Who Are The Leaders In Your State?

[+TEAM 360]

Who are the geocaching "leaders" in your state? I don't mean "who has the greatest number of finds?" (because many times those cachers with the greatest number of finds aren't always the ones who contribute the most to the game), I am talking about the cachers who go out and promote the game, the ones who always sponsor cache events, the ones who REALLY practice CITO and "trading fairly", ones who maintain others caches, the cachers who put back into the geocaching game...

 

Who would YOU nominate as a "leader" in YOUR state?

[dampeoples]

I don't know any other cachers in this state.

[+briansnat]

In northern and central New Jersey there are a lot of people who deserve accolades. Skully & Mulder, Harrald, Hartclimbs, Mopar (does he still count as NJ these days?), Team Ekitt10, Stayfloopy and way too many others to list, but one person who stands out lately is Avroair, who has placed a number of great caches and set up some nice events and group hunts. He was also the author of the Scientific American article that introduced countless people to geocaching. He's relatively new on the scene here, but has contributed a lot in a short time.

 

I don't know much about caching in southern NJ (Its kind of like a different state), but I know Tneigel has a great rep in that area for placing many interesting caches.

Edited June 20, 2004 by briansnat

[+Team Flying Dachshund]

Hands down its Cybercat. She has planned most if not all of the events in our area. She also is the owner of the the largest amount of caches in San Antonio.

[uperdooper]

in michigan it has to be victorymike. he is everywhere. i see log after log mentioning him.

[+MedicOne]

In Washington without a doubt it's Moun10bike. He's involved in every aspect of the sport and active in the Washinton State Geocachers Association. He invented the geocoin (no, it wasn't Al Gore!) and now his Moun10bike geocoins are highly coveted and hoarded by those who find them. He's a moderator on several Groundspeak forums. Seems everybody in Washington involved with the sport knows him personally and respects his contributions as a geocache approver. He placed the first cache in Spokane introducing the sport to the Inland Empire. He placed the first cache in the state of Idaho introducing the sport to the Gem State. He is highly active in geocaching in that state as well and serves as a moderator on the Idaho Geocachers Forum. Jon embodies everything that is good about this sport!

Edited June 20, 2004 by MedicOne

[+drat19]

Southdeltan is definitely our state "leader" in Mississippi. He took it upon himself to become our "ambassador" when working with cachers in neighboring states, runs our state association's web site, and is involved in most state-wide happenings and discussions.

 

-Dave R. in Biloxi

[+Big Tom]

From what I have read in the forums it looks like Carleenp does the most for cachers in Nebraska.

[+BadAndy]

Idaho has a few leaders. In my corner of SE Idaho I'd recognize RK as a leader. I'll let the Boise crowd speak for their corner, and the same for the Northern bunch.

[+boomhwr653]

RK had to leave Boise because of Beentherefoundit. He never misses an event and has more finds and hides than I think he can remember. Went to a remote cache in Washington and he had already found it. Looked up a remote cache in California and he HID it!

[+Coach Steve]

I don't know too many from other parts of the state, but in Southern Utah it has to be Chevums. He has some of the most imaginative cache hides that it makes the pursuit really fun.

[+Wander Lost]

In Washington without a doubt it's Moun10bike. He's involved in every aspect of the sport and active in the Washinton State Geocachers Association. He invented the geocoin (no, it wasn't Al Gore!) and now his Moun10bike geocoins are highly coveted and hoarded by those who find them. He's a moderator on several Groundspeak forums. Seems everybody in Washington involved with the sport knows him personally and respects his contributions as a geocache approver. He placed the first cache in Spokane introducing the sport to the Inland Empire. He placed the first cache in the state of Idaho introducing the sport to the Gem State. He is highly active in geocaching in that state as well and serves as a moderator on the Idaho Geocachers Forum. Jon embodies everything that is good about this sport!

I'll second this one. Moun10Bike is one of the best ambassadors for this sport we could ever ask for. He is also one of the nicest people I have ever met.

[+tstar]

Well, since Texas is such a large state, I would hate to exclude other great cachers. 9key has done a lot for caching in the Dallas area. In the central texas area, it is probably GeoGoes. I guess that the nice thing about being from a big state is the number of great cachers that are here...

[Happy Boy]

In South Carolina, it has to be TinSparrow. Not only does he have the most hides, he was key in starting the SCGA and sponsors many events. He also has adopted many geocaches that were started by others.

[+mtn-man]

In GA, we have a lot of key people. Our Steering Committee has some great cachers on it -- Rebel, Trailerman, Trez, Johnnie and ~erik~ (who is also a prolific cache reviewer). I am lucky enough to get to work with these guys on a regular basis. We plan meetings and such and they are all great cache hiders and finders.

 

We have the distintion of having the two people who though of the idea of an event cache in our state as well. Two cachers met at a cache back in the early days of geocaching. They thought it would be cool to meet other cachers and came up with the idea of creating a cache that was a meeting of cachers at a pavillion somewhere. LoCache and TJBowers ran with the idea and posted the first event cache in June of 2001. The GGA was born that day and the rest is history.

[+Alan2]

CCCCooper from PA who have huge numbers but also in placements. Always available for events and personnaly being of help to me and countless others. I just don't know where they get the time, it's amazing.

 

Alan

[+Tonsil]

There are a lot of people in southwest PA that lead by example, but I have to mention The Leprechauns. Lep is an insane cacher, great hider, and he may or may not know someone that reviews the occasional cache. He puts way too much time into the sport/hobby/pasttime to be considered mentally stable, but we all benefit from his efforts. His event coordination is unparalleled, and it is because of him that we have such a great group of cachers and high cache quality in this area.

[+strikeforce1]

In NY is has to be HFJohn,

http://www.geocaching.com/profile/Default....c7-d3f734195716

he has 1082 finds so far, and leads the state,. also the first New Yorker to hit 1000 finds as well. Congrads on all your finds and hides as well. Keep it going, maybe 2000 by the end of the year!

[+JMBella]

In northern and central New Jersey there are a lot of people who deserve accolades. Skully & Mulder, Harrald, Hartclimbs, Mopar (does he still count as NJ these days?), Team Ekitt10, Stayfloopy and way too many others to list, but one person who stands out lately is Avroair, who has placed a number of great caches and set up some nice events and group hunts. He was also the author of the Scientific American article that introduced countless people to geocaching. He's relatively new on the scene here, but has contributed a lot in a short time.

 

I don't know much about caching in southern NJ (Its kind of like a different state), but I know Tneigel has a great rep in that area for placing many interesting caches.

I'm not from NJ but it I think you forgot someone. Brian something, I can't think of his name right now, someone help me out.

[+TeamK-9]

You know, this is actually hard to answer because Pennsylvania is actually cut in to several pieces by mountains. And really there aren't any plain old pennsylvania geocachers, cause we're sort of split into geographical goups. And even just considering my group, it's hard because we have lots of great geocachers with lots of finds, and interesting hides, and really there is no one person who plans the events, it's sort of a rotation.

 

But I have one guy that I would nominate as the leader for our area.

 

First, there's Quest Master. From my email conversations with him, he's a really friendly guy. He's great at hiding, and he finds the most odd and random places that no one's ever heard of for a lot of his caches. Most of his caches have some kind of weird or interesting story about the location, and most involve a water hazard of one form or another. And he's pretty good at finding them too, he actually has found all the caches in the city of pittsburgh except for micros, he HATES micros, and instead prefers a trusty rusty ammo can. In the four counties closest to his home town, if there's a cache placed, he's usually at it within the first month. He even gave me some great parks in my area that haven't had caches placed in them yet, and he gave me the information for a story for a cache I put together that so far has been incredibly liked.

[+DeViDe]

Check out what these guy's have done for caching in Utah:

 

Utah's Nuts

[+JMBella]

As with pretty much any state, NY is made up of several distinct regions. As far as Long Island goes, I think you ask anyone from this area, the first name that would come to mind is Bayonets4u. There aren't too many cachers on the island that have been doing it longer. He has 47 great hides, nearly 450 finds and has started a geocacihng group as well and is responsible for getting quite a few people involved.

I'm not too familiar with areas north of me but some names that come to mind right away are JonBoy, MaMaBear, Rust o' Junk and Harrald. It's difficult to narrow it down to just a few.

[+carleenp]

From what I have read in the forums it looks like Carleenp does the most for cachers in Nebraska.

Well thank you! But I am thinking of a bunch more people! The problem is that I fear I will leave someone out if I list them! I sincerely think Nebraska has a bunch of great people and responsible cachers, some of whom have been around awhile and some who are quite new. So instead of naming names, I will say that there are people who have actively worked with the parks to encourage favorable caching policies, people who have placed great caches and actively maintained them, people who formed both formal and informal organizations and web sites, people who have held or attended CITOS, and people who have just been fun by finding and placing caches in a resposible manner. It is rare that I have a reason to complain about a Nebraska cacher. So they all get my nomination!

[+CCrew]

CCCCooper from PA who have huge numbers but also in placements. Always available for events and personnaly being of help to me and countless others. I just don't know where they get the time, it's amazing.

 

Alan

It's easy to see where they get the time... they find the cache, they sign the log, then they leave it on the ground. It's my pet peeve of them. REHIDE the freaking cache! I can think of 5 occasions that they've been the last to a cache before us and we've found the cache just lying in the open.

 

Not to mention fully rebuilding one of theirs that was pretty much left abandoned without so much as a thank you.. So their numbers mean nothing to me...

 

-Roger

[+Mopar]

Even though CT is a small state, there still seem to be several (overlapping) areas. Around here several people come quickly to mind.

CT Trampers is one of the top finders in the state. They also have plenty of hides, most of them great hikes in beautiful areas, ending up in EXTREMELY well-stocked caches.

RJFerret specializes in night caches and puzzle caches. Neither type will ever see the amount of finds as the typical walk in the park, but his caches are extremely well thought out and usually anything but typical.

Planet is "mom" to every cacher for 100 miles around! Besides plenty of decents hides, she is the one behind all the food at just about every event or group hike around. If Planet's coming, you know you are gonna be well fed. Her hiking wraps are famous. On top of that, she is the queen of CITO. If every geocacher picked up trash like she does, our parks would be clean in no time.

Not exactly local but worthy of mention include Wing-it, ZingerHead, and SkyTrek, the 3 kings of hydrocaching, and Connecticut A-Team's work promoting geocaching.

[+rusty_tlc]

Who are the geocaching "leaders" in your state? I don't mean "who has the greatest number of finds?" (because many times those cachers with the greatest number of finds aren't always the ones who contribute the most to the game), I am talking about the cachers who go out and promote the game, the ones who always sponsor cache events, the ones who REALLY practice CITO and "trading fairly", ones who maintain others caches, the cachers who put back into the geocaching game...

 

Who would YOU nominate as a "leader" in YOUR state?

There are probably two groups for Nevada The Yanks and the Rebels. The state has two population centers (Reno, Las Vegas) separated by 450 miles of sparsely populated region.

Here in the North there is no doubt that Drofrockology and NevadaWolf do the most to promote the sport.

[WH]

There are lots of great cachers here in SE Massachusetts. But if I had to name one who I believe does the most for geocaching, it would have to be a gentleman by the name of Blackstone Val.

 

Val is a park ranger in Blackstone Valley here in Massachusetts. He hosts the vast majority of our geomeets in the visitor's center where he works. In addition to being one of the nicest people Ive met he is also one heck of a good cacher. All of the caches he has planted were top notch and he practices CITO almost everywhere he goes.

[+Snoogans]

Hands down its Cybercat. She has planned most if not all of the events in our area. She also is the owner of the the largest amount of caches in San Antonio.

The names that come to mind immediately for me are 9Key & GeoVamp for Dallas, and Moosiegirl & The Outlaw, and bbelk, for Austin.

 

People in my area here in the Armpit of the Universe stand out as leaders for many reasons which would be self evident if you were here.

 

In no particular order:

 

UsMorrows

Pitmasters

Babslover

Geowyz

Geek-Qualizer

Dreamcachers

Mustard Devil

Cherokee Cacher

Mudfrog & Chicken

ParkerPlus

TerraTrekkers

MedTexPlacer

Love2Fly

Joyrose and Hubby

Muddy Buddies

Capt. J & Wildcat Bud

Bosun

MoTexOutlaw

Txsyank

Spaceman Spiff

 

There are plenty more, but these came to mind right off....

 

Sn gans

Edited June 21, 2004 by Snoogans

[+TotemLake]

In Washington without a doubt it's Moun10bike.  He's involved in every aspect of the sport and active in the Washinton State Geocachers Association.  He invented the geocoin (no, it wasn't Al Gore!) and now his Moun10bike geocoins are highly coveted and hoarded by those who find them.  He's a moderator on several Groundspeak forums.  Seems everybody in Washington involved with the sport knows him personally and respects his contributions as a geocache approver.  He placed the first cache in Spokane introducing the sport to the Inland Empire.  He placed the first  cache in the state of Idaho introducing the sport to the Gem State.  He is highly active in geocaching in that state as well and serves as a moderator on the Idaho Geocachers Forum.  Jon embodies everything that is good about this sport!

I'll second this one. Moun10Bike is one of the best ambassadors for this sport we could ever ask for. He is also one of the nicest people I have ever met.

I'll add my second to that too and add his generosity is beyond reproach... M10B donated some of his water for my little puppy on the Snow Lake / Gem Lake cache machine last August when I was running low.