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Ouch, that hurt!


E-trexer

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I'm still relatively new at geocaching. I just found my first multi-cache today. It was in a woods which required some off-trail hiking and wading a river. Just as I was getting to the first stage, I made the mistake of grabbing a weed which had these hairy, sticky quills which were sharp as a razor. Ouch, that hurt! It skinned my knuckle pretty nicely. I'm sure some of you have had accidents which would make that seem like nothing. What type of accidents have you had? Do you think they were unavoidable or could you have prevented them? This is a discussion of geocaching accidents and injuries.

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I was going from one cache to another, and felt down on a hillside of slate tailings from a mine (attraction to first cache site). I got lucky by not going face down the hill, but did catch my knee on a sharp edge and slid for about 4 feet. The cut was about a 1/4" deep and 3" long on my knee cap. It didn't bleed a whole lot. I didn't get stitches and I have plenty of scar tissue. That didn't stop me from hiking another mile to the next cache.

 

The hillside of tailings was covered with snow, so I think I probably could have prevented the injury by crawling down instead of walking down the hill. :)

Edited by Acid Rain
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No accidents to report, ever, in all my many episodes of placing and seeking extreme caches (and non-extreme caches as well). I have, at times, gotten a few scrapes on my knees, ankles, elbows or forearms, but they were always simply a side effect of crawling thru a tight and narrow storm drain pipe on my belly, where the bottom of the pipe was covered with broken glass, or from doing a bit of free-solo rock climbing on a nasty overhang to reach a cache; they were not the result of accidents but simply a bit of wear and tear.

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My mom fell down on some lava formations while looking for a cache near a lava tube. (cave). Her leg was bruised and swollen from the knee down. We, my little sister and I, called it a Kankle.

 

KANKLE = a word to describe the lower section of your leg when you can't tell where your knee ends and your ankle begins.

 

Darn. Now I wish I had taken a picture. It was a bit scary. we were worried about blood clots breaking loose.....

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abridged versions...

 

I have needed a tetanus shot, had a "high sprain" to my ankle, and am using medicine in my eyes that I will likely have to use for a year, all due to caching injuries/accidents....

 

And that is not to mention the various (numerous) bumps bruises scrapes, etc, that I have NOT sought medical attention for. icon_smile_blackeye.gif

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About half way into a 3 mile (one way) hike into the wilderness, a tree root reached out and grabbed me, wreasling me to the ground. Broke all three bones in my left arm... one of them twice.

 

1162294d-d353-486a-879e-fdbc8401ba56.jpg

 

I headed back to the trailhead and waited for the rest of the party to continue the hike. When they got back we cached our way back to town... so I found 10 more caches on the way to the ER. (Priorities you know!)

 

The picture above was taken a week or two later on another hike on the south slope of Mount St Helens.

Edited by Right Wing Wacko
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About half way into a 3 mile (one way) hike into the wilderness, a tree root reached out and grabbed me, wreasling me to the ground. Broke all three bones in my left arm... one of them twice.

 

1162294d-d353-486a-879e-fdbc8401ba56.jpg

 

I headed back to the trailhead and waited for the rest of the party to continue the hike. When they got back we cached our way back to town... so I found 10 more caches on the way to the ER. (Priorities you know!)

 

The picture above was taken a week or two later on another hike on the south slope of Mount St Helens.

 

This guy's unconquerable! :huh:

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I was just thinking about this topic the other day, I have unreliable knees and have had various falls etc over the years before geocaching, # ankle, torn ligaments, cracked tail bone , and ruptured achilles, all while enjoying the great outdoors. So now I take up this activity and find myself in places I shouldn't be with shoes I shouldn't be wearing, or bare legs through the brambles and nettles. So far the only caching ouches I have recieved are a bruised and scraped ankle, sliding off the side of a log and 3 wasp bites in 5 minutes last week while checking up on my own cache :lol: The geopups were along and thought my dancing and yelling was an invite to play, silly dogs, luckily they did not get bitten. The swelling and itching is almost gone :huh: Today I have to pick up my wedding ring that had to get cut off cause of the swelling and tomorrow go the eye Dr to get a new pair of glasses, that I dropped and then walked on coming home from a cache while camping on the weekend. It's getting to be an expensive hobby :lol:

 

Dira duck

 

Someday I hope to be the person my dogs already think I am

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About half way into a 3 mile (one way) hike into the wilderness, a tree root reached out and grabbed me, wreasling me to the ground. Broke all three bones in my left arm... one of them twice.

 

I headed back to the trailhead and waited for the rest of the party to continue the hike. When they got back we cached our way back to town... so I found 10 more caches on the way to the ER. (Priorities you know!)

 

The picture above was taken a week or two later on another hike on the south slope of Mount St Helens.

 

This guy's unconquerable! :lol:

 

I've seen worse! A LOT worse

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I haven't been caching long, but was bit by a snake today, on my fourth day out. I was walking down a trail in the middle of the woods and he just shot out from under some undergrowth on the side of the trail and latched onto my left boot. I'm sure it wasn't poisonous, and it didn't even get through the leather, but boy did he scare the living daylights out of me. Thankfully I didn't have my usual running shoes on. :)

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Nothing amazing, just the usual collection of bug bites, nettles, scratches from thorns and Lord knows what, minimal ivy poisoning, eye pokers doing their thing as I try to duck through the brush, big scratches on my arm from forcing it into a hole in a huge snag to reach a log book in an ammo can inside, fallen off a couple of logs, (yes it really is easy). Oh yeah, banged my head on a branch. Why did I forget that? What was I saying? Nothing broken, nothing that didn't heal easily. Not like some of you folks. Couple real ouchies there guys. What did Phil used to say on Hill Street Blues? "Let's be careful out there". Holds for cachers too I guess.

hairball

Edited by hairball45
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Not really finding a Geocache , but while going out to service one of my caches, I decided to ride my mountain bike (I have been riding for some time - this is nothing new). On the way to this particular cache I had to go around a deep rut in the trail from 4 wheelers and as I did, managed to not notice a small tree (about 2" around) that was bent down across the trail. On the side of the tree, someone had broken off a branch and this formed a nice v shaped fish hook like trap just at head level while on a bike. My head hit the "tree" and my neck was twisted almost completely around as the v from the tree slid nicely into my mouth "fish hooking" me, this, coupled with my forward momentum and the fact I was clipped into the bike's pedals (told ya I had been riding a while) allowed my full body weight and that of the bike to be suspended for a brief instant from the inside of my mouth on the treebranch. Then my mouth ripped open and I fell face first into the rut full of stagnant green water I had tried to avoid. The bike landed on top of me (I was still clipped into it). I removed myself fromt he "sewer" and recovered my bike. I knew I had hurt myself, but could not tell how badly as I was spitting a lot of blood and pieces of my mouth out. Quickly thinking and using my maguiver injunity, I dug out my digital camera and tried to take a picture of my face, but only managed to bleed allover the camera lens. I got back on the bike and headed back to the car and judging from the reaction from the couple I passed determined I must be hurt good.

 

When I got to the car I loaded my bike and looked in the mirror, yep, hurt good, lot of blood and a big rip in the side of my mouth. I jumped into the car and headed for the hospital. As I rounded a bend in Goverment road (along the Welland Canal) I noticed someone standing in the middle of the road and pointing at me.. HUH!!! A cop, he was pulling me over for speeding - Jeesh, I pulled over and as he approached the car I could see his reaction change. His first words confirmed to me I was hurt "holy SH*^ are you ok, what happened?" I quickly explained I crashed my bike and was heading to the hospital and he sent me on my way - things I will do to get out of a ticket!

 

12 Stitches to fix my mouth and I had to visit a sports specialist who explained to me I had displaced C1 and C2, I didn't really think this was a big deal until he explained that the spinal chord at that point is the consistancy of toothpaste and I had nearly severed it (aparently that is bad)...

 

I didn't even get to fix up my cache that day...

 

I am not allowed to mountain bike anymore (The wife wants to keep me around...)

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Buddy and I were doing a contest not publish on this site cause it was against thier guidelines...whatever.

 

Heading back home late some evening and it was dark...

 

Befofore I continue from there, we were hauling a trailer with a quad on it, anyway along the trail, we manage to bend the trailer axle. Well we got a flat and changed it only to get another a few miles down the highway. Went to pull over, remember it's pitch black dark by now, hit the shoulder and the whole truck felt like it was gonna flip over. Hit a spot where there was a ditch, about a four foot drop or so, only thing saving us was the quad ond the trailer which was wishbone behind us. Nothing we could possisbly do to get out of it.

 

Buddy finaly hitch a ride to the nearest town which wasn't so near and had a tow truck pull me out...that's when we saw the bent axle on the trailer. Fixed it the next morning and life has been good since then. :P

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On the side of the tree, someone had broken off a branch and this formed a nice v shaped fish hook like trap just at head level while on a bike. My head hit the "tree" and my neck was twisted almost completely around as the v from the tree slid nicely into my mouth "fish hooking" me, this, coupled with my forward momentum and the fact I was clipped into the bike's pedals (told ya I had been riding a while) allowed my full body weight and that of the bike to be suspended for a brief instant from the inside of my mouth on the treebranch.

 

Don't know if I'll ever fish again after hearing about what it feels like to be hooked! :blink: I guess I should donate a dollar to the "save the fish foundation" for every fish I've ever caught to in some way make ammends.

 

I was wincing all the way through the story so I'd definitely give you the geocacher's "purple heart award" for injuries received while answering the call of duty (geocaching). Hopefully that will be the most severe accident of your life (by far)!

Edited by E-trexer
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I got a nice sharp poke in the eye with a nice sharp stick the other evening. It was just before dark and I never saw it until I jerked backwards. Know how you jerk back (thank God for reflexes) and THEN say "OW!" Yep, happened... but I had no idea how bad it was until my girlfriend saw me the next day and said "Eeeeew!" Looked in the mirror closely, and my eyeball was BLOOD red. Apparently I had busted a vessel or something, and made my eye look pretty nasty for a few days.

 

Other than that, I honestly can't remember much worse than a bad case of poison ivy...

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It was about a month ago my wife, son, the dog and myself were out looking for one of our first 10 caches. D/T = 1/1 Sounded fairly simple.......We were just off the paved path in the park down by the lake and my GPSr was at 3ft when I heard my wife scream......I immediately went to check it out and almost fainted at the sight. <_< She had just punctured her "shin" about 1" deep and 3" long with a piece of a tree stump that was as sharp as a pencil........... It was NASTY, skin, blood and pieces of flesh were hanging out.... We were at the bottom of the slope and had to get her to the top by the path and almost 1/2 of a mile away from the car. Luckily there were some golfers on the other side of the path and they took my wife to the clubhouse in their golf cart while my son and I jogged the opposite direction back to the car.

 

This tripped turned from a nice 2 hour walk in the park to an extremely painful & expensive 6 hour trip to the emergency room where my wife got 5 huge staples in her shin..........

 

Now every time we go GeoCaching we always tease her about tree stumps or call her stumpy.......she has a great sense of humor about it......

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I was climbing up to a cache that was on a hill. My shoes didn't have much tread left on them at the time and I was being very careful because of this fact. I was nearly at the cache when one of my feet slipped. Immediately, with the added weight and pressure on my other foot, it slipped as well. Since I was walking up the hill I fell forward with my face landing right into some stinging nettles. They got me on the nose and forehead but the worst was right in my eye socket.

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Ha Ha some good stories there. Umm i was walking with my brother. A branch got caught on my backpack and I didn't notice. Jt was walking behind me and as i walked forward the branch started to bend and it broke off and it hit him in the face..... he had a huge red line across his face lol we all thought it was funny. he was even able to laugh about it afterwards. :rolleyes: lol

Edited by origami_fan
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Well, after yesterday, I can add my own injury to the thread, though its not as bad as most...

 

I was looking for a local cache, hidden at a bridge that parallels the road. The creek that the bridge (and road) crosses is full of PO. There is about 6 feet between the bridge and the road, with a small rain wash (drains into the creek) in the middle, also full of PO. My GPSr was jumping from the road to the bridge and back again, so I decided to jump across to the road side and take a look. I made it, without touching the PO, but wasn't thinking about my landing form. Just picture a short, overweight woman, wearing well worn flip flops (read: holes in the bottoms), jumping a 6 foot wide washout. <_< I hyperextended my left knee and stepped on goathead thorns (not sure if that is their real name, but thats what I grew up calling them) through the holes in the bottom of my flip flops. :rolleyes:

 

I am sore today and my knee is stiff, but I think I will live... LOL.

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Two or three weeks ago I was out caching on my mountain bike with my friend (luckily) and we found the cache just fine. On the way back, we decided to go down this nice dirt hill. It was about 50 feet down and the entire descent was about 250 feet, the first 80 or so being about 65-70 degrees down in angle. It may not seem like a lot, but thats about 10 feet down for every 25 feet of travel. I got down the hill fine - stable and everything, but at the bottom there was a small washout with sand a good 1" - 2" deep. The handle bar and front tire started to woble. And I started to freakout, considering I was doing about 25 and the trail was about to T off 200 feet away.

 

Now, before I continue my story, I must explain one thing - The bike I was riding on was new and equipped with Tektro IO Mech. disc brakes (which are the same concept of braking power found on most new cars). I am used to crappy brakes, considering that my old bike was a $150 discout bike with brakes that barley worked. That out of way, let me continue.

 

The wheel started to woble and I panicked. In possibly the stupidest thing I've done in a long time, I slammed on the brakes. Not just the rear brake, but the front brake. The bike flipped over and made a dead stop in about a foot. I was launched off the bike and tumbled a good 15 feet. The bike just kinda flipped over and landed next to me.

 

The only thing I remember about the actual crash is slamming on the brakes and laying on the ground sreaming for my friend (I remember not crying - It's not physically required by your body to cry when injured). I later have come to realize that the handlebars slammed into my chest and I passed out, so my face took the beating.

 

After I crashed, and was screaming for my friend, he came running over and then I passed out. I woke up with water on my forehead and on my back with my feet elevated. I was really dazed and noticed that my lip was swolen and bleeding a bit, as well as my forehead. I swished some water around in my mouth and spat out all the sand that was in my mouth. It tasted really bad with the blood. Kinda being able to think, I told my friend to call my parents. I told them what had happened, where I was and how to get there. Luckilly the road wasn't bad at all, because we have a Honda Odyssey. Superior street car, terrible off-roader. After hanging up, I blacked out again.

 

I woke up and asked to call my parents - again. I pretty much (from what I heard) repeated what I had said eariler. My mom started to freak out because I forgot that I had called earlier, and it took a bit of effort to remeber that I did. Lukily, my dad pulled up so I could go. He picked me up and loaded the bike up in the car, and off to the ER we went.

 

I was extremely tired on the way there and wanted to sleep like nothing else. My dad forced me to stay awake. When we got to the ER room, we did...ER stuff. I got a couple X-rays (nothing broken) and a CAT scan (nothing wrong). Then, they took me into a room and cleaned up my face, caked in a thin layer of dirt.

 

For a couple days I could barley walk (the pedals most of slammed into my leg) and it hurt to put any force on my hand, which took a long while to heal.

 

Today, I am in good condition with only a scar on my mouth. Which sucks cause everyday I have to put this cocoa butter vitiman-E crap all over it. I am back on my bike, but just on the streets - and after a $5000+ ER trip, I don't think I'll be back mountain biking for a while.

 

Well anyways, thats my story.

 

-TheAngryTomato

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Two or three weeks ago I was out caching on my mountain bike with my friend (luckily) and we found the cache just fine. On the way back, we decided to go down this nice dirt hill. It was about 50 feet down and the entire descent was about 250 feet, the first 80 or so being about 65-70 degrees down in angle. It may not seem like a lot, but thats about 10 feet down for every 25 feet of travel. I got down the hill fine - stable and everything, but at the bottom there was a small washout with sand a good 1" - 2" deep. The handle bar and front tire started to woble. And I started to freakout, considering I was doing about 25 and the trail was about to T off 200 feet away.

Just a minute, the hill was HOW steep? 70 degrees is nearly vertical. The steepest streets in seattle are only 20 or so degrees. It just dosnt make sense to me... :D

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I've cut my shin pretty good (still have the scar), and My wife fell pretty hard on her knee as I was lifting her up to get a cache in a rest stop in Wyoming. We were headed from Billings Montana to Albuquerque. She was very glad that she had some pain pills with her. If you haven't bled for a cache at least once you haven't had any real fun. :D

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If you haven't bled for a cache at least once you haven't had any real fun. :laughing:

 

True that. The first cache that I ever sought, I got into "the zone", paying more attention to the GPSr than to where I was walking, and ran straight into some old barbed-wire fencing, scraping the skin off of the front of one of my shins, down to the bone. I was hooked, both literally, and on the sport. Over 5 years later, it's still scarred pretty well, but I have learned to watch where I'm going. At least it was worth all of the cactus/chiggers/ticks/thorns/falls/near frostbite/twisted ankles/animal encounters enough to stick around this long.

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Two or three weeks ago I was out caching on my mountain bike with my friend (luckily) and we found the cache just fine. On the way back, we decided to go down this nice dirt hill. It was about 50 feet down and the entire descent was about 250 feet, the first 80 or so being about 65-70 degrees down in angle. It may not seem like a lot, but thats about 10 feet down for every 25 feet of travel. I got down the hill fine - stable and everything, but at the bottom there was a small washout with sand a good 1" - 2" deep. The handle bar and front tire started to woble. And I started to freakout, considering I was doing about 25 and the trail was about to T off 200 feet away.

Just a minute, the hill was HOW steep? 70 degrees is nearly vertical. The steepest streets in seattle are only 20 or so degrees. It just dosnt make sense to me... :)

It's a dirt road. Yeah, I would be confused myself if it was a street. :mad:

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Not really finding a Geocache , but while going out to service one of my caches, I decided to ride my mountain bike (I have been riding for some time - this is nothing new). On the way to this particular cache I had to go around a deep rut in the trail from 4 wheelers and as I did, managed to not notice a small tree (about 2" around) that was bent down across the trail. On the side of the tree, someone had broken off a branch and this formed a nice v shaped fish hook like trap just at head level while on a bike. My head hit the "tree" and my neck was twisted almost completely around as the v from the tree slid nicely into my mouth "fish hooking" me, this, coupled with my forward momentum and the fact I was clipped into the bike's pedals (told ya I had been riding a while) allowed my full body weight and that of the bike to be suspended for a brief instant from the inside of my mouth on the treebranch. Then my mouth ripped open and I fell face first into the rut full of stagnant green water I had tried to avoid. The bike landed on top of me (I was still clipped into it). I removed myself fromt he "sewer" and recovered my bike. I knew I had hurt myself, but could not tell how badly as I was spitting a lot of blood and pieces of my mouth out. Quickly thinking and using my maguiver injunity, I dug out my digital camera and tried to take a picture of my face, but only managed to bleed allover the camera lens. I got back on the bike and headed back to the car and judging from the reaction from the couple I passed determined I must be hurt good.

 

When I got to the car I loaded my bike and looked in the mirror, yep, hurt good, lot of blood and a big rip in the side of my mouth. I jumped into the car and headed for the hospital. As I rounded a bend in Goverment road (along the Welland Canal) I noticed someone standing in the middle of the road and pointing at me.. HUH!!! A cop, he was pulling me over for speeding - Jeesh, I pulled over and as he approached the car I could see his reaction change. His first words confirmed to me I was hurt "holy SH*^ are you ok, what happened?" I quickly explained I crashed my bike and was heading to the hospital and he sent me on my way - things I will do to get out of a ticket!

 

12 Stitches to fix my mouth and I had to visit a sports specialist who explained to me I had displaced C1 and C2, I didn't really think this was a big deal until he explained that the spinal chord at that point is the consistancy of toothpaste and I had nearly severed it (aparently that is bad)...

 

I didn't even get to fix up my cache that day...

 

I am not allowed to mountain bike anymore (The wife wants to keep me around...)

 

Good God Man!!! Holy Crap! :D

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Yah I fall alot. I'm naturally clumsy plus I have very weak ankles and a knee that likes to snap, crackle and pop all the time. Skinned knees and slight sprained ankle so far. Nothing as serious as some of the stuff I have read here! My God! I always make sure to tell someone where I'm going and more specifically the coordinates of the cache. And always make sure my cell is fully charged and with me, just in case.

 

Be careful out there!

 

P.S. Oh God, don't even mention snakes! I'm terrified of snakes! :D

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I broke 2 ribs after taking a nasty fall down a very steep icy road in Norway :D

It hurt for 2 weeks but i got the cache :D

 

We had to slide from tree to tree cause we could not stand on bare ice.

And beleive me that trail is so steep down !

 

geocaching in Norway winter time is "living on the egde" :D

ac4460e0-a96f-4bd3-bfe1-a07d2874468e.jpg

Edited by Mikkel
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I broke 2 ribs after taking a nasty fall down a very steep icy road in Norway :(

It hurt for 2 weeks but i got the cache :P

 

We had to slide from tree to tree cause we could not stand on bare ice.

And beleive me that trail is so steep down !

 

geocaching in Norway winter time is "living on the egde" :huh:

ac4460e0-a96f-4bd3-bfe1-a07d2874468e.jpg

 

That looks like you would need crampons to safely go down. :huh::(

Edited by Dwoodford
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I don't know if this is really a geocaching accident, since it was a bike accident on the way home from a geocache. There was a railroad track at an angle to the road that ate my front tire, down I went. It was OK though, my face stopped the fall. Broke my glasses too, couldn't drive for the next month until I got new ones. Later that night, I had my wife take me to the emergency room, since my wrists were so painful that I couldn't undo my pants to go to the bathroom. The diagnosis was two sprained wrists.

Then in May, I got a case of poison oak. I hadn't had poison oak in at least 25 years, but it was mild enought that a Triamcinolone cream fixed it up.

Last month, I came down with the worst poison oak I've ever had, required Prednisone pills and antibiotics. The predinsone works great, but has too many side effects.

So that makes three trips for medical attention related to geocaching, which, for me, makes it even more dangerous than mountain climbing (only two trips for medical attention.)

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I did a really stupid thing to try and find a cache and am lucky not to be more seriously hurt...or dead. It was the final of a cache series, and after already hiking for about 4 hours that day I decided this would be my last for the day(it sure was). I had 2 possible sets of coords, and it was around a gorge with waterfalls. I headed to the first set of coords, and it put me about 80m across the gorge. OK, other side, so walk around to the other side of the gorge. I'm running out of room here, almost to the edge, with about 10m to go, DOWN. There is a large rock formation jutting out of the side of the cliff, and having remembered that one of the caches in the series was on a hill, under a rock formation on the side, I think this is it. One problem, it's pretty well straight down.

 

But I see what looks like some tracks down the side, maybe 10 feet down to the rocks. Looks like others have been here, so I will just slide down, beside the 2 trees, and take a look. I take my first step of the edge, the dirt gives way, and I'm sliding, then tumbling straight down the side. I landed about 20 feet down, at the base of the only tree around. Below the tree, NOTHING-straight down to the gorge below, maybe another 100 feet or more.

 

I lay there and feel what's broken. Feel my face and teeth first. OK, legs move, arms move, I stand up. I look up, my GPS and fresh batteries are halfway back up, luckily my keys are still in my pocket. NOw I have to get back up to the top... VERY SLOWLY-one bad move and I'm at the bottom. I climb back up, go straight to the car trying not to think where I would be if I missed that tree. I get in the car, then back out cuz my leg hurts now. I tore the back of my pants on a large rock and have 2 huge gouges, but bleeding is minimal.

 

I ended up with a slightly sprained thumb, a black and blue hand to go with it, 2 cuts which are still healing, and so many bruised I can't count them. I don't think I will finish that series any time soon, I am scared to go back there. I didn' t even think I could go caching again on the trails. (Looking back, I should have known I had those coords wrong)

 

Well, I got over it, and was caching again the next weekend... and one of the caches was in a tree. You bet I climbed up to get it!

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I received my first minor injury caching last saturday. I tagged along with 3 other area cachers for a trip to Wheeling,WV to grab some caches and visit Cabela's. While doing an easy park and grab that we made more difficult than it should have been...I wandered off into a small wooded area and stepped on something sharp. The mental image I got when I felt it was a large thorn going up into my foot. I lifted my foot off and cleared the leaves to see what I had stepped on and, you guessed it, a large nail sticking out of a 2x4. I'm guessing it stuck out around 3 inches, but you know how guys are always overestimating length (of the nail, get your minds out of the gutter).

 

 

Well, knowing that the others would probably think it was a good idea to go get it looked at, which would've ruined our day of caching...I kept quiet and didn't tell anybody. It bothered me most of the day, but I attempted to not limp around. It apparantly worked pretty well, because nobody knew I was injured until I posted it in the log. Upon returning home, I removed my shoe and was surprised to not see any blood...I wasn't surprised any longer when I took my sock off and found that it had been shoved up into the wound by the nail. Needless to say...the blood flowed after the sock came off.

 

 

So, after a trip to the doctor monday afternoon...I ended up with a tetanus shot and one week's worth of antibiotics. Really, that's a small price to pay for great company and 25 finds :laughing:

 

 

Edit: I should add too. The pain didn't stop me from heading out on tuesday and finding four caches. One of which was a 4.5/4. It's amazing how the thrill of the hunt numbs the pain.

Edited by rhelt100
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this wasn't finding a cache, but help placing a cache

 

Some of know that if the hill is too steep, your short, and have bad legs (called trick knees), not to try to climb that hill. Well, i climbed that hill, and had a trick going down it. I've tolled my caching partner, Red 07z, about my trick knees and try to listen to me every once in a while (we're both guys, been best friends since elementery school). He didn't listen when i said i'll never be able to make it up the hill. I guess i somehow made a misstep and my knee did a trick on me, i even had that split-second "oh, Sh!t" thing as my knee "went out" i guess you can say (for the record, this was my knee's 8th trick). and the trick going down the hill? I fell backwards, scaring the hell out of my friend and two bikers passing by. I put my kneecap back in place, got up (on two shaky legs) and walked up and down the parking lot as my friend continued to place his cache, as i could see him the whole time. We tried to go caching after but the cache we tried had a rock slide in the way and i couldn't get around it. We went shopping later. You may now call me the gimp :rolleyes:

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I've not had any mishaps yet while caching aside from things like bug bites and scratches from thorns. My husband, however, took a major tumble as we were heading toward a cache that had me fearing for his life. Here's my log:

 

May 9 by niffir (169 found)

We headed out late this morning to find some of the Cove Spring caches that I had yet to find. We decided to go for this one first. We walked down the road and eventually found a sign instructing us not to go any further. Being only a couple hundred feet from the cache and seeing no danger up ahead (just more of the abandoned roadway), we decided to go a bit further anyway. We came upon an area with some cliffs above the roadway and decided it wasn't worth the risk to walk along there. We headed back down the road to try to find another way in. Turns out it might have worked out better for us to continue that way :blink:

 

On the way back to the parking area we found the Cove Spring Redux cache, and then began looking for an alternate way up to where I figured the cache must be hidden. We found a way that didn't involve cliffs over the roadway, so we started up that way. A couple of minutes into the hike, my husband took a tumble over the side of the hill. It started as a slide, then he hit something and flipped. After falling most of the way straight down the hill headfirst, he flipped back over upright before landing at the bottom. I was completely terrified that he would break a bone (and then scared he would land on his head and break his neck), but we got off lucky considering he fell probably 20 feet down a nearly vertical hillside. Just a big gash on his knee and a few other less serious injuries. I'm sure he'll really start to feel the other aches and pains from it tomorrow.

 

After making sure he was ok, I sent him off to wait in the car while I continued hiking to the cache. Needless to say, I was pretty agitated and a bit more cautious than usual in my hike. It would have been a pretty nice hike if I'd not been so worked up about his fall. Once I got to the area of the cache, it was an easy find. I'd rate this a 4 for the terrain, but more like a 1 or 2 for the difficulty.

 

I took a luggage tag, left a toy car, and signed the log. Then I quickly headed back to the car so my husband wouldn't have to worry about me having fallen off the hill somewhere.

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This is a pretty good topic by the way.

 

This is probably nothing compared to everybody else. Allright, so- another mountain bike one. There's a bunch of caches along these trails that I love to ride, so one day I decide to load up my backpack (mistake #1) and get them all on the way, one after the other. I usually only have a camel-back so its already awkward. Things are going well, Ive found a few, until I end up on a section of trail I wasnt familiar with. Cruising right along when I see about a 2 ft dropoff ahead. No problem- great chance for a little air time right? Well, I sometimes fail to consider what will happen AFTER a jump, and in this instance, its the TREE right in the middle of the trail about 10 ft after the dropoff. So I pedal harder, approaching the dropoff, then JUMP!, get a little sideways in the air, try to correct, but land a little too soon (...backpack) and correct myself right into the tree. In the blink of an eye, Im on lying on my back staring up at the still shaking tree, watching while twigs and leaves fall all around me. Took a while to get up, groaning, stunned, embarrassed (thank God no one saw it). Apparently my left forearm took most of the blow, bringing all 240 lbs of me to an abrupt halt. I thought it was broke at first- all bloodied up and already starting to swell- shins all scratched up from the pedals- I trudged on and finished the last few, it looked like there was a tennis ball underneath my skin on my forearm by the time I got back to the truck. Not really that bad, but it hurt like hell the rest of the trip and for a few days after that. :blink:

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I'm still relatively new at geocaching. I just found my first multi-cache today. It was in a woods which required some off-trail hiking and wading a river. Just as I was getting to the first stage, I made the mistake of grabbing a weed which had these hairy, sticky quills which were sharp as a razor. Ouch, that hurt! It skinned my knuckle pretty nicely. I'm sure some of you have had accidents which would make that seem like nothing. What type of accidents have you had? Do you think they were unavoidable or could you have prevented them? This is a discussion of geocaching accidents and injuries.

 

Haha, I was just thinking about making a similar post the other day. I've only been caching for a few weeks now but got a nasty 3 inch cut/gouge on my leg below the knee the other day walking into a jagged branch while bushwacking...

 

My wife and caching partner just broke her toe in the kitchen the other day but she still hobbles along on caches with me. She's a real trooper...

 

This has been a fun and educational thread...

 

Happy and safe hunting!

 

Bob

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This is my latest and best beating I've taken from Geocaching. Do enjoy this log...

 

Let me just start by saying that I hate stinging insects, especially Bald Hornets! We came close enough on the final stage to a nest in some Scotchbroom that had them poring out like a freshly tapped keg. Now let me backup here. We drove my trusty Ford Focus to stage one, no prob. I got out to retrieve the Coords. Walking up to them I see the remains of a large Bee's nest on the ground. I inspect it to make sure there are no bees around. Just as I step over it I see two Hornets flying around. They mind there own business. I see the placement of Stage 1 and flip it over and what do I see? Thousands of Red Ants. Insect #2 that I despise. I wait for them to disperse, grab the container and yell the coords for stage 2 to Super10. I replace the cache, leap like a Gazelle over the smashed nest and make a dive for my car door. We drive a 100 yard up the road and decide to walk the rest as the road was becoming too overgrown for the Focus. We hike and find stage 2 without incident. Now heres where it gets fun...not. We are about 140 feet from stage 3 and out of the corner of my eye I catch a glimpse of grey matter, with black liquid pouring out of it. Low and behold it's pissed off Hornets. I yell to Super10commander (since he is deathly allergic to bees), Hornets!!!!RUN!!!! Like a scene out of a movie he runs towards Stage 3. While he's running he looks over his shoulder and sees that the Hornets are all following me. He dives and makes it within 10 feet of the cache and takes up cover behind some huge Scotchbroom. I myself have made it to the road and am running back towards the direction of the car. As I am running my $185 Oakley's are just about ready to fall of my hat so I go to grab them. Just at that point I look back as I am running and see Hornets no B.S. in hot pursuit. I think to myself,"is this as fast as you can run Travis??) I decide to look to my left and see if there are any attached to me and what do I see? A hornet attached to my coat on my left side. I immediately start to disrobe my coat and in doing so I lose my balance and crash into the dirt doing roughly about Mach 1, maybe Mach 2. I manage to crash, do a barrel roll that would make a Judo master proud, get my Jacket off and continue running till my legs are screaming. I stopped about a 100 yards down the road worried about Super10 since I know that he could literally die if he got it from one of these bad mamma jammas. Once I stood up I realized that I had crashed on top of an anthill and was now covered with red ants on my groin area crawling all over and biting on to my pants. I brush them off in a hurry and walk about 50 yards back and yell out to him and he replys that he is good to go, has signed the log for the both of us and is ready to get the hell out of Dodge. I finally make it back to my coat, hat and glasses just as Super10 is getting back to the road. As I'm standing there trying to get my breath back, and find my glasses I see another hornet fly by me, bounce off Super10's hat and go straight to me. I run again another 50 yards down the road. A few minutes later I slowly go back grab my gear and we decide to call it a day. So needless to say, !!!!!ANYBODY GOING AFTER THIS GEOCACHE...USE EXTREME CAUTION!!!!! I will attach pics for all of you to laugh at. Other than the issues I just mentioned, this Cache was a piece of cake. TFTC I think. It will not soon be forgotten.

Edited by JEEOCASHER
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