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How many caches can you find in one day?


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26 minutes ago, NYPaddleCacher said:

There are a couple of trails here now, but before they were in place a few years ago it would have been very difficult to get 100+ caches in a day without driving a couple of hours away. 

I don't think driving a couple hours for a 100+ numbers run is unrealistic. The friends who found 100+ puzzle caches in a day did that. We were all in an area with pretty high cache density, but to get 100+ caches that none of them had already found, they chose a location a couple hours away. It happened to be an area with high puzzle cache density, so that's what they decided to do.

 

This was back before moden numbers trails, when a numbers run like this required advance work to choose the caches, plan the route, etc.

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37 minutes ago, NYPaddleCacher said:

 

It's also entirely possible that where you live isn't representative of many other places.   Cache machines may be common where you live but I've never heard of one happening anywhere in my state.   There are a couple of trails here now, but before they were in place a few years ago it would have been very difficult to get 100+ caches in a day without driving a couple of hours away.   Probably the most avid geocacher in my area once found 40 in a day (in this area).  She found many more in a day during trips out west but as incorrect to assume that it's impossible to find 100 in a day, it's equally incorrect to assume that it's easy to get 100+ in a day based on what it's like in the Northwest.  

Of course you haven't heard of a CM on your state, they are the creation of travisl and unique to the NW.  I never said it was easy to get a 100+ in day everywhere, just that it's been common in this area due to said CM's.  And many of them have been more than a "couple of hours away" for most participants(I've traveled over 5 hours to get to some).  Many places in the NW have wanted to have a CM but the density isn't great enough to support one.  I was just looking at the one where I got my high of 86 - the planned route was 118 miles long and had 110 caches (including the dinner event) on it (no power trails, no (generally) high terrain/difficulty, and shorter walks if needed).  This was less than 10% of the available caches in the area, so it takes a lot of work planning one.  They are not a "race" and are done at your pace, nor is everyone expected to get the entire route in one day (generally held on Saturday, so people can finish on Sunday if they want).  So while they are fun, they are a quirky event (the dinner afterwards is the event, the route is optional) for this area.

 

And, right back at you, where you live isn't representative of many other places.  Nor is Barefoot Jeff's area representative of many other places.  The cache density is different every place on earth.  I made no claims that what happens here can happen everywhere.  I simple was responding to someone who claimed it was impossible to get 100+ caches in a day without a group splitting up to log them.  While that may be true in some areas, it's not impossible everywhere.

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17 hours ago, cerberus1 said:
18 hours ago, NYPaddleCacher said:

Cache machines may be common where you live but I've never heard of one happening anywhere in my state.   

There are a couple of trails here now, but before they were in place a few years ago it would have been very difficult to get 100+ caches in a day without driving a couple of hours away.  

 

IIRC, this ended in 2011 with the OCATT series and surrounding caches in the Yonkers to Croton gorge park area. 30 miles. 

 

I've heard of the OCATT series, and know someone that used to live in Yonkers, but wasn't aware that is was used in a Cache Machine and it's over 4 hours away from here.

From the cache page on one of the OCATT caches:  "If you are looking for a quick P&G numbers crunch like other mega-series runs, this isn't it."   

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Our maximum in one day is 5 (five) caches found. Usually we do a bicycle trip and head to one(!) cache. That's it.

If you just want to push your statistics, I think you can easily just log 2000 "founds" on random caches as only a few owners will delete your log.

 

I don't get the point in throwing away hundreds of caches to a different spot along a highway. Are there people who do the ET highway without taking away the caches?

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17 minutes ago, Aprilscherzen said:

I don't get the point in throwing away hundreds of caches to a different spot along a highway. Are there people who do the ET highway without taking away the caches?

Yes, there are people who do numbers trails without using the three cache monte.

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On 9/17/2020 at 2:13 PM, niraD said:

I don't think driving a couple hours for a 100+ numbers run is unrealistic. The friends who found 100+ puzzle caches in a day did that. We were all in an area with pretty high cache density, but to get 100+ caches that none of them had already found, they chose a location a couple hours away. It happened to be an area with high puzzle cache density, so that's what they decided to do.

 

Especially if it's a geoart or two. Those in and of themselves are enticing to complete for many people, and often end up as series of quick roadside grabs within a few blocks.

 

 

2 hours ago, Aprilscherzen said:

Are there people who do the ET highway without taking away the caches?

 

I wouldn't doubt it. All it takes is a scan of the logs to see if anyone explains their strategy. Most likely anyone doing the series solo, or in a 'pure' fashion would have taken MUCH much longer to complete it, if they did end up completing it at all. To many, that could be considered a challenge itself, so I'm pretty confident there are many in the series history who've attempted and completed it those ways. But I'd bet the 'fastest' completions are more common (also since many travel on vacation time to do the series and don't want to take a week or more to finish it all :P)

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I found 67 or so one day, all individual caches, including 13 events all over the southern 2 counties of Delaware.  The next year, during the same event, we got a similar number, but planned for the way home... where we stopped and did the remaining caches to claim 101 that day (because we were working from paper notes, and I wasn't sure of my count).  We did those last remaining 27 or so caches the second year by doing (part of) a "power trail" in mid-Delaware, along a highway on our way home.  

In this way, we were able to claim the Century cache we had signed into (and filed a Note log) years earlier... 100 finds in a day.  

It IS possible.  We probably could have done it without the power trail (we still had 10 hours left in the day after the 6pm picnic event).  But we were exhausted and still had a 2 hour drive home, so we took the easy way out and finished our Century with a power trail.  

Mrs.Hoagie

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31 minutes ago, NYPaddleCacher said:
1 hour ago, GeoElmo6000 said:

You went to 13 events in one day?

that must have been before the "no event stacking" guideline.  

Not necessarily. I've seen people do that on days when Souvenir promotions took place. Another event was scheduled at the same time as ours, about 25 minutes away from ours. Both events were 30 minutes long. A group "attended" the first few minutes of the other event, drove to our event, and then "attended" the last few minutes of our event.

 

Most of us thought it was pretty lame, but we thought that Groundspeak's guidelines required the organizers to allow the Attended logs to stand.

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20 minutes ago, niraD said:

 I've seen people do that on days when Souvenir promotions took place. Another event was scheduled at the same time as ours, about 25 minutes away from ours. Both events were 30 minutes long. A group "attended" the first few minutes of the other event, drove to our event, and then "attended" the last few minutes of our event.

Most of us thought it was pretty lame, but we thought that Groundspeak's guidelines required the organizers to allow the Attended logs to stand.

Yep. 

We've seen a couple show, then leave after saying "hi" to folks.  Odd that these people often make sure they sign the logs.    :)

One said that there was an events total challenge at the time, and they were leaving for others, some many counties away.

We nod our heads and say "good luck", but thought the whole idea kinda rude to the EO. 

 - New folks came to the one we were at to meet them.  Too late.   Back then "numbers" still meant something I guess...

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4 hours ago, niraD said:

Not necessarily. I've seen people do that on days when Souvenir promotions took place. Another event was scheduled at the same time as ours, about 25 minutes away from ours. Both events were 30 minutes long. A group "attended" the first few minutes of the other event, drove to our event, and then "attended" the last few minutes of our event.

 

Most of us thought it was pretty lame, but we thought that Groundspeak's guidelines required the organizers to allow the Attended logs to stand.

I did a Flash mob at the Zurich train station then a regular dinner event in the evening.  There was also a CITO event in the area that day as well that I hadn't noticed until later.  I'm not sure that the events were related and didn't think of it as event stacking.  I did a fair amount of regular caching in between the events.  I could 2, even three events in a day without event stacking, but 13?

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55 minutes ago, NYPaddleCacher said:

I did a Flash mob at the Zurich train station then a regular dinner event in the evening.  There was also a CITO event in the area that day as well that I hadn't noticed until later.  I'm not sure that the events were related and didn't think of it as event stacking.  I did a fair amount of regular caching in between the events.  I could 2, even three events in a day without event stacking, but 13?

 

In the "Meet the Reviewers" session at the 2018 mega near here, my recollection is that they said they're quite strict here about event stacking and won't allow two events on the same day that are within reasonable driving distance (100km?) of each other. I don't know whether an exemption is made for special souvenir promotion days where attending or hosting an event on that day is needed for the souvenir.

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Okay, getting back on topic, yesterday I found 7 caches in the Watagan Mountains and visited another nearby one that I'd previously found. The seven, all part of the geoart series put out for the 2018 Morisset mega, were regular-sized containers hidden near overgrown and rutted gravel logging roads in stumps, hollow logs or at the base of trees. By the time I'd got to about the fifth one I was starting to think 'Can I go home yet?' I guess I'm not cut out to be a numbers cacher.

Edited by barefootjeff
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On 10/1/2020 at 12:42 PM, barefootjeff said:

By the time I'd got to about the fifth one I was starting to think 'Can I go home yet?' I guess I'm not cut out to be a numbers cacher.

 

I made up for that today, spending the whole day doing just one cache (GC6DQ30). It's listed as a T2.5, being a short climb and rock scramble up from the dirt road along the top of the ridge, but I decided to make it a T4 by starting my hike down in the valley, 5km away horizontally and 400 metres lower. A great day out with some nice views under a clear sunny sky. This is what caching's all about for me.

 

GoingUp.jpg.3815d038cf382d93ac0b9308e4013a94.jpg

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4 hours ago, barefootjeff said:

 

I made up for that today, spending the whole day doing just one cache (GC6DQ30). It's listed as a T2.5, being a short climb and rock scramble up from the dirt road along the top of the ridge, but I decided to make it a T4 by starting my hike down in the valley, 5km away horizontally and 400 metres lower. A great day out with some nice views under a clear sunny sky. This is what caching's all about for me.

 

GoingUp.jpg.3815d038cf382d93ac0b9308e4013a94.jpg

 

Jeff - Is that you?

'Cause, if it is, either you stepped in a deep muddy stream, or you ain't barefoot!

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1 hour ago, barefootjeff said:

 

Funny, it sure felt like I was barefoot.

 

Barefoot.jpg.a98fe8a2d80b302f744c7015aa70d3c3.jpg

 

Some of the dry creek crossings lower down were probably a bit muddy.

 

 

Once again you are an inspiration to us all.

Myself; I say "Ow" when going from carpet to linoleum!

----------------------------------------------

WITH my sneakers on!

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On 5/9/2014, I did a portion of the E.T. Highway with 3 other cachers.  We went from midnight to midnight (24 hours) only taking breaks every 90 minutes to swap drivers, relieve ourselves and stretch.  We also took a 2 hour break from caching to refuel our vehicle and check into our hotel.  We did the "Three Cache Monte" where we swapped film cans and stamped our logs in the vehicle to save time which (as noted in previous posts) is generally accepted on the E.T. Highway.  We also "replaced" any cache we determined to be missing.  We did NOT employ the "Divide and Conquer" method as we only had one vehicle and we weren't willing to play that way.  At one point, I found 105 caches in a 60 minute span and also found 151 in a 90 minute span...but that was during the day when we had good visibility.  In the end, we logged 1522 finds that day.  I look back on it today with fond memories with good friends, but at the time it was monotonous and exhausting so definitely classical Type Two Fun.  It should also be noted that I have ZERO desire to do it again.  NONE.  I was so sore from hundreds of 20 yard sprints that I could barely get out of bed the next morning.  

 

So, to answer the OP's question, if one was part of a dedicated group using the the generally accepted methods, took next to no time off, carried enough fuel and food to make it through the day without stopping, didn't get tired towards the end of the day, AND made finds at our highest rate per hour for 24 hours straight, then the math suggests that the extreme upper bound would be around 2400 finds.  Realistically speaking, I feel that 1700-1800 finds would have been the most we could have found that particular day if we didn't have to stop for 2 hours and 2000 finds would have been our upper limit had things gone absolutely perfectly.  

 

I've also found 100+ caches in a day more times than I can remember...mostly while riding bikes but sometimes in a car.  I seem to remember one day that I rode 50+ miles and found 300 or 350 in a day up in northern Minnesota.  That was with one other buddy and we were "leap frogging" the entire way...so I found a cache, he went to the next one, and if he didn't find it I would stop and look...otherwise he'd say he had it and I'd move along to the next one.  

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1 hour ago, Team Dennis said:

[...] where we swapped film cans [...] We also "replaced" any cache we determined to be missing [...]

In my view, both of these tactics put your "activity" outside the realm of geocaching. I know that it's "accepted" on the ET Trail, but it's not geocaching (maybe "powertrailing"?). If you reduce geocaching to "My name stands in some logbook, not necessarily in the one hidden by the CO, no holds barred!", then you can just as well include divide-and-conquer. And with that there are really no upper limits any more...

Edited by baer2006
typo
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1 hour ago, Team Dennis said:

We did the "Three Cache Monte" where we swapped film cans

 

We also "replaced" any cache we determined to be missing. 

 

were "leap frogging" the entire way...so I found a cache, he went to the next one,

 

Nope, nope and nope.

Don't know what you were doing but it wasn't geocaching.

 

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1 hour ago, Team Dennis said:

We also "replaced" any cache we determined to be missing.

I'm curious how long you looked before replacing a cache. 15 seconds tops? I recently posted a comment in a thread where a geocacher mentioned replacing 300 caches in one day. I asked if that was a record. Maybe she wasn't even close?

I will always and forever wonder about someone's find count after seeing posts like this. 

Edited by Max and 99
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1 hour ago, Team Dennis said:

I seem to remember one day that I rode 50+ miles and found 300 or 350 in a day up in northern Minnesota.  That was with one other buddy and we were "leap frogging" the entire way...so I found a cache, he went to the next one, and if he didn't find it I would stop and look...otherwise he'd say he had it and I'd move along to the next one.  

 

You indicate that you don't approve of the divide and conquer method but this sure seems like divide and conquer to me. 

 

1 hour ago, Team Dennis said:

We did NOT employ the "Divide and Conquer" method as we only had one vehicle and we weren't willing to play that way.

I realize those were two different outings that you went on, so if I got the wrong impression that you don't approve of that method then I apologize. 

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I think the only way to do the ET highway is the way Team Dennis did it. If I wanted to do it "properly" by picking up, signing, and returning each cache back in it's proper location then I doubt that I'd get much higher than a few hundred. But that's also a special case. People who do that in any other location ("couldn't find the cache so I helped by replaced it") are definitely doing the wrong thing.

 

On the other hand, doing the ET highway sounds like an absolutely terrible time to me. Driving endlessly, picking up identical caches and being hyper-focused all day just to get some number ... no thanks, not for me. :)

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1 minute ago, Unit473L said:

I think the only way to do the ET highway is the way Team Dennis did it. If I wanted to do it "properly" by picking up, signing, and returning each cache back in it's proper location then I doubt that I'd get much higher than a few hundred

If I ever do the ET Highway I will pick up each cache, sign the log in the cache, and return each cache to where I found it. If I can't find a cache I'll log a DNF.  I apologize to anyone if I get in your way if you're doing the ET Highway the same day as me. ?

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1 hour ago, Unit473L said:

I think the only way to do the ET highway is the way Team Dennis did it.

Not at all. There was one person who found several hundred ET Highway caches in a day solo, riding a motorcycle. Every cache was found, the log signed, and the container replaced as found. There was no three cache monte, and no leapfrogging or other divide-and-conquer shenanigans.

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3 hours ago, niraD said:

one person who found several hundred ET Highway caches

 

4 hours ago, Unit473L said:

doubt that I'd get much higher than a few hundred.

 

So I was right. :P

 

I wonder how many days it would take to do the whole lot, one person, properly? Might almost be easier to do on foot (with a support vehicle to carry food and water). Or maybe two people, one to drive the vehicle and one to jump out and do all the searching and logging. Though maybe it wouldn't need much searching if all the caches are on poles or otherwise easy to find.

 

3 hours ago, niraD said:

and the container replaced as found.

 

Ah, but if you found cache 124 in the spot where 123 is meant to be, would you put it back and reset all the misplaced caches? :D 

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3 hours ago, Unit473L said:

 

I wonder how many days it would take to do the whole lot, one person, properly? Might almost be easier to do on foot (with a support vehicle to carry food and water). Or maybe two people, one to drive the vehicle and one to jump out and do all the searching and logging. Though maybe it wouldn't need much searching if all the caches are on poles or otherwise easy to find.

 

 

Ok I know this is bad ...

 

My solo adventure was on a hot day so had the windows rolled down. I got to the point where I did not bother to turn the car off left the keys in the ignition. Between caches I know I did not always put on the seat belt. Yes you could see the next cache site. Very tedious and all the same hide type, but for numbers was good couple of minutes per cache it adds up and daylight fades. 

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Did you start "spacing out" at any stage? I can see it getting very monotonous and repetitive, and it might be hard to note how long you had been doing it.

 

With those caches, are they all the same? I can imagine whoever set them out might have gotten a bulk purchase of the same container. In which case I can see how it would work to pick up & travel while logging. If they're all basically the same.

 

And what are the logs? Is it just random paper and logs or is it a bit more orderly?

 

If I was going to set up a mega-power trail like that (which I wouldn't), I'd bulk purchase all the containers to be the same, then contract a printing company to do up all the stickers. Another bulk purchase of poles and mount all the containers on poles. maybe even stick a number, kind of like mile marker signs. If setting up that many caches, I'd simplify as much as possible!

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2 hours ago, Unit473L said:

Did you start "spacing out" at any stage? I can see it getting very monotonous and repetitive, and it might be hard to note how long you had been doing it.

 

With those caches, are they all the same? I can imagine whoever set them out might have gotten a bulk purchase of the same container. In which case I can see how it would work to pick up & travel while logging. If they're all basically the same.

 

And what are the logs? Is it just random paper and logs or is it a bit more orderly?

 

If I was going to set up a mega-power trail like that (which I wouldn't), I'd bulk purchase all the containers to be the same, then contract a printing company to do up all the stickers. Another bulk purchase of poles and mount all the containers on poles. maybe even stick a number, kind of like mile marker signs. If setting up that many caches, I'd simplify as much as possible!

I haven't done the ET train but from videos I've seen all of the caches look the same.  I'm curious about the logs though.  A *lot* of people of done the ET trail so I imagine that the logs are completely full.  I know many people use stamps on the trail.  Are they legible? It's not as if the CO is going to verify signatures, but are the logs becoming an inky mess?

 

There was another trail, I think in Idaho where the CO put stakes in the ground for each cache.  It was soon archived because the CO did not have permission to dig a hole.  Yes, pounding a pole/stake into the ground is considered digging.

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The ET power trail is known as a special case where people often do the Three Cache Monty and log extraordinary numbers of caches each hour.

 

If your reaction to that statement is: "GASP! :surprise:  I would *NEVER* do that!", then don't do it that way.

 

Several lackeys did this series in 2013 and noted in their blog post that their highest number in one hour was 116.  

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4 hours ago, Unit473L said:

And what are the logs? Is it just random paper and logs or is it a bit more orderly?

My understanding is that the owners provide a PDF that can be used to print log strips, and that many teams print these log strips, pre-stamp them with their team stamp, and insert them into film canisters. That way they can throw down a presigned container rather than log a DNF.

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7 hours ago, niraD said:

...the owners provide a PDF that can be used to print log strips, and that many teams print these log strips, pre-stamp them...

 

I literally burst out laughing when I read that, my wife is looking at me with a "what the..." expression. :laughing:

 

I can honestly say, that would never have occurred to me! Pre-filling logs is just ... wow. I am speechless. :D

 

Edit:

That way they can throw down a presigned container rather than log a DNF.

 

So ... does that mean the ET Highway can be done by rolling down the road at 50mph throwing film cannisters out the window every few seconds? Because that seems like the fastest way to do it. Also the least responsible and I hope nobody reads this and tries it. 

Edited by Unit473L
This numpty hit the submit button early...
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21 minutes ago, Unit473L said:

So ... does that mean the ET Highway can be done by rolling down the road at 50mph throwing film cannisters out the window every few seconds?

I think a more responsible approach would be to simply post online Find logs for all of them. That way, you aren't littering. Yes, it's armchair logging, but so is leapfrogging, and that's apparently sanctioned on the ET Highway.

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3 hours ago, Unit473L said:

So ... does that mean the ET Highway can be done by rolling down the road at 50mph throwing film cannisters out the window every few seconds? Because that seems like the fastest way to do it. Also the least responsible and I hope nobody reads this and tries it. 

 

Electric bike, net outta slow car, pooper scooper, and a mailbag fulla containers.     :D

 Pick up,  pitch to car in net, drop a container.   Rinse, repeat...

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On 10/7/2020 at 4:34 PM, Max and 99 said:

I'm curious how long you looked before replacing a cache. 15 seconds tops? I recently posted a comment in a thread where a geocacher mentioned replacing 300 caches in one day. I asked if that was a record. Maybe she wasn't even close?

I will always and forever wonder about someone's find count after seeing posts like this. 

 

I knew my post would bring on more questions, so here goes...  We looked for what we considered a reasonable amount of time.  If we found a pile of rocks with no cache under it, we dropped a new one.  If we didn't find a pile of rocks, we gave the area at least 60 seconds of 2 people searching before making a new pile of rocks at our GZ and then dropping a container.

 

We had one stretch of at least 50 caches that had recently gotten taken out by a road grader...literally nothing left but freshly leveled sand...no rock piles, no sage brush, no tracks, no nothing.  We replaced every single one of them.  

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On 10/7/2020 at 4:43 PM, Max and 99 said:

 

You indicate that you don't approve of the divide and conquer method but this sure seems like divide and conquer to me. 

 

I realize those were two different outings that you went on, so if I got the wrong impression that you don't approve of that method then I apologize. 

 

Divide and conquer (at least my definition) is multiple people (or multiple groups of people) going in all different directions and find specific caches that the others are never anywhere close to finding or seeing.  Not Team Dennis approved.  

 

Leap Frogging is as I described above:  2 or more people on a bike trail finding and moving one.  It's actually a lot of fun with 2 people.  Team Dennis approved.  

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17 hours ago, Unit473L said:

Did you start "spacing out" at any stage? I can see it getting very monotonous and repetitive, and it might be hard to note how long you had been doing it.

 

With those caches, are they all the same? I can imagine whoever set them out might have gotten a bulk purchase of the same container. In which case I can see how it would work to pick up & travel while logging. If they're all basically the same.

 

And what are the logs? Is it just random paper and logs or is it a bit more orderly?

 

If I was going to set up a mega-power trail like that (which I wouldn't), I'd bulk purchase all the containers to be the same, then contract a printing company to do up all the stickers. Another bulk purchase of poles and mount all the containers on poles. maybe even stick a number, kind of like mile marker signs. If setting up that many caches, I'd simplify as much as possible!

 

Not sure if this question was directed at me, but I do have some answers.

 

Yes, we were spacing out.  Big time.  Especially towards the end of our 24 hour run...which was actually 29 hours since we started at 7PM the previous day.  It became very difficult to focus as the driver, and finding caches got to be difficult as we were just so exhausted.  Our driver fell asleep with his foot on the brake in the 15 seconds we were stopped for a cache.  

 

The E.T. Highway is nearly all plastic film cans with a few notable exceptions like the 0001 and 2000 and a few more.  We brought several hundred replacements that we bought on eBay for next to nothing...I think like maybe $10 including shipping.

 

Logs are just strips of paper just wide enough to curl up inside the film cans.

 

The original E.T. Highway were all hidden on metal sign posts right near the edge of the road, but that series got archived because a Nevada DOT vehicle came around a corner and almost hit a cacher's vehicle that was pulled over in a blind spot.  That stretch of the E.T. Highway (something like 2-3 miles???) still has no caches hidden on it because of this near miss.  

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For what it's worth, I grew sick of chasing numbers years ago because it just wasn't fun anymore.  I probably won't even find 150 caches this year, but the ones I found are the types that I like...mostly ones at the end of a long hike or a mountain climb or virtuals.  I think I found at least 6 hides over 14,000' above sea level this summer alone...THOSE are the kind of numbers in which I am interested these days.  

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15 minutes ago, Team Dennis said:

Divide and conquer (at least my definition) is multiple people (or multiple groups of people) going in all different directions and find specific caches that the others are never anywhere close to finding or seeing.  Not Team Dennis approved.  

 

Leap Frogging is as I described above:  2 or more people on a bike trail finding and moving one.  It's actually a lot of fun with 2 people.  Team Dennis approved.  

 

On 10/7/2020 at 3:13 PM, Team Dennis said:

That was with one other buddy and we were "leap frogging" the entire way...so I found a cache, he went to the next one, and if he didn't find it I would stop and look...otherwise he'd say he had it and I'd move along to the next one.  

Maybe I'm not understanding what you are saying but this sure sounds like divide and conquer to me. I read it as though each of you only found every other cache. 

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1 hour ago, Max and 99 said:

Maybe I'm not understanding what you are saying but this sure sounds like divide and conquer to me. I read it as though each of you only found every other cache. 

Yeah, I don't see much difference between John finding caches 1-1000 while Jane finds caches 1001-2000, vs John finding caches 1, 3, 5, etc., while Jane finds caches 2, 4, 6, etc.

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3 hours ago, niraD said:
4 hours ago, Max and 99 said:

Maybe I'm not understanding what you are saying but this sure sounds like divide and conquer to me. I read it as though each of you only found every other cache. 

Yeah, I don't see much difference between John finding caches 1-1000 while Jane finds caches 1001-2000, vs John finding caches 1, 3, 5, etc., while Jane finds caches 2, 4, 6, etc.

 

Plenty of difference. In the latter, John and Jane were both likely seeing or touching every cache as they passed by. In the former, if John starts at #1 and the Jane at #1000, both only see or visit half the caches. This is the same as if say the two were doing a hiking power trail. Together they go to #1, Jane finds it and signs in both, but while she's signing, John goes to the next to search. They don't move on to #3 until Jane arrives. If it's being signed, Jane moves on to #4 and John can catch up. And so on. Optimizing time is an effective form of 'leapfrogging', and very different from the potential gap employed by 'divide and conquer' where groups are not even near all the caches they claim to 'find'.  I know first hand that in our area 'divide and conquer' is often used by many in large caching groups, and it's extremely annoying. "You don't need to go find that one, we already signed the group in."  Well then I won't log it unless I go to the cache and find it.  That's the effect of divide and conquer.

But leapfrogging - people will have various limits of acceptable "finding" of a cache before moving on, but it's almost certainly a linear strategy where every individual comes to at least first-hand knowledge of the geocache location.  Completely skipping caches has an inherent a risk - if John and Jane delegate say odds and evens (much more akin to D&C), then if one person has an issue, there could be a hangup and the other wouldn't know.

 

Now whether you think this optimal time-use leapfrogging is "geocaching" or not, the only point I'm making is that conceptually "leap frogging" !== "divide and conquer". At worst, perhaps a lesser form of it.

 

Personally, I've been very transparent about not logging caches I have not visited, don't feel I would have found, or missed a key experience for the finding of the cache.  I'll leapfrog like above on powertrails if the caches are simple and quick finds along the trail and I see the cache and feel I'd have found it. I won't log a stretch of the trail I did not visit if I bow out early, even if the rest of the group signed me in.

Similarly, for long roadside powertrails, occasionally if we have two vehicles, we may employ the same strategy. While one vehicle signs in, the other might pass by, slowly, to see the cache (it might get held up visibly), and continue on to start searching for the next. 

 

Keep in mind remember this is all in the context of powertrails, generally where the cache owner has not provided unique special experiences for each geocache, and fully expects this kind of "finding". And in most cases for the people I know or cache with, this kind of "finding" doesn't happen outside of powertrails (because where's the fun in skipping all the fun?). It's a different mentality - but it is 'legal' by the guideline minimum (name in logbook to log it found online).  And for sure it's a far cry from walking to a geocache location in a forest and enjoying a good, hearty, classic single geocache experience.

Not everyone enjoys powertrails (or various strategies people employ while doing them), and that's just fine :) 

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8 minutes ago, thebruce0 said:

John and Jane were both likely seeing or touching every cache as they passed

Not according to what was posted. 

 

On 10/7/2020 at 3:13 PM, Team Dennis said:

If he didn't find it I would stop and look...otherwise he'd say he had it and I'd move along to the next one.  

 

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