Face Palm Caching Moments

[+diamonddolljeanette]

So we all have had them, those moments when that one cache evades you and when you actually find it you feel stupid because it was in the one place you should have looked right away or whatever. So lets hear your face palm caching stories.

 

I had my worse one on Saturday with a urban cache. I was up in Northern Minnesota with my youth students for a conference and I wanted to find this popular one to drop a TB in. Well the coords brought me to this patio area with lattice fencing under it and wooden steps. Well so tried to look under the patio/steps where it ran along the sidewalk as much as I could but I kept getting the strangest looks from muggles and even had one ask me if I dropped something so I wandered into a few shops hoping to try a little later. So about a half an hour or more of shopping with some of my students I returned too look again. By this time I was getting pretty frustrated and desperate cause I really wanted to find it so I did something I hardly ever do, I asked on a Minnesota Facebook group for a hint since they had suggested I look for it while I was there. They said look under the steps which I found maddening unhelpful at the time. After another 15 minutes I wondered if it could be on the other side of the steps next to the building but I wasn't sure cause it seemed a bit too private but I figured it was worth the shot. Low and behold, there was a camouflaged peanut butter jar. If I would have just checked there I would have saved myself a whole lot of of time and muggle embarrassment.

[BFG99]

My biggest one so far: searching a large Christmas wreath on the side of a tree for the cache for 20 minutes, only to realize (when checking the Cache Size description) that the wreath itself was the cache.

[+The A-Team]

I can't think of any particular occasion, but there have been many times that I've looked in the right spot or even picked up the cache, but not realized it because I didn't look closely enough or from the right angle. There have also been many face-palm moments when working on puzzle caches. You finally figure it out, but then can't figure out why you didn't see the solution sooner.

[+Blue_Ranger]

A few weeks ago, while I was out with a few other cachers, I was getting close. I was a little ahead of the others, and I called out that I was really close, and stopped to let the GPSr catch up. While I was standing there staring at the screen, one of the others says "There it is." It was literally right at my feet!

[+Walker Stalkers]

Today actually, was looking for a simple PNG. Was only supposed to take 5 minutes tops. Was on the edge of a parking lot. Looked at all the usual places, light skirts,tree bases, birdhouses, (yes was one there but was not the cache. 15 minute in I was standing next to a no trespass sign looking back at all the possible places and just looked beside my hand there it was a magnetic tin at the top of the no trespass sign. Duh!

[+diamonddolljeanette]

My biggest one so far: searching a large Christmas wreath on the side of a tree for the cache for 20 minutes, only to realize (when checking the Cache Size description) that the wreath itself was the cache.

How did that work? Like was the log and everything decorations on the wreath?

[+niraD]

A number of years ago, I organized a group to take on a local multi-stage puzzle cache. It was my 500th find and 100th mystery/puzzle find, and it was a milestone for each of the others in the group as well.

 

We had a very enjoyable morning taking on one puzzle after another, working our way through the adventure. At the penultimate stage, we assembled a number of pieces in the appropriate manner, and that led us to the final cache location. We found the cache, swapped trackables, traded swag, took photos, and talked about the various stages of the cache and about geocaching in general. Then we put everything back in the ammo can and replaced it. And then...

 

...and then we realized that one of the pieces from the penultimate stage was gone. We searched. We retraced our steps. We searched some more. We checked all around the final cache location, around the penultimate stage location, and everywhere in between. The missing piece wasn't camouflaged. It wasn't small. We couldn't figure out how we had lost it, and no one else had been around to have taken it. Somehow, the piece just disappeared.

 

Anyway, I replaced the piece later. But it still baffles me how something like that could have just vanished like that.

[+lee737]

Searching around on the side of a dirt road, in the rain, for a regular sized cache - checking under logs, around bushes, under fences, everywhere - then look up to see a green/camouflage painted letterbox! Right in front of us.....

Edited April 19, 2016 by lee737

[+dprovan]

Face palms are fairly common for me, so I could never single one out as the cause of the biggest bruise. But one of my favorites was the day my lovely assistant and I spent about 10 minutes searching around in some trees, then stopped to reassess all the available information. As we talked, I realized we were speaking around the cache that was hanging a few inches above eye level right between us.

 

The biggest face palms are usually when solving puzzle caches, of course, but it sounds like you want to focus on the physical search.

[+Harry Dolphin]

Ah. Face Palm. An FTF attempt on a lamp post cache. Lifted the skirt and searched everywhere. DNF. It was an MKH stuck to the inside of the skirt. Oh, well.

[+J Grouchy]

Mine usually involve a lengthy search in a wooded area, followed by a stop to get my bearings and look at the logs and description again, only to look up and realized the cache is right in front of me, hanging on a branch or something. I seem to have a knack for finding JUST the right place to stop and get my bearings...and this scenario has happened at least half a dozen times.

[+Meow&Purr]

I've had two recently...

Searched and searched and searched then stood up and almost eye to eye with a big-freaking-box hanging at eye level. Something in the cache description made me think it was low-lying in a log or a hole in the tree so I just got too focused.

 

Last night we walked in circles for what seemed forever. Granted it was a very public spot - a strip of brush/trees about 10' wide between the library and shopping center - and full of trash. We were picking up trash as we went trying not to look too conspicuous but we had gone around this one bush about sixteen thousand times and I think we had both actually laid hands on the cache container when it clicked - 'this is it' On the bright side, we picked up a bunch of refuse in the process of a facepalm moment.

[+WilliamGray]

I gave up on a cache once and decided to head for the jeep.

I tripped and fell down the cliff the cache was on. I found it on the way back up.

[+anarcha77]

Mine was one of my early finds. I went to the final gz, which was at the base of a bunch of poles. The hint said something like ' look under' so I'm thinking 'under the flags! perfect!' and looking all over the place in the bushes in a very high pedestrian traffic area ... but at that point I had yet to find a lamp post hide or anything like it so I didn't know those little covers could be lifted... yeah. I did end up finding it, but looking back on it now, having found many similar hides since then, it seems like a pretty big *facepalm* to me now since I know that were I to search for the same cache again it'd be the first place I'd look.

[+princess leppard]

The very first time I found a nano. I was new to geocaching and had no idea what it was. I think I held it and put it back like four times before I thought, "well, maybe that IS the cache." So I went over to a bench and fiddled with it and realized it opened, and hey, there was the log.

 

After that, I went to the geocaching store to see what other types of "weird" containers there were.

 

Which is why I will still randomly poke at used chewing gum. So gross.

[+Lil Devil]

I've had many facepalm moments in my 15 years of geocaching, but the most memorable and talked about came on my 9th ever find, back in June 2002.

 

My wife and I were in a wooded area at the back of a neighborhood park, looking for a difficulty 4 hide. The most difficult we'd searched for so far, so we were a little intimidated. We searched around for quite a while checking stumps, logs, bushes, up in the trees, etc. Eventually my wife asked what the hint was, so I pulled the print-out of the cache page from my pocket, as this was long before smartphones or geocaching-friendly GPS units. I stepped up on a nearby rock, as if to stand on a podium, and read the hint out loud. The hint was one of those that only really helps in retrospect. So then I read the entire description as my wife continued searching. When I finished reading, my wife looked at me and asked what the name of the cache was. I looked to the top of the page and replied, "Alcatraz." Now, anyone who has ever visited San Francisco will know the nickname of the famous prison is "The Rock." The next few seconds were like slow motion as my wife's eyes scanned down my body to The Rock that I was standing on.

 

The Rock turned out to be concrete formed around a Tupperware container.

[+zihyer]

Two visits to a cache location with no luck either time. The 2nd time we spent almost an hour while combining our visit with what evolved into a mass trash cleanup event. Three of us completely scouring the area determined to find the cache. Finally took a look at the log and saw that it was last "found it" log was well over two years prior with 6 DNFs piled up after it.

 

Total derp moment but at least we got lots of trash picked up so it wasn't a total loss. In our defense, the first "visit" was a result of using that intersection as a spot to meet someone else for non-caching business. But still.. yeah, facepalm moment for sure.

Edited April 22, 2016 by zihyer

[+MysteryGuy1]

Last fall, I went looking for a basic guard rail cache where the CO is a good friend of mine. There were guard rails on both sides of the street and I looked each one up and down with no success. I got to his house, where I mentioned my failed attempt. He insisted we stop over there to check it out. As we're walking over, accompanied by a third guy who's only marginally familiar with caching, the third guy points to the guard rail from a great distance and says, "There it is!". Very embarrassing...

Edited April 25, 2016 by MysteryGuy1

[BFG99]

My biggest one so far: searching a large Christmas wreath on the side of a tree for the cache for 20 minutes, only to realize (when checking the Cache Size description) that the wreath itself was the cache.

How did that work? Like was the log and everything decorations on the wreath?

 

It's been a couple years, but if I remember correctly there was a small canister tied to the wreath that said "Merry Christmas" and held the log. I guess you could say the canister was the cache, not the wreath, but they were all one piece.

[+boda]

Delayed face palm.

 

Our second cache was difficult to find for us novices. As it turned out it was down inside a pipe that held up a sign with historical info about the site. The post was tall and the cache was way down. The description mentioned a handy tool nearby that would allow us to get at the cache and bring it up. We looked and looked and couldn't find anything. Finally, as resourceful newbies, we figured out a way to get the cache up and sign the log.

 

Years later I was looking through pictures of our early caching years. One was of us posing proudly at this hard-earned find. As I looked at the picture, I soon noticed something odd. Verrrry close behind me, and very obvious in the picture, was a coat hanger hanging from a branch.

[+Trycacheus]

A few years back we had a hider that was transferred over seas. I took it upon myself to watch their caches while they were away and replaced a few containers that went missing. When they returned to the area, they retired and moved to a different state. Then they archived all of their caches in the area. I stopped at one that was nearby and they hadn't taken the container that I had replaced. So, I decided to go to all their hides take the containers back. There was also a cache in town that I stopped at and the nano under the bench was still there. Well, I could just as well take that one too since they archived it. A few days later a new cache popped up and it was located at the very bench. After a few DNFs from other cachers, I started to think that maybe I took the new cache that was put out. I opened the nano I had taken and sure enough it had a blank log. I signed it at my place about 25 miles away and next time I was in town put it back where it should have been. Afterwards, the cachers that had logged a DNF couldn't believe they had missed it the first time. A couple of years later, I got to know the cache owner and told him about the story and we all laughed.