What Has Caching Meant For You?

[+Anonymike7]

Hey all,

 

I've just written this piece about what geocaching has meant for me; I'm wondering what it's meant for others. How has caching changed your life? My piece is here. Looking forward to reading others' thoughts!

[+AmphibianTrackers]

I liked your article and appreciate how much you are enjoying the time with your son. It sounds like geocaching is helping your relationship and that is wonderful. I enjoyed your writing style.

 

We always spend the summers hiking and exploring. Finding Geocaching this summer has meant we have gone to wildly different locations than we previously knew anything about. As we have moved around a lot I was really not familiar with the part of the state I am living near now and I have become much more confident discovering the areas and have found many back roads to get from place to place. My family is thrilled to participate and my daughter always wants to keep finding more than we did the last time we went out. Today, we saw baby raccoons and she was absolutely thrilled. We have created so many memories in such a short period of time. I can't imagine what it will be like after having done this for years.

[uperdooper]

it saved my sanity after an 11 month stay here by my crazy aunt, and is now saving my sanity after the death of my husband and all of the sturm und drang that goes with it.

 

last fall i started going to some monthly local events and have made a few friends. add the little people that live in my computer and i'll be just fine.

[+DRA6N]

At first I didnt really focus on WHAT geocaching was doing for me. I was more focused on finding them and learning about the diffrent ways people hide them around my local area. I then began taking a lot of notice of the areas people OUTSIDE the city were hiding their caches in. They made me hike, swim, rockclimb, battle the elements, fend off creatures to find these buggers. I really started to appreciate the scenery and found a new love for the areas I drove or walked passed nearly every day..

 

Geocaching has really changed my life. Its a simple hobby that [after getting a GPSr] is pretty dadgum cheap, and very healty. I am one of those people that picks up a hobby.. then gets bored with it and moved onto another. With geocaching it never gets old and I always want to find the next one!

[+Fianccetto]

It's meant I feel less of a stranger in a strange land. There's a purpose to my being out in the great outdoors, walking around and taking it all in. I've often gone back to the places that geocaching has taken me to just take in the view, enjoy a good walk or get some exercise without needing a 'reason'. My kids still need a reason though, and finding caches has got them out walking and learning about outdoorsy skills better than anything else I know. Sometimes we get somewhere (like the waterfall we got drenched in yesterday) and we just enjoy where it's brought us for what it is. It doesn't matter that we didn't find the cache - we want to come back anyway!

 

We have moved about a fair bit, and Mr F is away a lot because of his job(s) and so we often cache separately under the same name, compare notes, swap TBs, share our caching stories (it's a great way for him to explore the new places he finds himself in) and I save some of the best places to go to, or go back to for when we're together. Geocaching is one of the few things we have in common and it brings us together to enjoy the walks and discovery of new places in our own ways.

 

The biggest thing for the past year, for me, is that I have lost over a stone (14 lbs) of fat that I didn't need to have, and am well on the way to losing the other stone I don't need! All this walking and climbing and scrambling about is getting me fit. As well as this, I am at that point when my youngest is starting to express her independence and I have more time to be myself and do some of what I want. Geocaching is helping me to take stock and not rush into anything, to take my time and reassess my dreams, my ambitions.