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succotash

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Everything posted by succotash

  1. If there's good educational or historical information on a cache page, we'll often close our log entry with "thanks for the history and the cache" or something of that sort so the CO knows we read and appreciated the effort that went in to the cache page. We don't always do that, this is a good reminder.
  2. Condolences on your loss. Thank you for sharing your story and for continuing his positive legacy. Very inspiring.
  3. I'm not sure about our first thousand, but at 3350 caches to date we're happy to report: -Regular at the top of the list with 37% -Micro 26% -Small 23% We really appreciate cachers who place regular-sized caches.
  4. LOne R, great photos of swag for adults, and a very interesting and creative geoswag blog. Some of the best swag we've ever found was from TokenCollector. He put interesting items in bags along with information sheets on the items. We always learned something.
  5. GLRG9K2 "Not Your Garden Variety Cache" is still active (although it has required quite a bit of attention from the owner). "This was our first cache. What a beautiful park in January. We took the deck of cards and left a keychain flashlight and a Battlebots Winner pog from Jabberwock the battlebot season 4.0 in San Francisco. Logbook is totally full we were the third to sign on the back cover. Thanks for the cache. We are hooked!" We were right about being hooked on caching. This first cache was part of the reason, as it is a special container in a beautiful park and really made us appreciate the sport.
  6. We actually did "stumble upon" a cache once. The cache was unlisted - it turns out that the owners had hidden it waiting for someone with geosense or luck to stumble upon it. It took a year for that to happen! The owners published it as "The Succotash Cache". Very exciting! You can read our log entry here.
  7. I enjoy puzzles and have solved many that we'll never visit. Sometimes I'll post a note to let the cache owner know how much I enjoyed the puzzle. As the owner of a puzzle cache I think that kind of feedback is nice, and I would imagine other puzzle cache owners might feel the same way. But log a find if we didn't go to the location and find the container? No interest in that.
  8. Very helpful answer, Potato Finder, thanks. I hadn't paid attention to the different battery types and realize now that it makes a difference since our strategy is to recharge them right away and then stow them back in our caching bag for future use. Bean
  9. Interesting! We adopted a cache and I just looked at how it is displayed on the map. It shows up as a smiley face, not a star. Since we found the cache years before we adopted it, I'm guessing that our "found it" log takes precedence as the map can only identify a cache in one way. We're fine with that, but it is interesting and not something we'd noticed before.
  10. We have only done seven caches in Tennessee, but our favorite is also an EarthCache, "Norris Weir Dam."
  11. Thanks for sharing your positive story and observations! Welcome!
  12. We enjoy both. Checking out benchmarks can help identify interesting history of an area and that's the main attraction for us. Sometimes, finding a benchmark can be very physical and require focused navigational skills - we've worked a lot harder for some of our benchmarks than many of our cache smileys! We do consider benchmarking secondary to geocaching and don't always seek them but to us it does seem very compatible with caching and adds another dimension to our exploration when in a new area.
  13. Lone R, I posted a question on this some time ago and generally got positive responses. Cachers thought it was nice to post a note saying you solved and liked the puzzle even if you wouldn't be able to go to the location to seek the cache. Nice positive feedback for the CO on the puzzle. I've done it a few times!
  14. This sign made us laugh. We were driving our mini that day and the speed bump was so large that all four wheels fit on it at the same time.
  15. Congratulations, MooseJawSpruce! Attaching the laminated card to ours wasn't as helpful as we'd hoped it would be... it was picked up last July and hasn't been moved again. Hopefully it will be soon!
  16. If you get a chance while in DC, we recommend the virtual Last Stop for a Weary Traveler. In this case the favorite system is right on - it has over 270 favorite points and it is unforgettable.
  17. Early on we also figured out that we needed "multipurpose" shoes for caching. We use the same shoes for walking several miles on a paved path, or a dirt trail, climbing on rocks and slippery slopes, or crossing a stream. Good grip, structure (low cut), and ability to dry quickly are features we like. We do have separate water shoes for boating. Not recommended for a long walk! We also like the convertible pants. Quick dry is a great feature and of course lots of pockets and loops are a plus for caching adventures (if you like trackables it's nice to have a small secure zipper pocket to secure geocoins).
  18. We feel the same way. It's the unexpected nature of the swag that makes it fun. We like glass, metal, and wood so sometimes even the simplest object is interesting to us.
  19. Good luck with your health. Getting outside and walking is something we loved before caching but caching adds another dimension. Now if we have high stress or pressures from work we can lose all of that by going after a high terrain cache (if we can find one in our area). Sometimes just a mile into the woods and you can tell the difference. I imagine the same would happen downtown near the doctor's office due to the focus on the find. What a great benefit to be able to use caching so positively. You were wondering if you looked strange with the GPSr and tears. I imagine not very strange to the many who walk around texting! Good luck to you.
  20. One of our most memorable DNFs was part of a three-part log entry... the main part is below... Chapter Three – “The Long Arm of the Law” It was a short drive over to this cache from the nearby Teachers Pet cache. We parked in front of the church and knelt down at the coordinates. We acquired the needed information and started doing the math. Little did we know that we were in the calm before the storm. The calculation on the page for the western coordinates confused us slightly and we thought it could be interpreted two ways. We did both calculations and plotted both sets of second stages. One set was very close (just alongside the church), and one was a short drive away. We decided to check alongside the church first. We made a quick survey of the area and were close to deciding to move on when a Union County Police cruiser pulled into the church drive blocking our way. This was a little surprising but we knew we had a good reason for being there. When the second cruiser pulled in we knew this was something different. As the policeman exited the car, we heard Corn’s name being announced over the police radio. The police asked us what we were doing there. Luckily we had the printouts of the mystery cache webpage and we described geocaching. The police indicated they had not heard of any such treasure hunt, and were quite curious what kind of “treasure” we were seeking. We explained that it was just a scavenger hunt that gets us out of the house and takes us to interesting places. One of the policemen said he didn’t see the point of it all. We showed him on the Garmin Colorado that Union Point was covered with lots of caches that bring folks from all over to his town. In fact, we said, there was one over at the old schoolhouse that we just found. At the mention of the schoolhouse the policeman’s eyes flashed and he said, “Tell us about the schoolhouse, you know that’s now part of our City Hall.” At this moment another car pulled in and a man in camouflage and a big floppy leather hat walked up. He was wearing a harness with a nice set of camouflage binoculars on his chest. The police asked him who he was. He said, “I’m the pastor here at First Baptist.” We explained to him what we were doing there and he knew of geocaching. When the police asked why he was dressed in cammo, he said he was just heading out to go hunting when he heard there was trouble at the church. The police asked if he was planning on hunting in the briar patch since he was wearing briar pants. The pastor appropriately said, “You never know where hunting might take you.” Then the pastor said that he was an FSU fan and that the police should arrest Corn for wearing a Florida Gator shirt. The policemen discussed that idea for a moment since they were both Georgia Bulldog fans. Then the kind pastor said he did not have any problem with us geocaching and that they should let us go. He then left for the woods (or briar patch depending on the outcome of his hunt). At that point the police returned to the topic of the old schoolhouse. We explained the nature of the hide, and that it included bricks. The police looked at us knowingly. It seems they had received a report of strange folks pulling bricks from the old school house. Our story now at least made sense. They had us draw out the location of the cache. They were going to check it out. They were certain no one had given permission for that type of cache. Corn pulled up the webpage on the Colorado and showed that the cache was placed during an event at the schoolhouse and all was well. The police took down all of our contact information and let us go on our way. They were much more relaxed now and were actually very kind to us. By this time it was after 5:00 and we needed to head home to watch the Gator game. We left stage two for another day. We left Union Point heading east after an eventful afternoon. As we drove down Highway 278 towards Crawfordville, GA Corn’s cell phone started ringing. It was one of the Union Point policemen that had detained us at the church. He asked if we were still in town. When he found out we had already left town, he invited us to come back and keep geocaching. Somehow he found out that it is a good thing and that visitors were welcome to spend time in Union Point seeking caches. He offered that if we came back he would even show us a new cache hidden behind the cemetery (we realized he was referring to “Point of No Return” – our first Union Point cache of the day). We declined the kind offer saying we needed to head home to watch the Gator game. He welcomed us back to Union Point any time. We do plan on returning.
  21. I wonder how many cache owners write to the person who leaves a great log on their cache and let them know how much you liked it? We probably don't do it as often as we should, but we do every so often. We really try hard to give positive feedback to people who leave great logs, or newbies who move one of our trackables, or people who post a great picture. this thread is inspiring me to do better at that feedback. Sometimes we write seriously positive log entries and we try to post a lot of photos, whether we get feedback or not, because that's part of what we love about caching. But for this cache we had fun and the cache owners loved the log and wrote us an email telling us so! It didn't have to be 500 words to make their day, and it was great to hear from them.
  22. We also sort bookmarks by manually editing the entries. If it's for a long road trip I often group them by letters beginning with "A - Cache Name" at the begin point. I leave some gaps as the list develops to keep the list flexible as we make our plans. I also add parking coordinates (if given) to the bookmark entries to make it easier to program the car GPSr.
  23. Are you asking the question because of the "dangerous animal" cache attribute? If so I think it would be most helpful to mention whatever the spider issue is on the cache page. Even though Bamboozle is right, some spiders actually can be dangerous, I doubt most people would think of spiders when seeing the "dangerous animal" attribute. Bean
  24. Welcome! Our advice is to start out looking for caches in places you like to be anyway - so you and your son will enjoy the experience no matter what. It is also helpful to look for "regular" sized caches and caches with a difficulty rating of no more than 1 or 2 when you first start. Very small caches, and caches with a high difficulty rating, can be hard to find even for experienced cachers. It's nice to have some success at the beginning! Also, remember that the GPSr/arrow will only get you close. Once you are in the area, start looking around. Sometimes the cache page will have a helpful hint to guide you. Enjoy your time together!
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