Regularity Of Cache Placement

[AE_Rodney]

I'm new to the sport and really enjoying it. We have so far found four geocaches, but I have researched many more. (I'm lining them up for the holidays). My question though is this: How often do most of you place geocaches? I'm almost ready to place my first, and at the same time I'm wondering if I shouldn't place another somewhere else at the same time. My first geocache is going to be placed near Carletonville, which I visit every second week (Carletonville is roughly at: S26 21.797 E27 23.778), but I stay in Pretoria. Does anyone who stayes in Pretoria think there are too many caches here, or too few.

[Azaruk]

I'm in Natal (Hillcrest).

 

VERY few caches here, so I have decided to become a 'hider' for the next few weeks and months. I intend to place at least one cache a week if possible.

 

As long as they are not too close to one another, the more the merrier. I think one of the reasons that the sport hasn't taken off here is due to the low numbers of caches to go find. If I do a search on caches close to me, there are probably about three in immediate vicinity, the others being well over 100kms from home. This means a major planning session before setting out, with the prospect of perhaps not even finding the only cache in that area.

 

There are some amazingly beautiful places here in Natal, easily accessible, all crying out for caches.

 

If I get get a 'circle' of caches surrounding the area, all within, say, a half-hour drive of each other, then cachers would be able to have a ball.

 

I also have a passion for off-roading, so a large proportion of my caches will be designed for access by 4X4 vehicle only. Unfair? I don't think so - there are other caches that cater to hikers, bikers and urban warriors to satisfy all out local cachers.

 

Hope this helps

 

Edited for spelling

Edited November 5, 2004 by Azaruk

[AE_Rodney]

Yes, that does. Pretoria has quite alot of geocaches, there are at least five within 5km of my house. I will be going to Dullstroom this weekend and maybe I will place a cache there, or at least research it. I really think it's better when people put effort into placing their caches. Of the four that I found so far, only two were really well thought out. The more difficult were also the most fun, especially if we had to come back and try again.

[AE_Rodney]

I placed my first cache today. If all goes well it should be a great cache. Now to wait for approval. In two weeks or so I will check on another cache that I'm working on. If they both go through then that's new caches in places that really need them.

 

I had another idea for a cache, and I'm going to share it here because it will only work through a combined effort. So here goes:

 

Someone researches and sets up a virtual cache which is actually a nice braai area. Then he/she or another person sets up a second cache, which is a micro cache with an invitation to a Geocacher get-to-gether/bring-and-braai, scheduled much later in the year. The invite contains the coordinates to the virtual cache. So, if it works then a whole bunch of people pitch up to braai and swap geocaching adventure stories. I think this idea would work in places where a number of geocachers stay, like Pretoria, Johannesburg, Cape Town and so on. The invite would have to stay in the micro cache though . Let me know what everyone thinks, and if it has or hasn't been done before. A special 'event cache' could be set up for the day, and a race held to see who finds it first.

[+GlobalRat]

There can never be too many caches. As an example, where I lived in the UK, if I did a search on all nearby caches I would get 250 hits. That was two years ago. If I do the same search now, it hits 2600 odd caches.

 

There's no point in tiresome useless caches, but Pretoria/JHB has the potential for many more caches, so go ahead and place some so that the rest of us have something to do after a hard day at the office which doesn't require a weekend trek to find a cache in MP, or FS, or KZN or NW or........

 

BTW, Groundspeaks rule of thumb is that a cache may not be closer than 0.1mi to another cache....

[+AntarcticMan]

I've found planting caches can be more fun than finding them...!

 

In the UK we have the advantage of Ordnance Survey mapping and a small country loaded with history, so it can be a lot of fun finding sites of historical interest simply by scanning local maps etc.

 

I've done two nice caches in Seapoint recently that had the advantage of some unique history which gave added interest to a place I had often visited (my sister used to live there).

 

Although I enjoy the occasional challenge, I usually prefer at least some of my caches to be simple and reasonably easy to access, but with some added twist.

 

Hope you find planting caches as interesting and as much fun as I do!