Geocachers Shame

1.2k · November 3, 2010

This is happening to me so often now and I can't figure out why. I can't find D1 caches anymore? What's wrong with me?

I found a D4 the day before quickly.

Is this a known phenomenon? Help!

1k · November 3, 2010

Oh yes, happens to me too. I spent 20 minutes searching for a 1.5 last weekend, looking for tricky devious hiding spots. I stood up to leave and nearly poked my eye on it (a brightly colored bison hanging from a bare tree branch, no camo at all). Sometimes we over-think things.

7.3k · November 3, 2010

I spent over an hour hunting the second stage of multi-cache.

I'd decrypted the hint - which was pretty descriptive.

Eventually I decided that I'd mangled the coords in hand loading them, and would have to return to stage 1.

About then the BRIGHT ORANGE MATCHSAFE on the coords, per the hint, poked me in the eye. I dunno, it happens....

19k · November 3, 2010

Yes, but much more common is that the one that finds it is a newbie.

2.6k · November 3, 2010

Yeah, it happens to all of us. Don't sweat it. I wouldn't know what to do if I didn't have an "easy" cache vexing me at any given moment! One I particularly like to recall is one hidden by a good friend of mine. It took me 7 visits to find - 2 after the owner told me SPECIFICALLY where it was! The whole time folks were finding it and saying how easy it was and they walked right up to it. Just forget it for a bit and go back from tiem to time. You'll get that "A-ha!" moment!

November 3, 2010

Yep, I recently failed at finding This 1.5D, yet I had been finding 3D caches easy. It still hasn't been found since my DNF, so I'm not sure whether this cache has gone missing, or what?

Edited November 3, 2010 by Mini-Geek

1.2k · November 3, 2010

I have terrible guilt for secretly wishing the cache was stolen! :huh:

This is my 3rd or 4th D1 that eluded me. Must have blinders on.

3.6k · November 3, 2010

It happens to us too. Four of us couldn't find an "easy" magnetic key holder recently. The next few made a point of saying how easy it was. "In the first spot we looked." "Super quick grab." "In and out in less than 30 seconds..."

Grrrr. :huh:

38.2k · November 3, 2010

Last year my wife and I DNFed a D1 cache. We were the first logged DNF and the cache had close to 100 finds. We were certain that it had gone missing. 2 days later it was logged and last time I looked my DNF was still the only one.

A few weeks ago I was hunting a 1.5 Diff cache with 4 other cachers. Between us we had over 12,000 finds and close to 30 years of caching experience. We searched for quite a while to no avail. Next day a newbie who just started that month and had a handful of finds found it. :rolleyes:

1.2k · November 3, 2010

LOL! Thanks for the stories. Makes me feel better!

Being the only DNF on a D1 is rough too. That was me 2 weeks ago.

November 3, 2010

Here is one that has me pulling what little hair I have left out.Fletcher Covered Bridge

I even had a hand in building the bridge :rolleyes:

Its split all most 50/50 on found it and DNF.

I can't tell if its a very clever hide or bad coordinates or both.

Errrr

7.2k · November 3, 2010

"Blackwell's Black Box"

I'll never forget it. I looked probably six times before I found it. I swear someone was watching me come down the road, would go remove it, wait until I was gone and then go replace it. That's my story and I'm sticking to it.

3.2k · November 3, 2010

It's happened to me more times than I care to think about. Of course, when I log a DNF on a D1 cache I'm sometimes just one of the few who bother to log it that way. I've found that most folks don't care to log a DNF - especially on a D1 cache. I've logged a DNF on the same cache several times. It's a bit frustrating but not something to be embarrassed about.

2.2k · November 3, 2010

This happens to me all the time. I can find a D3.5 at night with a flashlight in 30 seconds, but there are some D1s that just elude me for months...

6.7k · November 3, 2010

I am going to be different and say that it never happens to me. I am, of course, lying but am saying it anyway.

November 3, 2010

I am going to be different and say that it never happens to me. I am, of course, lying but am saying it anyway.

Hey its your lie and you can tell it any way you want to :rolleyes:

7k · November 3, 2010

and then of course there's the grossly misrated D1s. mostly placed by newbies who seem to assume that everybody's GPSr will lead the right to the exact hiding spot, at which point the cache would be indeed a very easy find. what they ignore is the fact that in the direct vicinity of this spot, there's about a million other spots where the cache could also be hidden...

6.7k · November 3, 2010

I am going to be different and say that it never happens to me. I am, of course, lying but am saying it anyway.

Hey its your lie and you can tell it any way you want to

Ain't THAT the truth. :rolleyes:

19k · November 3, 2010

LOL! Thanks for the stories. Makes me feel better!

Being the only DNF on a D1 is rough too. That was me 2 weeks ago.

I'd quit if I were you.

:rolleyes:

PS: That's a wink, not a smirk

Edited November 3, 2010 by knowschad

November 3, 2010

You wouldn't feel so bad about DNF'ing caches if everyone logged their DNFs. I estimate that more than half the people who DNF don't bother logging the fact.

I'm constantly not-finding caches. The worst was probably a cache I'd visited 4 or more times and nobody else seemed to have too much of a problem. Someone even found it and said it was the first cache they had ever looked for. I'd probably found 500 others by that time and still couldn't find the thing.

1.2k · November 3, 2010

LOL! Thanks for the stories. Makes me feel better!

Being the only DNF on a D1 is rough too. That was me 2 weeks ago.

I'd quit if I were you.

PS: That's a wink, not a smirk

I always threaten to quit! But then I remember I have a membership. I also always go and find a huge ammo can or something obviously easy to get some self pride back after the horrible D1 DNF.

The CO gave me a hint to the cache I posted above. I didn't go look again yet but I don't understand where they mean! Crap.

1.5k · November 3, 2010

You wouldn't feel so bad about DNF'ing caches if everyone logged their DNFs. I estimate that more than half the people who DNF don't bother logging the fact.

My estimate is of the ratio is 3:1 or 4:1 for not post:post.

November 3, 2010

Searched for a 1.5 today that I couldn't initially find. It was a large container. How hard can it be to find a large in the middle of the woods?

Looked around for several minutes, beginning to think it was missing. Then I started looking above the ground. :rolleyes:

I have found that experience works against me sometimes. When I started, I had no idea what i was looking for or where to look, so I poked and examined everything. Now I tend to assume certain containers to be in certain places, and I need to step back and rethink things from time to time.

"There is no film can in the lamppost. Must be missing. Or maybe I should check that tree next to the lamppost..."

1.1k · November 3, 2010

Oh yes, happens to me too. I spent 20 minutes searching for a 1.5 last weekend, looking for tricky devious hiding spots. I stood up to leave and nearly poked my eye on it (a brightly colored bison hanging from a bare tree branch, no camo at all). Sometimes we over-think things.

Truer woprds where never spoken

November 3, 2010

I had a D1, T1 that eluded me for weeks. It was a 'micro' placed at an ancient bridge over a small creek.

Every time I drove by the place (which was at least weekly) I stopped to look for it. I made special trips out there to look for it. I was under the bridge, poked fingers in the sign posts and I was all over the small tree 5' from the bridge.

I endured sliently the good-natured taunts of the CO (a good friend of mine) for my failure to find.

One day I finally spent almost an hour at the cache site.

Just as I was about to give and was hanging my head in shame yet again, I looked down. I'd been standing on the @#$%^ thing. No wonder I couldn't find it, it was under my foot.

And no, it wasn't buried.

Now I try to remember that a 1/1 is supposed to be easy. I'd been making a 3/3 out of it... :rolleyes:

2.3k · November 3, 2010

I will have occasional issues with the easy difficulty ones. Sometimes my head just isn't that into it and wandering elsewhere. Once this summer I got super dehydrated after a cache (it was a hot and humid day) and by the time I did the rest I think I has having some heat exhaustion problems and failed that day.

Sometimes caches migrate. Sometimes I just am bad at finding them. But it keeps me busy and I don't feel bad about it usually.

24.7k · November 3, 2010

...Is this a known phenomenon? Help!...

It is for me. 1/1's are my nemisis.

3.6k · November 3, 2010

I got my share of them. Some are very embarrassing. There is one 1/1 hide that I still cant find. There was a hide that was a large container and it took me three trips to find that sucker!

2.4k · November 4, 2010

Did a night cache recently - newly published and all the logs said how bright the object was. How easy. Not for us!! Poor cache owners went and checked on it the next day...it was fine. We found it later that day. We always make the easy ones a thousand times more difficult..............d'oh!! At least we weren't the only ones to DNF it.

7.3k · November 4, 2010

This thread jolted another memory

Isonzo Karst

The four of us spent quite a while here, hunting, hunting, not finding....

Average find count of the group around ~6500, time at site over two hours as the cache was the main focus of a long drive.

and then there's this log:

New User (2 found)

Nice scenery. First find for us.

At least the cache owner was nice enough to check it and sharpen the coords (but not by enough that it should really matter).

November 5, 2010

1/1 regular cache is real nightmare! In most cases I am sure that here is impossible to hide anything bigger than micro. (In the fact, regular is sometimes cylinder 10cm in diameter and 20cm long)

10.1k · November 5, 2010

Do I have to admit to this??? Actually, it's a 2.5/1.5. Bison tube velcroed to an aluminum bleacher. Everyone saying how it's an easy cache and dash. It took us four tries over three years to find that #$%@#

November 6, 2010

LOL! Thanks for the stories. Makes me feel better!

Being the only DNF on a D1 is rough too. That was me 2 weeks ago.

Maybe it isn't really a D1. We have a guy in our area who puts a D3 on his lampskirt hides. I'm confused. Maybe if he puts a D1 he knows nobody will look for it. As for me I don't waste my time on D1.

November 6, 2010

LOL! Thanks for the stories. Makes me feel better!

Being the only DNF on a D1 is rough too. That was me 2 weeks ago.

I'd quit if I were you.

PS: That's a wink, not a smirk

I always threaten to quit! But then I remember I have a membership. I also always go and find a huge ammo can or something obviously easy to get some self pride back after the horrible D1 DNF.

The CO gave me a hint to the cache I posted above. I didn't go look again yet but I don't understand where they mean! Crap.

Remember people rate there own stuff. I looked for a D4 1/2 expecting it to be impossible to find. It also had a Terrain of 4. It turned out to be a D1 1/2 Terrain 1 wheelchair accesible. Then next one is a D1 or 1 1/2 and I can't find it. The ratings aren't accurate.

November 6, 2010

I got my share of them. Some are very embarrassing. There is one 1/1 hide that I still cant find. There was a hide that was a large container and it took me three trips to find that sucker!

There is no way this is a D1.

6.1k · November 6, 2010

I have a fairly easy to find decon container hidden in the hollow branch of a tree in a nearby park. It is the only spot where a "small" container will fit, and the only tree within 50 feet. Parking is about 50 feet away also. I went to randomly check on it one day last month and could not find it. It wasnt in the hiding spot, or anywhere else. I intended to disable it, but by the time I got home 8 hours later, someone had posted a find. I initally suspected that perhaps they had found a micro that someone else had thrown down, or posted a find anyhow despite the fact that it wasnt there. I was about to e-mail the cacher and ask them where they had found it, and to describe the container, when another find was posted by a different group. Now I was really curious, so I went back to check the area again, and it was right where I had originally left it.

The only thing that I can think of was that another cacher had taken it back to their car to sign the logbook when I went to look for it. Since I did not have a GPS they probably figured I was a muggle...

9.3k · November 6, 2010

A few weeks ago I was hunting a 1.5 Diff cache with 4 other cachers. Between us we had over 12,000 finds and close to 30 years of caching experience. We searched for quite a while to no avail. Next day a newbie who just started that month and had a handful of finds found it.

So, based on that experience, should the difficulty be raised or lowered?

Or maybe the two contrasting hunt conclusions balance each other out?

1.9k · November 7, 2010

It happens to us too. Four of us couldn't find an "easy" magnetic key holder recently. The next few made a point of saying how easy it was. "In the first spot we looked." "Super quick grab." "In and out in less than 30 seconds..."

Grrrr.

when the owner saying its magnetic, doesn't always mean the magnet is in use!

1.9k · November 7, 2010

LOL! Thanks for the stories. Makes me feel better!

Being the only DNF on a D1 is rough too. That was me 2 weeks ago.

We have a guy in our area who puts a D3 on his lampskirt hides. I'm confused. Maybe if he puts a D1 he knows nobody will look for it. As for me I don't waste my time on D1.

EXACTLY!

thats to defeat those that filter out the lower difficulty hides.

November 7, 2010

It happens to us too. Four of us couldn't find an "easy" magnetic key holder recently. The next few made a point of saying how easy it was. "In the first spot we looked." "Super quick grab." "In and out in less than 30 seconds..."

Grrrr.

when the owner saying its magnetic, doesn't always mean the magnet is in use!

Yes, I learned that the hard way

1.2k · November 7, 2010

LOL! Thanks for the stories. Makes me feel better!

Being the only DNF on a D1 is rough too. That was me 2 weeks ago.

Maybe it isn't really a D1. We have a guy in our area who puts a D3 on his lampskirt hides. I'm confused. Maybe if he puts a D1 he knows nobody will look for it. As for me I don't waste my time on D1.

Do you mean if you don't find the D1 within seconds you don't bother looking more?

Or that you don't hunt D1's anymore (you've found a bunch).

How long do you look for a D1? I like to find them so I look until I find, but I can see the point of having a 5 minute limit on D1's.

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