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What do you normally put into a geocache?


trader2340

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When you go geocaching, and you find a cache, what do you put in the cache?

 

I put in Hot Wheels Cars from the 1980's and 1970's.

 

What do you leave in a cache?

 

We've got a small bag that has all kinds of odds and ends in it- some are toys some are just random goodies. We rarely take things out but we do often leave swag.

Currently we've got a bunch of buttons, some toy cars and some patches.

It changes based on what drawers I've cleaned out most recently. ;)

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Matchbox and Hot Wheels are excellent swag.

 

Yesterday I was explaining geocaching to a neighboring property owner. My swag bag had gotten torn on some thorny bushes, but here's what I pulled out of my pocket to show what I might trade in a small cache (rated as not kid-friendly):

  • Keyring
  • Bracelet
  • Zipper pull
  • State quarter
  • Friendship pin
  • Deck of playing cards
  • Wheat penny
  • Measuring tape

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On my first find, there was something I really wanted but I didn't have anything on me so I took the mini carabiner off my keychain and used that. The other few I've found I've just left cool little odds and ends I've found around the house, but I'll be going to buy some "geoswag" in the next day or two! I've found some great ideas through posts on here!!!

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Probably the thing that I most liked leaving was a vintage Pocket Watch Fob. I don't collect them, but I know some people do. It was sitting around in my drawer gathering dust and hopefully whoever finds/takes it will appreciate it more than I do.

 

I've also left small double ended screwdrivers, keyrings, flashlights,... and the like.

 

I try and leave something I would like to find.

 

Z.

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We have a few people here that have the little golf pencils .. had them marked with the local geocaching association name, and drop them in every cache. It is so nice to have a pencil when I forget mine.

 

In general I think of things for kids, as an adult I don't really care and rarely find anything that interests me. The kids love to find and trade for little things.

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We had custom guitar picks made with our handle and symbol printed on them. A lot of people collect signature items, so since we both play gee-tar, or at least attempt to, we figured that picks would be perfect. They're good quality ones from steve clayton too, so they are definitely usable if a cacher is a picker as well.

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I like to visit the thrift store for my swag. Today we picked up a bunch of mini beanie babies for 25 cents each. Not a thrill for me, but for my 5 yr old? She LOVES finding that stuff.

 

I sew, and one thing I make is a reusable fabric cloth baggie. Like a ziplock but with velcro. So sometimes I will put one of those in a bag with a note saying it's made by me.

 

Everything we leave as swag is placed in a clear plastic zip-lock type bag. I hate it when the swag is all dirty and nasty in a cache so that's my little effort at clean swag :unsure:

 

I've also left books, polished rocks, sand dollars, and in the earlier days party store/dollar store stuff. I know there is more but my brain is tired and I can't think of any. :)

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Yesterday was my first day...what a blast!

 

I placed some very nice pens, a few brand new golf balls and my sister placed some bracelets.

 

I've decided the only thing I will personally take are the travel bugs so I can move them unless I find something with anything Boise State related...then perhaps I trade for it! :)

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We hit garage sales on Memorial Day Weekend and scored. One person even had small baggies with about 5 things in each, good stuff too. Old Mickey Mouse stuff, puzzles, old childrens toys. I asked if they were swag bags, and seller had never heard of geocaching. I bought five bags for 50 cents each. Another sale had a collection of really neat magnets, bought whole box for $2.00 After 6 sales had about a bushel of swag and spent about $15.00. Needless to say my new caches are loaded, and I have spare swag for other caches that are a little "light".

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I hit dollar stores and the cheapie toy aisle at walmart. Some good stuff I've found to stock my caches with AND trade:

Silly string

"Flarp" putty (its exactly what you think it is-FUN haha)

lanyards

bracelets

pins

toy compasses (like party favors)

bug spray/spray sunscreen/poison plant relief spray (all $1-$2 for travel sizes at walmart in sporting goods)

mini first aide kit (also less than $1 in the travel size stuff section by shampoo and stuff at walmart)

small packs of baby wipes

mini flashlights

mini tape mesasures

 

We had custom guitar picks made with our handle and symbol printed on them. A lot of people collect signature items, so since we both play gee-tar, or at least attempt to, we figured that picks would be perfect. They're good quality ones from steve clayton too, so they are definitely usable if a cacher is a picker as well.

 

where did you find a place to have those made? My cache buddy wanted to have some made. Share a website pllleeeasee? :laughing:

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I have pecos diamonds. rocks, motorcycle charms. pins, magnets, small toys and other small goodies that I find.

Recently we found magic towels that were new and came from Vegas priced at 50 cents each and were originally 4.99! My first finder things I try to have something nice too.

Edited by armadillogal
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We very rarely take anything, but often leave First Nations Spirit Coins. We call them "Tokens" so fellow cachers don't think they may be trackables. They have a First Nations' symbol on one side, and a word on the reverse...."Guidance; Patience; Inspiration" are a few that come to mind.

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I put in old toys. Since cleaned out my closet I found a bunch of random old goodies like figures, pullbacks and other doo dads that have been there for years that I forgot about.

 

I love it when ppl leave matchbox cars. I might be 20 but they are still fun lol.

Edited by DannyCaffeine
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I'm totally new and so far my bag of stuff to leave includes:

  • A magnetic clip.
  • A half-used bottle of glitter nail polish.
  • Two rose-scented tea lights.
  • A Mario Bros. 1-Up/Green Mushroom iron-on patch.

I'm looking into simple signature items like wooden nickles. And I also like the idea of taking items (no matter how simple or useless) because I tend to be very sentimental. Not like a hoarder, but probably moreso than most, haha. But I only plan on taking one trinket/object from each cache and leaving one of my own every time I do.

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I hit up the party store last summer & got a bag of about 1000 carabeeners for like $10! Im fine with leaving several! I've also had good luck in target's clearance sections. At valentine's day, I got a bag of 10 little heart shaped rings for about 25cents! They're constantly rotating their dollar section, so I check it when the clearance signs go up.

 

I collect penguins, so i've only traded for penguin items I find... but, we've come across hello kitty band-aids (a friend in the army was at training camp, so he took those back with him!) & a talking ned flanders figurine! Those we busted into the good swag to trade for (thermometer zipper pulls are excellent for these trades!)

 

In our hometown, a local photographer leaves 4x6's he's taken & printed. One was of Bill Clinton! LOL!

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I'm totally new and so far my bag of stuff to leave includes:

  • A magnetic clip.
  • A half-used bottle of glitter nail polish.
  • Two rose-scented tea lights.
  • A Mario Bros. 1-Up/Green Mushroom iron-on patch.

I'm looking into simple signature items like wooden nickles. And I also like the idea of taking items (no matter how simple or useless) because I tend to be very sentimental. Not like a hoarder, but probably moreso than most, haha. But I only plan on taking one trinket/object from each cache and leaving one of my own every time I do.

 

You may not want to leave the tea lights as the heat may cause them to melt. I also avoid anything with a scent as not to attract critters.

 

My son would LOVE to find that Mario patch, though! :)

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I usually like to leave any of the following:

 

Mini deck of cards (going to try to make those a sig item once we get the time to do so)

Mini deck of uno cards

Mini Mad Libs game

Mini Skeeball game

Mini rubber ducks

Mini toy pirate compasses (that actually worked) - usually for caches that we have a hard time locating. :)

$1 DVD's that party stores are now carrying. (even got one with John Wayne movies on it recently!!)

 

My wife like to leave pens, pencils, notepads, magnets and stickers.

 

We almost always will leave a cache with more items in it that when we found it keeping the "trade even or trade up" philosophy going.

 

I hate it when I see green army men in a cache, especially since I know that Dollar Tree sells 50 or 100 for $1 in a big bag. Nothing like a 1cent trade item. Now if the entire cache is filled with them and you have to dig through them to find a log sheet that's an entirely different story. :D

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My son likes to swap hot wheels and matchbox cars. My wife and I usually swap for signature items, or if there's something else we want, we leave stuff such as small pocket sized first aid kits, little flashlights, compasses, ect. For the kids, we leave miniature decks of cards, hackey sacks, or water bomb balls.

 

David

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I've got a small drawer full of "whimsies" that came in handy when I started geocaching. So far I've left small figurines, both storebought and polymer clay ones. Bouncy balls... A cookie cuter... A tiny keyring notebook... I like leaving things and finding things, but so far I've left more than I've grabbed. As it's supposed to be, right?

 

It's starting to get really cold now so what I'd like to do (if I ever get around to place a cache) is to knit up a pair of fingerless mittens or something and leave for the first one to find it... Now that's something I wouldn't mind finding.

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Pressed pewter First Nations coins, design on front, word(s) on back...intuition, patience, guidance, etc. Most often, though, we TNLN. If the cache is looking a bit empty then we have polished pebbles and small toys that seem to be liked.

At Wal-Mart here, they have Hot Wheels cars for $1 in a big bin....yes, we got some for caches!

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One of my favorite things to do is go to my local St. Vinnie's and shop for swag. I only buy new or VERY clean items and I shop the half-off tags and I find some of the awesomest stuff....

 

for example, I got four almost-mint Rocky Mountain Elk Foundation collectible raffle coins for $1. Looked on ebay and they're going for over $5 each...cool camping ketchup and mustard pump containers (Tupperware!) for under $1 for the set...mad libs...seasonal stickers and small home decor type stuff...small pins for the tiniest caches...found some foreign coins from Sugar Pops cereal from the 80s that are in cool little protectors on ebay for a couple of bucks (and I think I got 8 of them for $3).

 

I also buy multi-packs of little toys, like stretchy spiders or other animals and break them up for small caches. I bag everything at home and have it all stashed in the swag bag in the car so I'm always prepared for a cache stop no matter where I am. I look for a wide variety of sizes of swag so I can trade to any cache that has swag to swap.

 

It's one of the most fun parts of caching for me...and in my regular life, my favorite part of the whole Christmas shopping ordeal is getting the stuff home and wrapping the presents, so it makes sense that I like this part of it!

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What a great question. It is fun reading the answers. They have given me some new ideas.

 

My son and I just go to the Dollar store and buy a bunch of stuff that we think children would like. Then, if my son finds something in a cache that he just has to have ( :unsure: ) we trade something for it. It's grand fun watching how excited he gets about cheap trinkets and knick knacks. It restores some of my lost youth and enthusiasm as well! If you want to stay feeling young...geocache! Who knew?

 

Tom

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I'd have given my right eyeball for some of the $1 bug spray a previous poster leaves, the other day. Instead I signed the log, "WOW, mosquitoes! Need transfusion!" :D There was swag in that ammo can, but we RAN from there as fast as we could, didn't even look! :D

 

So, I'm off to look for some bug spray today!

 

I also make jewelry, so I might make a batch of dangling earrings up and put them in little plastic packets with "made by FloridaFour" tags on them. They cost me a few dollars to make. Time is the issue!

 

I've considered leaving small bags of local Florida shells that I collect, does that sound like a good item?

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I'd have given my right eyeball for some of the $1 bug spray a previous poster leaves, the other day. Instead I signed the log, "WOW, mosquitoes! Need transfusion!" :D There was swag in that ammo can, but we RAN from there as fast as we could, didn't even look! :D

I did one like that, but even wors, the cache was over stalked, and I couldn't seem to get it all back in

I've considered leaving small bags of local Florida shells that I collect, does that sound like a good item?

Sounds cool, especialy if you are not leaving them near a large sourse of shells (i.e. in an inland state.)

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When I get the kids to do a "deep clean" of their rooms, I have 3 boxes for them to sort into:

 

1) trash

2) donate/Goodwill

3) geocache swag

 

As the kids outgrow stuff, we've accumulated a big bag that I pull from before we go geocaching. In my bag right now:

 

Sodor trains (those wooden Thomas the Tank Engine trains . . figure that's making some kids happy)

some unopened small craft kits (like the foam crafts)

a variety of plastic animals

a variety of kids meal toys (only in great condition)

bouncy balls

drink koozies

keychains

puzzles

action figures

name badge holders (those retractable things for holder your ID badge at work -- I have a ton from current and previous employers --- some are pretty cool, like the monster truck ones from Advance Auto)

mini mad libs games

Hotwheels or matchbox cars

pins

and so on

 

The kids love to find silly bands, hotwheels/matchbox, marbles, pins or patches from the state parks. We have only just started collecting signature items.

 

We ALWAYS leave more than we take. I've often refilled a cache that was virtually empty of trade items.

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I wanted to add that I've never taken a sig item...I wasn't sure if there was protocol on that or not. I've also been trying to find something cool for my and daughter's sig items, but haven't found the thing that's "us" yet. Maybe after I have something to leave, I'll feel better about taking someone else's. I haven't seen (IRL) anything that I thought was so cool I'd love to have it (as far as sig items go, that is) but I HAVE seen some really cool things online.

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I put into a cache whatever i took out of the last one. I will generally only take something i think is pretty cool or unique so i can keep it moving, otherwise i just pen my name to the paper :huh:

 

The very first item i put into a cache was a little red apple ceramic i brought from a 2buck shop. I have sitting on my car dashboard now a moo cow key ring i found in a cache in Exmouth and thought it was hilarious, so that will go into whichever cache i find next!

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