice comment about how you found it and how much you appreciate the hider's effort. Who knows? Maybe you'll decide to join that game, too. One can never play too many games

That's great! Not only were you successful, but you were also persistent, which is very important in this game, as in much of Life. Far too many newbies (and we all were newbies, once, so I am not using that term pejoratively) give up after the first DNF, and they miss out on a lot of fun. And even us grizzled vets log DNFs: you can't find them all Now that you have found some, you have an idea of what's involved. Just one piece of advice: Never Assume Anything!! NAA is a key to being a good geocacher, whether hunting or hiding. Different cachers have different ideas of what Terrain 2 means, or Difficulty 3, or whether a container is a small or a micro or a regular. Different models of GPSr can disagree by a few meters. Tree cover, narrow canyons (of rock, or of steel-and-glass), and cloudy weather can all affect signal. And sometimes caches are replaced, but the listing isn't updated; this happened to us this weekend on several caches in the Big Bear Lake area. Frustrating at times, but it also adds to the adventure. And it's all about the adventure Hope you have lots of fun, and a few fun adventures!

If the fact that I'm standing in a bunch of plants, bent over and moving the branches, isn't proof enough that I'm a total loony, errrr... that is, a geocacher, nothing will!

I do that, as well. The point is getting other cachers to do it. When a message such as the Admin one goes out, it ought to say that posting a note to the TB is encouraged. We need to remember that "common sense" isn't very common, not to mention that it takes a while, even for those newbies who read everything, to figure out all of the little quirks.

Moi, aussi! Too bad it isn't my 9th, but it isn't my 99th, either, so I guess it all works out in the end

How can we resist? Order placed

I'm curious. What would you have done with timely notification? Retrieved it and dropped it into one of our own archived caches, now that the TB Burial Grounds have all been closed. Call it "closure", if you want to put a label on it. Call me a fussbudget, if you want to put a label on me :laughing:

That helps: thanks! I *did* look in there, but didn't see that thread.

Then what do you put in the cache log? Here's how this works, in excruciating detail... A) Find cache sign log (trade swag, take or drop TBs and geocoins as appropriate) C) at home, write up your log on the cache's page D) highlight and copy the log E) highlight your personal geocoin/TB (as well as any that you physically left in the cache) F) submit the log G) go to the cache page; scroll down to the list of travelers in the cache; click on your personal goodie H) paste your cache log into the big box; type in the ID #; highlight "Retrieve from..." I) submit this info The traveler is now back in your inventory, with the exact same log as there is on the cache page. We and two other cachers have the personal geocoins of each other on our respective watchlists. When the others go caching, we get e-mails of their travels, and they of ours. This let's us know where they've been, any interesting adventures they've had, neat caches they've found, etc., and vice versa. This is a lot more efficient than going on a trip and writing an e-mail to them, telling them all about our caching. Certainly, we'll write them, but we won't need to give them blow-by-blow accounts of the caches, as they already have those. And another thing; the geocoin page loads a *lot* faster than the listings of all of our Finds in our Profile. Hope this helps

It would appear that all the caches that were set up some years back as TB/Geocoin burial grounds are now being locked, so that no more travelers can be dropped in them. Is this, in fact, the case? If so, that's fine, as far as it goes. I ask because I we've had three of them on our watchlist. We've dropped off a number of missing TBs and geocoins in them. A couple of weeks back, we got an e-mail notification of a Note posted by an Admin-type (the name isn't important); this note said that the preferred thing to do is to mark them as in an unknown location, i.e. "Missing". This would be OK, except for one small problem: soing so doesn't tell the owner of the traveler that it has been so marked Is there any chance that the system can be fixed so that an e-mail notification goes to the traveler owner when something is marked as Missing? I try to keep tabs on all of our travelers, but with several hundred of them out there, it's not possible to be on top of all of them all the time. On a side note, if a cacher Finds a cache that has a TB or geocoin listed, but no such is in there, please Post a Note to the traveler page, not just to the cache! Thanks you

I'm sure it is The thing to realize is that the "caching gods" understand that Life is What Happens When You Were Making Other Plans. You did the right things; may this serve as a good example for others of how to handle things when Stuff Happens.

... and be sure to drop them off into another cache as soon as reasonably possible, being certain to log them in Post a photo, too, if you can, especially if are helping it along on a specific mission.

Well, thank goodness for that! NOOOOO!!!!! Don't Tell Me That!!!!!!! Don't worry. You need to have one before it can get in the way. I'm safe

This is the key... I learned a long time ago that the safest thing I could when dropping off a TB or coin is to write down the number on the sheet (we've been caching since long before PQs were invented ), or in my PDA. At the least, you can mark it Missing, with an explanation. I know that we've had a similar problem a few times, and it gives me yet another reason to think hard about buying a Blackberry or similar device. When I hand off a traveler... "Oh, BTW, before you go, log into your account and grab that puppy, would you? Here, use my portable internet"

I (Jim) have never paid more than the issue price for any geocoin. I've gotten a few in trade, and gave away a little more value than the issue price was, for a particularly good coin. The largest set I've bought at once was the Ranger216 Christmas series a couple of years ago. That was seven coins; probably ran about $110 for two sets. Now Sharon (the other half of the team) has bought a few things on ebay, but never any outrageous price. I flat refuse to buy any geocoins on an auction site. We have lots of geocoins for trading, though

Has the list at the start of this thread been updated anywhere? Or is that list at the start the current, updated list? There are so many posts on this thread tree that I'm not keen on trying to go through them to add any that aren't on it.

Not a thing, and it affects both of our computers. Perhaps this is an ISP issue; that might explain the intermittent nature of the problem. Still, the fact is that some information is being exchanged; I can see data being transferred, just not as much when I get the blank page as when I get the page, itself. I suppose that if no one else reports this, it's not in GC's system; if others *do* report it, then it's definitely a bigger problem.