Zoraima

Hi All: My husband was suddenly given a job interview in Springfield, VA next week. We will be arriving on June 23 and leaving June 24. I'm wondering if anyone out there could recommend anything in the area that I could do quickly while he's in his interview. I've looked at the Springfield listings, but not being familiar with the area, it's hard to know. We'll be at the Hilton. Thanks. Susan ----------------------------------------------------------- Even the smallest person can change the course of the future. --Galadriel, "The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship Of the Ring"

...the more you do it, the more you want to do it ...getting dirty is not only expected, it's almost mandatory ...even getting a little sidetracked can be fun ...if you do it right, you wind up breathless ----------------------------------------- Even the smallest person can change the course of the future. --Galadriel, "The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship Of the Ring"

I haven't run into anyone yet, but my vivid imagination tells me that there are serial killers and rapists lurking in the woods. I carry pepper spray and a big stick. I get especially nervous when I pull into a parking area and there are people just sitting in their cars for no apparent reason. Even the smallest person can change the course of the future. --Galadriel, "The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship Of the Ring"

Mine doesn't motivate me at all. I've only just begun and don't even have 20 yet, but I figure if I get to where the numbers put some kind of pressure on me, I'll just give up enjoying it and not bother. I've never been a hiker or outdoorsy type. My biggest thrill from caching has been an appreciation of being outdoors and the beauty of the world around us, a world I have spent plenty of time zooming on by. Susan Even the smallest person can change the course of the future. --Galadriel, "The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship Of the Ring"

My husband, two friends, and I were out caching. According to the cache description, there was a beach near the trail and we were wanting to visit the beach to fly our kites after logging the find. We went a little ways and discovered we had followed the wrong trail. As my husband is blind, and we were going to cut through the trees and do a little bushwhacking. I asked him if he wanted to go with us or if he wanted to wait on the main trail and we'd be right back? He decided to wait, so we left the kite with him and took off. It only took us about 5 minutes to find the cache and start heading back. Just as we had started back, we heard a dog start to bark. We came out of the woods and there is my husband, standing right where we left him, talking with two people who had a yappy little dog. We drew closer. My husband, who was laid off in December, is telling this guy all about his job prospects and job hunt. I had 2 thoughts: 1. What are these people going to think of a woman who leaves her blind husband alone in the woods with only a kite for protection? and 2. He really will talk to anyone. We drew up on them, and my husband introduced me to the guy. It turns out it was a guy he worked with in his old firm and they were catching up on old times. The guy said he was so surprised to see Michael out in the woods and couldn't figure out how he'd gotten out there. It was a good laugh at the end of the day! Susan Even the smallest person can change the course of the future. --Galadriel, "The Lord of the Rings: Fellowship Of the Ring"

People who go to a 1 star cache and then complain it was too easy. People underrating the difficulty of the terrain or the find, which makes me have to leave my handicapped husband off and come back for him. People who take 10 dollars worth of swapping goodies and leave 50 cents worth in return. Planning a full day of caching with friends, only to have the heavens open and rains to pour down. We go anyway, but it'd be nicer in good weather. Getting all the way to a spot the cache is supposed to be and then not being able to find it. Or having my GPS lose the signal. Susan

In terms of vision impairment... Most blind people are not totally blind; in fact, only a very small portion of the blind population is totally blind. To make caching easier for vision impaired folks, some of the following could be implemented: Placing the cache in a container that has a good contrast to the environment. Even if the cache is covered with ground cover and well hidden, leaving just a little portion of the contrasting color showing could help someone spot the cache. Selecting a trail that does not traverse major natural obstacles--rock climbing, lots of roots and uneven ground, water, slippery spots. Or at least giving fair warning in the cache description. Using a trail with bright trail markers or leaving a piece of conservation tape nearby to give the person a visual focus. Obviously these cannot all occur with every cache. These are just some immediate ideas I've had. As for wheelchair users or cane users, the elderly, or children, a good wide path is a must. Placing the cache at a comfortable level--be it on the ground or just a couple of feet off the ground can make all the difference. Particularly with people who have trouble bending, placing the cache up a bit may be just what they need to participate. I agree that hearing impairment probably doesn't need many adaptations. However, I did do a cache where it was mentioned that a rod and gun club was nearby and beware of walking to close to the shooting range (listen to gunshots). Details like that should definitely be included. For folks with a cognitive impairment, making a clear additional hint could be useful. These are just some things off the top of my head. Thanks to all who have participated thus far. Susan

Hello All... I'm relatively new to Geocaching and started it in the hopes it would get me and my husband (both of us are dedicated couch potatoes) out of the house and some much needed and long delayed exercise. My husband is blind. He really is more or less along for the ride when it comes to caching. When he is with me, we do one star caches, as it is incredibly difficult to trek through wilderness and do sighted guide over rocks, under low lying tree branches, etc. Unfortunately, a lot of one star caches really aren't one star at all. He got to the point of staying home and saying "forget it" as it's too difficult and stressful for him to be out there trying to navigate. I recently placed a one star cache and made it handicapped accessible--no strenuous hiking, close to the main trail, easy to locate. It got me thinking about how geocaching could be made accessible for people with handicaps. I came up with four main categories of handicap: vision, hearing, cognitive, and mobility. For my part, of course, and for most Geocachers, accessibility is not much of an issue, we can go pretty much anywhere. But for individuals who do have some kind of impairment, what can make geocaching easier so they are still able to participate? I work with the visually impaired and blind population (yes, in this PC world, the blind still wish to be called the blind) and I have some ideas about how caching can be made easier for those individuals, although the GPS itself is inaccessible and they will definitely need a sighted person to use that and get coordinates. My questions are: 1. What ideas have people out there got for making the sport accessible to individuals with vision, hearing, cognitive, or mobility impairments? 2. Can it be done? Can the sport be made accessible? 3. Should there be some way of noting on the cache descriptions that the cache is accessible to a person who has one of the impairments mentioned? I'd like to think that 1 star caches/terrain ratings would mean the cache is easy enough to get to, but know from experience that it is not the case. What ideas do others have? Susan

I went on caching with friends recently and we decrypted the following clue: Located in a group of evergreen trees in the Tree Plantation part of the park. There were literally hundreds of groups of evergreen trees. Sheesh, thanks a lot! Someone even commented after finding it: "I mean really, under a tree in a tree plantation?" Susan

This totally happened to me a week ago! My husband and I were due to go to a wedding and had to leave our house at 1:30. I told him at 11:30 I was tired of sitting around and would go do a cache about 3 miles from our house. I told him I'd be there and back in 30 minutes. I arrived at the trailhead and fortunately, took the time to read the sign. The trail had three branches, one marked yellow, one red, and one blue. The red was the main trail and the yellow and blue were side legs off it. The cache itself seemed to be off the yellow trail. Because I am a landmark traveler, I always make mental notes of the visual landmarks I travel past, under, or over--streams, funny looking trees, a piece of trash in a strange place, flowers, etc. Unfortunately, the cache was out in the middle of a dense forest canopy and my GPS kept averaging. It put me at 5 or 6 different spots where I was supposed to be less than 10 feet from the cache. Each time I seemed to be close, the GPS lost the signals and started over. Then the warning went off that the battery level was dangerously low. I had to shut it off. No problem. I hadn't found the cache, but I was only two tenths of a mile from the car. I had followed the yellow trail. I could do this. I turned around and followed the yellow trail. Nothing looked familiar. I went over a bridge over a stream, and while I remembered going over a stream, the bridge was not what I remembered. I seemed to be walking a long time and not finding the entrance to the red trail. I came out on the wrong end of a barbed wire fence and saw I was in someone's backyard. So I was faced with leaving the woods and not really knowing where I was or where my car was and trekking through someone's back yard, or to go back and try to find where I had been. For whatever reason, I decided to go back in the woods. I was a little nervous, and I had no idea what time it was, and I heard a man in the woods whistling. A dog barrelled up to me. I have a vivid imagination when it comes to that kind of thing--was convinced there was an axe murderer on my tail. I returned to the last place I remembered being. I looked at the trails leading out of that part of the forest and looking forward, decided to follow a stretch of the blue trail. As it happened, this stretch of blue trail led directly into the yellow trail I followed when I left the red trail from my car. I was able to quickly get back into the car and was only an hour late getting home. By the time I got home, my husband was worried and about to call the police. Unfortunately, I do not own a cell phone, but from now on, if caching alone, I will bring our ham radio with me for use in a pinch. I also learned not to use the spare batteries on my camera without replacing the ones for the GPS and to program in the waypoint for the car/parking lot. It was genuinely scary, but I picked up some good lessons out of it.

If anyone has the occasion to come to Massachusetts, I would highly recommend The Depot by Chooch. It's the longest hike I've taken so far for a cache, roughly 3/10 of a mile. The trail cuts off through the woods and you do have to do a little bit of scrabbling over large rocks, etc. The trail is marked by road signs in Icelandic and small birdhouses. The end of the trail leads to a large area the cache-master has created, including a working model railroad trestle and small village scenes. Any description I might give can't do it justice. If you get up this way, enjoy it. You won't be disappointed.

Tired of waiting for the snow to melt, I dragged my husband geocaching one March day. It was fairly warm for winter, but there was a lot of ice. He slid on the ice and sprained his ankle. I practically had to carry him back to the car. I went back the next day alone, only to discover the stupid cache was plundered. Go figure. Zoraima

I am another female geocacher! I heard about the sport from a friend of mine, who is male, but lives about a thousand miles away. He was really into it and got his wife into it. I thought it sounded really cool, and convinced my husband to buy a GPS with our tax return money. Having done so, my husband is not really into it, but for good reason: he is totally blind and hiking over rocks and roots and other such stuff is difficult for him. He's been out with me to two or three caches and he just sort of stands around and humors me. I get a bit more enjoyment out of without him standing around "making that face." I do go caching with another couple on and off and we have a good time--it's us two women against the one man. Zoraima

Hi there! This is my first post on the forums and I'm posting a link to my Geocaching site, per request! Zoraima's Geocaching Page Enjoy! Susan