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What was your most memorable First Time Find/Attempt?


SoonerL8R

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I want to pose the question to all of you cachers out there...What was the most memorable experience you ever had with a FTF? Did you have bad coordinates? Was what you found beyond your imagination?....Maybe not all it was cracked up to be?

 

I myself have not had the pleasure of finding one yet but it isn't for lack of trying. Just last week two new caches were listed about half an hour away from me at about 9:30 at night in totally unfamiliar territory so I decided to wait and go look the next morning. My wife and I arrived at the first of the 2 and the coordinates were all over the place and after half an hour I decided to attempt the second one which was 3 miles away down a dead-end dirt road. This road went past one random house and on the way out to GZ I thought nothing of it as I drove past it. I once again looked for half an hour and having no luck decided to head home. As we reached the highway we were met with old pickup turning onto the lane and asking what we were up to. We shrugged it off and said "just driving around" so we wouldn't alert any Muggles. This answer didn't seem to satisfy so I held up my gps and said "we're just geocaching." It was at that moment he raised his hands and we couldn't help but notice the word "SHERIFF" printed across both. He told us "Well at least it keeps you off the street!" My wife and I just nodded and drove off as quickly as we could. Later that night I read the FTF log for the cache past the house and in the notes the person who managed to find it said "the neighbor drove out to make sure they weren't littering."

 

I invite all of you to tell about your past experiences!

Edited by SoonerL8R
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My most memorable FTF was my first FTF. It was a puzzle cache, with an on-site puzzle to find/retrieve the container. Others had solved the more obvious puzzle to get the final coordinates, but I was the first to figure out the on-site puzzle and find the cache at the final coordinates.

 

Unfortunately, the on-site puzzle was rather fragile, and the CO ended up archiving the cache, and then re-listing it without the on-site puzzle.

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I rode my bike right past a black bear on the trail to an FTF. It was going north, so I kept going south.

 

I met up with the CO of a new multi in southern Mexico for beers and tall tales, and then, reassured that he'd fixed up the multi by removing a couple of stages that had already gone missing, I FTF'd it the next day.

 

I spent two full days working on a complicated multi in my own city, and came within an arms-length of finding the final when I stepped in some human poo that was covered with leaves. Gross. Did more research, realized I'd just missed the find by inches, then came back the next day to tiptoe around the you-know-what and grab the FTF.

 

Hiked with some friends including the CO to a potential year-old FTF deep in the BC wilderness. Took two days to get there, to the most beautiful backcountry spot I've ever seen. But the FTF wasn't ours; somebody'd found the cache by accident a month after publishing and never logged it online. The only other party in the valley heard our screams from several kilometers away.

 

I failed to FTF a cache in a remote and not-so-pleasant corner of the Dominican Republic. I was hot and cranky and just didn't have the energy to make a wide-area search; the coords ended up being WAY off. Somebody has since found the cache, and marooned a TB there that belongs to a buddy of mine. What are the odds? He keeps asking me to go back and rescue it.

 

But my favorite FTF adventure had to be bushwhacking into the "mosquito coast" of Nicaragua with a couple of helpful Sandinistas, looking for a box that somebody hid over five years ago, and nobody had ever gone looking for. We didn't find it. But I did learn that there aren't necessarily mosquitoes on the "mosquito" (Miskito) coast. I never even bothered with repellent.

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Got mine today. Did 64 caches today, and the last one was a FTF...and my #1000. I was sitting in line for a car wash (I had gotten the Suby a bit muddy and salty after chasing down a bunch of caches in a state forest in MN), and my phone beeped that I had an email. New cache listing, and I happened to be very close. Serendipity.

 

Made the short drive, the .25 mile hike on the Superior Hiking Trail, and made the find. I was exhausted from the day, and decided that I was done. Got home to check my account and finish some logs, and discovered that it was my #1000.

 

Pretty sweet. ...I've been looking for GPS stashes since 2001, but only been caching on geocaching.com since 2005... Took me long enough! :laughing:

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Years ago we had one cacher that seemed to grab most of the FTF's late at night. Well, when a new cache popped up less than two miles from home at about 10pm, I got re-dressed (we were almost in bed) and hurried out. I spent over an hour wandering around some woods with mountain bike trails going every which way trying to find this cache. The hint mentioned a stump and one was right at GZ, but no cache. I was ranging out in all directions trying to find another stump. I took one last trip (I'd decided if this one didn't produce I was going home) and spotted a piece of trail I hadn't seen and followed it back toward GZ. I passed a stump and took a look - yep, there was the ammo can! And a blank log. I signed the log, took a reading with the GPSr (it was a little over 150' from GZ) and packed up to head home. On the trail out, I saw a flashlight coming towards me. "Martmann?" I called. "Yeah" came the reply. "Beat ya!" We wandered back and his GZ matched mine, and knowing (from me) that the cache was 150' off, he took a lot less time to find it.

 

One of the funniest, was when one popped up very near to a stage of one of my multi's (back before you had to list all of them). I waited a couple of hours and the headed that way. My cache (a film can) was tucked in a small hollow under the end of some concrete bleachers at a small park. GZ was right close, so I reached in and found the new cache in front of my cache. They'd not seen/felt the film can when they placed it. It turns out it was the daughters (ages 7 and 9) of a guy I'd introduced to caching. They archived it with this line in log: "...since he taught us about geocaching, we think that the right thing to do is relinquish the spot to him. Besides, he is much bigger than we are."

 

Recently, my best FTF (I'm not in the game anymore) was on a cache that popped in the morning. I looked at it early afternoon and saw 5 or 6 DNF's from the local FTFer's. It wasn't far away, so I headed out. I found a cacher literally beating the bushes looking for it. He said they'd scoured GZ and he was just widening the search area. I tried a few likely spots, but could see most had been searched. Finally I decided to start at GZ and work my way out. Within a few seconds I called "You want to find it yourself, or should I just pull it out?" It was within a couple of feet of GZ.

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I had to look at my bookmark list to remind me of my FTFs. None really stood out as far as a story goes. I will go with a multi.

 

I found this one multi, it was done by a friend of mine. I was not even trying to get FTF. I think I was 3rd or 4th to arrive on the scene and I already knew FTF was gone. Its by a church but with permission (at least I imagine). I found the cache pretty quickly, it was hanging in a tree. The logsheet was unsigned. I was like, huh, the first finders are all experienced geocachers and am friendly with all of them. Turns out one of them found something which resembled a geocache hanging in a sign and assumed it was the cache, so he added a log sheet. The next finder then signed that logsheet. I found the actual cache. Thus, I was awarded FTF. It was amicable to all parties.

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My FTF popped up on my phone just after the kids headed to school. I headed out; it was stated in description that it was an ammo can; but it was marked other as well??? After checking all strategic larger hiding places; I thought of a baby ammo can the kids had found in Montana. Sure enough it was a baby ammo can. So neat. Our regular FTF Nabber had to go back three times to find it. That made me as a beginner feel pretty good.

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Here's a few memorable ones.

 

Our first FTF was our 212th cache find. We were living near Frankfurt, Germany, which has a lot of geocaches and a lot of geocachers, many of whom love to go for FTFs. I'd been trying to get a FTF for a while and kept coming in second, third, or later. One I missed by just a couple minutes, as I saw the first finder leaving. So I was very excited when one popped up late on a weeknight in the hills overlooking the Rhein. I set out the next morning in the rain. Either the clouds or the terrain (or a combination) played havoc with my signal; it took me a half hour to find it.

 

We had a few FTFs in countries outside of Germany, which was always fun, but by far the most interesting was this one in a lava cave just outside Reykjavik, Iceland.

 

We went up to Winterhaven, Virginia, for a relaxing weekend just after "Snowpocalypse" in early 2010. There were a bunch of caches that were a couple months old that had been hidden by the same CO, but allof them had already been found. Except a TB hotel, which he'd forgotten to publish until just before our weekend. The snow was almost hip deep, making the find a bit of a challenge, but we got it.

 

Our most recent FTF was on the top of Mount Suribachi on Iwo Jima. I managed to hitch a ride down on a little 2-prop Air Force plane with a group of Air Force officers. After I logged the cache, I went back out to the clearing on top of the mountain and watched a Marine unit scatter the ashes of a retired Marine colonel who had taken part in the invasion.

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I went for a FTF in January of last year. When it popped up it was late afternoon so I took off work to go grab it. MAde my way to groundzero excited about the prospect of being First. When I got neat the area I noticed best parking was in a cul de sac behind some industrial buildings. Well I went to park and there was a huge truck out there. I thought "dang someone is going to beat me to it if they havent already" I jumped out of the car grabbed my walking stick and took off for the 300 feet to GZ. I was making more noise than I probably have ever made. I was hoping to meet with the other cacher and maybe if we find it together get a joint FTF. When I got within about 50 feet I still have not seen the other cacher. Than I hear someone yelling. "Hey What are you doing" I started looking all over. Finally this guy steps out of nothing wearing complete camo. I think he is holding a rifle. So I became very glad for HUNTERS not shooting first. Of course I tried explaining to him what I was doing at the same time he was yelling at me about what was I doing there. He really did not want to listen to reason. So I decided arguing with a man with a loaded gun might not be best option. I went back to my truck as well as he and headed home. Decided than and there that I will go for FTF's but they will not be a priority. Oh and after telling owner what happened he kindly archived the cache.

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Our most memorable would have to be our first one, CTF I - Magic Orbs. We were fairly new to the game (just over two months) and after 6 days of trying to figure the puzzle out I WANTED that one. Wanted it bad enough to go climbing around on some of the loosest crumbled rock I've ever seen, in the middle of winter and in the middle of the night, then turn around and make the 40 to 50 mile round trip drive again the very next morning so I could look in the daylight.

 

Edited due to use of incorrect brackets....

Edited by NicknPapa
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I think my best FTF was the one where the CO posted the north coords for the parking area. One of the DNFs pointed this out. So, I searched due south, for a small container hidden in the rocks. It took me four tries over a month, but I did find it! 748 feet south of the posted coords. It astonished everyone that I was able to find it!

That was my best FTF!

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I don't keep track of my FTFs but my most memorable would have to be my second. It was a puzzle cache that came out one summer evening that began with some hidden Morse code and went through several levels before revealing the final coordinates. It wasn't that difficult but I didn't finish it until about lunch time at work the following day. I zipped home after work, put my sea kayak on my car, left a note for my wife, then drove the 30 miles or so to a spot on the lakeshore where I could see the small island about a 1/2 mile from shore where the cache was located. It was a gorgeous summer evening with a couple of hours of daylight remaining and no wind so I launched my boat and paddled out to the island. It took me 10 minutes or so to find the cache and I was pleased to find an empty logbook and a nice $1 silver coin for a FTF prize. On the way back to shore I spent another half an hour or so paddling along the shore along the area of the lake I had not paddled previously. I headed home after that, logged the find then watched the cache for over a month before the next find was made.

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My most memorable was my first...

The cache was hidden in the roots of a tree on a slope next to a bend in a country lane.

I had just found it when I hear a car coming so ducked down, the car lost control and hit the tree I was hiding behind!

Not badly, just a dent and the driver drove off straight away. I am not sure what they thought as I am sure we made eye contact in the mirror of the car as they drove off.

Oh yes, I forgot to say, it was in the morning and I had stopped off to get it in full suit & tie... :anibad:

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