+MMaru Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 Inspired by the thread about standard height, and Roman!'s suggestion of wearing some very fashionable ankle-breakers to reach those caches hidden well above our heads... What is the weirdest tool you've ever used to obtain a cache? I personally was going for a cache recently that was placed on the far side of a tree that had no low branches to climb onto, and was right up against a barbed-wire fence that you had to lean over to reach the cache. It was a 1.5/1.5 so I was not expecting to struggle with it much at all, but it was hanging from a branch that was well out of my reach. I have not yet added a long grabby tool to my collection, and trying to knock it loose with a pen wasn't giving me enough height. I dug through my purse to see what else I could possibly use... and ended up using an action figure of Hajime Saito from the anime Rurouni Kenshin, who, amusingly enough, is supposed to be one of the taller characters on the show. Raising his arm gave me just the right last bit of height I needed to retrieve the cache and to replace it back on the branch I nabbed it from. I used to keep Saito in my purse as a placeholder for pictures, but it's nice to know he doubles as a reaching tool! Quote Link to comment
+T.D.M.22 Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 Does it count if the tool is part of the cache? I've found a cache that was in a tube, and you had to pull the handle down to launch the cache into the air. Kinda like the thing on a pinball machine. Quote Link to comment
+narcissa Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 Last summer we fashioned a long reaching tool out of broom handles, sticks, an old shower curtain rod, and a coat hanger. The cache was a magnetic micro stuck to the top of a very large culvert/underpass. Quote Link to comment
+Viajero Perdido Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 Not for finding the cache, but... Sometimes I have an oh shoot moment when I realize I don't have a pen, and there isn't one in the cache either. When that happens, I use a leaf and a car key to make a bunch of green chlorophyll dots in the shape of "VP". Quote Link to comment
+Bubbles&Bonkers Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 KNOWSCHAD (I got permission to say that, by the way) Quote Link to comment
+L0ne.R Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 I've used tongs, footstool, hiking stick, long branches, thick gauge wire and dragged logs over. Most often I use my hiking stick to knock a hanging cache off a high branch or a shallow near-the-edge nook. Putting it back is tougher but I persevere. Sometimes I throw it up, sometimes I use both my hiking stick and a long branch to hold the cache and place it back up. Often nothing will help get a cache but a ladder. Example the cache is in a nook about 6.5-7 feet up and deep into the middle of the nook. The footstool that I carried from the car turned out to be useless because the grade of the ground and the trunk made it impossible to set it up properly and safely. Quote Link to comment
+lamoracke Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 Justin Bieber duct tape to attach some sticks together to make a pole comes top of my head but am sure we have McGyvered something else better. Quote Link to comment
+niraD Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 I've used an assortment of reaching tools for elevated caches. One was provided by the CO. The others I've provided myself. Of those, the weirdest one might be a tool that was originally created for removing coursemarkers after a gimmick car rallye. That one is a painter's telescoping extension pole with a dandelion tool attached to the end with hose clamps. Quote Link to comment
+Chrysalides Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 Fly swatter, metal detector, "snake" camera. But not all at the same time. Quote Link to comment
knowschad Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 KNOWSCHAD (I got permission to say that, by the way) You're saying that I'm a weird tool? hahaha! Quote Link to comment
4wheelin_fool Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 A six foot high slingshot, used by arborists, to lob a bean bag attached to a thin cord over a tree limb, so a climbing rope can be tied to it, to be pulled over. Quote Link to comment
+cerberus1 Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 CJ sent me to do a "float to the top" pvc cache on my way to another. Only had a little pony bottle of water and I'd probably need it later. Walked over to the rusted pipe at roadside with "spring water" running out, and filled a male barrier device with enough water. Worked great. - Luckily no one showed while I filled either one. Quote Link to comment
+narcissa Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 A six foot high slingshot, used by arborists, to lob a bean bag attached to a thin cord over a tree limb, so a climbing rope can be tied to it, to be pulled over. This is amazing. Quote Link to comment
+MountainWoods Posted March 4, 2015 Share Posted March 4, 2015 I regularly carry a tent peg with me to reach in those tight places and/or where there is a possibility of something that I might not want to encounter, like a snake or a black widow spider. Better the tent peg than my fingers! Quote Link to comment
+MMaru Posted March 5, 2015 Author Share Posted March 5, 2015 I'm on Facebook too much - I keep wanting to 'like' these posts! Love hearing about these tricky tools! Quote Link to comment
+joshuar9476 Posted March 5, 2015 Share Posted March 5, 2015 I had a magnetic container that was shoved so far up a sign post that I couldn't get it back down. I wadded up some duct tape inside out so the sticky part was on the outside and wadded it around a nearby stick. After some fishing I finally got the container to stick to the tape. Quote Link to comment
+J Grouchy Posted March 5, 2015 Share Posted March 5, 2015 A pine needle to extract a log from a nano. Quote Link to comment
+Chrysalides Posted March 5, 2015 Share Posted March 5, 2015 A pine needle to extract a log from a nano. I use a thin twig to extract logs. Stick it in the center, roll it up tighter, pull it out easily. Works better than a tweezers and you can just pick it off the ground. Quote Link to comment
+Uncle Alaska Posted March 5, 2015 Share Posted March 5, 2015 I once used a folded up cot. I needed to reach a cache that was just out of reach of my extendable tools. So I leaned the cot against a pole, that gave me another four feet of reach. Quote Link to comment
+MountainWoods Posted March 5, 2015 Share Posted March 5, 2015 I keep a pair of tweezers in my GC kit, mainly for getting logs out of nanos. Quote Link to comment
+NYPaddleCacher Posted March 5, 2015 Share Posted March 5, 2015 (edited) I once used a folded up cot. I needed to reach a cache that was just out of reach of my extendable tools. So I leaned the cot against a pole, that gave me another four feet of reach. It took me awhile to find this but this was one of my favorite logs ever...posted by a cacher that left the area long time ago "Well... I'm proud to say... FTF @ approximately 8:10 PM. This was quite an adventure! I wasn't sure whether I wanted to give this cache a shot tonight in the freezing rain, but finally I figured "what the heck" and I strode out the door. I arrived at the cache site for the first time at about 7:30 PM and, after a few minutes of searching (thank goodness I finally bought a headlamp) I spotted the cache. I looked around for something that would help me retrieve it, and I found nothing suitable. I returned to the cache and grabbed Barry, the four-foot-long Travel Bug that is currently riding along with me. After trying to climb Barry for a couple minutes -- even, I'm ashamed to say, removing my shoes and socks to try for a better grip with my bare feet (sorry Barry) -- I returned home for more supplies. I returned to the cache site at about 8:00 PM with my set of porch furniture -- a plastic table and a lawn chair (which previous finders of Cortland's Travel Bug Courthouse know well). I never claimed to be a mechanical engineer: it took a lot of positioning and repositioning of those two devices in different arrangements before I finally came up with a contraption sturdy enough and tall enough to allow me to grab the cache. As I stood at the top of my makeshift ladder precariously, I heard *pop**pop* coming from below me. Something was breaking, and I was likely seconds away from plummeting to my doom. I quickly scrawled "12-11-07 de-n-cc" on the cache log, replaced the log and rescrewed the bison tube. Just then, two legs of my table blew out and I fell to the ground. I laughed out loud hysterically -- I like to think I was sane at some point in my life -- and collected all the pieces. I carried my furniture out of the park and headed back home, soaking wet. Thanks for the adventure! If I had known archiving "Little Bit" would result in having this fun, I would have done it long ago!" Edited March 5, 2015 by NYPaddleCacher Quote Link to comment
+Uncle Alaska Posted March 5, 2015 Share Posted March 5, 2015 I once used a folded up cot. I needed to reach a cache that was just out of reach of my extendable tools. So I leaned the cot against a pole, that gave me another four feet of reach. It took me awhile to find this but this was one of my favorite logs ever...posted by a cacher that left the area long time ago "Well... I'm proud to say... FTF @ approximately 8:10 PM. This was quite an adventure! I wasn't sure whether I wanted to give this cache a shot tonight in the freezing rain, but finally I figured "what the heck" and I strode out the door. I arrived at the cache site for the first time at about 7:30 PM and, after a few minutes of searching (thank goodness I finally bought a headlamp) I spotted the cache. I looked around for something that would help me retrieve it, and I found nothing suitable. I returned to the cache and grabbed Barry, the four-foot-long Travel Bug that is currently riding along with me. After trying to climb Barry for a couple minutes -- even, I'm ashamed to say, removing my shoes and socks to try for a better grip with my bare feet (sorry Barry) -- I returned home for more supplies. I returned to the cache site at about 8:00 PM with my set of porch furniture -- a plastic table and a lawn chair (which previous finders of Cortland's Travel Bug Courthouse know well). I never claimed to be a mechanical engineer: it took a lot of positioning and repositioning of those two devices in different arrangements before I finally came up with a contraption sturdy enough and tall enough to allow me to grab the cache. As I stood at the top of my makeshift ladder precariously, I heard *pop**pop* coming from below me. Something was breaking, and I was likely seconds away from plummeting to my doom. I quickly scrawled "12-11-07 de-n-cc" on the cache log, replaced the log and rescrewed the bison tube. Just then, two legs of my table blew out and I fell to the ground. I laughed out loud hysterically -- I like to think I was sane at some point in my life -- and collected all the pieces. I carried my furniture out of the park and headed back home, soaking wet. Thanks for the adventure! If I had known archiving "Little Bit" would result in having this fun, I would have done it long ago!" A log that makes you wish there was a video camera recording it all...or, walking up to look for it yourself, arriving right at the point of furniture "collapse". Quote Link to comment
Love Posted March 5, 2015 Share Posted March 5, 2015 I've definitely used grass and dirt with a stick to sign a cache log before (I often forget to bring a pen). My coworkers and I used each other to retrieve a cache once. Quote Link to comment
+niraD Posted March 5, 2015 Share Posted March 5, 2015 My coworkers and I used each other to retrieve a cache once. One time, the tool we brought for an elevated cache wasn't quite long enough. So someone stood on my shoulders, and was then able to reach the cache container with the tool we brought. I guess that makes me a tool... Quote Link to comment
+colleda Posted March 6, 2015 Share Posted March 6, 2015 My coworkers and I used each other to retrieve a cache once. One time, the tool we brought for an elevated cache wasn't quite long enough. So someone stood on my shoulders, and was then able to reach the cache container with the tool we brought. I guess that makes me a tool... :lol: Quote Link to comment
+K13 Posted March 6, 2015 Share Posted March 6, 2015 How about a boat paddle? A log from one of my hides. Had to think how we were going to get this one back once we were able to grab it. Glad we had the boat paddle. This is a great hide! AND we were put in a position to explain geocaching to the nice policeman that came to check out 2 suspicious persons. Quote Link to comment
+jellis Posted March 6, 2015 Share Posted March 6, 2015 Besides a few times taping my hiking stick to a 8' painter's pole. When I had surgery we were caching in Sacramento and couldn't reach something up on a pole and the driver forgot to put his tools in his car, we used one of my crutches to reach on top of a pole. Quote Link to comment
+WarNinjas Posted March 6, 2015 Share Posted March 6, 2015 I used a oar a few weekends ago to keep me from sinking in the mud! Quote Link to comment
+Chrysalides Posted March 6, 2015 Share Posted March 6, 2015 I used a oar a few weekends ago to keep me from sinking in the mud! Next time don't forget the hoverboard! Quote Link to comment
+jellis Posted March 6, 2015 Share Posted March 6, 2015 I used a oar a few weekends ago to keep me from sinking in the mud! I hope you didn't put a cache out there. I won't do it. Quote Link to comment
+jellis Posted March 6, 2015 Share Posted March 6, 2015 I used a oar a few weekends ago to keep me from sinking in the mud! BTW did you get my message about the tunnel/kayaking ones? Quote Link to comment
+popokiiti Posted March 7, 2015 Share Posted March 7, 2015 I'm on Facebook too much - I keep wanting to 'like' these posts! Love hearing about these tricky tools! I was thinking that. Like, or a thumbs up, would be good.... I actually went to look for a like button in this thread! Quote Link to comment
Recommended Posts
Join the conversation
You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.