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Waymarks vs geocaches


elyob

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Finally, my total of waymarks (posts and visits) is greater than my total of caches (hides and finds).  I was hooked by Waymarking more than two years after becoming a cacher.  While I'm not much into caching anymore, I still log a cache each week.  I find much more satisfaction in Waymarking.  Even at their lowest common denominator, I would much rather log a meal at a McWaymark than DNF a pill bottle at a utility pole in a parking lot.

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7 hours ago, elyob said:

I find much more satisfaction in Waymarking.  Even at their lowest common denominator, I would much rather log a meal at a McWaymark than DNF a pill bottle at a utility pole in a parking lot.

You've pretty much captured the essence of why we Waymark now, too. Geocaching just lost its lustre after so many tupperware and pill bottle chases. Too, Waymarking can keep us - me at least - busy 24/7/365.25. Sit here, watch a few ball games, listen to some music and spew out a few Waymarks; that's my day... ...

Keith

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Mega ditto.

I'd much rather Waymark interesting things ("Wow factor") for folks to go see, whether or not they ever visit any of 'em :) , than log more and more DNFs on geocaches in a mixed bag of areas (admittedly, some from pretty cool areas like my first finds, all the way down to "why am I even here??"!).

I got into the geocaching souvenir thing, so I still look for geocaches when I'm in a state where I haven't found any before.  Also, if I'm planning a Waymarking outing and I see some simple geocaches in the planned area, I may go for 'em.  But that only happens rarely.

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Geocaching has allowed me to take people to historic locations and write about our local history, and my geocaches get visits as opposed to my WM's that are never visited.

It's some of the people here that have turned me against this site. I have had to argue with members here to have WM's published and I'm not getting stressed out anymore, like the last time I had to prove my memorial to a fire fighter was actually a memorial to a fire fighter. This memorial in front of a fire department. I also had issues getting my photo goal published, and several people contacted me by PM to complain abut it.

I select the geocaches that I seek, I filter out micros and LPC urban hides, and I don't play the FTF or numbers side game. I do enjoy Virtual geocaches, and recently 3 out of 4 I visited were also WM's published at a later date and they were "spoilers" to the Virtuals.

I'm a History Geocacher that tried Waymarking to highlight local history as if they were Virtual geocaches and it has not worked well for me. I still support this site by paying my membership dues, but I don't fit in to the group here. Sounds like I'm just a Geocacher with sour grapes, and sour grapes will likely fit into several categories here. :)

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15 hours ago, elyob said:

Finally, my total of waymarks (posts and visits) is greater than my total of caches (hides and finds).  I was hooked by Waymarking more than two years after becoming a cacher.  While I'm not much into caching anymore, I still log a cache each week.  I find much more satisfaction in Waymarking.  Even at their lowest common denominator, I would much rather log a meal at a McWaymark than DNF a pill bottle at a utility pole in a parking lot.

You've pretty-much captured why we don't do either.   

We pick and choose what caches we do, and nondescript roadside/parking lot caches aren't it.  

When asking at events, many think it odd that Waymarking still exists.   :)

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Geocacher first, there are some amazing caches out there, series of caches that have formed a great days walk with friends and family. Unfortunately geocaching has been plagued by boring nanos and roadside film case. Likewise Waymarking has some very interesting waymarks, and then there is the McDonald's waymarks. Each to there own really. Both are just games to pass your time.

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even for the commercial categories, I try to find different and unusual instances to Waymark. Not the McD's or Subway in the Walmart. My first waymark for those is my local store, then try to find something special. (Like the closed Walmart Neighborhood store for a visit, to mark it as "Closed").

Edited by vulture1957
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Well, PISA-caching consists of Mr. PISA (me) and Mrs. PISA. We started with geocaching many years ago. We both don't own a car and we prefer to go geocaching/Waymarking without other people. So, we are somehow limited to areas where public transport is in walkable distance and we never created a geocache, because it takes just too much time and effort to maintain a Cache using public transport. Additionally, Vienna (where we live) is quite crowded with geocaches which urges the owners to use places that are not that spectacular. Also, more and more nano caches show up and I just hate them. But I created some waymarks to calm down my bad conscience and fortunately I don't have to visit them again once they are created. However, Mrs. PISA isn't at all interested in Waymarking, but still likes to solve riddles and search geocaches, while I find it much more inspiring to search for new waymarks to post them or existing waymarks to log them. With almost every new waymark I create I learn something new about my hometown. For example, I had no idea that the "Heilsarmee" (Salvation Army) is active in my hometown and I have been living here for 50+ years!! The only things I learn from geocaching are more nasty ways to encrypt coordinates in an almost unsolvable riddle :-( So, whenever we go for geocaches, I grab my GPS and my camera and if there are just boring caches to find I hope to find some interesting waymarks in between and most of the time my hopes are fulfilled.

I think I'm very fortunate to have Mrs. PISA who shared the hobby of geocaching with me when I started it, is patient enough to wait until I took all the photos and Information I need for a new waymark when we are out for geocaches and also isn't angry, if I go Waymarking on my own. I know a lot of geocachers, who would love to go geocaching with their wife, but have to go all alone all year long (and only at times where their wife allows them to go), because their wife has no interest in it at all.

Two last sentences: I think there are both boring geocaches AND waymarks and also phantastic geocaches and most interesting waymarks. Therefore I will never quit one or the other.

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We (my wife Mama Geomauli and our daughter Geomauline) are active geocachers as well as waymarkers. However, we are not hyperactive geocacher or waymakers. We love hiking in combination with the search for geocaches (especially our daughter). However, we plan our excursions not only according to this point of view. I also make some geocache spontaneously alone, because I sit all day in the office and I am always happy if I could have a little walk.

We discovered Waymarking just a few months ago. We use it parallel to geocaching. If we are somewhere  in a new area we use „Waymarking Mobile“ to locate  interesting waymarks nearby or we create a new Waymark when we have found something interesting. For us Waymarking is a great complement to geocaching.

Because Waymarks have no distance rules, you can show interesting places even if the area is already contaminated with uninteresting Nano´s on traffic signs :D. This is especially interesting for us, because in our area are a lot of puzzle caches, whose finals blocks interesting places for geocaches.

Sadly we are a very small number of active waymarkers in the state of Saarland. In the last months I could only identify two more here in the state of Saarland.  So the chance that our published waymarks will be visited are very  low :(.

Apparently, perhaps also to counteract the strongly reduced number of active geocachers and geocaches in many countries compared to the previous year (see statistics: project-gc.com) Groundspeak seems to have a new focus on the locationless waymarks (The number of the waymarks is still increasing steadily and many premium members now operate in the meantime only Waymarking as hobby) and has approved 4000 new locationless geocaches worldwide.

 

 

Edited by GeoMaulis
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I am one of the small minority of the waymarkers who have not played geocaching before. I do understand that it can be fun, but it has never attracted me.

The two games are very different. There are a lot of people who enjoy both, but you cannot generalize that if someone likes one of them they would also like the other. I think that is the main problem of Waymarking: due to its close historic relation with Geocaching it is often tried by Geocachers with a Geocaching approach. This often does not work and then they are disappointed. It is not the fault of the games, neither of them.

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4 hours ago, GeoMaulis said:

Groundspeak seems to have a new focus on the locationless waymarks (The number of the waymarks is still increasing steadily and many premium members now operate in the meantime only Waymarking as hobby) and has approved 4000 new locationless geocaches worldwide.

 

 

Even these specially selected premium members seem unaware of waymarks already in place, providing spoilers for their brand new virtual caches.

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On September 5, 2017 at 3:45 PM, elyob said:

Even these specially selected premium members seem unaware of waymarks already in place, providing spoilers for their brand new virtual caches.

They are two different games, I doubt that waymarkers go onto munzee websites and check there. I also suspect that local tourism boards also have pictures on their websites that are 'spoilers' 

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On ‎9‎/‎5‎/‎2017 at 4:40 AM, GeoMaulis said:

 Groundspeak seems to have a new focus on the locationless waymarks (The number of the waymarks is still increasing steadily and many premium members now operate in the meantime only Waymarking as hobby) and has approved 4000 new locationless geocaches worldwide.

Virtual caches are not "locationless".   Each has a set location, with coordinates leading to it, that numerous people can head to. 

Locationless caches ended well before you joined the hobby.  Those only allowed a single person to claim that "location".

(IIRC) the idea of locationless was still popular at the time enough that Waymarking was created as kind of a replacement.    :)

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On ‎9‎/‎5‎/‎2017 at 8:45 AM, elyob said:

Even these specially selected premium members seem unaware of waymarks already in place, providing spoilers for their brand new virtual caches.

I kinda agree...  

 - But we don't know of anyone who is a waymarker, so I guess the only "spoilers" (in relation to this other hobby) would probably benefit only the waymarkers who also geocache.  :) 

Those who look for spoilers often find them on something as simple as google.  Hopefully the CO thought of that when placing.

 

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1 hour ago, tyzack4 said:

They are two different games, I doubt that waymarkers go onto munzee websites and check there. I also suspect that local tourism boards also have pictures on their websites that are 'spoilers' 

That's funny: I always check the munzee  map.

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20 hours ago, cerberus1 said:

I guess those stickers do cost some.  My favorite salmon area has a parking lot with over a dozen on a lamp pole.

Maybe to some that's fun...

You can buy the stickers, or print them out for free. And you have to space them out so there can't be a dozen on a lamp post, only one.

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1 hour ago, tyzack4 said:

You can buy the stickers, or print them out for free. And you have to space them out so there can't be a dozen on a lamp post, only one.

I looked at the map by me, and it shows a business district near me that looks to be completely covered with stickers. I plan on going there to see what I can find. I don't think it sounds like something I'd like to do. (see 35.461949 -97.648498 )

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On 9/6/2017 at 9:38 AM, cerberus1 said:

Virtual caches are not "locationless".   Each has a set location, with coordinates leading to it, that numerous people can head to. 

Locationless caches ended well before you joined the hobby.  Those only allowed a single person to claim that "location".

(IIRC) the idea of locationless was still popular at the time enough that Waymarking was created as kind of a replacement.    :)

Ah, the locationless cache - man I miss those!!!!  The longest found log I ever wrote was on a locationless cache for grave sites of Civil War Generals - George Washington Dietzler.  I had never heard of him before I logged this locationless cache, but found out that he was VERY important in Kansas Territorial history as well as being in on some of the important fighting in the Trans-Mississippi and Western Theaters (Wilson's Creek, Vicksburg, Westport).  It was locationless and virtuals that got me hooked on geocaching, now, how many wet logs can one pull before getting discouraged.  I pretty much stick to my Waymarking and trying to complete geocaching challenge caches.

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