What's the longest a cache has gone before finally being found?

[Alpenglow Expat]

I placed a geocache on Dur Ghella island, a part of Eritrea, in the Red Sea in November 2005. It's not an easy place to get to. Getting permission to travel almost anywhere in Eritrea is not easy. So the cache remained unfound. Occasionally, someone would propose archiving it, but others always jumped in to defend it because it was in such an unusual and seldom visited place. 

Almost 20 years later, someone has found it! Or what is left of it at least. User @after8 visited the island, sent pictures that confirm their find, and maintained the cache! I'm so glad there was at least something left to find and that the cache proved to be as much of an adventure to find as it was to place. 

 

[+Smitherington]

My guess is that is a record. I’m glad you waited for the first finder. 

[+ViezeVingertjes]

That's amazing! 20 years?! 

[+Goldenwattle]

WOW, waiting pays off. Good it wasn't archived.

[RuideAlmeida]

20 hours ago, Smitherington said:

My guess is that is a record. I’m glad you waited for the first finder. 

 

I think it still belongs to this one...

[+baer2006]

3 hours ago, RuideAlmeida said:

 

I think it still belongs to this one...

That one was actually a DNF + a throwdown.

 

In the OP's example, the original cache has actually been found (at least its clearly identifyable remains).

[RuideAlmeida]

1 hour ago, baer2006 said:

... (at least its clearly identifyable remains).

 

So, a throwdown also.

[+baer2006]

1 hour ago, RuideAlmeida said:

 

So, a throwdown also.

True. But I tend to give some leeway to "finder maintenance", when the original cache in bad shape was actually found. As opposed to finding nothing at all, and just assuming that there once was a cache where you just placed your throwdown.

 

But anyway, yes, the record for the longest time for an FTF to find a (more or less) intact cache would be interesting to know as well 😉.

[Stebin92]

I'm quite new to geocaching, I started 1.5 years ago and I've almost 500 finds.

The longest-unfound cache I found was this one, untouched for 3.5 years before me.

As vegetation has grown and paths have disappeared, it was very difficult to find a way to GZ between trees. The original rate of T2 is probably around T4 now. And this was in winter. In spring/summer/early fall it would probebly be impossible becaause of the dense vegetation.

Edited May 13 by Stebin92

[+MNTA]

10 hours ago, Stebin92 said:

I'm quite new to geocaching, I started 1.5 years ago and I've almost 500 finds.

The longest-unfound cache I found was this one, untouched for 3.5 years before me.

As vegetation has grown and paths have disappeared, it was very difficult to find a way to GZ between trees. The original rate of T2 is probably around T4 now. And this was in winter. In spring/summer/early fall it would probebly be impossible becaause of the dense vegetation.

Thanks for sharing and congratulations. Fun to find "lonely" caches. I still get excited about my quest for my loneliest cache find of 8.5 years. Took me 4 attempts to find a way to access as the original road had been long blocked and I hit snow a couple of times. Found an  old logging road from google satellite view that was not on any of my physical or digital maps and managed to get 0.1 miles across a small river (cache name was dangerous creek as it was the site of an old washed out bridge)  I had to find a way to cross. I documented my finds in logs hoping others would follow. Now it's been a little over three years and no one has logged a visit hope it will be found soon.

 

Keep on caching!

[+2Abendsegler]

8.5 years, fantastic! Great story in your log! And that's with a D1/T2. If that were higher, there would probably be more interest in following you.

[+thebruce0]

I wonder what the oldest last-found but archived (and not removed) cache is   I stopped by a cache that was DNF'd and archived years prior, but found clear remnants of the cache container where a tree had been basically destroyed by nature.  Cleared up the remains and logged a find as it wasn't locked    Finding archived geocaches is a challenge in and of itself. Could be another interesting stat

[+barefootjeff]

Around here, FTFs tend to get claimed fairly quickly but it can then be a long wait for the next finder. In August 2017, one of my friends created an EarthCache (GC7BE3Q) near Newnes in the western Blue Mountains. FTF was claimed about a month later and that's been it. Admittedly there are perhaps some reasons for that, firstly the Black Summer fires of 2019, then COVID in 2020 and 2021, then the deluges over the next few years that caused a landslip blocking the only road into the township. An alternative "road", an historic track called the Donkey Steps, was opened to traffic but it's 4WD-only.and very steep. A new road following a different alignment is planned, but it's not currently due for completion until 2031 so it may be a while longer before that cache sees its 2TF.

 

[+Goldenwattle]

Some years ago I was planning a trip to the Chatham Islands, a remote island in the Pacific east of NZ, and was hoping to log two caches there which hadn't had a FTF for eight months. Someone beat me to it by two weeks. My FTFs that waited the longest for me to find, was a short power-trail waiting about a week without a FTF. Here in Canberra FTF logs happen very quickly.

 

I did have another FTF in the Chathams though. An Earthcache was published while I was visiting.

 

Chatham Airlines at Wellington Airport, and aboard with the cargo.

  

 

I logged my most westerly cache there: 
(from Prime Meridian)

GC2DNHK - First to See the Sun, Chatham Islands, New Zealand (Chatham Islands, New Zealand)
S 43° 57.763 W 176° 34.607

(My most eastern is: GC22PA5 - Ka Awatea Hou (Te Tairawhiti) (North Island, New Zealand)
S 37° 41.344 E 178° 32.898 - I have been looking to better this.)

 

Edited Tuesday at 02:36 AM by Goldenwattle

[+Chwiliwr]

Whilst caches in Canberra generally do get found very quickly my longest FTF was a Canberra cache at just over two years. ( GC6VKWE Perplexing Pentominoes )  Whilst I had solved the puzzle not all that long after it was published it took me the two years before I could make the trip from Western Australia to Canberra to find it and need then needed the CO to help with the required TOTT to reach it.

[+niraD]

8 hours ago, barefootjeff said:

Around here, FTFs tend to get claimed fairly quickly but it can then be a long wait for the next finder.

I know someone who was STF for a wilderness multicache. As I recall, FTF had taken a couple years, and then she was STF a few years after that. The cache required a 3-day backpacking trip: one day to get to the cache area, one day to do the cache, and one day to return to the trailhead. As I recall, one of the stages had been compromised, but she was able to work out where the final had to be without it.

[+BirdSearcher]

9 hours ago, thebruce0 said:

wonder what the oldest last-found but archived (and not removed) cache is   I stopped by a cache that was DNF'd and archived years prior, but found clear remnants of the cache container where a tree had been basically destroyed by nature.  Cleared up the remains and logged a find as it wasn't locked    Finding archived geocaches is a challenge in and of itself. Could be another interesting stat

While looking for a hiding spot to place  a new cache , I stumbled upon the stage 2 of a multi-cache that was archived 10 years prior & never removed 😮 It was in fine shape too! I have been retrieving lots of archived caches(litter) lately but that is the oldest so far.

[+brekkcaching123]

The loneliest traditional cache is in Boise, Idaho about 4 hours from my home. GCJXZF. Hasn't been found since 2007.

 

[+Goldenwattle]

7 hours ago, brekkcaching123 said:

The loneliest traditional cache is in Boise, Idaho about 4 hours from my home. GCJXZF. Hasn't been found since 2007.

 

I was going to say, "Off you go and find it then", but first I put it in Google maps. Oh, now I see the problem and reason for it's long not found😆.

[+brekkcaching123]

1 hour ago, Goldenwattle said:

I was going to say, "Off you go and find it then", but first I put it in Google maps. Oh, now I see the problem and reason for it's long not found😆.

i'm Headed to Boise in two weeks. I'd have to add a whole extra day to find that cache😂😂

[+thebruce0]

I"m really hoping the original california fizzy cache GC11E8N opens again; qualified 3 years ago. It was disabled 5 years ago due to the major forest fires but hasn't reopened since. I just checked and kealia is indeed still trying to get it back up again but apparently the whole area is still closed off, even though the fires were so long ago. As long as he keeps checking it and verifying, it can stat disabled until otherwise.  As a challenge cache it's a task to analyze for when the last actual find was At least more than just looking at the last Find. Need to look at notes and Finds for text indicating the geocacher signed the physical log. Ain't no body got time fo that taday!

Edited Wednesday at 01:24 PM by thebruce0