So I Deleted A Cache Log Entry ...

[+kewfriend]

This relates to an EARTHCACHE Dune de Pilat

 

The cache requires:

To log the cache submit a photograph of Arcachon Bay (looking north to the oyster beds with your GPS in the picture ) or email kewfriend with the number of steps in the ladder - ( and its a lot! ).

 

I recieved this entry ( lots of pix as well ):

We didn't want to pay for parking and we were not guest of the campground. So we parked our car besides the street (we drove from the parking place in the direction of the campground and stopped a few meters after the campground). There is a way through the "jungle" to the dune. We had to climb up without stairs. So I was a litte bit sapped (*grinn*). On the dune we enjoyed the outlook - on the onehand side the sea, on the otherhand side the woods.

 

Annoyingly I forgot my gps device in the car (even though I prepared the geocache when I was at the Business School of Bordeaux by printing the cache description). So I took some fotos of the dune and the Arcachon bay without the gps device. I hope you all will tolerate this fact and let me count this cache as found (it is about 1900km for me to return to the dune!). It was the most impressing landscape in my holiday (we did a circular tour in France)

 

No email was received re ' the number of steps'.

 

My emailed reply explaining the reason for deleting the log was:

Thank you for your posting about Dune de Pilat.

 

Your request to 'log' this cache has been difficult to decide. I have no doubt that you were in France recently, and that you climbed the Dune de Pilat, and that you have some lovely photographs.

 

However you logged  the cache GCC183 Kilometer 452  in France as follows:

 

June 19 by ckappel (25 found)

This was our first cache in France we actually found! It was a really impressive area with the water channel and the railway bridges.

 

You logged GCC183  on your return home on the 26th June.

 

You will note your date: '19 June', and your comment 'our first cache in France'. This conflicts with your Dune de Pilat log on the '16 June' and the fact that you logged the Dune de Pilat today, a month after you logged GCC183.

 

You will note that by logging the cache on the '16th June' you have made yourself FIRST to FIND this cache - but you have not supplied any of the two requirements for the find: the GPS picture or the 'number of steps in the ladder'. It would be unfair to those who have supplied this to allow this log, particularly as you will jump ahead to be FIRST to FIND.

 

If you had been able to tell me the number of steps in the 'ladder' to the top I would have allowed this 'late' log - all you needed to do was to walk up and down the ladder once to do the counting.

 

I am happy for you to add a 'Note' that you enjoyed the location as part of your holiday and to show us your pictures.

 

Yours with regrets - KEWFRIEND

 

 

Was I unreasonable in deleting the log - there were certainly pictures of the couple on the Dune but no indication of date or compliance with the cache requirements.

 

As the Dune has been there a long time ( not surprising as its an Earthcache ), I have been strict in applying the requirements.

 

Am I a bear with a sore head?

[+Simply Paul]

Rules are rules. I give deletion my vote.

 

SP

[+Skippy and Pingu]

Was I unreasonable in deleting the log - there were certainly pictures of the couple on the Dune but no indication of date or compliance with the cache requirements.

 

As the Dune has been there a long time ( not surprising as its an Earthcache ), I have been strict in applying the requirements.

 

Am I a bear with a sore head?

I don't think you're a bear with a sore head. I would think that they went on holiday, did some caches and visited this location not realising it was an Earth Cache. They got home and realised that it was a cache and therefore tried to log it. You have clearly stated the requirements to log this cache and given people 2 different ways to do so, I would have thought that its not that hard to do one or the other.

 

If you don't stick to your rules for the cache then anyone could log it, they could just stick up a picture they took on holiday 5 years ago or worse still, one they got off the internet.

[+KiwiGary]

Seems fair to me, if the cache wasn't done with required steps then I say you are being very fair.

 

See ya...Gary

[SlytherinAlex]

As the Dune has been there a long time ( not surprising as its an Earthcache ), I have been strict in applying the requirements.

 

Am I a bear with a sore head?

It depends on your attitude to geocaching in general. There was a time when I might have deleted the log but having mellowed out a lot recently and gone into "it's only a game" mode I'm much more relaxed about how people log my caches.

 

I have a virtual outside the Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa (a vaction cache - whatever next !!!) that requires specific information to be provided to prove that the person actually visited the cache. Sometimes people will find the cache on their GPS while passing on the freeway and do it without having access to the cache page. We don't all have paperless caching. But as long as they have photos to prove they were there, I'll allow it. As I said. It's only a game.

 

What does bug me though as the sad b****** who try to log one of my other virtuals from their armchair by guessing the four letters that are needed for confirmation. Easy to spot as there is an obvious answer that can be found with google, that is actually wrong.

 

But what really counts if how you feel. If you are comfortable with deleting the log, then great. However, the fact that you feel you need a second opinion, might just show that you have doubts.

 

-

[+The Hokesters]

Does that mean we can't log it from our holiday in 1995?

[+kewfriend]

But what really counts if how you feel. If you are comfortable with deleting the log, then great. However, the fact that you feel you need a second opinion, might just show that you have doubts

 

Yes I did have doubts - because quite obviously they had travelled round France and been up the Dune. But I surmised that they only discovered it was an Earthcache on return - we've all done that - walked straight past a cache without realising it ( I did that on Haggis Hunters meet in Edinburgh ).

 

The problem with and and is that they are so easy to cache 'virtually' or 'in retrospect'.

 

I am a pretty laid back Geocacher - but I suppose I want it done 'proper like'.

[+HazelS]

No - I'm with you on this one... certainly ok to delete... No doubt they WERE there, but I reckon they cannot prove they visited it as a cache site... if you get my drift!

[NickPick]

My vote goes for your option of asking them to re-log it as a "Note"

[+third-degree-witch]

totally fair

[+stu_and_sarah]

Personally, I'd let them have it. The idea of the cache after all is to experience the location, which they did.

 

Maybe I'm just a big softie.

 

Cheers,

 

Stu

[+Renegade Knight]

If you let them have it, you make light of the people who took time to do it right. The only thing I might have done different is give them a chance to tell me the number of steps or to change their log to a note so they don't lose the log.

[+Kitty Hawk]

With you.

[+kewfriend]

Tx folks for the comments - keep em rolling as they say.

 

The only thing I might have done different is give them a chance to tell me the number of steps or to change their log to a note so they don't lose the log.

 

Actually I wanted to do that, but as the cache owner I couldn't see how to do that - only seemed to be able to accept the log or delete/archive it. Perhpas there is a way and I missed it.

[+Haggis Hunter]

With you on this Kewfriend, I have had to edit my earthcache listing about 3 times, because people can't understand that I want the whole trig point or flush bracket with the GPS in it. Or the answer to my question. Both of which have clearly been stated from the offset.

So far I have had pictures of the view at night and pictures of the very top of the trig, with a few other variations. I have emailed the people concerned, and each time have managed to come up with the goods.

 

I shouldn't have to email them to ask for the correct picture or information, it should happen straight away. I may start to delete logs that don't meet the criteria without warning.

[+Skippy and Pingu]

I want the whole trig point or flush bracket with the GPS in it. Or the answer to my question. Both of which have clearly been stated from the offset.

So far I have had pictures of the view at night and pictures of the very top of the trig, with a few other variations. I have emailed the people concerned, and each time have managed to come up with the goods.

I wouldn't know what a flush bracket was.

 

I would know what trig point was though

[+Snosrap]

Your cache, your choice.

 

It's hardly a matter of life or death either way.

[Ben Pid]

I say fairplay! Its your cache so its your choice...

 

I might have asked him if he could answer how many steps there were, but on the other hand he probably didnt know anyway...

 

like earlier poster said, Can I log it from my Holiday in 1995!??

 

Pid

[+kewfriend]

Can I log it from my Holiday in 1995!??

 

You know how many steps there were - errr

 

...... thinks .........

 

- probably a few more than there were in 1995 -

 

try a random guess between 1 and 1000.

 

Nope its not 446 .......

[+Haggis Hunter]

I wouldn't know what a flush bracket was.

 

I would know what trig point was though

It's the metal plate that is attached to the trig point, with the trig number on it.

 

The trigpoint in question has a unique shape, so far I have never seen another one with the same shape.

 

One poster didn't actually know what a trigpoint was, and posted a picture of the information pillar that is nearby. I accepted this as a one off, but you would expect if you didn't know when you read the description that you would take a look at the pictures to see what it looked like, or get the written answer and email me to be on the safe side.

[+Bill D (wwh)]

Of the cache logged on the 19th June, they say "this was our first cache in France we actually found". They just could mean that that one was the first container that they found, and they weren't including the earthcache because it's not a physical cache.

 

Just a thought.

[+Sensei TSKC]

Kewfriend,

 

What are your views on people logging your caches online but not signing the cache logbook? Would you allow them the find or not?

 

Is it not the same thing? - PROOF of being there for the cache.

 

Just my two penny worth.

 

Oss!

[nobby.nobbs]

658?

 

with you on this one, simple choice for cachers either photo or info. neither given and so sorry but no log.

 

it's not like the requests you make are so difficult.

[+Haggis Hunter]

Only 3 weeks ago I spent a total of 7 hours driving and 6 hours walking in the Southern mountains of Scotland, so that I could get to a location that I wanted to be an Earthcache. Now if I didn't want proof of people visiting the site, I wouldn't have left my home. I would have done all the work at my desk.

 

However, I believe that it is part of setting up an Earthcache to-

 

1. Visit the site yourself, bit rude getting people to go to a place that you have never been to.

 

2. Have the primary way to log as a picture, but for those people without cameras, have a question which allows them to say they were there. My question for that particular cache, I would never have came up with it if I had not visited the site.

 

So if the cache owner is going to go to the effort to place the cache correctly, then surely the cache finder can respect that, and post or send the information that is required for a find.

 

There are not many cachers out there that would log a virtual without sending the answer at the same time, WHY? Because they know it will be deleted without question. Earthcaches are no different.