Boogus

We got a package today in the mail and we just knew it had to be the Secret Santa! So what did we do? We opened it as soon as we got home of course!! We are so weak - we couldn't wait. And we recognised the Secret Santa as the one and only JGYPSY33 from Idaho. haha Thanks JGYPSY33!! We love the Smores. We are making them tonight for a treat. And the coins are all perfect. We had not heard about the football coin or the Beijing Observatory Geocoin - they are beautiful. The Cache Movers traveler is perfect and we will be placing that in our next cache hide for sure. Here are some pictures of the package unwrapping. And KylieDog got into the action too - she was very curious. Thanks so much Secret Santa (wink, wink). We hope you like what we sent you too. Merry Christmas. The First look before we opened the bag ... Yummy to the Tummy ... KylieDog getting curious about what we were opening ... Geocoin Christmas Goodness!

I wrote to contact@geocaching.com They are always very polite and quick to help if they can.

Good news from Groundspeak ... I have got the first few codes back from Groundspeak very quickly - in less than a few hours. So Groundspeak seems to be very cooperative to give out the codes for these at least.

Thanks for posting avroair. I don't understand your reluctance to post here but your comment is valued and correct. The only reason for this post in the first place is to notify all those who may be having trouble getting activation codes from coinswag.com - and to possibly get some answers from them. And doesn't this thread become exactly what you suggest? - a resource for those to do their homework. But still they have not responded to any of my attempts to get help so, I for one, am beginning the labourous task of contacting Groundspeak to get the codes for the many coins I have through coinswag.

1. Participating #1: email sent 11/14/09 2. Received Name: Recieved on 11/24/09 3. Mission Complete: mailed on 11/30/09 4. Package Received:

Thanks for the suggestion. That is always an option however, here is the problem... I have numerous coins from coinswag. Why should I have to bother Groundspeak directly? Coinswag's website is still up and they are still selling coins. On their website they have this big stamp that says 100% customer satisfaction, lol. But they never answer my e-mails or all others asking about this major problem. I have numerous coins made through them and it would be a labourous task to bother Groundspeak about all these. Thanks for the suggestion but this post is simply an attempt to get Coinswags help and to inform others that might be having this same problem. Still no help or response though ... I will post here if they do ever respond.

Still no answer from anybody from my inquiries - neither through my e-mails or here And the coinswag website still will not accept or let me enter my geocoin codes ... Maybe after Thanksgiving someone will answer, or not

Dear coinswag, Thank you for all the coins you have sold and for your website. I have tried to get numerous activation codes from your site but everytime I enter a coin number, it says that I need to enter all six characters before it will give me a valid activation code. The thing is I have entered all the six numbers correctly but it still gives me the error and then indicates that I need to enter all six digits and to try again. Do you know if your site will ever be fixed so I can retrieve these codes. I have sent other inquiries about this topic but have not heard back from anybody. Please can you help or let me know when the site will be fixed? This is a very time sensitive question since I plan to give some coins for Christmas and I need the codes before I can give them away. Please help or respond soon. Thanks so much.

I am writing to personally thank you CastleMan. Thanks for contacting me back and for helping to get the codes. You have been very gracious and patient with me. So thank you and thanks so very much for the wonderful coins you have helped design and create. They are treasured.

My open letter that I sent to Castle Man.... Dear Castle Man, I am writing to you to inquire on the status of the coin codes being transfered to Oakcoins. Can you please tell me the status of the transfer and if the codes will ever be transfered? I have numerous coins purchased through Castle Coins and I need the activation codes desperately. The current state at Oakcoins is awful for responses to my inquiries. Their response time to get activation codes is 2 to 3 weeks if they even do respond and the number of coins I have to get codes for is a bunch so this task is quite exhausting when I see I options as it is. I am really desperate here and any help you could offer would be greatly appretiated. I mean greatly. The thought of having all these coins go to waste because of no activation codes is just awful. I understand your descicion to end your site but please see my frustration here and the frustration of all of your other customers in my shoes. The response from oakcoins is less than hopeful and there has been little information for us customers to go on. Please do not just drop your site like this and evaporate on us. Please forgive my sounding frustrated. It's just that I have been trying and the response has been very light so far and I have more than a few coins. Please can you help me or any information would be great. I saw your post on the forums but what kind of help is that really? Anyways, thanks so much for all your help and wishing you the best in your future caching endeavors.

1. Participating #1: email sent 11/14/09 2. Received Name: Recieved on 11/24/09 3. Mission Complete: getting it ready now 4. Package Received:

I got an answer directly from Oakcoins. The codes are not in their database. You have to email them, sigh. Oakcoins finally e-mailed me back after about two weeks to get me an activation code. Thankfully they are at least responding to e-mails even though it takes a while.

http://www.oakcoins.com/activate/ There, that wasn't so hard was it? If you click on the link above, the is a link in the middle of the page that you can click on to reach support@oakcoins.com Their database was corrupted, but I believe it's working again. Thanks avroair - I very much appreciate the e-mail link but as I had indicated before I had sent them e-mails before but had not received any replies. But I am patient and polite. I will wait and be thankful if they do.

I am very troubled by this Castle Man that you have dropped your site and transfered the codes since Oakcoins does not seem to have the codes in their database. And I am sorry but also getting very irritated. I have numerous geocoins from Castle Coins and through OakCoins. Some of the coins I have tried to activate through Oakcoins have not been recognised and therefore do not give activation codes. I have contacted Oakcoins and have got no response. Also it is so difficult to even find a link on the Oakcoins website to send them an e-mail. I have posted on this forum to ask for help in activating a few coins but still no response from Oakcoins on this forum either. It seems quite hopeless. This is so dissapointing and frustrating. May I please ask for help from Oakcoins again and may I ask for your help too, CastleMan, since Oakcoins does not appear to care. Will either one of you please send me an e-mail so I could get some help. Thanks in advance.

This geocoin is the one with the sun & clouds on the front and the moon and the starts on the back. And the letters say ... Caching From Dawn Until Dusk Thanks for all the help. I have checked to make sure about zeros and the letter O. And all the possible other variations but no luck. Still waiting on a response from Oakcoins.

It seems that a lot of older geocoins are getting difficult to aquire an activation code for. With the drop of AEToys website and the notice from Castle Coins, I have been motivated to go into my entire collection and get every code written down somewhere before sites drop off the net and then no activation code can be retrieved. Anyway, my lesson has been learned ... get the activation codes the moment the new geocoin arrives in the mail. This being said, does anybody have any info on where I can activate a Caching from Dusk until Dawn geocoin? It says Oakcoins in the slip that came with the coin but their site does not recognise the coin #. Also, everytime I send Oakcoins an e-mail for assistance, they never return my messages. Thanks for any help.

never mind - i found the codes for the sins geocoins at geocoindesign.com

Thanks for the update. I have a bunch of the coins made through Castle Coins and am sad to see your site down. Wish you luck and love in all ! Hey Castle Man, Do you know if all the codes have been transfered yet. I still am unable to get the codes for a bunch of coins. Two among them are the first two in the series of the 7 Caching Sins. The slip says they were made through Castle Coins. Thanks for any help.

Thanks for the update. I have a bunch of the coins made through Castle Coins and am sad to see your site down. Wish you luck and love in all !

This is good news to know. Thank you for haveing these codes transfered. Apon seeing this message I started to try and get the codes for various coins that I have aquired through Castle Coins. While trying to get the codes I noticed that most or all of the codes are not found in the Oakcoins database. Is that because they have not been completely transfered yet? And if so, when do you expect the codes to all be transfered? Thanks

no help from geocaching.com, they say i need to contact the original coin owners or producers. i will also try to contact Groundspeak.com as suggested earlier by a forum memeber. i didn't realize these were different entities. any other suggestions from the forum? I'm trying to activate these too. I have 6 of them. The aetoys website is kapoot. Any luck in finding an answer as to where to get the activation codes? I hit a dead end. Thanks

Tough choice but the two keepers would be ... 1. Pay It Forward (Gold 2006) 2. Crop Circle ver.1

We received ours in the mail today. They are thicker than I thought they would be (about 1/4 inch) which is a good thing. They are beautifully crafted with no flaws and feel very nice in hand. Definitely an exquisite addition to the compass rose collection!

So true. As someone who has set free dozens of geocoins free, I just shake my head when I see how many have gone missing. Quite sad as some go missing right from the first cache I put them in. I have so many nice coins that I would like to set free but it seems that the nicer the coin design is, the quicker it gets stolen. So I only tend to release the less exciting coins with the least interesting designs. Oh well. But I refuse to quit releasing geocoins and let the thieves win. I will continue to regretably release geocoins and thus keep a cosistent supply to thieves going.

Yes the bubble does look like it is in all of them. I got three coins and the little air bubble is in all three.