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Introducing Caching


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Last week I was visiting my hometown and picked up a friend so we could go out to dinner. I had brought a TB along and stopped at a cache between her house and our destination to drop it off. She had a fun time finding that one so now her family is looking into getting a GPSr.

 

How many people are now cachers because you introduced them to the sport, game, obsession, whatever?

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6 have cached with me. Of those, 1 will definitely never cache again. 2 might cache again, but didn't make an account. 3 people have made accounts.

 

Several more are interested in going with me at some point.

A couple have decided at the last minute to bail (good thing because that one was a bushwacking cache!)

 

However, the only one that has really kept caching so far, has been doing it with the person that introduced me to caching.

 

I'm sure the others will come around. I made a facebook group to organize stuff in my area and it has 16 members.

 

I may have found 2 more prospective cachers today as well. I was playing disc golf on campus around an area with 8 caches in it. It was all I could do to not just tell them where one of the caches was to get them hooked.

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I present Geocaching 101-type seminars at events fairly often and know that a few of the attendees eventually do play the game.

 

I can watch an audience and just about tell by the look in their eyes which ones will 'get' the game. If I had to put a number on it based on, say, the annual attendance at our geocaching booth at the Moss Rock Festival where I and other volunteer cachers give an hourly 10-minute Intro To Geocaching presentation then lead the attendees to hunt caches in the Moss Rock Preserve I would say that we have around 300 attendees to our presentations over the weekend from the festival's several thousand attendees. Of those 300 maybe 10 each year will eventually show up in our local forum and become regular geocachers. In the five years we have had a booth at the festival I would guess that we've picked up 50 folks who are still in the game.

 

As far as friends and family to whom I have introduced geocaching - Zip. Nada. Not one has even a passing interest or understanding of why I love this game! I've even given all my 5 grown kids a GPS, which none of them have ever used to find a cache unless they were with me! :laughing:

 

I took my 19-year-old daughter to GW7 and we had a good time together but it was obviously a gift of her day, not something that she'd ever do on her own.

 

My wife will go to caches that I have already found, are easily accessible and I can assure her that there is interesting swag to look through.

 

My fishing and hunting buddies will sometimes stop with me to get a cache, but it's clear that they'd never even consider going after one on their own.

 

That's why I laugh when the threads about this game going mainstream come up... not one person in ten thousand will ever get interested in this game!

Edited by TheAlabamaRambler
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My son has gone with me and found he likes the game. He doesn't get a lot of time to go with his job, and a new baby at home. But he goes when he can, and looks forward to his daughter getting old enough to go. His wife went with us once and she seems to like it too, but I would have to give him the credit for introducing her to the game. :wacko:

 

My brother and sister-in-law enjoy it now, as does my niece and her boyfriend.

 

One of the nurses at the hospital I had my knee replacement done, liked the idea and went out to grab some caches. I don't know if he stuck with it, I haven't heard, but do know he really liked it.

 

However, the ones I wonder about, but will never know, are the people who I tell about the game. Some of the people I've talked with really sound interested, but who would know if they ever followed through and gave it a try? :laughing::blink:

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It is amazing how each one of us found our way into geocaching. My start was about five years ago. I had suggested to a friend that we should go hike a nearby mountain, and he suggested that we should try this new craze called geocaching. The very next weekend I had my first two finds!

 

So far I have introduced geocaching to a handful of people, and two of them are still active geocachers to this day! :laughing:

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Three.

My mom, she's still trying to figure out the technology. I think after I visit home next and get her all set up she'll cache often.

 

And two co-workers. One it really didn't stick. The other did okay for a while, with a semi-smart phone, and has slowely ground to a halt. Of course the triple digit weather hasnt' helped.

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How many people are now cachers because you introduced them to the sport, game, obsession, whatever?

 

One that I know of. I've introduced or explained geocaching to many others but really don't know how many may have gone out on their own and tried it.

 

The one person that I know is still geocaching is my brother. I was visiting him in California (where I was born and grew up) from NY a couple of years ago and we found a few geocaches together. He got a GPSr a couple of months later, found a few hundred and hid a bunch of caches in the first year. He's not as active as he used to be though. Coincidentally, I've been visiting him for the past week and am posting from his house right now. We went up to visit my father a couple of days ago and found a few caches along the way. On the first one, he was 10' in front of me as we approached GZ and had it in hand while I was still looking around for a likely spot. I took his bicycle out this morning to find one of his and a few other caches. He's planning on visiting me next summer and I'm looking forward to taking him to some of the better local caches in my area.

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Everyone I tell think's I'm crazy. It also makes it doubly hard that I enjoy going after the more challenging caches; often in the woods and/or requiring a change of shoes afterwards. The initial intimidation level is difficult for people to get over.

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Last week I was visiting my hometown and picked up a friend so we could go out to dinner. I had brought a TB along and stopped at a cache between her house and our destination to drop it off. She had a fun time finding that one so now her family is looking into getting a GPSr.

 

How many people are now cachers because you introduced them to the sport, game, obsession, whatever?

3

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I don’t think it’s an activity for everyone. You need to be comfortable poking around in places where there might be critters, comfortable working on the computer, and really enjoy the outdoors. That in itself is pretty limiting to most people. What I see is that people who like it, like it and really get it without much explanation. I work with the Scouts, and they tend to get it better than most, but even then it’s just a few. Think I saw a description of a Geocacher awhile ago that was something to the effect of “a computer geek with a tan” – think that about sums it up. (yes I am a computer geek with a tan)

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I got started caching locally with a friend.

 

We've been joined by 3 different people on various occasions, 2 of whom have signed up for accounts.

 

One of those we introduced to it went back to college and has been introducing her friends up there to it (including TABjuggler who responded earlier in this thread).

 

I took a trip last weekend to northern Florida and introduced two friends to geocaching. One signed up for an account immediately and has already found a few caches near his home. The other is likely to try some geocaching with a friend later in the year when it's not so warm.

 

Many of my other friends like to hear about my geocaching adventures so they are at least aware of geocaching and what it is. I have at least 4 that are interested in joining me on some future geocaching (especially after the summer is over).

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I don’t think it’s an activity for everyone. You need to be comfortable poking around in places where there might be critters, comfortable working on the computer, and really enjoy the outdoors. That in itself is pretty limiting to most people. What I see is that people who like it, like it and really get it without much explanation. I work with the Scouts, and they tend to get it better than most, but even then it’s just a few. Think I saw a description of a Geocacher awhile ago that was something to the effect of “a computer geek with a tan” – think that about sums it up. (yes I am a computer geek with a tan)

 

I agree with you. Toss in that you need a little patience too. This is not always an instant gratification sort of hobby. If the GPS aspect or the cache page stuff then I lose them at the patience part.

 

Then I've had a handful that really enjoy the easiest ones but bail the second it gets hard. I had one complain about walking 70 feet once.

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I got started caching locally with a friend.

 

We've been joined by 3 different people on various occasions, 2 of whom have signed up for accounts.

 

One of those we introduced to it went back to college and has been introducing her friends up there to it (including TABjuggler who responded earlier in this thread).

 

Yeah, Joshism is my geo-grandfather. I too enjoy hearing about his geo-adventures through fb.

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We like to customize the "CacheStats" on our profile page and have had this stat tucked into the grid for the past year or so:

 

Family Members Introduced to Caching: 16

Family Members Still Geocaching: 6 (37.5%)

 

We all live in different parts of the country it's been great to follow each others caching adventures from afar.

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