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Personally, I am dead-set against that sort of commercial exploitation of geocaching. We have had a taste of it here in Minnesota, starting with the State Parks, who first banned geocaching, and then realized that they could make money with it, so exploited what they had previously banned. My county has recently done the same, to the point of putting out a few of their own hides... some of the lamest geocaches that I have ever seen in seven years of caching. Government.... stay out of our activity. If you feel that you must regulate it, educate yourselves first, and be intelligent about it. Don't come in like a bunch of noobs and start telling us how to do what we have been doing under your noses for years, generally without issue. The only reason you want in is the almighty dollar.

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Personally, I am dead-set against that sort of commercial exploitation of geocaching. We have had a taste of it here in Minnesota, starting with the State Parks, who first banned geocaching, and then realized that they could make money with it, so exploited what they had previously banned. My county has recently done the same, to the point of putting out a few of their own hides... some of the lamest geocaches that I have ever seen in seven years of caching. Government.... stay out of our activity. If you feel that you must regulate it, educate yourselves first, and be intelligent about it. Don't come in like a bunch of noobs and start telling us how to do what we have been doing under your noses for years, generally without issue. The only reason you want in is the almighty dollar.

 

First let me start out by saying I've hidden one of those Seaway Trail caches, which are sponsored by a non-profit tourism entity. I myself don't even know what that means, but they are indeed non-profit, and the project manager is an experienced Geocacher. He even had a booth at Geowoodstock.

 

I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves. :lol:

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While on vacation I came across a tourism brochure about geocaching. I was shocked with the brochure. It contained coordinates to local area attractions and indicated something like there were hidden containers where they could find small toys. Whoever created it obviously was using the name of geocaching to attract people to tourist locations but thankfully they did not post cache names or coordinates just coordinates to the tourist locations. Anyway, it was a disaster of a brochure. Someone clearly did not know what they were doing. :anibad:

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Personally, I am dead-set against that sort of commercial exploitation of geocaching. We have had a taste of it here in Minnesota, starting with the State Parks, who first banned geocaching, and then realized that they could make money with it, so exploited what they had previously banned. My county has recently done the same, to the point of putting out a few of their own hides... some of the lamest geocaches that I have ever seen in seven years of caching. Government.... stay out of our activity. If you feel that you must regulate it, educate yourselves first, and be intelligent about it. Don't come in like a bunch of noobs and start telling us how to do what we have been doing under your noses for years, generally without issue. The only reason you want in is the almighty dollar.

 

First let me start out by saying I've hidden one of those Seaway Trail caches, which are sponsored by a non-profit tourism entity. I myself don't even know what that means, but they are indeed non-profit, and the project manager is an experienced Geocacher. He even had a booth at Geowoodstock.

 

I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves. :lol:

 

Of the three county caches I've found, one was an ammo can at the end of a downed tree, covered by two pieces of bark (all of these caches are quite new, with a half-dozen or fewer finds so far). One was an ammo can at the base of a tree, right next to the trail, hidden by no more than a few foot-high summer ground-cover plants. In a month, it will be completely in the open. The third, also an ammo can (hey, they did something right, anyway) was sitting on the ground in the middle of a small clearing. Not a single bit of cover nearby. There was a FTF log, then there were two muggles logs (found while hunting mushrooms, and found while taking a break at the nearby archery range). I was the forth one to log it.

 

I emailed the county and got one reply that basically said, "yeah, we could do better". I replied with a few ideas about how to do better, but got no reply.

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Personally, I am dead-set against that sort of commercial exploitation of geocaching. We have had a taste of it here in Minnesota, starting with the State Parks, who first banned geocaching, and then realized that they could make money with it, so exploited what they had previously banned. My county has recently done the same, to the point of putting out a few of their own hides... some of the lamest geocaches that I have ever seen in seven years of caching. Government.... stay out of our activity. If you feel that you must regulate it, educate yourselves first, and be intelligent about it. Don't come in like a bunch of noobs and start telling us how to do what we have been doing under your noses for years, generally without issue. The only reason you want in is the almighty dollar.

 

First let me start out by saying I've hidden one of those Seaway Trail caches, which are sponsored by a non-profit tourism entity. I myself don't even know what that means, but they are indeed non-profit, and the project manager is an experienced Geocacher. He even had a booth at Geowoodstock.

 

I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves. :lol:

 

Of the three county caches I've found, one was an ammo can at the end of a downed tree, covered by two pieces of bark (all of these caches are quite new, with a half-dozen or fewer finds so far). One was an ammo can at the base of a tree, right next to the trail, hidden by no more than a few foot-high summer ground-cover plants. In a month, it will be completely in the open. The third, also an ammo can (hey, they did something right, anyway) was sitting on the ground in the middle of a small clearing. Not a single bit of cover nearby. There was a FTF log, then there were two muggles logs (found while hunting mushrooms, and found while taking a break at the nearby archery range). I was the forth one to log it.

 

I emailed the county and got one reply that basically said, "yeah, we could do better". I replied with a few ideas about how to do better, but got no reply.

 

It's rather obvious (to me, at least), that a Government entity Should have experienced Geocachers on board, and in charge of their project. But I guess common sense isn't always that common. Those do sound rather bad. I suppose you've done all you can with an offer to help.

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I see all points, so I throw my hat in. I am a sitting board member with the Texas Geocaching Association, so when the Texas Parks and Wildlife Department was having issues, we came forward to educate and work with them on creating a fun yet ecological sensitive criteria for caching. It took a couple of months, but we hammered out some simple paperwork, which is free to file, made the politicians happy, cachers happy, and the parks happy. The form is about five questions and takes two minutes. The parks loved the caching idea so much, they now offer a "passport" competition with free geocoins once completed. Some parks now even have their own pathtags, which comically are selling to more than just cachers.

 

So there is a way, without big brother trying to run it. Feel free to check out the TPWD site on geocaching: Texas Parks Geocache Challenge

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Personally, I am dead-set against that sort of commercial exploitation of geocaching. We have had a taste of it here in Minnesota, starting with the State Parks, who first banned geocaching, and then realized that they could make money with it, so exploited what they had previously banned. My county has recently done the same, to the point of putting out a few of their own hides... some of the lamest geocaches that I have ever seen in seven years of caching. Government.... stay out of our activity. If you feel that you must regulate it, educate yourselves first, and be intelligent about it. Don't come in like a bunch of noobs and start telling us how to do what we have been doing under your noses for years, generally without issue. The only reason you want in is the almighty dollar.

 

First let me start out by saying I've hidden one of those Seaway Trail caches, which are sponsored by a non-profit tourism entity. I myself don't even know what that means, but they are indeed non-profit, and the project manager is an experienced Geocacher. He even had a booth at Geowoodstock.

 

I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves. :lol:

 

Of the three county caches I've found, one was an ammo can at the end of a downed tree, covered by two pieces of bark (all of these caches are quite new, with a half-dozen or fewer finds so far). One was an ammo can at the base of a tree, right next to the trail, hidden by no more than a few foot-high summer ground-cover plants. In a month, it will be completely in the open. The third, also an ammo can (hey, they did something right, anyway) was sitting on the ground in the middle of a small clearing. Not a single bit of cover nearby. There was a FTF log, then there were two muggles logs (found while hunting mushrooms, and found while taking a break at the nearby archery range). I was the forth one to log it.

 

I emailed the county and got one reply that basically said, "yeah, we could do better". I replied with a few ideas about how to do better, but got no reply.

 

It's rather obvious (to me, at least), that a Government entity Should have experienced Geocachers on board, and in charge of their project. But I guess common sense isn't always that common. Those do sound rather bad. I suppose you've done all you can with an offer to help.

 

In fairness to the county entity that I mentioned, I went back into my email replies tonight and found my reply to them, and discovered that I sent it to "noreply" (they didn't have their profile set up to send their email address), so I resent my 3 week old email. Hopefully I will get a reply this time!

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Okay, my two cents.

 

I think that commercial use of geocaching is great. Most of my best geocaching memories were commercial. A 120 mile (2 hour) trip up to pottsville, 100 miles through back country roads with beautiful views to find 12 caches (4.5 hours) taking a trolley to the tricentennial event (For the entire county to go to) to pick up my free geocoin* (1.5 hours) and a 120 mile drive back (2 hours).

 

Or how about the Warminster Bicentennial event, my first event, I won a raffle, found 12 caches, got free food, and had great fun.

 

Then there is the Schuylkill River Trail of 120 caches, hidden by the trail owners (Bike/Hike only).

 

Then the Delaware Commission and there 138 power trail, the 300 cache power trail they are working on, and the 800 cache powertrail in the preliminary stages).

 

Then the amazing caches hidden by the Baltimore Tourist Association I found.

 

The best series of caches I have every did (Everyone has over 40+ favorites) of center city Philadelphia caches hidden by the city to advertise something a couple years ago.

 

Then there was the Dinosaur trains I did in Center City Philadelphia, and Central Park NYC. Both were absolutely astonishing caches. All hidden to advertise the new PBS show.

 

These are just some of my personal examples. I can't see how anyone could say it is a bad thing!

 

 

 

*Free if you don't count all the gas money...

Edited by Coldgears
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The guidelines prohibit commercial caches.

Caches placed in the name of tourism even by nonprofit organizations, are still commercial and should be disallowed.

The final decision would be up to the reviewer.

 

Hi Student Camper, the final decision on commercial caches is NOT up to the reviewer.

 

These tourism / visit the parks series are cleared by Groundspeak.

 

They're becoming more common, I'm seeing 4 in south Fl at the moment. All have been vetted by staff at Groundspeak.

 

They go back quite a long way too, I recall a Treasures of North Florida series from '04, hosted by a north FL tourism council, published with Groundspeak permission.

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I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves.

 

Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

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I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves.

 

Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

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I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves.

 

Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

 

HERE

 

That wasn't so hard to find.

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I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves.

 

Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

 

HERE

 

That wasn't so hard to find.

 

From the cache page for C&D 01:

 

ET trail with 1021 caches 0.1 miles apart over more than 100 miles of Rt 375, the Estestrial Highway in the Nevada high desert. (now archived)Click here for ET Trail Link

 

Estestrial ?? really?? they can't even copy any better than that??

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I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves.

 

Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

 

HERE

 

That wasn't so hard to find.

 

NO!!!! I refuse to click that link. I have seen those Delaware cache pages before, and to be perfectly honest, they disgust me. :lol: I'm speaking of the language blowing off maintenance reponsibilities, and encouraging throw-downs.

 

But back to the Seaway Trail, that is an excellent article posted by TAR showing how successful it's first year was. So much so that when I posted it to Twitter a few days ago, The Seaway Trail themselves re-tweeted me.

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Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

 

HERE

 

That wasn't so hard to find.

 

NO!!!! I refuse to click that link. I have seen those Delaware cache pages before, and to be perfectly honest, they disgust me. :lol: I'm speaking of the language blowing off maintenance reponsibilities, and encouraging throw-downs.

 

 

That sort of irresponsibilty on the paart of the CO should be grounds for Archiving the whole PT. (IMO)

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Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

 

HERE

 

That wasn't so hard to find.

 

NO!!!! I refuse to click that link. I have seen those Delaware cache pages before, and to be perfectly honest, they disgust me. :lol: I'm speaking of the language blowing off maintenance reponsibilities, and encouraging throw-downs.

 

 

That sort of irresponsibilty on the paart of the CO should be grounds for Archiving the whole PT. (IMO)

After next weekend PLZ?

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Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

 

HERE

 

That wasn't so hard to find.

 

NO!!!! I refuse to click that link. I have seen those Delaware cache pages before, and to be perfectly honest, they disgust me. :lol: I'm speaking of the language blowing off maintenance reponsibilities, and encouraging throw-downs.

 

 

That sort of irresponsibilty on the paart of the CO should be grounds for Archiving the whole PT. (IMO)

After next weekend PLZ?

 

Umm, no, they're not going to archive it for that text. Although it does in fact look like it was added after publication, the way it's a "Note" on top of the cache page before the cache description.

 

I do know someone who had the original ET trail archived a couple weeks before his plane/hotel reservations. He and his crew just improvised, and did RT. 66 instead. I predict you'll be fine here, and woowee, how is Delaware doing on their zany threatened 800 cache top to bottom power trail thingy?

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I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves.

 

Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

 

HERE

 

That wasn't so hard to find.

 

From the cache page for C&D 01:

 

ET trail with 1021 caches 0.1 miles apart over more than 100 miles of Rt 375, the Estestrial Highway in the Nevada high desert. (now archived)Click here for ET Trail Link

 

Estestrial ?? really?? they can't even copy any better than that??

 

Actually, that was the case of Estes v. State of Nevada. It was quite the trial, and is still used to this day in case law regarding power trails and snow plows.

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I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves.

 

Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

 

HERE

 

That wasn't so hard to find.

 

NO!!!! I refuse to click that link. I have seen those Delaware cache pages before, and to be perfectly honest, they disgust me. :lol: I'm speaking of the language blowing off maintenance reponsibilities, and encouraging throw-downs.

I wasn't going to click the link, until you made a big deal about it. :laughing: Then I had to. ;)

Link to comment
I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves.

 

Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

 

HERE

 

That wasn't so hard to find.

 

NO!!!! I refuse to click that link. I have seen those Delaware cache pages before, and to be perfectly honest, they disgust me. :lol: I'm speaking of the language blowing off maintenance reponsibilities, and encouraging throw-downs.

I wasn't going to click the link, until you made a big deal about it. :laughing: Then I had to. ;)

Naughty girl!

Link to comment
I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves.

 

Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

 

HERE

 

That wasn't so hard to find.

 

NO!!!! I refuse to click that link. I have seen those Delaware cache pages before, and to be perfectly honest, they disgust me. :lol: I'm speaking of the language blowing off maintenance reponsibilities, and encouraging throw-downs.

I wasn't going to click the link, until you made a big deal about it. :laughing: Then I had to. ;)

 

"The Commission" Thanks you. Delaware needs your tourist dollars. They have a NASCAR track. And a Power trail. And that's pretty much it. :o

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I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves.

 

Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

 

HERE

 

That wasn't so hard to find.

 

NO!!!! I refuse to click that link. I have seen those Delaware cache pages before, and to be perfectly honest, they disgust me. :lol: I'm speaking of the language blowing off maintenance reponsibilities, and encouraging throw-downs.

I wasn't going to click the link, until you made a big deal about it. :laughing: Then I had to. ;)

 

"The Commission" Thanks you. Delaware needs your tourist dollars. They have a NASCAR track. And a Power trail. And that's pretty much it. :o

And a lottery with some real wholesome marketing:

 

fall08_01b.jpg

topbar.gif

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I wasn't going to click the link, until you made a big deal about it. :laughing: Then I had to. ;)

Naughty girl!

 

Yup, that's me! :rolleyes::laughing:

 

I would agree however, with your thoughts about Government entities jumping on the Geocaching bandwagon. The most horrific .50 cal ammo box hides I've ever seen were hidden by a "County". And their maintenance record was less than stellar. As a matter of fact, it was about as horrific as the hides themselves.

 

Delaware has a power trail placed by what I guess is a quasi government agency. They state right on the pages that there should be no DNFs. If you can't find the cache throw down your own so they don't have to bother with maintenance.

Linky?

 

HERE

 

That wasn't so hard to find.

 

NO!!!! I refuse to click that link. I have seen those Delaware cache pages before, and to be perfectly honest, they disgust me. :lol: I'm speaking of the language blowing off maintenance reponsibilities, and encouraging throw-downs.

I wasn't going to click the link, until you made a big deal about it. :laughing: Then I had to. ;)

 

"The Commission" Thanks you. Delaware needs your tourist dollars. They have a NASCAR track. And a Power trail. And that's pretty much it. :o

 

I've only found one cache in Delaware. We were just driving through the state, at night, and found a park and grab along the highway. Didn't do much for tourism, there. :P

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But back to the Seaway Trail...

 

I've done a few on the Seaway...rather good as I recall...

 

The Seaway Trail is fun and interesting. It is not what most would consider a power trail though. This series is far more than a bunch of magnetic key holders and film canisters every .1 miles along a strip of guardrails or utility poles. The caches are several miles apart and some require short hikes, though others almost qualify as park and grabs. We even met a singing cow.

 

We have completed two sections and hope to get back there sometime to do the rest. The only problem we noted was that some of the punches were missing from the ammo can/cache containers for an extended time. We still found those caches even knowing that the punches were missing and that those particular caches would not count on our passports.

 

The C&D Canal Trail in Delaware is a more traditional power trail. One could easily walk or bike it as well as drive it. Part of it is closed to motorized vehicles, so we walked out with our new geohound and then back again. We did the odd numbered caches going out and the even numbered ones returning to the start. Those that could be driven are still far more interesting than the guard rail variety power trails due to the lack of any real traffic and the added bonus of all the boat and ship traffic on the canal. If you have youngsters, take them along and take photos of the various ships and boats. After returning home, try to identify some of the gear and equipment on those ships. You might learn as much as the youngsters unless you did a hitch in the merchant marine.

 

The Seaway Trail and the C&D Canal Trail get both thumbs up from me.

Edited by wigoweb
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