DNFed it, then found it years later.

[AZcachemeister]

Yesterday, I finally returned to make the find on a cache I DNFed back on 11/8/03.

That's 7 years, 3 months, and 18 days in between!

 

What is your longest time span between the DNF and the FF (Finally Found) on a cache?

[+Harry Dolphin]

Just under four years is my record. For nearby caches, I generally go back within a year. For DNFs on vacation, I seldom go back again. (Other places to go. Other states to color in. Well, except for Maine. My sister lives there...) This on was on the PA Tpke. DNF 7/12/2005. Found 6/26/2009.

Got some interesting DNFs in WVa, KY and Ohio from the second trip, and Florida from last year's trip. But I doubt that I'll be going back to look for them. Hope to head to Wisconsin, Iowa and Minnesota this year.

[+StarBrand]

Right at 4 years and 5 visits to a cache some 250 miles away. A bridge cache. My wife and I even dragged a van full of high school students with us twice as we drove them across the state for ate StScience Bowl competition.

 

When we finally found it, it was a real letdown - a rusty altoids tin with a soaked logsheet. But we just had to find it after so very many noted it as "easy find" or "found after short search". Now archived.

[+simpjkee]

Almost exactly one year to the day. It was a puzzle cache along a trail I was hiking while on vacation in Texas. I was trying to do some math 'in the field' and it started raining pretty hard. I rushed through the work and got what I thought was the final coords and looked for a bit but DNF'd it. When I got home I realized my math mistake and almost exactly one year to the day later I was on vacation in Texas again and stopped by the actual coords to make the easy find. I think thats the longest from DNF to find for me.

[+Isonzo Karst]

4 and half years. Finally finished up the last in a group of paddle caches. DNFed it the day we worked the group in '04.

 

I was the last finder, thought I might be at the time - it was a bonus cache, and the series was deteriorating, absent owner, so getting the coords for that last cache was probably no longer possible when I went back and found it.

The cache itself was an extremely rusty ammo can, just barely holding together.

[+Walts Hunting]

never happened to me DNF's generally got to the ignore list and are never seen again.

[+power69]

never happened to me DNF's generally got to the ignore list and are never seen again.

same here. unless its a muggle dnf. caches i dnf go to the big blue monster[ignore list]

[+Mark+Karen]

never happened to me DNF's generally got to the ignore list and are never seen again.

 

Nah, if I DNF that cache becomes a 'problem' and I have to sort it out! Quite often the reason I couldn't find it was because it wasn't there so leaving it for a while at least lets other cachers confirm it actually exists.

[+MoonCatKDT & Peanut]

My longest is only about a month.. I end up being very determined to find a cache once I dnf'd it. It bothers me until I find it, especially when all I see before and after my DNF are 'easy find, knew where it was as soon as i got to GZ'

[+Michaelcycle]

Yesterday, I finally returned to make the find on a cache I DNFed back on 11/8/03.

That's 7 years, 3 months, and 18 days in between!

 

What is your longest time span between the DNF and the FF (Finally Found) on a cache?

 

Ours was 19 months, nothing special in terms of time but it is a cache that is more than 9,500 miles from home. I never expected to get back to that little jungle island in the Straits of Johor and I almost DNF'd it again:

 

Ubin Quarry log

[chephy]

It's funny how different people treat DNFs. Some are only willing to try once, and if they don't find the cache then -- too bad for the cache! Some take it as a personal challenge and decide they MUST find it at all costs. I'm definitely in the latter category -- my most fun finds were for those persistent pesky buggers that required multiple tries and long searches. I have a couple on my list now that I simply MUST find now. I've been to one of them about five times so far... and the worst part is that it's a 1.5 cache and everyone is going on about how easy the find was!!!

 

As for the longest personal stretch between find and first attempt, it's 560 days, which is just over a year and a half. Took about 4 trips, I think.

[+wimseyguy]

2.5 years give or take a month. But it's almost 700 miles from home and I haven't been back in that part of MA since that DNF.

[+Shawn&Holly]

5.2 years and 4.5 years are the longest from first attempt to found, quite a few have taken a couple of years. We still have one from 2002 and a few from 2003 to attempt again when the timing is right with season and travel. Some of our DNF's may never get re-attempted, but we did find one in Massachusetts, 3.8 years after the first attempt, did not think we would ever drive that highway again. So far, we have 97 caches to clear up our DNF attempt, 127 that were DNF have been archived and 185 have been resolved to account for our 409 DNF caches. I keep too much info in my spreadsheet I think.

Edited March 1, 2011 by Shawn&Holly

[+briansnat]

2 years and 2 months for Old Stone School. A pure DNF

 

2 years and 9 months for NY/NY Multi State Multi Cache. A A DNF because I didn't complete the multi (twice).

 

This thread made me go through my DNFs and my oldest DNF of a still existing cache came in 2003. I'd like to complete that just for ha-has, but it's 375+ miles away. Not too far from this year's Geowoodstock so maybe I can bag it then.

Edited March 1, 2011 by briansnat