Thursday, March 26, 2009

6 years ago today

March 26, 2003 I found my first geocache

State quarter cache

I had no GPS and no clue what I was getting myself into. That little film canister with a couple of quarters and a wadded up peice of paper would lead to hundreds of adventures. It might not have been the most exciting cache by todays standards, but there was something about the hunt... and that moment of finding it... I was hooked.

Little did I know that 6 years later I'd still be having fun at it. I have a website and blog devoted to the hobby, and many new friends some of which I only know by their odd nicknames.

I have found 114 caches so far this year which puts me well on pace to shatter my previous record of 321 in a year. Last year I set my second highest mark with 309. So despite seeming to slow down I am finding as many as ever.

Wednesday, March 25, 2009

No whining... the controversy

As of late there has been some talk about a new cache in the area

NO WHINING

I've had conversations with a few geocachers about this one. I also declined the opportunity to search for it earlier in the week. Lets face it... I'll probably never get around to it. The cache started with 12 DNFs. That is about 10 more then it takes to be on my list to skip, but not everyone is as smart as me.

The problem with a difficult cache is that the area gets torn up by everyone that looks. Rocks get thrown about, moss gets stripped from trees, sticks and leaves get moved around until only bare dirt remains... and on and on. No single geocacher is usually to blame for this, it just gets a little worse on each visit. A standard geocache in a natural setting has an impact, but the difficulty amplifies that impact. The difficulty of a cache should take into account the environment that it is hidden in.

With that said I haven't actually looked at the area... or for the cache. There are plenty of caches around to find so I probably never will.

Sunday, March 22, 2009

Central Oregon Run

Yesterday was my Parent's 40th wedding anneversary. They decided to celebrate by us all going to dinner at the Cowboy Dinner Tree near Silver Lake, OR. On the way over I picked out a few caches to find... and we had plenty of time to search for them all. I had 9 lined up and only 1 was too snowed in to search for. These were my finds

Crystal - an old virtual at the Crystal Springs rest stop towards Ft. Klamath. It would be easy to hide a traditional cache in this area, which is probably why virtuals eventually grew out of favor. There was a lot of snow here so I suppose a virtual might be the best year round option.

Going to School - This is a cache Lazyboy would be proud of. Despite it being easy I still had to climb over some snow.

Do You Feel Lucky? - a fun cache near the Kla-Mo-Ya Casino

TIMBERRR!!! - Oregon History Lesson #17 - In an old logging museum right off Hwy 97

El Fuego - just off Hwy 97

Beef ? No. - A nice break on the road to Silver Lake.

STUMP ROCK 49 - A five month old cache that was still waiting for a finder. Nearly 100 miles as the crow flies from my house and I was the FTF.

State Plates - Probably the easiest logscaler cache you will ever find. I left my GPS sitting by the cache and had to go back for it a few hours later. I didn't worry much about someone picking it up as its pretty quiete out there.