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Streakers


===sgb

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Really really ?

 

For over 4 years people have found a cache absolutely every single day without a single gap.

 

All of those things that life throws at you, work, illness, appointments, family events etc. etc. and yet somehow they found the time to travel what must be increasingly large distances to find at least one cache every day.

 

Not even one day missed ?

 

Now I'm not saying you can't find thousands of caches per year if you set out to do it but every single day for four years?

 

How tempting it must be to find several on a one day and then log one a day for the next few days while you put your feet up or get on with other things in your life.

 

I'm not saying it can't be done, I'm not saying is hasn't been done, but for those with streaks above a couple of months it is an astonishing achievement to be able to squeeze a new cache in absolutely every day.

 

I wonder how far the nearest unfound caches are, how many miles need to be driven each day, how long it takes.

 

My mind boggles with the dedication needed.

 

I do well to manage a 7 day streak so to anyone who has done 1000 or even 1500 I take my hat off to you.

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I'm with Paul and Ros.

How easy is it to add the date you want to a logsheet. Find 7 caches and log them with different dates sorted.

No one will ever bother to check it out.

And I doubt for one moment that those big finders, say 500 and above, have actually found and signed every log.

It's human nature to "persuade" oneself to just add that extra find that wasn't actually found.

I stopped logging and signing caches soon after I started this great hobby, as I wanted to enjoy the walks and hunts, without spending extra time in front of a pc.

Good luck with your 2000th consecutive find though. :lol:

Edited by JoLuc
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Really really ?

 

For over 4 years people have found a cache absolutely every single day without a single gap.

 

All of those things that life throws at you, work, illness, appointments, family events etc. etc. and yet somehow they found the time to travel what must be increasingly large distances to find at least one cache every day.

 

Not even one day missed ?

 

Now I'm not saying you can't find thousands of caches per year if you set out to do it but every single day for four years?

 

How tempting it must be to find several on a one day and then log one a day for the next few days while you put your feet up or get on with other things in your life.

 

I'm not saying it can't be done, I'm not saying is hasn't been done, but for those with streaks above a couple of months it is an astonishing achievement to be able to squeeze a new cache in absolutely every day.

 

I wonder how far the nearest unfound caches are, how many miles need to be driven each day, how long it takes.

 

My mind boggles with the dedication needed.

 

I do well to manage a 7 day streak so to anyone who has done 1000 or even 1500 I take my hat off to you.

I guess the givaway would be a series many miles from their home which had logs on consecutive days rather than the same?

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And I doubt for one moment that those big finders, say 500 and above, have actually found and signed every log.

It's human nature to "persuade" oneself to just add that extra find that wasn't actually found.

 

It must be depressing going through life with that kind of attitude about people.

 

Cachers create all kinds of challenges for themselves but don't do it to impress others or to brag about them. I think it is rare to have cachers play with the logging dates.

 

We had a streak of 472 days with all kinds of great highlights and it ended when we went on a cruise. The stories we tell caching friends have to do with the various adventures and problems but it is not bragging. We aimed to get a cache on every day of the calendar and did it. We then aimed for 5 on every day of the calendar and did that. Now we want to get 10 but it will be at least 2 years to accomplish because of more cruises. We plan on eventually getting caches in each of the Canadian provinces and American states. It is a challenge we give ourselves.

 

Our stats are for our pleasure.

 

PAul

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I do well to manage a 7 day streak so to anyone who has done 1000 or even 1500 I take my hat off to you.

Same here. For myself 6 days is my longest on this site, and two of those finds I deliberately went out about 11pm so that I could find one each side of midnight. After doing that I thought 'this is just daft' and gave up the streak. I'm quite good at doing streaks of non-caching days, I've managed a 27 day streak of that variety :laughing:

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kablooey is currently at 3669 days... and still streaking.

 

Edit to add: I know this chap isn't a UK cacher, but just putting it out there to encourage (discourage?) you all :). Personally I only managed 115 days before ennui/common sense [delete as appropriate] set in.

Edited by simplysup
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I'm with Paul and Ros.

How easy is it to add the date you want to a logsheet. Find 7 caches and log them with different dates sorted.

No one will ever bother to check it out.

And I doubt for one moment that those big finders, say 500 and above, have actually found and signed every log.

It's human nature to "persuade" oneself to just add that extra find that wasn't actually found.

As Paul & Ros, and JoLuc, appear to be casting aspersions on Mario McTavish's integrity, I think I should point out that there are few cachers less likely to cheat themselves either deliberately or by self delusion.

 

Rgds, Andy

Edited by Amberel
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Really really ?

 

For over 4 years people have found a cache absolutely every single day without a single gap.

 

All of those things that life throws at you, work, illness, appointments, family events etc. etc. and yet somehow they found the time to travel what must be increasingly large distances to find at least one cache every day.

 

Not even one day missed ?

 

Now I'm not saying you can't find thousands of caches per year if you set out to do it but every single day for four years?

 

How tempting it must be to find several on a one day and then log one a day for the next few days while you put your feet up or get on with other things in your life.

 

I'm not saying it can't be done, I'm not saying is hasn't been done, but for those with streaks above a couple of months it is an astonishing achievement to be able to squeeze a new cache in absolutely every day.

 

I wonder how far the nearest unfound caches are, how many miles need to be driven each day, how long it takes.

 

My mind boggles with the dedication needed.

 

I do well to manage a 7 day streak so to anyone who has done 1000 or even 1500 I take my hat off to you.

 

My longest ever streak was 10 days and that was an accident. I don't care how many consecutive days I've found a cache and having gone out on a few truly dismal days to fill my calendar when I finally completed the task I was left with a feeling that I hadn't actually achieved anything worthwhile. I'd hoped for a feeling of completion but instead got a feeling that I needn't really have bothered.

 

It's easy to speculate on how some people do stuff. If you've got a full time job (and maybe even evening job to make ends meet) and a partner, and maybe small children, and all that sort of thing, then it's easy to see how hard it must be to get out every day. But not everybody has a full time job, not everybody even needs to work at all, not everybody has a partner or children (and some have families who enjoy caching as much as they do), some people regard family get-togethers as an opportunity to find a cache in a new area (you only need one to continue a streak) and so on.

 

A while back I took part in a cycling event and rode for a considerable distance with a guy who does long distance cycling all over the world. I couldn't figure out how he does so much cycling, not least because of getting the time off work. It turned out a relative had died and left him a lot of money, enough money that he didn't need to work any more. His tastes were simple, a place to live, a bike that was reliable and comfortable to ride, and the freedom to go where he wanted to ride it. So where the likes of you or I might wonder how people manage it, if someone is freed from the burden of going to work every day it opens a lot of doors to them.

 

I'm sure some people do cheat, and as the number of consecutive days rises the inclination to cheat to fill in that one missing day where you went out in the pouring rain only to DNF the one cache in the area, but I wouldn't assume that just because someone has done something I consider to be a lot of work for no benefit at all they are probably cheating. My mind boggles with how far they must travel each day for a cache and it also boggles why they'd even bother. But then some people wonder why we as geocachers bother with the game at all, and whatever hobby you might like to think of will have people wondering why anyone would waste their time doing such a thing. I guess that's what distinguishes a hobby from a business.

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I'm going to go ahead and assume most streaks are real. Odd as it may be to some people, maybe some people suit it. If they have cheated though, there's no prize, so they've only cheated themselves, so who cares?

 

As for over 500 or above, those are not big finders, there's plenty local to me in the thousands, in the whole UK there must be a lot. 500 is just 10 a day for 50 sundays of the year, which if you find trails etc with some, wouldn't be hard at all, there's a big trail or 2 (not power trails as such, just long walks with them) in Cornwall. That's assuming they never found some on a day off or an evening or such.

 

I couldn't do it, but considering people manage to get to jobs they hate 5-6 days a week for 8+ hours, somebody managing a hobby they actually enjoy every day doesn't seem so nuts.

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And I doubt for one moment that those big finders, say 500 and above, have actually found and signed every log.

It's human nature to "persuade" oneself to just add that extra find that wasn't actually found.

 

It must be depressing going through life with that kind of attitude about people.

 

PAul

 

Too true PAul.

I like you started life with no preconceptions.

But over the years I have seen Lords and Ladies, Politicians, sportsmen and women lie through their teeth.

 

My attitude has been fathomed by those we trust. :(

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Really really ?

 

For over 4 years people have found a cache absolutely every single day without a single gap.

 

All of those things that life throws at you, work, illness, appointments, family events etc. etc. and yet somehow they found the time to travel what must be increasingly large distances to find at least one cache every day.

 

Not even one day missed ?

 

Now I'm not saying you can't find thousands of caches per year if you set out to do it but every single day for four years?

....

 

In my case I work 30 miles from home and can take a different route each way each day. I generally do "easy" caches and always prepare 2 or 3 to allow for problems on arrival at GZ. It probably uses up around 30 minutes a day.

 

CCD 1026 at present.

Edited by ===sgb
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I'm going to go ahead and assume most streaks are real. Odd as it may be to some people, maybe some people suit it. If they have cheated though, there's no prize, so they've only cheated themselves, so who cares?

 

I figure it makes no difference to me whether someone else's find count or longest streak or whatever is genuine or not so I really don't care.

 

As for over 500 or above, those are not big finders, there's plenty local to me in the thousands, in the whole UK there must be a lot. 500 is just 10 a day for 50 sundays of the year, which if you find trails etc with some, wouldn't be hard at all, there's a big trail or 2 (not power trails as such, just long walks with them) in Cornwall. That's assuming they never found some on a day off or an evening or such.

 

It's easy to find 10 a day, one day a week. That's a very different thing to long streaks though. There are lots of places where you can go and find a circuit of 5-10 caches in a day. It's just a different proposition to go back to the same place on 5-10 different days to find a single cache. Circuits in particular are designed to be done in a single hit, rather than driving to the parking area and finding the first cache, and the next day driving to the parking area to walk past the first cache and get the second cache, and the next day driving to the parking area and walking past the first two to get to the third, and repeating on any number of different days.

 

I couldn't do it, but considering people manage to get to jobs they hate 5-6 days a week for 8+ hours, somebody managing a hobby they actually enjoy every day doesn't seem so nuts.

 

The comparison doesn't really work because people go to the jobs because they need the money to live. Fitting a hobby, however enjoyable, around a job is more difficult, especially if you're proposing travelling further and further afield every day once the local caches run out.

 

That said while it's not something I'd have any interest in doing it obviously appeals to others, so I just figure "vive la difference" and leave them to it :)

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It's just a different proposition to go back to the same place on 5-10 different days to find a single cache. Circuits in particular are designed to be done in a single hit, rather than driving to the parking area and finding the first cache, and the next day driving to the parking area to walk past the first cache and get the second cache, and the next day driving to the parking area and walking past the first two to get to the third, and repeating on any number of different days.

 

Depends, that is exactly how I did caches near home. It is usually quite a nice walk so no problem and I maybe did 1 a week on the same track. Main difference is to start at the furthest away and work back. I was also assisted by a kind soul setting a series of 50 not too faraway at just the right time. That's it my secret is out.

 

Even with that help I could only do a streak because I work away from home in 2 different places. Therfores I had three main caching areas which helps enormously. Just around home would be impossible. Now how to stop.......

 

Much harder and further to drive was the LQ series with 1 specific cache in each county.

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It's just a different proposition to go back to the same place on 5-10 different days to find a single cache. Circuits in particular are designed to be done in a single hit, rather than driving to the parking area and finding the first cache, and the next day driving to the parking area to walk past the first cache and get the second cache, and the next day driving to the parking area and walking past the first two to get to the third, and repeating on any number of different days.

 

Depends, that is exactly how I did caches near home. It is usually quite a nice walk so no problem and I maybe did 1 a week on the same track. Main difference is to start at the furthest away and work back. I was also assisted by a kind soul setting a series of 50 not too faraway at just the right time. That's it my secret is out.

 

Even with that help I could only do a streak because I work away from home in 2 different places. Therfores I had three main caching areas which helps enormously. Just around home would be impossible. Now how to stop.......

 

Much harder and further to drive was the LQ series with 1 specific cache in each county.

 

Sure, if that's how you want to play the game that's your call. I just find it hard to comprehend driving back to the same spot 50 times to find 50 different caches on 50 different days, unless the area is really nice enough that you'd want to visit it every week for a year.

 

There are cycling routes and trails I really enjoy riding so it's entirely possible I'd ride the same route multiple times, so if there were multiple caches along the route I'd pick off all, some or none of them on any given trip based on whether I fancied geocaching or if I had any specific goals in mind (e.g. when I set out to fill my calendar I didn't cache at all on the days that were full, to save the caches for the days I needed them). But personally I wouldn't go as far as planning to keep revisiting an area over and over and over again just for the sake of an inordinately long streak.

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It's just a different proposition to go back to the same place on 5-10 different days to find a single cache. Circuits in particular are designed to be done in a single hit, rather than driving to the parking area and finding the first cache, and the next day driving to the parking area to walk past the first cache and get the second cache, and the next day driving to the parking area and walking past the first two to get to the third, and repeating on any number of different days.

 

Depends, that is exactly how I did caches near home. It is usually quite a nice walk so no problem and I maybe did 1 a week on the same track. Main difference is to start at the furthest away and work back. I was also assisted by a kind soul setting a series of 50 not too faraway at just the right time. That's it my secret is out.

 

Even with that help I could only do a streak because I work away from home in 2 different places. Therfores I had three main caching areas which helps enormously. Just around home would be impossible. Now how to stop.......

 

Much harder and further to drive was the LQ series with 1 specific cache in each county.

 

Sure, if that's how you want to play the game that's your call. I just find it hard to comprehend driving back to the same spot 50 times to find 50 different caches on 50 different days, unless the area is really nice enough that you'd want to visit it every week for a year.

 

 

Not quite a circle has many starting points and sometimes I did 5 or 6 at a time, in fact I still have a group of 5 to do. It just helped me fill in the hard days. There happened to be some groups of 5 or 6 caches that you could easily find 1 at a time. The walk up was always varied depending on the weather and not too far. No different to walking along the same path from your house every day apart from a couple of miles drive to the start point.

Edited by lodgebarn
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I know how hard it is to maintain a streak but there are enough caches out there to maintain the streak provided you travel around quite a bit. As I live in Cheshire and work around the country, it is easier for me to maintain a streak than if I was at home 24/7. I spoke to RickardClan (666 consecutive and stopped) and SirPhilPamAndRob (900 odd and still going) and both were driving extra miles to grab the caches.

 

I've only once or twice walked past a cache and not logged it. Most of the time I log them as I find them. I do have about 10 bankers around the country in case of emergencies.

 

I'd hate to do a 30 cache series one at a time. I've seen people do it on my Avro series. Written the wrong date on a log? Me - rarely - only because I'm an idiot and didn't know what the date was. The electronic log did have the right date though and normally a comment from me along the lines of "I thought it was the 10th, not the 11th Doh". Have I found a cache a day for 573 days. Yup. Occasional days were hard mostly when I had food poisoning or after a big caching day. When will I stop? No idea but I want to get to 600 so I can sign the HarveyJJ Black Belt 7th? Dan Challenge cache in the Wirral.

 

Cheers

 

Richt2000

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Here are some cold, hard facts (rather than dubious 'thoughts and feelings' to consider:

 

i) My longest streak was done by accident. It was 13 days in June and July 2009, while caching in Scotland, Orkney, Shetland, Scotland again, England (Scafell Pike) and Wales (Snowdon).

ii) I'm currently doing the 31 Days in August challenge. So far, so good.

iii) Within 10 miles of home (cycling range) I have 452 unfound caches; enough to keep me busy until November 2014, approx. By then, more would have been hidden than archived, extending me into 2015.

iv) I'm not crazy enough to attempt a long streak, but I know people who are. Cachers are perhaps a little more 'focused' than regular people (discuss if this is code for OCD, mental or merely enthusiastic).

v) I've known cachers to cheat, but I've known more who've refused to sign a log or log a cache online which they didn't feel they'd personally 'worked hard enough to find' even when the logbook/strip was under their nose. Integrity is alive an well.

vi) Just because I couldn't (wouldn't) do something, it's wrong to imagine others haven't (couldn't. Will not) do it. My limitations are not theirs.

vii) Bullet-points and cold logic will always be lost on some people. Do not engage with them. Your time on Earth is limited; why waste it? :)

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oooh, namecheck, thanks richt2000 B)

 

For me I work 40 miles from home, most of that is driven on Cornwall arterial (the A30) with heaps of junctions between home and work - I'd cleaned out a good section of both areas prior to starting (a big mistake!) so it was a little more tricky than if I'd have started from day one.

 

Yeah, drove extra miles, but due to the commute it was rarely significant, I started with the intention of a year, then 500, then it seemed like it was becoming a chore, so I set myself a final figure and stuck to it (in spite of the very kind placement of a "667 ur no" cache 0.25 miles from my front door on the day after I stopped!) that was also how I quit smoking too now I think about it.

 

But, I set myself extra rules, no virtuals, no wrap-around's (grab one at 11:59pm and then the next day's cache at 12:01am in the same session), had to be actual plastic so I wouldn't count an event as a day's find, and I had to find them all myself, even with a group (as we do from time to time) I had to at least get in on one first just to keep me happy. And the only motiviation was mine and mine alone, I wanted to do it, just like I wanted to find 100+ in a day.

 

I can quite honestly tell you that ALL caches were found on the logged days, but some of the dates written _in_ the logs were probably wrong, because I'm crap at remembering the date like that - however my Garmin seems to cope with it fine - I'm sure I'm not the only one.....but cheating on something like that is only cheating yourself I'd say.

 

The close shaves, soaking wet, covered in mud, in the dark, minutes from divorce! And the times when I was dog sick and didn't want to leave the house, were the ones that made me pause and consider stopping (in particular nearing 300 and 500 days) but in the end I think it's an achievement, an unrepeatable achievement mind you!

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...I just find it hard to comprehend driving back to the same spot 50 times to find 50 different caches on 50 different days, unless the area is really nice enough that you'd want to visit it every week for a year...

Isn't that what people who own a dog do... every day... often back to the exact same spot & route?

 

(only guessing, I don't have a dog, but I get the impression that they go back to the same walking spots time after time)

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...I just find it hard to comprehend driving back to the same spot 50 times to find 50 different caches on 50 different days, unless the area is really nice enough that you'd want to visit it every week for a year...

Isn't that what people who own a dog do... every day... often back to the exact same spot & route?

 

(only guessing, I don't have a dog, but I get the impression that they go back to the same walking spots time after time)

 

That would presumably fall under the "unless the area is really nice enough" clause. There are routes I regularly cycle because as cycling routes they work out very well. If an area wasn't nice to cycle then I'd only ride if if I needed to be there for something or needed to pass through on my way somewhere else. If I wanted to go caching I'd clean everything out in one visit rather than planning another 17 visits on 17 different days.

 

There's also a big difference between going to the same local area for specific functionality and going to the same more remote area lots of times for no reason other than to find dozens of film pots. I'm sure people do it but I don't see the point of it. To me it would be like owning a dog and ignoring the nice walking areas a mile from home so you could drive 20 miles to walk around an industrial park.

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I take my hat off to those who want to undertake lengthy streaks. I found it hard enough filling in the days of my calendar (once I'd decided to give it a go, with about 260 already covered; it took me another 18 or so months due to illness preventing me doing it sooner). For me, there is a sense of achievement in having done so, and yet I'm neither unique in this regard, nor as assiduous as those who have gone for the cache-every-day-in-a-year like one of my caching friends who did all 366 last year, plus a few either end (in 2011 and 2013). But his lifestyle is such that he travels a lot for his job and his extracurricular work, so he doesn't necessarily trample the same patch all the time.

 

That said, if someone lived near a series such as the Chiltern 100 and could exercise the restraint not to get every one in a couple of days' worth of caching, they could use those to pick off 109 as part of their streak.

 

Personally, I'm having trouble enough going out every day in August for the 31 days. As I put in a log a couple of days ago, that's completely up to me whether I'm daft enough to keep going and at 23 days, I have to really, but I'd really rather find a cache because I want to rather than feeling obliged to. It's been an interesting exercise, but I feel a bit sad for willing August to be over, because that's willing summer to be over and the nights are already fair drawing in enough as it is...

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I have just done my 300th / 366 and only started 349 days ago! Only missed 22 days in 2013, vast majority of those before mid-Feb. I wonder what the quickest for a new cacher to 366 is? I'll hope to get to at least 350 within 2 years. Will obviously have to wait until 29/2/16 for 366. Longest strech BTW is only 74, but currently on 54 I think. Weekdays getting tough as home town, work town and the various routes between I'm really running out.

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Personally, streaking (of either kind) is not for me. I love caching and most days I will do it if I can. But some days I can't, and some days I just don't feel like it. I don't want finding a cache to feel like something I have to do.

 

Recently I was on a plane where I missed a whole day. E.g. left at 2300 on Monday, landed 0700 on Wednesday. No way I could find a cache on that Tuesday.

 

But if people like and can do streaks, that is great.

 

I am working on my 366 day calendar. I resisted that for a long time until a local cacher started hiding challenge caches... and I also realised I'm not that far from completing it.

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Personally, streaking (of either kind) is not for me. I love caching and most days I will do it if I can. But some days I can't, and some days I just don't feel like it. I don't want finding a cache to feel like something I have to do.

 

Recently I was on a plane where I missed a whole day. E.g. left at 2300 on Monday, landed 0700 on Wednesday. No way I could find a cache on that Tuesday.

 

But if people like and can do streaks, that is great.

 

I am working on my 366 day calendar. I resisted that for a long time until a local cacher started hiding challenge caches... and I also realised I'm not that far from completing it.

 

Gives me an idea, if someone was really bothered about continuing a streak, but stuggled on one of the days, they could go to a different country behind them in time difference and it would be a totally legit way of making up the find without cheating :P

 

Maybe a little costly though haha.

 

Also with regards to the people saying its hard and how much travelling must people do in order to find the nearest unfound cache. I have instant notifications set up for a 10 mile radius of my home, and I usually get around 3 or 4 new caches published within that radius each day. The odd day our reviewer is busy so nothing comes through, but more than enough being placed to find 1 or 2 a day even in walking distance.

 

Ok, so our reviewer is probably one of the most time efficient out there, but I'm sure there are similar reviewers out there in other places too.

 

Not that I'll ever find the time, I never get a chance to cache as much as I like (For now :))

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