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Fuel for Geocaching


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Are you adjusting your Geocaching activities because of rising fuel prices? What changes have you made or are planning to make? What vehicle do you drive on your Geocache hunts?

 

We're slowing down and keeping hunts within a 50-mile radius. We drive a 2002 Honda Civic and get an average of 30 mpg using regular unleaded fuel.

 

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Inland (Southern California) gas prices take biggest jump in five years

10:55 AM Fri, Jun 06, 2008

Posted by: PE News

A 21.1-cent increase, the largest in a week since August 2003, pushed the average price of a gallon of self-serve regular gasoline in the Inland Empire to a record $4.345, the Automobile Club of Southern California reported today.

 

The average in Riverside and San Bernardino counties was 43 cents more than last month and $1.01 more than at this time last year.

 

This was the ninth time in the past 10 weeks that the average hit a record high.

 

The last time that weekly gas prices rose by more than three cents a day locally was in August 2003, when several refinery outages and an Arizona gasoline pipeline shutdown caused a major supply issue, Auto Club spokesman Jeffrey Spring said.

 

"Oil industry analysts say that California refineries have begun producing more diesel fuel and less gasoline, creating a need to import more costly unleaded fuel from out-of-state and overseas."

 

Spring said "there are a few rays of hope" as crude oil and California wholesale gasoline prices have dropped, and "several Midwestern and Southern states have seen slight gas price decreases in the past week."

 

The average increased 16.6 cents from May 23-30; 3.3 cents from May 16- 23 and 3 cents from May 9-16 after falling 1.4 cents from May 2-9.

 

Prices jumped more in Orange County (22.3 cents) and Los Angeles (22.7 cents) but still remained cheaper ($4.315 and $4.339, respectively). San Diego's increase was smaller (21 cents) but the overall price remained higher ($4.375) than the Inland area.

 

—From news services

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I found a receipt for gas from March 30th. Gas here was $3.06 a gallon. Just over 2 months later, gas is nearly $4 a gallon.

 

Fortunately this means I'll be visiting fewer lame micros since it's far better to park at a trailhead and find some decent caches in the mountains than it is to waste gas driving from parking lot to parking lot lifting lamp post skirts. :)

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Sort of but not really. :)

 

We still cache a lot, but when we go out, we try find more on each trip. We stopped going for FTFs unless there's a bunch of them or other unfound caches in the same area.

 

We've also been doing more caches on bike, both in the woods and on bike paths, but that may not be saving us much. Sometimes we end up driving 60 miles to a great bike path so we don't have to drive all around.

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I used to drive my car a lot but now there are two factors that make me stay closer to home. One is the current gas price (over $4 here in NJ) and the other one is my 2 year old that doesn't really like long car trips. So we mostly stay close to home exploring nearby parks. It is kinda fun spending half a day in the park by the playground, go to the zoo and then make a quick stop at one of the cache sites. I also do a lot more bicycle riding these days. It takes longer to get from cache to cache but I already went down one pants size. So I would have to say that the higher gas prices have some positive impact :-)

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Even at the prices we are paying now caching is an inexpensive hobby. We don't go to football games, movies, amusement parks or what have you. We have enough active cachers in the area to keep us busy finding caches and that helps keep the miles down. We pack a lunch now so don't spend that money while caching. All in all it's still not cost prohibitive. When you go caching keep in mind the money you aren't spending on something else.

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Today, 87 Octane gas is selling for from 4.33 to 4.69 here in Hemet, California. Seems like the beginning of last week, it was 3.98 at my station and by Friday it was 4.25.

 

I was looking at Vespas. Many models require 91 Octane fuel and average 60-70 MPG.

 

Here's an experimental Toyota Prius that's getting 100 MPG! \

 

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/news/2008...0-miles-gallon/

 

I heard today that the U.S. government is thinking of changing retail fuel sales to 1/2 gallon increments. Talk about trying to pull the wool over our eyes, or in this case, the dinosaur bones. Weren't they talking about switching to litres some years ago?

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I began this topic to survey three questions for a report. As topics do, it's expanded and morphed into a wide-ranging discussion. The three questions:

 

• Are you adjusting your Geocaching activities because of rising fuel prices?

• What changes have you made or are planning to make?

• What vehicle do you drive on your Geocache hunts?

 

Deja vu or just not perusing far enough?

Edited by Coyote Raven
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I'm closing this thread in favor of the other one that's been linked to. Also, if you wish to use the forums for conducting a survey, please see the forum guidelines:

 

We generally do not allow surveys to be conducted using this forum. Special requests for permission to survey the forum members should be sent to Groundspeak prior to publicizing the survey.
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