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Is Geocaching possibly the most expensive sport/hobby to get into


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I think that Geocaching is possibly one of the most expensive sports to get into i think, next to paintball at least

 

- You need a GPS (at least a $100 one) plus if your serious you can spend up to $500

 

- Paper and ink or a palm pilot

 

- Lots and Lots of gas

 

- A car if you dont allready have one (I myself am hurrying up on buying one cause im tired of borrowing)

 

- Goodies

 

- Materials and things to create your own caches

 

-Etc Etc.

 

Im not complaining I gladly spend the money but would you agree that Geocaching is probably the most expensive sport to get into?

No, model railroading can be extremely expensive (a decent HO scale locomotive costs easily over 100 U.S. dollars). Skiing also very expensive. But yes, if you really get into geocaching it can get expensive.

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Well for me skydiving was and still is an expensive to get into and still do

Initial training: about 1200 bucks (to get to self supervision)

gear:(about 2500-3000)

jumps: are range from 10-24 CAN dollars

after 200+ jumps it starts to add up :)

 

The main thing for geocaching for me is gas. I live in a rural area so find caches nearby is hard to come by 60 within 50 miles. So now I have to drive upwards 100 miles to go caching. :anibad:

 

I cant believe I had to read so far to get to another skydiver! You know, one of the funny things though is at the drop zone when someone talks about how expensive it's getting because of the cost of feul going up, we remind eachother that it is still cheaper than golf...

 

Don't hate me...when I used to skydive, it was $10 a pop to get a ride up to altitude...

 

'course that was a college team and the pilot pretty much donated his time. Didn't own my own chute, and I don't remember how much the fees were, but they were pretty cheap. Still more than geocaching. Heck, I've spent WAY more in scrapbooking supplies than on geocaching supplies.

Edited by TMDMom
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By FAR Geocaching is NOT the most expensive hobby.

 

Try bowhunting.

 

$300 for a bow

$100 each for treestands (everyone knows you need at least 3)

$300 for good camoflauge

$30,000 for a truck to get you to the good spots

$.....................

 

Geocaching is cheap.

 

I'll pick up where you left off...

 

$600+ Mathews Bow (don't forget you need a back up bow or two)

$ Gas for travel to hunting land

$ Hunting License fees

$ Planting food plots (time, labor and materials)

$ Deer processing fees ($60 for a deer in my area)

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I have another one...pottery

 

wheel...$200 to $1000's

 

kiln $$$$$

 

glazes $alot more than you'd think

 

clay

 

tools

 

instruction

 

even if you don't buy your own equipment, you'd have to pay studio fees to use someone else's.

 

But I never got as dirty geocashing as I did throwing pottery!

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High Powered Rocketry (this is for a level 1 rocket--level 2 and 3, you can double each category except explosives case and users permit):

 

Launch pad: $150-300

Electrical relay launcher (car batteries not included): $50-$75

Explosives Users Permit: $100

Explosives Case: $200-$500 (soon to go up due to new ATFE regs)

Rocket kit (or parts): $80-$200

Drogue & Main Parachutes: $40

Logging Altimeter: $90-250

Motor case: $120

Motor: $30-40 (good for one launch)

Dremel, palm sander, scroll saw, etc etc etc...$$$$

Epoxy, fiberglass cloth, Bondo, primer, paint, etc etc...somewhere around $50 per rocket.

 

The look on your kid's face when (s)he not only sees, but FEELS a rocket you worked on together shooting up in the air: Priceless.

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Paintball is far more expensive!

 

Gun/Marker upwards of $1500.00

Mask $70

Field Fees just to play $30-$40

Paint for one day $40-50

Air $20

Pods and Belts $45

 

Not to mention clothing pads and repairs....Unknown Probly $200

 

Weekends will run you about $150 if nothing goes wrong with your equipment.

 

Also included are gas to get you to the field, food for the day, and any medical bills for things like sprained ankles or serious knee injury.

 

I played paintball for over ten years.

 

Geocaching is so much cheaper.

 

GPS $100 new or $40 on ebay

Plastic containers $10

Stuff from my junk drawer....uhm free.

I don't use a car to geocache...I live in San Francisco so PT (Public Transit) is great for caching. I have a monthly PT card which I would use for work anyway.

 

Plus the risk of serious injury is way less....and I never really have a bad day. And my whole family can play. This is the best cheap sport I ave found. Maybe its different if you live somewhere else.

 

We can also play on vacation to see new and cool things that books and stuff don't tell you about.

 

later.

 

Wow. You need to move up here if you're paying that for paintball. I have a fully Vaporized Bushy 2K with a Flatline regulator and HPA tank that I got for $400, including a Freak back with an AA front and the .689 insert. I also have an Automag w/ a Hyperframe that I got for about the same (holy crap is that one accurate). My mask is a Proteus 2 that I got mint used for $20 on a paintball forum (tried others, but keep coming back to this one). None of it is the latest and greatest, but if you're old enough to have been playing for 10+ years, you're slower than the rig is anyway. :anibad:

 

Around here, if you're paying $30-40 on-site, it's going to include rentals if you don't have your own stuff, air/CO2 and 500 rounds of paint. We fill a scuba tank and bring it to the site, so no issues for air. Most sites make you pay for their crap paint on rec days, so with my own stuff, it's about $30 TOPS for field & paint.

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By FAR Geocaching is NOT the most expensive hobby.

 

Try bowhunting.

 

$300 for a bow

$100 each for treestands (everyone knows you need at least 3)

$300 for good camoflauge

$30,000 for a truck to get you to the good spots

$.....................

 

 

Geocaching is cheap.

 

That's for ONE bow, not the eight or so my husband has. At least he shoots traditional and makes his own arrows, but every time I turn around he's ordering more arrow-making supplies. But it makes him happy.

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As far as outdoor hobbies go, geocaching is one of the cheapest besides hiking. The only cost that can really add up is gas.

 

try kyaking, or climbing. holy crap you wanna talk about expensive. compare:

 

GPS- 100-500/ Kyak and equipment- 1000-7000 (or more for high end equipment)/ climbing gear- 500-1500 (or more if you want to buy crash pads, and the high end equipment)

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Mmmm - I don't know... buy a boat to go fishing and you'll see how expensive a hobby can become... :anibad: and that's all I'm sayin' 'bout that. (ok - I own an 18' skiff - and I have 'boat envy' every time I see something larger!).

 

I saw some sailboats earlier this month on Lake Michigan that were 'hobby boats' - in the quarter-million dollar range - and that's just the purchase price!

 

No, I think it's relatively inexpensive in that you can cache without all the bells and whistles. As in any sport/game/hobby, the more you play the more you 'want' for better tools to play... but they're not necessary - just desirable! ;)

 

Good points. I've heard a boat defined as "a hole in the water to throw money into". Skiing costs bigtime too, especially when you figure in the cost and time off for knee surgery.

 

For me caching is pretty low budget. My Garmin Vista was pretty inexpensive. I already owned everything else. A Camelback, good hiking boots a beat up Mitsubishi pick up truck. As for swag, I tend to accumulate small intresting objects in my daily life. When they pile up I pass them on.

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I think that Geocaching is possibly one of the most expensive sports to get into i think, next to paintball at least

 

- You need a GPS (at least a $100 one) plus if your serious you can spend up to $500

 

- Paper and ink or a palm pilot

 

- Lots and Lots of gas

 

- A car if you dont allready have one (I myself am hurrying up on buying one cause im tired of borrowing)

 

- Goodies

 

- Materials and things to create your own caches

 

-Etc Etc.

 

Im not complaining I gladly spend the money but would you agree that Geocaching is probably the most expensive sport to get into?

 

um....not at all. You can buy a used GPS unit on ebay for $50. It might not be top-of-the-line but it will give you Long and Lat coordinates which is all you really need. And on that note...there are many geocachers who do NOT use a GPS at all. I found 7 before I bought mine.

 

Pen and paper....not too pricey.

 

Car and Gas?......Maybe if you are driving all over doing micros. I usually go geocaching by bike.....free pedal power. If I do drive to them, I do not go out specifically for geocaching but I grab a cache while already out on the way to something else.

 

Goodies......those are relativly cheap. Now, I don't mean give cheap crap like popcaps and coupons, but you can get some fun stuff for cache's that aren't too expensive. I cleaned my house and got lots for stashing....the trinkets that are cute but don't fit into my decor or are just sitting around not getting used but are perfectly good.

 

So far, geocaching has been relatively cheap! It's been much less expensive than my beading, wool spinning, crafting hobbies. It's certainly cheaper than my husband's computer hobbies. And when compared to all hobbies/ sports.....I would say it certainly doesnt' rank as one of the costliest. It doesn't come near to the cost of such sports/ hobbies as skydiving, scuba diving, yachting, car racing, horse racing.....I coudl go on and on and on. Geocaching can be cheap.

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All hobbies can get expensive if you really get into them. Doesn't have to be anything that involves any big major purchases like a boat or car...

 

My wife scrapbooks and I tell you, that gets expensive quick. It's deceptive because each item is usually pretty cheap so she thinks "Oh, this won't be too much." But it usually doubles what she intends to spend.

 

I play video games.. again.. expensive. A couple of new releases per month on the Xbox 360 runs me in the $120 - $140 range, not to mention all the misc $6 I spend on other download content for the 360.

 

The way I look at it a GPSr and a premium subscription to geocaching.com. A bit of gas (which you can split with your caching buddy) and the few other costs involved are pretty cheap.

 

Either way, seems like it'll be well worth the costs.

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I was shocked to even see a post like this.

Your cost is a gps and you can use it for other things.

You do not have to drive out of your way to find Geocaches if you do not want to.

this is the cheapest sport I have ever found.

I have saved so much money since I started geocaching.

Fishing cost a lot for poles and you need several types and if you have kids like me you need a ton for all The different type of fish and all the other goods you need to fish.

Skiing is real expensive.

The kids always grow out of everything.

When we go out caching this meens we are not spending money at resturants or anything and it is great excersise. :ph34r:

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Not that expensive, except to get your GPS. My husband plays Warhammer 40K and he'll drop a good 100 bucks on a box of unpainted plastic bits that he may or may not ever get assembled into a tank which he may or may not ever get painted to "regulation standards (at least 3 colors)" which he may or may not ever use to play in a tournament (another 50-plus dollars). He "needs" alot of tanks. And army men. And these things called "war walkers." And these are the cheap models. The most expensive ones are upwards of 3,000. Nah, I think we've got it pretty good. Besides, it's something we can do on the way to someplace else.

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HAHAH! 500$ being expensive?

 

Try medieval recreation!

 

Let's see.. 1400 for a good canvas pavilion.

2K for the trailer to haul said pavilion around in.

2300 for a custom suit of armor.

Yearly membership + site fees adds probably another 300 per person.

all the accoutrements that are required: probably another 2 grand

upkeep/replacement, several hundred a year.

 

Nah.. I don't think you _can_ spend as much in Geocaching as you can in many other hobbies.. even Photography will blow geocaching out of the water. There are 1200 dollar telephoto lenses out there.

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-//- Im not complaining I gladly spend the money but would you agree that Geocaching is probably the most expensive sport to get into?

there are far more expensive hobbies I'm sure.

but you make this as expensive as you wish.

 

we do mostly multis (more time for the buck) and then visit the trads that are on the way there or home.

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Considering OPs avatar s/he should know of at least ONE more expensive hobby: Photography! MY DSLR camera cost way more than my GPSr. Plus the cost of photo paper and printer ink? And the printer, for that matter (which broke after less than a year :laughing: (last time I buy a Samsung printer). And before the age of digital, good lord! Even having free access to the high school darkroom, the cost of chemicals and paper, and film. Crap. And that was just b&w. I don't even KNOW the prices if you wanted to do color.

 

Yeah, geocaching is cheap. Woot :laughing:

 

EDIT for bad spelling

Edited by Silfron Mandotheneset
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An expensive hobby/sport is golf. Gotta buy clubs, which if you buy a decent set of middle-of-the-road irons and a couple decent woods and a nice putter will run you more than a Garmin Oregon 400t, and then every time you play golf, you have greens fees, balls, and tees, then either a cart rental or buy your own pull cart, unless you want to lug the bag around with you. Way more expensive than caching.

 

So far, for caching, I'm in it $188 for my Garmin Legend HCx, $180 for my DeLorme PN-20, about $45 to put my first cache together (and I don't think this really counts, as placing a cache isn't mandatory to geocaching), and the trade stuff is just some little stuff, some of it I had laying around the house, and the other stuff I bought was just a buck or two each, so that's pretty much nothing. And since you take something/leave something, you don't really need to keep buying stuff at all. And for gas, there are over 400 caches within a 10 mile radius of my place, so I do a lot of my caching from a bicycle I got for $10. So, no, geocaching is not very expensive to get into at all. I started out with less than $200 spent, and you can do it for even less if you buy a more inexpensive GPSr.

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Geocaching is my least expensive hobby by far.

 

Try buying a 5th wheel & the truck to pull it with for traveling.

 

We backpack too. If we lost our packs we would be out probably about $2k.

 

I don't even want to know how much money I have wrapped up in amatuer radio gear. I sure don't want the YL to know!

 

Shooting: Guns, ammo, reloading supplies, misc gear. Don't ask!

 

Dogs: One in Conformation, one in Obedience. Again, I don't even want to know how much.

 

Nope, Geocaching has the most bang for the buck by far!

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Amateur Photographer:

When I used go out shooting, I was carrying over $6000 in equipment... easily.

 

 

It kinda depends. I don't carry that expensive of gear. The D70 was 400$ and my tele zoom was around $350. (I split that cost) Those are my most expensive pieces of equipment. I have a couple of lenses that were much less. All my gear is used, though two of my lenses were almost new. BUT, it's still more expensive than geocaching! I also own a darkroom, which is becoming more expensive all the time.

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No Geocaching is not as expensive as my other Hobby. RC Racing.

 

Mugen MBX5r Buggy Kit $600

Mugen MBX5T Truggy Kit $600

Motor for each $300x 2

DSM Radio for both $350 x 2

Personal Transponders $100 x 2

Reciever Packs $30 x 6

Glow Ignitors $30 x 2

Starter Boxes $120 x 2

Chargers $300

Spare Parts $600 ish

Tools $300

EZUP $200

Tables $80

Chairs $40

Compressor $200

Nirto Fuel $35/Gal go through 8-10 gallons in a season of racing Which is not bad. Talk to a guy this weekend this season they went through 20+ gallons.

 

This is just my Nitro racing. So In comparison Geocaching is CHEAP.

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As far as my hobbies go, shooting sports are farrrrrr more expensive. I can't afford to shoot sporting clays more than about once a month. I have everything I need to geocache. I can go any time I like.

 

My husband shoots and I agree it is a much more expensive sport/activity than geocaching. My quilting addiction is more expensive than caching. If you want to talk expensive hobbies, believe me quilters make geocachers and shooters look like amateurs. :P:D:D

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To me geocaching is a hobby. Something to do when going out on a hike, bike ride, errands in town, a puzzle to solve.

 

Geocaching is perhaps my cheapest hobby ever.

 

Try reefkeeping.

I have a 20 gallon reef tank. well a start of a reef tank as I only have a few corals.

I have nearly $1000 into it, and I cut corners (CMU blocks & 2x4 for stand, etc.)

Some have reefs and spent $50,000 on up, and costs them a grand or 2 in electric bills every month.

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