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"Motorcycles Allowed"


majormajor42

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I just upgraded to premium membership and have been playing around with some of my new features. Good Stuff. Since I own a motorcycle (SV650s for the curious) I wanted to see which caches in my region would be especially good to do on a motorcycle. by doing a query for caches with the "motorcycle" icon on them I knew I would get some results that would be more for off-road dirt bikes, which are motorcycles too. I understand. I was at least hoping to get results for caches along twisty roads and other areas that are known for motorcycle riding. I was disappointed in how many other results came up that have nothing to do with motorcycles.

 

A cache in a Wal-Mart parking lot, for example, was labeled "motorcycles allowed" probably because motorcycles are in fact allowed there. So would any other park-n-grab. but I don't think that was the intention of the label in this case.

 

Since I'm new, maybe this is a common problem that people here discuss. I tried doing a search but saw that this motorcycling issue hasn't been discussed specifically.

 

Maybe labeling it "fun on motorcycle" or "motorcycling preferred" would get the idea across. who knows?

 

I have a mountain bike too and to a lesser extent, I see people put the bike symbol on their caches in the same manner. just cause the cache is accessible by bicycle, and bikes usually are "allowed" anywhere a car is, doesn't mean I'll take my bike off the rack once I park my car 200ft from the cache.

 

I don't have a 4x4 but I see a lot of people on here do. Does the "off-road vehicle" icon get overused too? I mean, if you have a license plate on it, your jeep is "allowed" in the Wal-Mart parking lot as well.

 

please excuse the rant. I haven't placed any caches yet and perhaps shouldn't complain. maybe I too will want to click as many attributes as I can when I place a cache :D

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Your assessment is on target.

 

I ride a Gl1800 GoldWing to cache quite often and quite often just for fun. I don't depend on others for judgement of how a cache will "ride" for me. I take a good look at the map provided. If the roads are crooked around or on the way to the cache.... well, you know. It may or may not be exactly your kind of suitable, but you may find it is indeed. Depending on others may leave you disappointed.

 

The Icon is a Dirt Bike after all.

 

RATTLEBARS

 

http://www.rattlebars.com

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Flip side.....I would rather have a motorcycle icon and find that it's at the local Walmart than not have one and find that we have a two mile ride on loose gravel! I really do not like trying to ride on loose gravel, up and down hills. While the same ride would be great on a solid road! I have also heard that there are towns that do not allow or seriously restrict the riding of motorcycles. I'd like to know that also prior to showing up to cache.

 

On vacation, that means we're caching in areas we are not familar with, we have two very different caching vehicles. We use an RV towing the bike. The bike gives us access to a lot of caches but try parking a big rig! I use the icons but like you I wish they were used a little better. When downloading a query, you don't get the cache page which would normally tell the cacher important transportation information.

 

Terri

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I want to hide a cache near my ex-wife's house and use the "Watch for Livestock" attribute.

 

Just because I can.

 

cow-yes.gif

 

I agree. I hope I don't upset a cow enthusiast. :D

 

I have a regular/irregular monthly event at a very popular Tex-Mex restaurant and I use that icon EVERY time. ;)

 

It seems that you can't have a really good sit-down Tex-Mex restaurant, in Houston, unless you have at least ONE stuffed bull head & a mural of bullfighting. This particular place has several of both. :(

 

0b96f809-c138-4d5f-a2c7-1b324e3be024.jpg

88776914-ee7b-4018-8b0c-22c5c2ec7911.jpg

 

Did I mention that the food was great. I even had the rehearsal dinner for my wedding in their private room there. :D:D

Edited by Snoogans
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Many owners misuse icons. Here in Florida you see lots of snowmobile (or NO snowmobile) and much more annoying, scuba attributes on parking lot caches. People think this is funny. Ha ha. Wait 'til they're traveling and hunting for some scuba/dirt bike/off road caches. There are many many in Florida with the scuba attribute, but I think that there are, in fact, TWO active scuba caches in the state.

 

I'm guilty of underusing the poison ivy, thorny plants, ticks and snakes attributes. They could probably go on 95% of the caches I own. Along with NO STEALTH. But the only attributes I routinely use are HUNTING and DOGS/NO DOGS. Wading, if it's likely.

 

I've always supposed the motorcycle icon to = off road (dirt bike). As you say, anywhere you can drive a car you can use a road bike.

 

It's the 1 terrain WITHOUT the wheelchair attribute that's truly annoying. Means the cache owner never really gave 1 terrain a thought. Or the cacher in a wheelchair or walker. We have quite a lot of cachers that are less mobile in Florida, you'd think cache owners would notice, but evidently not.

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We have the motorcycle attribute,

motorcycles-yes.gif

 

The "Quads" attribute,

quads-yes.gif

 

and the off-road vehicles attribute:

jeeps-yes.gif

 

I've always thought that at least one of these is redundant. If you can take a 4WD vehicle down a trail, then surely you can take an ATV or dirt bike. Okay, maybe a specific road/trail is restricted to licensed, street legal vehicles only, but that's rare. I personally have never seen a trail that was only open to ATVs, but not bikes, or vice versa.

 

I found a cache this weekend in an ATV/motorcycle trail system, and there was no way I was about to take the Ninja down that trail! :D

Edited by DavidMac
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...I don't have a 4x4 but I see a lot of people on here do. Does the "off-road vehicle" icon get overused too? I mean, if you have a license plate on it, your jeep is "allowed" in the Wal-Mart parking lot as well....

 

The problem sounds like it's one of knowing what the attribute means. What you want it to mean, isn't what everone who places caches thinks it means.

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If you can take a 4WD vehicle down a trail, then surely you can take an ATV or dirt bike. Okay, maybe a specific road/trail is restricted to licensed, street legal vehicles only, but that's rare. I personally have never seen a trail that was only open to ATVs, but not bikes, or vice versa.

 

In Florida, it's not rare. It's the norm. The state forests and the national forest both are limited to licensed street legal vehicles. The water management lands (a huge land manager in the state) are limited to licensed street legal vehicles only. State Forestry has designated a big chunk of one of the state forests for ATV/dirt bikes (some old mine pits). That's it. Otherwise - NO!

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What you want it to mean, isn't what everone who places caches thinks it means.

 

Exactly.

 

We see it a lot with "Winter Accessible". Some people think it means the cache is hidden up higher and thus is not likely to be buried under a lot of snow. Others think it means "you can get to the cache site in the winter", even if the cache might be under three feet of snow. Since I don't know which one I believe to be correct I don't use it.

 

"Kid Friendly" is another one I avoid because I don't know what it means. To some people it means a cache location that is safe and/or enjoyable for kids. To others it means the swag inside the cache is good for kids. So, if I hide a cache along a nice easy walking trail but put no swag in it is it a "kid friendly" cache or not?

 

Back to topic....

 

I've never used the motorcycle icon that I remember, unless it was on a cache in an area where "No motorized vehicles allowed" was posted, in which case I likely used the 4x4, motorcycle and the quad attributes with the "NO" slash across them.

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If you can take a 4WD vehicle down a trail, then surely you can take an ATV or dirt bike. Okay, maybe a specific road/trail is restricted to licensed, street legal vehicles only, but that's rare.
Not in the northwest Oregon area. We have networks of OHV trails (no street vehicles allowed) intertwined with dirt roads on which only licensed street-legal vehicles may travel. A couple of months ago I saw an ATV pulled over by the sheriff for riding on a non-OHV dirt road.
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It's amazing how many parking lot micros we have around here that provide a "scenic view" to the finder -- at least according to the attributes on the cache page. I know such things are subjective, but if you find a bent guardrail or a rusty dumpster scenic, you really do need to get out more. (And please STOP hiding geocaches!) :D

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Not in the northwest Oregon area. We have networks of OHV trails (no street vehicles allowed) intertwined with dirt roads on which only licensed street-legal vehicles may travel. A couple of months ago I saw an ATV pulled over by the sheriff for riding on a non-OHV dirt road.

 

Guess it's more common than I thought...

 

So if I had a dual sport, does that mean I'd have to stop and take off the tag and mirrors before proceeding down the OHV trail so that I'm no longer riding a street legal vehicle? :P:D

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Thanks for the replies everyone. As I get more familiar with the in and outs of this website, I'll find my way. All and all it really is a great community of people that enjoy this caching thing even though I haven't actually met anyone yet. Not too many events in the wintertime and I only started doing this two months ago.

 

As far as finding caches that are good for my street-bike and others that are good for my mountain bike, maybe I'll stumble across some good BOOKMARK lists that people have put together. I might even create and share some myself as I get more experience.

 

I think I read in the forums that there is still no great way to search thought the shared bookmark lists. I can either access them by stumbling across one when looking at a cache page, or just search for forums posts that have bookmark links, right?

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...I don't have a 4x4 but I see a lot of people on here do. Does the "off-road vehicle" icon get overused too? I mean, if you have a license plate on it, your jeep is "allowed" in the Wal-Mart parking lot as well....

 

The problem sounds like it's one of knowing what the attribute means. What you want it to mean, isn't what everone who places caches thinks it means.

 

Exactly. The attributes don't have any detailed explaintion of what it means / when to use it. So even if someone is trying to use them 'correctly' they use their opinion of what that attribute is meant to describe. This may or may not be the same way other people would use the attribute.

 

I usually limit myself to the special equipement and facilities attributes, and not bother trying to figure out people here use the various permissions, hazards, and conditions.

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