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I enjoy this pastime very much but don't have as much time to pursue it as I'd like, or anyone to go with.  One of the few drawbacks is that once you've found a cache, that's it, and more caches are being disabled, archived or abandoned than new ones are being placed.  I hope this can be remedied.

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9 minutes ago, A1smallfry said:

I enjoy this pastime very much but don't have as much time to pursue it as I'd like, or anyone to go with.  One of the few drawbacks is that once you've found a cache, that's it, and more caches are being disabled, archived or abandoned than new ones are being placed.  I hope this can be remedied.

Where do you live? There is no shortage of new geocaches in my area!

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Sometimes with geocaching you do need to be patient. You might not be able to go geocaching on any one particular day, once you hit a certain point where most/all caches around you have been found. At that point, you need to plan trips for geocaching, or plan to geocache on trips. You can also put a lot of time into planning your own hide(s), and then maintaining them. Be the change you want to see.

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20 minutes ago, Max and 99 said:

Where do you live? There is no shortage of new geocaches in my area!

 

The OP must live near me. We've had 2 caches published within 50 miles since April 10. Unfortunately, there were 21 caches archived in that same time span.

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17 minutes ago, Mudfrog said:

 

The OP must live near me. We've had 2 caches published within 50 miles since April 10. Unfortunately, there were 21 caches archived in that same time span.

 

Near the OP:

55 new caches in the last two months, including 2 new virtuals!

Granted, a handful of those are disabled, but that's a nice number of new caches with 16 miles of the last find. Not bad at all!

Edited by Max and 99
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2 hours ago, A1smallfry said:

I enjoy this pastime very much but don't have as much time to pursue it as I'd like, or anyone to go with.  One of the few drawbacks is that once you've found a cache, that's it, and more caches are being disabled, archived or abandoned than new ones are being placed.  I hope this can be remedied.

Wow, that's really rough. It's not that way everywhere. Keep planting your quality caches and hope other people start following your lead. You might only be able to enjoy creating caches, but at least other people in your community will have new caches to find.

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3 hours ago, A1smallfry said:

I enjoy this pastime very much but don't have as much time to pursue it as I'd like, or anyone to go with.  One of the few drawbacks is that once you've found a cache, that's it, and more caches are being disabled, archived or abandoned than new ones are being placed.  I hope this can be remedied.

When I started 13 years ago, I was told that it was common for newbies like myself to find all the easily accessible caches (e.g., close to home or close to work), and then have no more easily accessible caches to find. At that point, one's find rate drops, except for the occasional newly listed cache. So the "problem" really isn't all that new.

 

One thing I learned is that this isn't Pokemon, and you don't "Gotta Catch 'Em All". It's okay to leave some caches for later.

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On 6/11/2019 at 6:01 AM, A1smallfry said:

I enjoy this pastime very much but don't have as much time to pursue it as I'd like, or anyone to go with.  One of the few drawbacks is that once you've found a cache, that's it, and more caches are being disabled, archived or abandoned than new ones are being placed.  I hope this can be remedied.

 

I currently live in Germany and can't do much to help you out directly.  But I can think of two things you can do to help remedy these issues:

 

Capture.JPG.2651b75370b0c9d8ad203319b8880a55.JPG

 

Suggestion 1: you have no hides.  Go hide some caches.

 

Suggestion 2: since it helps to have other cachers hiding caches for you to find, attend (or host) an event, and bring up that there could be more new caches around.  Promise to do your part by hiding new caches (see suggestion 1), and see who else is encouraged by your initiative to go hide some new caches of their own.  (Meeting fellow cachers in your area and making plans to go out and find caches together would also help fix the "I don't have anyone to go with" part of your issue.)

 

I move around every couple years, so sometimes I find myself in vibrant caching communities, and sometimes I don't.  It was a big change when I moved from Germany back to the USA and found myself in a small town with few geocaches.  I hid a few and hosted an event.  The event ended up being on a rainy, terrible day, but seven other caching teams showed up.  For three of them, it was their first event; another hadn't attended an event in years.  We swapped coins, shared stories, and talked about caches in general.  I started seeing more new caches after that.

 

Taking direct action to fix a problem, as well as assembling other like-minded people to discuss that problem, can often help attain a group goal.

Edited by hzoi
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8 hours ago, niraD said:

When I started 13 years ago, I was told that it was common for newbies like myself to find all the easily accessible caches (e.g., close to home or close to work), and then have no more easily accessible caches to find. At that point, one's find rate drops, except for the occasional newly listed cache. So the "problem" really isn't all that new.

One thing I learned is that this isn't Pokemon, and you don't "Gotta Catch 'Em All". It's okay to leave some caches for later.

Agreed.

When we started we not only hit all locally, but ended up further into another state just to keep playing.

A short time later the other 2/3rds a FTF monster, and we were hitting two states besides ours for FTF. 

Now there's thousands of caches all around that I'd never think of doing.   Things change.    :)

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11 hours ago, A1smallfry said:

I enjoy this pastime very much but don't have as much time to pursue it as I'd like, or anyone to go with.  One of the few drawbacks is that once you've found a cache, that's it, and more caches are being disabled, archived or abandoned than new ones are being placed.  I hope this can be remedied.

 

As a basic member, depending on apps used, you may be limited by D/T ratings for caches, and maybe missing some "advanced" caches.

By going onto the website, the only limitations on caches are premium member-only hides, and your physical limitations.   :)

 - Even the app lets you add waypoints...   Traveling just a bit,  you'd have whole-new areas to explore. 

Exploring away from our own area was the reason we joined. 

No offense, but if we had to just keep finding caches close-by, and in areas we've already been before, we would have been done with this hobby years ago.  ;)

 

 

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On 6/11/2019 at 12:01 AM, A1smallfry said:

I enjoy this pastime very much but don't have as much time to pursue it as I'd like, or anyone to go with.  One of the few drawbacks is that once you've found a cache, that's it, and more caches are being disabled, archived or abandoned than new ones are being placed.  I hope this can be remedied.

 

I think this is one of the advantages of geocaching. More recent virtual GPS games encourage people to keep revisiting the same places. What's the point? If I've been there and want to go back then I don't need a game incentive. Otherwise, I would rather go somewhere new.

 

I find myself caching less and less in my local area. After nearly a decade it seems largely cached out. Oh, sure there are active caches I haven't found, but mostly hides I don't want to seek or places I don't want to go. I don't have to find them all. So I find caching much more enjoyable when traveling outside my home area. 

 

What the caches help me find is more important to me than finding the caches.

 

YMMV.

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14 minutes ago, JL_HSTRE said:

I find myself caching less and less in my local area. After nearly a decade it seems largely cached out. Oh, sure there are active caches I haven't found, but mostly hides I don't want to seek or places I don't want to go. I don't have to find them all. So I find caching much more enjoyable when traveling outside my home area. 

 

Ditto.  I rarely have any desire to find caches locally, but will almost always try to find the time to find a few while traveling.  

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7 hours ago, JL_HSTRE said:

I think this is one of the advantages of geocaching. More recent virtual GPS games encourage people to keep revisiting the same places. What's the point? If I've been there and want to go back then I don't need a game incentive. Otherwise, I would rather go somewhere new.

I do also find it advantageous that geocaching encourages me to go to new places to look for new caches, but what I find even more interesting is that, over time, geocaches come and go, so I find myself with a reason to go back and revisit a place I enjoyed before but haven't had an excuse to return since I found the old caches there. I find myself with a reason to go back to my favorite parks every 2 or 3 years, which is just about perfect to remind me about the parks that have snuck out of my consciousness.

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4 hours ago, dprovan said:

I do also find it advantageous that geocaching encourages me to go to new places to look for new caches, but what I find even more interesting is that, over time, geocaches come and go, so I find myself with a reason to go back and revisit a place I enjoyed before but haven't had an excuse to return since I found the old caches there. I find myself with a reason to go back to my favorite parks every 2 or 3 years, which is just about perfect to remind me about the parks that have snuck out of my consciousness.

Yeah...

Many areas drivable I've visited before this hobby was a thing.  The other 2/3rds (a heck-of-a-lot younger) gets to see more of those places because of this hobby.  :)

We've kept a ledger of places outside our immediate area (that have awesome views, or specific hunting/fishing opportunities), using cache coordinates.

We'd like to go back to see how much they've changed time to time, and this hobby helps some for that. 

Just last week I revisited an area (for a cache) I've walked over a dozen times, and this last showed the area unrecognizable.

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On 6/11/2019 at 2:33 AM, dprovan said:
On 6/11/2019 at 12:01 AM, A1smallfry said:

I enjoy this pastime very much but don't have as much time to pursue it as I'd like, or anyone to go with.  One of the few drawbacks is that once you've found a cache, that's it, and more caches are being disabled, archived or abandoned than new ones are being placed.  I hope this can be remedied.

Wow, that's really rough. It's not that way everywhere. Keep planting your quality caches and hope other people start following your lead. You might only be able to enjoy creating caches, but at least other people in your community will have new caches to find.

 

Yeah, also, if you place caches that are interesting to non-locals, you could get a bit more activity that way. They might find value (if they like traveling longer distances from home) in placing more caches in your area as well. (and I don't mean vacation caches, I just mean people from the greater region, not necessarily within your own town) And that could help boost some local activity.

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A1smallfry, you have found 100 caches in Madisson county and another hundred in St-Louis. In Maddison alone, you have still 600 more geocaches to find. There are more than 10.000 geocaches in Illinois you haven't found. If you keep finding geocaches at the same rate as you did the last two years, It will take you at least 100 years to find all the geocaches in your state.

You seem to have almost exclusively tried to find basic traditional caches. No premium caches. No mystery caches. No events.

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I defiantly agree that you should hide one! but make sure that the cache you hide is the kind you like to find! if its not a memorable cache don't hide it! there's already plenty of non-merable caches out there. plus if local caches like your cache it just might encourage them to hide similar caches.

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On 6/11/2019 at 2:01 PM, A1smallfry said:

I enjoy this pastime very much but don't have as much time to pursue it as I'd like, or anyone to go with.  One of the few drawbacks is that once you've found a cache, that's it, and more caches are being disabled, archived or abandoned than new ones are being placed.  I hope this can be remedied.

Not where I live. LOTS of new caches keep getting published. I am getting overwhelmed by the numbers.

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6 hours ago, Goldenwattle said:

Not where I live. LOTS of new caches keep getting published. I am getting overwhelmed by the numbers.

 

Here in the same country and just a few hundred kilometres away, in my region there've been only 12 new caches in the first half of this year, 2 of them mine. A few years back we'd be getting well over a hundred a year - there were 124 in 2013, 170 in 2014 , 159 in 2015, 77 in 2016, 61 in 2017 and 78 in 2018 (40 of which were geoart puzzles for the Oz Geomuster mega in Morriset).

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2 minutes ago, barefootjeff said:

 

Here in the same country and just a few hundred kilometres away, in my region there've been only 12 new caches in the first half of this year, 2 of them mine. A few years back we'd be getting well over a hundred a year - there were 124 in 2013, 170 in 2014 , 159 in 2015, 77 in 2016, 61 in 2017 and 78 in 2018 (40 of which were geoart puzzles for the Oz Geomuster mega in Morriset).

Did you not notice the 200+ Geoart PT, a little north of the Central Coast just outside Maitland, a couple of months ago. I realise that it may not be your thing but, I agree, it does look quiet in your area.

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1 minute ago, colleda said:

Did you not notice the 200+ Geoart PT, a little north of the Central Coast just outside Maitland, a couple of months ago. I realise that it may not be your thing but, I agree, it does look quiet in your area.

 

Yes, I've been following the story of that PT on the Facebook group. Maitland's a fair drive from here and, while a T4 multi in stunning bushland would get me up there quick as a flash, not so much a PT.

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1 hour ago, barefootjeff said:

 

Here in the same country and just a few hundred kilometres away, in my region there've been only 12 new caches in the first half of this year, 2 of them mine. A few years back we'd be getting well over a hundred a year - there were 124 in 2013, 170 in 2014 , 159 in 2015, 77 in 2016, 61 in 2017 and 78 in 2018 (40 of which were geoart puzzles for the Oz Geomuster mega in Morriset).

From previous comments, I think that geocacher has moved south, to here. Am I correct?

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1 minute ago, Goldenwattle said:

From previous comments, I think that geocacher has moved south, to here. Am I correct?

 

She wasn't the only contributor. Here are the hides by CO from 2013 to the end of 2017, for those with more than 10. She was top of the list but there was a good spread of COs across those years, including me at number 4.

 

image.png.7640ce10520f7a0a7cdf2cd943fdb1fd.png

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I have the advantage of frequently traveling for work, so I am able to pick up a few no matter where I go.  Perhaps you can plan for a small vacation a little farther than you usually go for work and activities.  Do touristy things, and get caches everywhere you go.  I've never taken a vacation specifically for geocaching, but I certainly have gone to a work location a day or two before my scheduled event in order to have some good caching time!

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