Frustrated

[USAFgunner]

<RANT> I haven't been caching very long (since the end of July) I have 43 finds and 4 published caches so far. However, I placed two caches one was placed in a great spot but had to be moved because of a virtual cache with no physical cache. Someone just pulled a coordinate out of their rear and posted it. I bit my tongue and moved my cache to a less desirable place. My other cache I spent about $100 bucks on swag for it and hid it in a wooded area with extremely low foot or vehicle traffic. I searched out the area to make sure no caches were to close and submitted the cache. I get an email a few day later saying unfortunately some multi cache has a physical cache within 250 feet of my cache so I have to move mine. Nothing on the map for more than a mile and the location of the start of the multi is 15 miles away. The moderator who publishes all of the caches in the area suggested that I should have done the multi cache to ensure that no caches were within my area. I think this answer is unacceptable. I as a cache placer should have some way to know that my cache is in a valid location without doing every multi and mystery cache in a 50 mile radius. I was about to buy two memberships here but now am re thinking this. This experience has me so frustrated I dont even want to cache anymore. To make matters worse Blue Rajah wont answer any of my emails asking for some clarification on things <RANT/> I think this is why the caches around here get spammed with another geocaching website. Any one else have any similar problems?

[+niraD]

The following Help Center article may help:

Checking for Cache Saturation

 

IME, the reviewers are happy to verify a location (it's easy with the tools they have available) before someone invests a lot of time/money building a cache specific to that location.

[+geocat_]

I am sorry to hear about your frustrations. I applaud your ambition for hiding caches so early in your "career" It is a bit challenging with the multis and mystery caches. You really can only be sure of the location of these by doing them yourself. However, I have had the experience of my local reviewer helping quite a bit more than you have indicated. My advice...get to know some other cachers in your area. You can do so at events which are always fun. After getting to cache and talk with some "seasoned" veterans, you might get some more ideas for hiding caches. It sounds like you just had some bad luck right off the bat. I mean, a multi stage over 15 miles from stage 1 is a bit unusual, at least around here, but it does happen. If you get to know some other cachers, they might be able to give you some help with future placements as many have likely found many of these multis and mystery caches. I'm not saying they give you the coords for them (although this has been known to happen) but maybe could help by sort of "reviewing" your location to give you a heads up. Good luck and stick with it. It will get MUCH better!

[+steben6]

Please don't get frustrated! We love having new cachers join the hobby Your best tool for finding out whether a virtual, puzzle, or multi cache might be where you want to place your cache is to contact your local reviewer. The reviewers generally do an amazing job and are more than willing to help!

 

You might try to find out how close your coords are to the multi and then move it farther away. You would probably only have to move it a few hundred feet down the trail to get it far enough from the multi.

 

Thanks for adding some caches to the game!

 

Edited 'cause I can't spell.

Edited September 19, 2012 by steben6

[+The A-Team]

However, I placed two caches one was placed in a great spot but had to be moved because of a virtual cache with no physical cache. Someone just pulled a coordinate out of their rear and posted it. I bit my tongue and moved my cache to a less desirable place.

I'm confused about this one. If there wasn't anything physically hidden at those coordinates (ie. a virtual element), the proximity guideline doesn't come into play. For example, if there's a puzzle with bogus coordinates, you can happily plunk a cache down as close as you want to that spot (assuming there isn't another cache within range).

[+niraD]

However, I placed two caches one was placed in a great spot but had to be moved because of a virtual cache with no physical cache. Someone just pulled a coordinate out of their rear and posted it. I bit my tongue and moved my cache to a less desirable place.

I'm confused about this one. If there wasn't anything physically hidden at those coordinates (ie. a virtual element), the proximity guideline doesn't come into play. For example, if there's a puzzle with bogus coordinates, you can happily plunk a cache down as close as you want to that spot (assuming there isn't another cache within range).

Yeah, it seems odd. I assumed that someone had listed a virtual waypoint as a "stage of a multi-cache" rather than as a "question to answer". But whatever is going on in this specific instance, the larger issue of checking for cache saturation remains.

[+rhodesisland]

I also was under the impression a virtual or Earthcahe location wouldn't prohibit a physical cache in the same location. I think you'll need to double check w/ your reviewer again.

Sorry you've had problems, this is not the norm and hopefully things will get better!

[+terrkan78]

Sorry about the problems you've had trying to get caches published! Most multis don't start that far away, so it was a somewhat rare thing that you ran into with that one. Puzzle/mystery cache finals have to be within 2 miles of the "?" on the map (there's no distance limit on multis).

 

The first thing I do when I'm thinking about placing a new cache is look for any puzzle/mystery caches on the map within two miles. If my preferred hiding location is in town, there will undoubtedly be a few that I haven't solved yet.

 

Next I scout the area out, find a good hiding spot, take coordinate readings, then type up a bare-bones cache page, putting a note in the "reviewer notes" area saying that it's not ready to go yet and I'm just checking the coordinates (but do click the box that says the cache is in place and ready to go, even though it's not). The reviewer will respond and let me know if it's good to go or not.

 

If not, I find a new spot, edit all the stuff on that cache page and submit it again. Your reviewer will either want you to do it this way (by submitting a dummy cache page) or the reviewer will want you to e-mail him/her the coordinates (different reviewers handle it differently).

 

Once you get thumbs up from the reviewer, you are sort of "holding" that spot for a limited amount of time, and you don't have to worry about anyone snagging it while you get your cache ready, place it, fine tune the coordinate readings (although if you fine tune it by too many feet, you could potentially run into a cache conflict again), type up the cache page, etc.

 

I hope you try again! And I sure hope your future cache placements aren't so difficult!

[Pup Patrol]

However, I placed two caches one was placed in a great spot but had to be moved because of a virtual cache with no physical cache. Someone just pulled a coordinate out of their rear and posted it.

 

As mentioned already, this part doesn't make sense.

 

According to the Guidelines:

 

http://support.Groundspeak.com/index.php?pg=kb.page&id=304

 

7. Physical elements of different geocaches should be at least 0.10 miles (528 ft or 161 m) apart. A physical stage is defined as any waypoint that contains a physical element placed by the cache owner, such as a container or a tag with the next set of coordinates. Non-physical caches or stages, including reference points, trail-head/parking coordinates and/or a question to answer waypoints, are exempt from this guideline. Additionally, within a single multi-cache or mystery/puzzle cache, there is no minimum required distance between physical elements. The graphic below shows a few examples of what is and is not acceptable in terms of cache saturation. EarthCaches are exempt from this guideline as they do not have physical waypoints.

 

I'm curious about what you mean by "Someone just pulled a coordinate out of their rear and posted it." I don't understand that statement at all.

 

 

B.