Geo Based Picnic Games Ideas

[+Team Shydog]

I am hosting a geocaching picnic this spring and was wondering if anyone had any ideas for simple games. I am familiar with the closest to the pin contest and plan on doing that one. Any other ideas would be appreciated.

[Jokester]

I am hosting a geocaching picnic this spring and was wondering if anyone had any ideas for simple games. I am familiar with the closest to the pin contest and plan on doing that one. Any other ideas would be appreciated.

 

One thing that always goes over well is pocket caches. The only problem is to pull it off well you have to have a fairly good crowd. It works by giving X number of notebooks to random cachers. To log a "find" they have to introduce themselves to a suspected cacher and ask if they have a pocket cache.

 

If the cacher does, one of two things could happen. One the person that had the cache gives the cache to the person that asked. Or two the person could hold on to it until a designated time (they want to switch, they're leaving the event or the host takes it from them). I found that both ways has its advantages and disadvantages. The primary goal, of course, is to to get people to interact with each other.

 

Edit: It kind of goes without saying that the notebooks have to be small enough to be completely hidden in someone's pocket. I guess it would kind of defeat the purpose otherwise.

Edited February 9, 2006 by Jokester

[+Texas-Jacksons]

I am familiar with the closest to the pin contest and plan on doing that one.

I'm also planning a GeoPicnic. Could you elaborate on this contest? And how it's played?

[+Team Shydog]

The closest to the pin contest I just ran this last weekend is very simple to do and people seem to have alot of fun with it. It is best to have an open field to play in. The day before the picnic I went to the area that the contest was going to be held at and picked a spot and placed my gps there and let it average for a good twenty minutes. This gave me the coordinates that I posted the next day. The cachers would then take the posted coordinates, plug them into their own GPS units and try and get as close to my spot as possiable. The way I had them mark their spot is with a field flag, the type you can get at any farm store, they cost about a dime a piece, so ten bucks goes a long way. Of course to be consistant, I usually mark the spot some how so that I can go back and find the exact spot I took the origanal reading at. The first year I did this I place a nail in the dirt and than measured off the corner of a nearby flower bed. SInce I didn't think I could get away with using a nail this year, I used a fixed fence and attached a rope to it and then made the ends a equal length, I than crossed the rope at the exact spot and placed duct tape on each piece of the rope at the spot were they crossed. This allowed me to find the spot at the end of the contest. The person that won the contest placed her flag 3" from my posted spot. The flag furthest away was roughly 25'.I gave the winner a new small MAG light as a gift and she now has bragging rights for having the best GPS around Check out some of the pictures from the event page GCT4KD. ALso if you check my profile and look at the other event I did last year you will see some more pictures of the contest for that picnic.

 

This is alot of fun and I hope you enjoy doing it.

 

Chris-Team Shydog

[+rjw661]

THere is a type of scavenger hunt where you get a sheet with about 20 or 25 things associated with other cacchers. They have things like who's from out of state, who has over 500 finds who has more than 50 hides, who has less than 10 finds. It's also a nice ice breaker for new cachers at an event to met others.