How do you hide caches to stump them? Hiding strategies

[+Paul Ag]

I am in a new phase of geocaching. I am over the initial going out every waking second to find them and I am also over the stage of throwing caches together quickly to get my hide rating up. I guess I am maturing in my old age.

 

I have this new desire to stump the geocacher, to make it so hard (but fair) to have them look for hours when it is right under there nose. I love it when someone can't find my cache only to find out the next day it was found by a group of 7 year olds. I hope it makes the geocacher feel, … hell, feel like a failure.

 

Let’s face it. Most caches can be found by the blind with a compass. No offense to the blind. We are too easy to the common geocacher. We need more caches to test their patience. p*ss them off.

 

Okay now to my question, what hiding tricks do you have to stump them?

 

One technique, I have is the old “You just think it is in the bushes, but in reality it is that cylinder that is cover with bark, sucker.” That seems to get most cache baggers.

[+RobertM]

quote:

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Originally posted by Paul Ag '94:

I am also over the stage of throwing caches together quickly to get my hide rating up.

---

 

Mmmmmm, your profile currently says:

Found = 29

Hidden = 30

Now when did you say you got over that stage?

 

quote:

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Originally posted by Paul Ag '94:

I guess I am maturing in my old age.

---

 

Yeah, whatever.

[+Paul Ag]

I have been on a vacation from geocaching for a year or so. A little here or there, but nothing serious. Those hides stats are from my youth in 2001, before you came on board, you 2002er.

[+RobertM]

quote:

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Originally posted by Paul Ag '94:

...you 2002er.

---

 

That's "August 2002er". ;-)

[+canadazuuk]

quote:

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Originally posted by Paul Ag '94:

 

I am in a new phase of geocaching.

 

I have this new desire to stump the geocacher, to make it so hard (but fair) to have them look for hours when it is right under there nose. I love it when someone can't find my cache only to find out the next day it was found by a group of 7 year olds.

---

 

You aren't alone it appears.

 

It was once a novel idea to hide a cache so that it could be found, and include a clue that actually proved to be helpful.

 

Now it seems people want to make a cache, where the primary purpose is to annoy the seeker. This leads to destroyed areas near caches among other things you have so duly noted.

 

Hopefully you enjoy seeking out these caches as well, so that you don't get accused of being a geohypocrite.

[+ZingerHead]

As long as you make them clever rather than just plain mean, anything goes. You could just hide a hollow rock in a pile of rocks to **** somebody off, but that's not clever. Some of the most memorable and talked-about caches around here were very tough hides that took a lot of creativity and hard work to set up. I guess the best way to describe them is that they forced you to recalibrate your sense of what a geocache is.

[+RobertM]

The other problem is that you get a lot of people posting NOT FOUNDs on the page even although the coordinates have been confirmed a dozen times by you and others, etc, etc. Ask me, I know. I hid a cache (Just Find It!) and all I did was spray the container a different colour and people can't find. It's basically in plane sight behind a thin-stemmed tree. I've been told the coords are spot on by those that have found it. It's easier and less headache to just place a plane old cache that easy for people to find else you get all these negative logs and e-mails from everyone whining.

[+Paul Ag]

quote:

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Originally posted by canadazuuk:

Originally posted by Paul Ag '94:

 

This leads to destroyed areas near caches among other things you have so duly noted.

 

---

 

How true, good point! I have seen that before, my caches have indirectly killed some plants. Sorry God. I had to archive the caches because I felt somewhat responsible. We learn from our mistakes, or until people like you point them out.

[+canadazuuk]

quote:

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Originally posted by Paul Ag '94:

 

Okay now to my question, what hiding tricks do you have to stump them?

 

---

 

Decoys. Plain and simple.

[+Bloencustoms]

I've been chewing on an idea for a micro that will be attached to a length of bungee cord. This will be inserted into a vertical tube with the end facing down. A thin piece of monofilament will extend down to the tube opening. To retrieve the cache, one would pull down on the monofilament untill the bungee stretched enough to allow access to the cache. The only problem is, I have yet to find a suitable overhanging tube in an area that would merit a cache.

 

"The fertilizer has hit the ventilator"

[+honeychile]

I feel that I've failed if there are multiple "not founds" on my caches. I want them to be hard enough to be challenging, but not so difficult as to make people mad.

 

For me, I like it when the difficulty of the find is inversely proportionate to the difficulty of the hike. If I trek 3 miles one way up a mountain to find a cache, it makes me mad to find a micro in a snake hole. After a long hike, I wanna sit down with a big fat ammo box full of treasures. (BTW, I also want world peace.)

 

On the other hand, if the distance is 400' from the parking lot, then I expect to spend some time looking for the micro in the snakehole.

 

Regarding the ecology issue, I have to agree with Canadazuuk. Multiple people doing a scorched earth hunt for a micro in the woods can really tear up an area. If I were a land manager, I would welcome geocaching and traditional caches, but I wouldn't permit micros in wooded areas.

 

But back to the original question. I like to be sneaky, but sometimes I'm limited by the area. I recently bought an ammo tube that I planned to strap upright to the trunk of an evergreen, above eye level. But when I got to the park I'd chosen, there were no evergreens large enough to support the tube. Darn. Had to do the typical roothole thing. I made it a multi-stage to add to the difficulty.

 

I've had good luck making insulation foam stumps that fake out innocent passersby, but really don't fool geocachers for too long.

 

And the dollar store sells fake rock key hiders that work nicely in a multi-stage.

 

The hardest one I've found lately was on a multi-stage hunt for a number of black film canisters. There was a huge hollow tree that matched the coordinates, but I looked several times and saw nothing in that tree. Closer inspection (as I was desperately looking everywhere I had already looked for the fifth time) revealed the film canister hanging inside the hollow tree, suspended with fishing line. It was nearly invisible against the dark inside of the tree. Definitely one of those forehead-slapping moments.

 

[+briansnat]

My hide strategy fits in exactly with Honeychile's post. If my cache is in the woods at the end of a nice hike, its ususally an ammo box hidden well enough and far enough off the beaten path to prevent accidental discovery, but somewhat obvious to someone who is actually looking for it. I don't want people ripping up the area looking for my cache. I also try to make my encrypted hint a dead giveaway.

 

If I have a cache in an urban, or heavily used area, I try to be a bit more clever with my hides. But still, I provide a dead giveaway clue in most cases. To me the point is for people to find my caches, not for me to stump them.

 

I do have one cache out there created specifically to be difficult, just has a change of pace. But in this case, there is nothing in the area for people rip up. I also pretty much tell them where it is on the cache page. They look right at it and don't "see" it. I can e-mail you the specifics, but don't want to post them here because a lot of local geocachers come to these forums.

 

"Give a man a fish, he'll eat for a day. Teach a man to fish, he'll sit in a boat and drink beer all day" - Dave Barry

[+Sissy-n-CR]

I'm a firm believer in making hides interesting.

 

There are two modes of making caches hard once on site; hard to find and hard to retrieve. Sounds like you're wanting hard to find.

 

I guess the first thing you have to realize and it's been touched on already, the harder you make it the more time the finder will be on-site. The longer they are on site, the more tracks they will leave. Therefore the area needs to have durable surface. Alternately, the area has to have a lot of foot traffic so no one can tell the cacher's footprints from the muggle's. In other words, the area needs to be able to support two or more people in hiking boots trampling heavily around for a couple of hours and you'd never know it from looking at the area even after they just left. You can go for slightly less durable areas like lawn grasses, but look at the type most grasses can't handle real heavy traffic, but plenty of city parks use grass meant for foot traffic and is tougher--you have to decide if it's durable enough.

 

Also, You have to take into account the wide area a cacher might look because of the inherent assumption that their, or your, GPS has a larger error than normal. It's natural for cachers to fan out from their ground zero.

 

Now that you've found a suitable site that show evidence of additional activity, it's time to hide the cache.

 

Here is where additional challenges come in. These include, but are certainly not limited to, making a cache container out of objects found in the environment, making a full trading cache smaller and smaller (the smallest trading cache I found so far is an APS film cannister), and hiding larger regular cache containers in near open situations.

 

Making containers out of items found in the environment could include fake electrical boxes, fake lawn sprinklers and control boxes, fake rocks, fake tree limbs or stumps, fake benchmarks, fake dog doot, pine cones, the list goes on and on. The ability to hide something like this is only limited my your imagination and your craftsmanship.

 

Also, you can hide things in readily available hiding spots. You might get permission to magnetically attach a large mirco or small regular to the bottom of the water main lid. The list is endless on this, as well. One word of caution, if I undestand correctly the only person allowed to go into a mailbox are the authorities and the box owner--so that's out.

 

I've found full sized caches literally within 2 feet of a sidewalk on a buzy college campus.

 

Here's one that was visited a great number of times and is (was) in a very small park before coming up missing. It was in a simple small tupperware container, not hard to find. So caches in high traffic areas can last a while and not even be hidden that well. Add to this a good bit of camouflage and making it look like it belongs you have a recipe for success.

 

CR

 

[+Sissy-n-CR]

quote:

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Originally posted by honeychile:

...revealed the film canister hanging inside the hollow tree, suspended with fishing line. It was nearly invisible against the dark inside of the tree.

---

 

The very reason I'm looking into one of those "tactical, hand-held sun" mini flashlights I mentioned in another thread. Bright enough to illuminate a hollow tree, but doesn't weight 10 lbs.

 

Also, I recently picked up one of THESE, an inspection mirror. That company has a $25 minimum, though. You can pick up a smaller one from your local Sears. Works great when trying to look up inside a hollow tree for a cache, saves having to feel around blindly.

 

CR

 

[BassoonPilot]

All one has to do is give the cache difficulty and/or terrain ratings of 3 or above. People either won't find it (regardless of how it is hidden), or won't seek it.

 

There is no faster or easier way to turn a "4-star" hiding technique into just another "1.5-star" technique than 'confiding' it in the forums.

[+Sissy-n-CR]

quote:

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Originally posted by BassoonPilot:

There is no faster or easier way to turn a "4-star" hiding technique into just another "1.5-star" technique than 'confiding' it in the forums.

---

 

Security through obscurity is just plain dumb. Not only that, but I don't think there is such a thing as 4 star hide; the overall hunt, yes, but the end game? I don't think so. Not unless it requires something special, but then just knowing about it wouldn't drop the rating.

 

Plus, by your logic, the same technique can only be used once in an area.

 

I figure if your technique is so weak that reading a hint in the forums makes it a give-away, then it's not much of a technique after all.

 

Eventually, experienced cachers are going to run across all kinds of techniques and giving up some basic techniques to newbies in the forums isn't going to hurt anyone.

 

Now don't get me wrong, specific techniques and examples don't belong in the forums. For that, direct email should be your choice.

 

CR

 

[OuttaHand]

Two caches come to mind as far as clever hiding spots. One is a cache I found last weekend. It was a tupperware container inside a hollow upright tree. Basic enough. Except that when you looked inside the hollow opening at the base of the tree, you saw nothing. Along the inside edge of the tree was an upright stick. On top of the stick was the tupperware. Completely out of sight until you looked UP into the hollow and/or moved the vertical support stick. #2 is one my dad hid. It is in a round 1/2 gallon clear container. He found a fallen birch tree which was decaying apart. For those of you who know trees, you know that the insides of a birch will rot out and leave the bark. My dad took a hollow section of bark from the center, wrapped it around the cache container, and replaced it back into the center of the fallen log --right in line as if it were still in tact. The cache description describes it as a regular sized cache so you don't really look at a 6" diameter log for such a container.

[BassoonPilot]

quote:

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Originally posted by Sissy-n-CR:

 

Security through obscurity is just plain dumb. Not only that, but I don't think there is such a thing as 4 star hide; the overall hunt, yes, but the end game? I don't think so.

---

 

One of us is confused; I never mentioned "security" being an issue. Also, there definitely are true 4 star (or higher) difficulty caches that don't feature puzzles or gimmicks ... just creative/imaginative means of hiding. I've found a few of them.

 

quote:

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... Not unless it requires something special, but then just knowing about it wouldn't drop the rating.

---

 

Of course it would. Once you've done (or read about) a cache hidden using a particular technique, you will automatically consider that technique on subsequent hunts. From your post, I know you'd be surprised by a few of the places people have hidden full size ammo boxes ... and the difficulty even very experienced cachers have had in finding them. That's precisely why I think it's best not to "give away the goods" here in the forums ...

 

quote:

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Plus, by your logic, the same technique can only be used once in an area.

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I wasn't referring to copy-cat caches in my previous post, but thanks for bringing it up. I have found it absolutely true that once a new technique has appeared in an area several similar caches usually appear in quick succession. And even when all of the caches have been well implemented, once a cacher has found one of the caches and learned "the trick," the rest present little, if any, challenge. I'm not saying that's good or bad; that's just the way it is. For me, it cheapens the original cache a little and takes some of the fun out of all of them.

 

quote:

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Eventually, experienced cachers are going to run across all kinds of techniques and giving up some basic techniques to newbies in the forums isn't going to hurt anyone.

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Well, in my opinion it's cheating the newbies. I prefer people to be creative ... to use their own imagination. I would recommend that people who don't consider themselves especially creative or imaginative would receive a much better education in hiding techniques by going out and looking for as many different kinds of caches as they can. Of course, that requires more effort than reading the forums does ...

 

Someone suggested near the top of the thread that the hiders of well-concealed caches are responsible for areas being torn up.

 

Baloney. It's the idiots who expect to find every cache in under two minutes, regardless of rating, who are responsible. Every well-concealed cache I've found has been accessible without causing any damage to the area. It seems the hardest technique for people to learn is to stop, open their eyes, consider what they see and take nothing for granted ... I think most damage is caused intentionally by unthinking, frustrated seekers.

 

[This message was edited by BassoonPilot on June 26, 2003 at 07:54 AM.]

[BassoonPilot]

I've reconsidered; CR is right. Here is the best hint I can provide our newbie pals:

 

1. Make your hide look "natural."

a. Hide the cache under sticks, but don't place the sticks parallel to each other.

b. Hide the cache behind a rock. For an easy find, put the cache behind a rock of a different color from the surrounding rocks; for a harder find, use a rock of the same color.

c. Add lots of detritus.

[+Alan2]

If it took me that long to find someone's caches on a regular basis, I would stop hunting their caches. I don't like spending that much time poking around in tick infested areas where most woods type caches around here are located. I also just don't like poking around, period, for that long a time. I'd rather be enjoying the hike or view at another cache.

 

Alan

[+High Desert Fish]

I have made my 1st 4 caches and I do get complaints that they are too easy. I do point out that I do not want the surrounding area destroyed. It is funny the way it varries on cachers. Somethimes a cache is really hard for an experienced cacher while others do not have a hard time at all. I give hints if people have trouble. I email them. I am in all this for the fun. I do not compete.

[+Paul Ag]

quote:

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Some of the most memorable and talked-about caches around here were very tough hides that took a lot of creativity and hard work to set up.

---

 

Another good point. I like this idea better than my first idea of the slight of hand trick. I like the concepts of fake rocks, hollow out stumps, microcaches with magnets etc. Creativity is the key. Thanks

[+The Leprechauns]

I've put out a few caches, and found many, that use the "misdirect" technique. In its simplest form, you find a place with an obvious hiding spot, like a large hollow tree or an overturned stump. Then you walk past that, twenty feet away, to a less-than-ideal hiding spot, like on the ground under a bush. The idea is to get everyone to spend a few minutes looking at the obvious spot before they turn around and see the cache. In one of my multicaches, the first stage is a one-pint rubbermaid container, in plain sight, with no camoflage. Only one person has been able to find it because it's ten feet away from a large overturned tree. Regrettably, I may need to move it because it's a three-mile hike to stage one and I am getting too many "couldn't find it" logs.

 

On the hunting side, my favorite misdirect thus far was where the coordinates took me to an abandoned stone well. The cache HAD to be down in the well. I spent my time looking for ropes, loose rocks, etc., while one of my companions found the cache under a rock 15 feet away.

 

In a more evil form, the misdirect hide can involve creating fake stick piles and fake rock piles, simulating a poor hide, and then concealing the cache in a more expert fashion.

 

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Some mornings, it just doesn't pay to chew through the leather straps. - Emo Phillips

[+Sissy-n-CR]

BP, I hope I didn't come off as a jerk. Okay, so I know I came off as a jerk. I appologize.

 

What frustrates me is people being too tight lipped about hide techniques. I understand about spoilers in the forums, I just wish there was a good way to share techniques without giving things away.

 

quote:

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Originally posted by BassoonPilot:

From your post, I know you'd be surprised by a few of the places people have hidden full size ammo boxes ... and the difficulty even very experienced cachers have had in finding them

---

 

This is exactly what I mean. I've come across a few like that, but I would certianly like to learn more. I've found caches that other people have put in their log that they've sat on to decrypt the hint!

 

I really wish I had the time and resources to visit every 3+ cache that is cleverly hidden. "Little Nasty" really intrigues me, but much too far away for a visit.

 

It's the clever hides that intrique me and I want to learn more.

 

CR

 

[Team VaxCave]

On the lines of not putting caches in the obvious spot, another option is to place the cache in a place that has an overabundance of 'obvious spots'. Such as an old stone wall with numerous holes and cracks, an area with many trees that are fallen or hollowed, etc.

 

When we hide our caches we almost always create fake concealed spots within a 50 foot radius. It just keeps things interesting. I agree on the notion that I don't want to walk 3 miles and then have to search alongside a cliff or an insanely small cache. Anything more than a mile walk I want some nice trinkets to paw through. I love the urban microcaches though. It's all about thinking like other cachers and having enough stealth to not alert the muggles to your intentions.

 

::+::=::+::=::+::=::+::=::+::=::+::=::+::=::+::=::+::=::+::=::+::=::+::

Searching through the cave. Team VaxCave.

[+Renegade Knight]

1) Dont post your idea or as Bassoon says it will be just another idea that has been done and easy.

2) Figure out where everyone will look. Don't put the cache there.

3) Make sure the area is resistant to mass destruction from people looking. I had to archive a cache because people ransacked the area. It's not like I didn't tell them it was hard...

 

That's about it. No 2 works well if you can get in the right frame of mind.

[+Kite and Hawkeye]

quote:

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Originally posted by RobertM:

I hid a cache (Just Find It!) and all I did was spray the container a different colour and people can't find. It's basically in plane sight behind a thin-stemmed tree. I've been told the coords are spot on by those that have found it. It's easier and less headache to just place a plane old cache that easy for people to find else you get all these negative logs and e-mails from everyone whining.

---

 

I love a challenge, but I would also be irked if I went to a difficulty 1 cache that took an hour of searching. I'd suggest rating it higher and just saying it's challenging -- people may complain anyway, but they won't really have a leg to stand on.

[+Turtle3863]

I have found a new way to make a urban cache a challenge without having people destroy the area and making cachers think outside the box. Without giving too much away, you take a item that people see or pass by everyday and you insert a cord. into it. You know like that little made by bla/ bla company lettering on the edge of a stop sign, or a serial # label on a light pole. These cords are a 1st stage to the final cache. I explain on the cache page that the cords are in plain veiw and no poking around is nessassary.

 

Slow and Steady Wins the Race

[+Web-ling]

My tactic is to look around the area where I'm placing the cache, note all of the places I'd be looking if I were hunting a cache, then hide it somewhere else.

 

[+Confucius' Cat]

This One surprised me.

 

It is a very large bottle and the hide is very simple. Just a camo-taped jar sitting there in the middle of a very busy city park.

 

No great hiding technique, but so far has evaded the muggles.

 

Seems to me such a simple technique as putting something above (or below) eye level and making it look like its surroundings is usually good enough to fool most.

 

Above eye level works best. Think where you usually look- on the ground.

 

Put a cache 8-10 feet off the ground and it'll stay there. Of course there must be some means of getting it without dragging a ladder into the woods.

 

Caint never did nothing.

GDAE, Dave

[+hikemeister]

I think that making it difficult to find a cache is fine, as long as (1) the difficulty level correctly identifies this feature, and (2) this strategy does not lead to the area being transhed by cache seekers. My son and I visited a cache this week that had a difficulty rating of 1.5. It had not been found for some time -- no big surprise, because the coordinates were in the center of a dense "jungle" of vines, palmetto, dead leaves, and many holes. The log indicated that the cache had very good camo. Yes -- much better than a 1.5 difficulty level. We spent a full hour searching and never found it. The area around the site was heavily trampled by seekers.

[+graewulf]

making a cache hard to find is one thing.. making is so hard that you need to spend hours looking for it is another... when you have logged hundreds of finds, you may find this cute, when you have logged a dozen and are looking for a 1.5 rated cache and it is nowhere to be found, it is downright annoying.... If you are going to make it that hard to find, say so in the description..... don't just say "it is well hidden"

[+flask]

i'm having good luck with this method: always keep 'em guessing. if you always tend to a certain method, you will be transparent. if they don't know whether to expect camo, or magnets, or overhead, or bungees, or plain sight, or...

 

you get the idea. vary the method fequently, and it keeps 'em off balance.

 

it doesn't matter if you get to camp at one or at six. dinner is still at six.

[umc]

Elevate them.

 

I have placed three real caches and 2 virts. Of the three 'real' caches not one of them is on the ground. Not even any of the stages of my one multi.

 

______________________________________________________________________________________

Caching without a clue....

[+pater47]

The Little Brown Bottle is one of mine that has gotten several 'clever hide' critiques because it's not in a typical hiding spot.

This one tickles me because hundreds of people drive or walk right beside it every day, with dozens actually looking at it, but after roughly a year and a half, it has yet to be plundered.

Several cacher, even after finding, realize an extra challenge of "ok, I see it. Now how do I get to it?'

 

I guess probably the simplest way to clever hides is to think ' now where would I look?' and put it somewhere else nearby.

 

Visit the Mississippi Geocaching Forum at

http://pub98.ezboard.com/bgeocachingms

[Dinoprophet]

There's the Third Dimension ploy, where the cache is located at the coordinates but is somehow above or below the "obvious" spot. For example, in a culvert or cave. I've seen one on top of an H-shaped building as well, so you can be at the correct coords when you're on the ground.

 

One of my favorite tricks is a multi whose final stage is an offset. But the instructions for the offset, given in one of the stages, can be interpretted two ways, a very obvious way, and a less obvious -- and of course correct -- way. Now, clearly this leads people to not only trample a lot, but to do it in the wrong spot. Fortunately the clue also suggests where the cache is hidden, and there are no possibilities in the wrong location, which is the tip-off to look at the clue more closely.

 

quote:

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Originally posted by Sissy-n-CR:

There are two modes of making caches hard once on site; hard to find and hard to retrieve.

---

I wish there were more hard-to-retrieve ones. Or rather (and I think this is what CR means) caches where the retrieval method isn't obvious. Caches that you walk up to and say, "What?! How the hell am I supposed to get that?!" I've only seen one like that, and it was a sight to behold.

 

I'm curious if Sissy-n-CR have moved forward with the idea they had like this.

 

Well the mountain was so beautiful that this guy built a mall and a pizza shack

Yeah he built an ugly city because he wanted the mountain to love him back -- Dar Williams

[BassoonPilot]

quote:

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Originally posted by Graewulf and Bug:

... looking for a 1.5 rated cache and it is nowhere to be found, it is downright annoying.... If you are going to make it that hard to find, say so in the description..... don't just say "it is well hidden"

---

 

To me, "well hidden" means precisely that. When someone fails to find a cache, they (and the cache owner) need to consider a few things ... Had anyone found the cache previously? Subsequently? Did the other logs indicate the cache was overrated?

 

Reading through all the logs of a long-lived cache, one is likely to discover comments ranging from "knew where it was from 100 ft away" to "spent an hour but couldn't find it."

 

Of all the experienced cachers I know, every one (myself included) has been skunked at least once by apparently simple 1/1 caches. That's life!

[+jollybgood]

I can tell you what stumps me usually.

 

Any cache hidden in plain site.

 

Any cache hidden above waist level. My eye just isnt' trained to look for caches not on ground level.

 

Jolly R. Blackburn

http://kenzerco.com

"Never declare war on a man who buys his ink by the gallon."

[+Sissy-n-CR]

quote:

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Originally posted by Dinoprophet:

I'm curious if Sissy-n-CR have moved forward with the idea they had like this.

---

 

Not yet. It's been sitting on the back burner.

 

I've had some reservations about this placement due to the elements and the ease of which it could be retrieved without regard to returning it.

 

Good news is I think I've got both problems figured out and am ready for prototyping.

 

CR

 

[+Scott Johnson]

My enjoyment is the journey to the cache site, not spending an hour walking in circles trying to find the hidden box (and yes, trampling the grass around it). As long as the cache coordinates were listed accurately, any cache should be easy to find (well hidden or not). It is the people who are sloppy in their readings that irk me. If I am looking for a level 1 or a level 4 cache...I still expect accuracy in the directions.

 

Never underestimate the stupidity of people in large groups.

[+Mr. Snazz]

Who are we supposed to be hiding the caches from?

 

The ones who seek them, or those who might find them by accident?

[+Criminal]

Score one for Snazz!

 

That’s exactly my idea, hide them from non-players but make them fun and challenging for geocachers. It’s tough to do. I could provide good coordinates that will put you within 20 feet or so, but hide a cache container so well you’d be unable or unwilling to find it. Is that fun?

 

I’ve been playing with the concept of hiding in plain sight; the only thing that really hides the cache container is the general public’s lack of awareness. I have two out using that format and another is on the way that takes it to the extreme. My point is that if you try hard enough, you can hide a cache so well that almost nobody could find it. Is someone going to have a fond memory of the search? Even in the most picturesque location, if the search is tedious or by the same token, too easy, will they be thanking you for the fun hunt?

 

As for me, I want to read long praiseful logs in caches, my caches especially. Not all pain is gain.

 

EDIT: Typo

 

http://fp1.centurytel.net/Criminal_Page/

[Swagger]

quote:

---

Originally posted by ZingerHead:

As long as you make them clever rather than You could just hide a hollow rock in a pile of rocks to **** somebody off

---

That's been done near me - I still haven't found the @!$%#&* thing!

 

--

Random quote:

[Micqn]

You want to stump a cacher? Look at this cache.

 

Its still there but its hiding VERY well!

 

Don't Drink And Park: Accidents Cause People.

[+Newenglandah]

hehehehe The last cache I hid, part of it was in a poison ivy patch, from what people were posting it was a strategic foot placing to get the cache. Finally I broke down and went and moved it. I guess I'm not allurgic to p/i cause I sat down in the patch for a while....

 

NOSEEUMS--High Protein Low Calorie unpacked trail snacks!!!!

See You In the Woods!!!

Natureboy1376

[+jollybgood]

Personally I love caches taht stump me. We could use more challenging caches.Several months ago I had become bored with caching (too many "drive up and log 'em" caches).

 

Then a few people started placing caches which were really difficutl to find.

 

That put some of the magic back into the sport for me.

 

Please!!! More caches which require some real thinking or searching to find.

 

If you don't like caches that stump you then use the rating system to screen out the more difficult caches.

 

I've now become more selective about which caches I go after. If a cache doesn't seem creative or interesting (based on the logs by previous finders) I put it on my "someday list".

 

Jolly R. Blackburn

http://kenzerco.com

"Never declare war on a man who buys his ink by the gallon."

 

[This message was edited by Jolly B Good on July 11, 2003 at 04:48 PM.]

[+jollybgood]

One of the things I like about Geocaching is that each placer tends to have his own style.

 

if everybody approached the sport with the same attitude and placed their caches EXACTLY like everyone else, how boring would that be?

 

I like variety. If you like placing caches which are difficult to find. More power to you. If you like sitting them out in the open or putting them in the obvious spot -- that's kewl too.

 

I agree placing a cache that is impossible to find is a bad idea (and no fun). But to be honest I've NEVER encountered such a cache.

 

About the closest I've come to giving up on a cache was one hidden in an abandon rock quarry. There were literally thousands of holes and recesses in piles of shattered limestone in which to hide a cache. On top of that the area was surrounded by rocky cliffs which caused a lot of signal bounce. I spent two hours on my first attempt looking for that dadgum cache. No luck. I went home angry and frustrated feeling I had wasted my time.

 

The next day I went back (after the owner insisted it was there). Ten minutes into my search I saw what looked to be a bit of trash (a coffe can) and kicked it. Feeling it had weight and that it rattled I immediately realized it was the cache container. I must have stepped over that stupid can a hundred times on my first search thinking it was just trash.

 

ANyway that cache is among my all time favorites. As it turns out it wasn't impossibly hidden. The hider wasn't being a jerk. It was right out in the open. I just wasn't searchign properly.

 

I could have posted a nasty note after my first search complaining about this cache. I'm glad I didn't. And I'm REALLY glad I went back to try again.

 

 

Jolly R. Blackburn

http://kenzerco.com

"Never declare war on a man who buys his ink by the gallon."

[+suemac]

I agree with Jolly - the kind of caches I most enjoy are ones that really stump you, but after you find them you go 'well, sheesh! of course!'.

[+brdad]

I love when a cache takes me 20 minutes or so, to the point of being irritated, then I sit down to think it over and there it is!

 

I've hidden two that seem to be a challenge, more of a challenge than even I had intended. And I won't say how they are hidden, but they are fairly basic, yet not typical. But people do find them eventually and seem to have fun with them just the same, and with minimal environmental damage due to being placed with the hide taken into consideration. That is what the difficulty rating is for after all.

 

Warning: Objects in GPS may be closer than they appear!

[+yorelken]

Is the point of this "I have hidden a cache somewhere in North America. Good luck"?