Oregon Jasmer

[+jellis]

Back in June I came to Oregon to find the Oregon Jasmer and Fizzy Challenge. I did have a little problem finding the Jasmer due to the Devil's Club but I found it and it put it back safe and sound before I left. I posted a photo of the ammo can as proof I found it.  After that I had other cachers ask me where did I found it. I did give them nudges but they still couldn't find it. Recently some friends of mine said they tried and found a group of cachers searching. From what was said they practically destroyed the area searching. One photo by a witness showed a garden tool next to some wood. Do cachers have to be this extreme to find a cache or just except defeat and try again another time. I sent a message to the owner to see if they can check it to see if the cache was still there, cause I can not see any reason it would have gone missing after I found it as there was no one in sight and it even it took me awhile to avoid the Devil's Club and find it.

[+MNTA]

Having found this cache let me give my $0.02

 

Remote forest caches in the PNW are always tough even for local experienced cachers. In my case I found and signed it a week after a local filed a NM log. This cache is not for the faint of heart the forest road down/up to the cache is not the best I only remember doing this near the end of March after hitting snow blocking my planned trip nearby.  

 

Summer is not the best time of year for these caches tons of seasonal growth as you mentioned the dreaded Devil's Club, personally ran into some last week myself ouch. So bush wacking is not for the faint of heart, specially in shorts.

 

So personally fall/winter/spring is a better idea and the problem with caches that draw tourists which we have a lot of due to GC92 GC12 GC17 GCA5 to name a few. Is that if you have driven an hour outside of town then an 45 minutes up a forest road and walked maybe 15 minutes you really really want to get the find. Add to that you probably never are going to return. Personally I'm ok with returning another day as forest caching is my favorite activity just not in the summer besides its hot on most summer days give me a nice and cool 60s with a light mist any day. The scariest muggle you can run into is a logging truck on a dirt road.

 

Most COs place forest hides in a way to make it easy for folks (maybe just locals) to find specially since you usually have lots of tree cover and in the case of this cache probably lack of cell coverage. So your GPS is rarely accurate, one day coordinates can be spot on and the next finder complains they are off by 30 feet or more. Head to the obvious, stumps, logs, trees. The garden tools seem to be pretty common, I don't use them, mostly for black berry vines which can make a GZ inaccessible. Though I donated a lot of blood to find some caches. Now if foliage has grown up for the summer any man made path through waist high growth can cause a little distress usually there is a well worn trail to follow.

As you said forest caches rarely go missing, the exception being ones near hunters campsite, wildfire, or logging. In the case of this cache a finder will find it soon enough. Sounds like the CO has health issues and this cache will either be adopted or archived soon.

 

Edited August 24, 2022 by MNTA