Final Post Due for Project

Well, here we are at the final required post for my project. I know what you are thinking; I bet he is never going to post again. Well, I hope that for my sake you are wrong. I fully intend to continue this blog and my website simply because I enjoy doing it. Don’t get me wrong, I may be away from the thing for a little while with my vacation coming up and moving back home. However, I do not want anyone to think I am just giving up that easy. Anyways, looking back on this project I must say that I am completely satisfied with what I have accomplished. My professor told us to create a blog for something we love and I did just that. Geocaching has been my most intense hobby for quite some time now and that is something I can guarantee will stick with me for a very long time. I can also admit that in the beginning I may have thought this to be a little bit much. It just seemed like we may be doing this for no real gain. However, once I got into the swing of things I came to realize that it did not seem like I was being forced to do any of this. Creating this blog and website became something I enjoyed and I have this class and my professor to thank for that. So, as you read this blog post, professor, I thank you for giving me this opportunity to create something such as this. It has opened my eyes on a whole new aspect of the business world and I fully intend to take what I have learned from doing this project and hopefully applying it to my career in the future. I truly did enjoy creating this e-business and learned a lot along the way. I even made a few bucks which I thought was going to be impossible. All in all, this was a fun experience and I am glad that I was able to gain so much from it. Thank you again.

Caches in a Series

Many cache hiders like to create some sort of series when hiding different caches. This is not only fun for them, but it can turn out to be very joyful for the finder as well if done right. I feel like a lot of cachers like to find cache series simply because we assume that it is going to be well thought out and interesting. Most of the time this is completely true and the series is one that we will never forget. I am trying to think back and as of now I cannot say that Erin and I have ever gotten a complete cache series accomplished. In our defense, the few series in our area are very in depth and we simply do not have the time necessary to do them. However, I do not like to make excuses. I am sure we could have done some if we were not looking for the almighty numbers. The one that always remains in my mind, however, is one done by a fairly well-known cacher in the Bloomington area. She incorporated the flavors Jelly Belly jellybeans in starting a cache series called “Evry Flvr.” Do not ask me why she misspelled the words because I have no idea. Anyways, the caches were fun, because they were not actual flavors. For instance, one was called Evry Flvr – Booger. It was quite interesting to find the cache only to discover that it was submerged in goo like substance also known as slime. That stuff did not come off our hands for a few good days. We did not care thought because the cache was so ingenious. Unfortunately, several of these caches had to be archived for reasons that I have no control nor do I know. None the less, it is series such as this that keep cachers coming back to complete them. I highly recommend that at some point in your caching career that you either hide or find a series. Better yet, do both because you will not regret it.

Kids and Caching

I have come to recognize that caching for kids is much like when a husband enjoys caching while the wife does not. It is hit or miss somewhat compared to that. Sometimes kids will enjoy caching and always want to tag along as much as possible. However, there are also other instances when they absolutely hate the idea and will do anything to avoid it. I have two little sisters and I can tell you that they each display the opposite characteristic. My youngest sister, Jill, would love nothing more than to cache everyday as long as my dad is going. She is always his little helper whenever they go caching. In fact, she gets angry when my dad will occasionally go and grab a cache on lunch while at work. She feels left out and therefore lets my dad hear about it when he gets home and she has already inevitably checked his profile to notice that his cache count went up. I personally get a kick out of it. I must give her credit though because last year she got a tick on her and I thought my dad was doomed. I was positive that he had lost his geocaching partner all because of some stupid little bug. To my surprise she was back out in the field the next time he went out. My dad is now beginning to fear that Jill will “grow out” of this phase and want to forget about geocaching. Colleen, my other sister quite possibly has done this. She enjoyed the idea a few years back when my dad first joined the site but now she has moved on to bigger and better things. My dad and Jill will ask her to go with every time and every time she will say no. I am not sure what caused her to dislike geocaching, but I know my dad wishes that the urge to quit does not hit Jill. I hope so to because there is no way he will ever be able to get my mom out in the woods.

Numbers, Numbers, and More Numbers

I have only been into geocaching for a little over a year and already I have begun to notice one of the key trends that cachers are leaning towards. It appears as though obtaining higher cache numbers is the key to this era of geocaching. Gone are the days when people will simply go out and look for a few multi caches for a thrill. Traditional caches are by far the most popular cache found and it makes sense as to why. Don’t get me wrong, I still do believe that the other specialty caches do get found a fair amount of the time. However, it has become more apparent that cachers want to get out there and find as many caches as possible in as little of time. I myself am guilty of this and I alright with admitting that. There have been days when Erin and I are aiming for 50 finds (which is still little compared to the veterans) and all of them will be traditional. There are also those times when we try to mix it up and try to search out the other caches. Those days we try to recognize that numbers are not going to be on our side. It is more a time to enjoy the environment and also get a few caches out of it. I have come to realize that although it is nice to obtain a lot of caches in one day they are not always the more fun days. It feels as though we are always in a rush with no time to relax and enjoy our surroundings. Time is constantly against us and we typically will only spend about ten minutes searching for a cache before we make the judgment to move on. Sometimes that can be fun while other times it becomes more stressful than fun. I personally enjoy taking my time and finding the difficult caches that I know I will always remember. Now, I say this here, but there are definitely those times when I am extremely focused on getting those finds and moving on.

Geocaching in My Hometown

One would assume that I would like to cache in the town that I will be spending a lot of my time in. However, this is actually not the case. I have a few reasons for this and I think they are legit. First off, my dad, who got me into this whole thing, has pretty much already cached the entire area and therefore does not want to spend time with me canvassing the area. Not to mention, any time that I mention going around my town he will usually ask me what caches I have planned. Silly me, once I tell him he will go on to tell me things about them to kind of give me hints that I do not necessarily need. It is not a bad thing and I do appreciate it, believe me. He does come in handy when I need a phone-a-friend during those tough finds that just seem to elude me. I have always said that once I determine where I am going to live for quite some time that I will clear out that area of caches because it seems like a neat goal to achieve. I do not plan on living with my parents the rest of my life by the way. I guess I will continue to casually cache in my area once I move back home from school. The times that I cache with my dad though will be spent in areas that I would have never considered going simply because they are so random to me. As I said, he has pretty much cleared by my house and needs nothing to do with that area. On top of all that, I just don’t have as much general fun searching out that area. For some reason I have a blast out here in Bloomington/Normal. I am going to seriously miss the area once I move back home for good. There is just something about it that makes it more entertaining for me to adventure out.

The Arizona Plan

With May 18th rapidly approaching, it is becoming apparent that Erin and I need to begin to plan exactly how we are going to go about our trip. I have been running through different scenarios through my head but until we actually get out there it is still tough to tell. A part of me wants to begin picking out some caches, but then again I still realize I have way too much other stuff to take care of first. The vague plan that we do have defined is to attempt to get at least one cache in every state that we drive in. I find this goal to be fairly easy as there are usually rest stop caches at virtually every rest stop. With that being said, I do not want us to be tied to just finding those as well. There are bound to be many more interesting caches beyond those rest stops and I want to make sure we do plenty of exploring into those as well. Also, as of right now, I believe we have five trackables in our possession to bring along with us on the trip. I know I have mentioned this before but we are planning on putting a trackable in every state as well. At first we were thinking about buying a bunch of them and placing them. However, after what happened to our first bug, (see past posts) we are somewhat apprehensive about the idea of purchasing any at this point. A lot can definitely change over the next few weeks and I recognize this. There is still a chance that this trip may never happen. I am prepared for this which is another reason why I do not want to plan too much into it. By doing so I will get myself probably way more excited than I need to be at the present moment.

Last Saturday

So, as I predicted, Erin came into town on Friday and early Saturday morning we woke up with the itch to go geocaching. I was hoping this would happen and was excited when it eventually did. However, we did not know how we were going to go about it for awhile. It felt like we just kept looking at the map hoping for certain caches to jump out at us and scream to be found. Unfortunately, that did not happen, but we did figure out a route that would have us nabbing 20 caches. We had decided that we did not want to go for extreme numbers on this day and rather take it easy and hopefully end up with 20 finds by the end of the day. As our quest began, we were doing very well on the first few finds and making almost too good of time. What I have come to learn about geocaching is that you are never making too good of time. We came up to the lonely multi-cache we had planned for the day and enjoyed the stages very well. We were taken all over the small town of Lincoln. It was all fine and dandy until the final stage brought us to some park that appeared to have not had visitors for years. Not to mention, with the warm weather here, there was green pretty much everywhere causing me to be somewhat hesitant in my trek through the forest. I did not want to get poison ivy my first trip in the woods. Once that one was found the rest of the day was pretty much smooth sailing. Aside from the time that I had to trek through rapids (that is another post in waiting), we were out in the country. In fact, there were probably seven or eight cemetery caches that we ended up finding on this day. All in all though, it was a very fun day and it was great to be caching with Erin again.

Bring on the Nice Weather

Today was the first 70+ degree day of the year thus far and it is bringing about a lot of optimism and also a lot of cachers. I am noticing the website being overpowered with different finds each day as the weather continues to warm. It is definitely nice to see some familiar faces picking up the pace again. It was a very long winter that seemed to last an eternity and I know everyone else is just like me and want to cache as much as possible. Erin is coming to visit me this weekend and I can assure you we will cache. I can only hope that this carries over into tomorrow because that is the likely day of caching. A lot has happened since my last post to kind of put me at ease and not to mention de-stress as well. I recently was offered a job to work with Edward Jones Investments as a Financial Advisor upon graduation and that is a giant weight lifted off of my shoulder. I can now focus on finishing school and caching as much as possible while doing so. It is going to feel great to not have to attend at least two interviews per week. Those can definitely get very stressful, and not to mention, take you away from doing something as awesome as geocaching. With all that being said, it is again nice to have the beautiful weather with us. The sun will be out much longer making for longer days of searching and much less hurrying while out on the field. I can assure you this; I am going to avoid the small three leafed plant also known as poison ivy as much as possible this summer. I want to wish all of my fellow geocachers the best of luck this season and hopefully I will catch a few of you out on the field.

The Future of Geocaching

I was sitting in class today and kind of daydreaming about what the future may hold for geocaching. I did not come up with much but it was just interesting to me to think about and speculate. I am sure all cachers agree that they hope this sport lasts for many years to come and continues to evolve. I can only imagine how many caches may be hidden worldwide ten years from now if the trend continues to gain steam as it has over the recent years. Not to mention, I have been finding more interesting containers as I cache more and more. The creativity of these cachers is unparalleled from what it must have been in the very beginning and it bewilders me to think what kind of ideas we will be coming up with in the future. Moreover, there is inevitably going to be new ideas as far as cache types as the years go on. Although all of this sounds awesome on the surface, I can see where I think some cachers are going to have a differing opinion. There are many traditional cachers out there who enjoy geocaching exactly the way it is right now. The fact that it keeps growing and becoming more popular may cause some of the veterans to re-consider their membership to this fantastic sport. In a way I can see this sport being exploited and almost becoming too popular for its own good. There may be so many caches placed that it will be hard to find places to hide those tough caches that you know no one is ever going to forget. I guess I am torn as to what way I want to believe geocaching is headed. I am hoping there is some type of happy medium where we will all be a happy and can continue to embrace this sport for as long as possible.

Our Arizona Trip Update

Well, a lot has gone on since the last time I wrote about the trip Erin and I are planning on taking over the summer. For one, school has really caught up to me and is starting to what feels like defeat me. Second, I have yet to find a job for when I graduate and that was a stipulation that I put upon myself in order to take this trip. However, I am trying to stay positive about the whole thing and my hope is that we still are able to go. For the past couple of weeks I have just been itching to begin planning the caches we should go after on our journey. However, I have held back because then I am afraid I will get my hopes up too much in that slight chance that we are unable to go. On the flipside, I should have been working on the boatloads of projects that I have coming due in the next couple of weeks and I have been unsuccessful at those as well. Regardless, it does not hurt to have some ideas for our trip still running around in my head. For instance, the very few times I have been caching since my first post about the trip I have been saving up every trackable item we have retrieved. If and when we take our trip we will then place them in the numerous states we visit along the way to Arizona and on the way back. I realize that a few of these we will have held onto for about two months, but I try to look on the bright side of that. A lot of cachers, like me, enjoy seeing their trackable move a great distance in between holders. I look at it like we are doing the right thing in holding these items until we can move them a legitimate distance from its previous home. I have also been in the process of running queries for the different areas in which we are going to want to cache. These are small steps for such a big trip, but like I said, I do not want to get too excited just yet. As of right now it is fingers crossed that we get to go.

This Could Be Our Last Hoorah

This upcoming weekend Erin is coming out to visit. This may not mean much yet, but it could be our last caching trip out here in good ole Bloomington-Normal. With crunch time rapidly approaching as far as school projects and finals it more or less will be our last hoorah. With that said, I am not sure how we should go about it. There are a few options as far as I see it right now. We can go for numbers and grab as many caches as possible in the area and try to clear it out. This would follow our usual technique for caching as of late. The other viable option that I am kind of leaning towards is taking the more challenging approach. There are numerous caches in the area that we have either put on the back burner or simply could not attempt due to time constraints. We have a cacher that likes to place a lot of challenging, yet very fun caches in the area and we have always said that we wanted to get them all before we graduated. This is possibly our last chance. I would prefer to spend our last day in the area finding caches that we will hopefully never forget. On paper this seems like the perfect opportunity to go out with a bang and grab those caches that are found on rare occasions. However, like I said before, there are a lot of constraints holding us back from being able to solve some of them before going out. I have five projects coming up and it looks like the only time I will be able to solve these ones is on the weekend which could severely cut into our caching time. Here we find ourselves in kind of a catch-22. I know Erin would probably like to do the second option as well but I also know she is just as busy as me if not more. It is going to come down to what time we can find leading up to the weekend to figure out the caches we have been dying to find. I am sure I will fill you all in right after this weekend so stay tuned…

Easter Weekend Caching

You had to figure I was going to do some caching when I went home for the Easter weekend. Granted, I was unable to have Erin accompany us, my dad was ready to go on Saturday and I find it hard to ever turn down an opportunity to cache. Not to mention, it can be fun to cache with him and my sister. Anyways, we decided to head out to Oswego where my dad has been trying to clear out for what seems like the past few months. It started out like a day that was going to be filled with a whole bunch of park and grabs of different sorts because we were up to 15 finds within about two hours. You may even find it hard to believe then that we only ended up with 20 finds for the day. Now this is partially because we did not want to be out until dark and because of the last five caches we decided to do. There is a park in Oswego that we had gotten part of a while back when Erin was in town. We never finished it so that was how we planned on ending our day. However, we did not plan for a two hour multi cache. We did know there was one on our list, but we were not sure what to expect. It was solely based off of pirates and everything associated with it was somehow related to pirate language. First we had to search in one end of the park to find the initial clue. That took awhile because there were lots of muggles in the woods and my dad was unsure as to what we were looking for. Eventually, we made the find and realized that we were going to have to go to the other side of the park. Once over there, it took us an extreme while to even decide on what we were looking for until my dad found a container underneath some tree roots that provided us with a map to the cache. It was hard to first understand because of the pirate like lingo but after a quick phone a friend we were finally able to come up with the find only to have to head home right afterwards. It did indeed take us about two hours to nab this find and although it was strenuous, it is definitely one of my favorites.

Yet Another Reason Why I Love Arizona

As you have read in my previous post, I am apprehensive to cache in certain areas as soon as the weather begins to warm up. However, there are places in this world where I think I would feel much more comfortable caching almost anywhere year round. It is actually funny because I actually despise the cold. If you recall, I love to cache in it. If I had the option to have warm weather all year I would definitely take that, especially in Arizona. There it is a desert and not a humid forest. I am not positive if poison ivy grows there, but after spending a lot of time there hiking, I could totally see myself caching virtually anywhere all the time. There basically appears to be no restrictions when it comes to the environment there. If you have yet to visit this beautiful state, then I highly recommend you go. I have yet to cache there, but as I have spoken of before, Erin and I are road tripping there this summer and I could not be more excited. The one aspect I would have to get over, however, is the different types of wildlife that lives there. Rattlesnakes and tarantulas and any type of spider are what give me a little cause for concern. I think I could put that past me if I lived there. I hope to one day move there within the next ten years and if that does indeed happen, I expect to cache much more than I do at this point simply because the barriers will not be as apparent. I know I am saying all of this when there probably are some hindrances that may play a factor in our ability to cache but I think my bias is so focused on moving there that I will continue to tell myself the exact opposite. If anyone has cached there and has anything exciting from it I would love to hear about it.

As Spring Rapidly Approaches

I have been known to promote the idea that I really enjoy winter caching. There are many reasons behind that, but the most reasonable one is the fact that there are no living poison ivy plants ready to spread their toxins all over me. I am extremely allergic to these plants and truly believe that the toxins can simply be in the air and I will find a way to get the infection. Needless to say, spring and summer time are a very cautious time for me to geocache. Don’t get me wrong, I am still going to be out there with the best of us whenever I get a chance. However, I am just much more apprehensive when it comes to woodland caching. I tend to want to stay on the trail as much as possible making sure to avoid any types of weeds that may even resemble poison ivy in any way. I feel bad having to cache like this because I think Erin does not really get affected by these plants. In a way I feel I am hindering her from caching where she wants to but I cannot help that. Once I get this stuff, I am out of the game for at least a few weeks and that is no fun. With all this said, spring is indeed upon us and I am preparing myself for the caches that I know that I can retrieve this time of year. Urban caching will become my forte once again and also the ones I know are not too far off the beaten path as well. The caches I will stay away from are the ones deep in the woods. Occasionally I will feel a little brave and journey in to get those, but that is rare. So as spring approaches, I am trying to ready myself for the caches at hand. Albeit, it is still going to be quite some time before I am even out in the field due to school and graduation right around the corner.

Our Worst Multi Cache Experience Yet

Of our now 426 finds, only 19 of those happen to be multi caches. It is not that we do not like them or avoid them. Traditional are just simply everywhere we look out here and we try to get them all. However, we did have an experience with a multi cache that put quite a sour taste in our mouth. Back in the fall of 2008 Erin and I decided to go on a rather long cache day that began with us trying to find a nine stage multi cache that seemed rather exciting. It was placed in the town of Lexington which was small and the cache was meant to give us a tour of the town while searching out a cache. It sounded like a great idea at the time. We arrived to the first coordinates, which somehow directed us to some barn in which people were painting. The description said we would end up at an old train station. We decided to ask the people and they said that the train station was about a half mile east. This was just the beginning of a messed up cache. So we get to the train station with which there was no correct coordinates leading us there. The next two stages went alright and we were beginning to become optimistic again. Wrong again, because the fourth coordinates brought us back to that same barn and said that a sign would be there to obtain numbers off of. We searched high and low for a sign that did not exist. Reading ahead in the description we were able to brute force our way to the next couple of stages which were again messed up. They were describing all these signs we were supposed to see that magically were not there anymore. After two hours of frustration we finally managed to find the cache by pretty much guessing since the entire thing was wrong. I still wonder how people were able to find that before us because it was ridiculous. If I sound bitter it is because I am. After that find we tried to reach out to the cache hider and we got a lot of attitude back. It was not a great experience what so ever, but we did learn from it.

Geocaching is my Escape

With college quickly coming to a close it is really beginning to become very stressful. When the weekends come I just want to do something other than think about school. In fact, school is the last thing I want to think about until Sunday night when it is time to study for the next day’s inevitable exam. Anyways, the weekends are when I can free myself of the chains of education and go geocaching. There are so many benefits to this sport for me. Not only do I find it as a very fun hobby to just do for fun but it helps me to take my mind off of the things that are going on around me. I may go off on some tangents here but it is only because my mind has been so jumbled as of late. I am trying to find a career for after I graduate and in doing so I have had interviews almost every week. I do not know what day of the week it is anymore. This past weekend when I went home it was such a breath of fresh air to be out in the woods again completely oblivious to the fact that in less than two months I will be facing the real world head on. I am not sure if other cachers get this feeling or not but I hope it never goes away. Even after I do find somewhere to work and begin a whole new chapter of my life I still want geocaching to be my escape from everything. Who knows what kind of stress I will be facing then. The one thing I do know is that whenever I need a pick me up or some kind of positive energy in my life I like to go geocaching. I realize I am still rather young and am pretty new to the whole geocaching scene. However, I do not think it is too early for me to notice that when I am out in the world searching for hidden treasure that every one of my problems or troubles just seem to disappear all together. Who could complain with that?

My Theory Behind Earth Caches

My father and fellow geocaching buddies often jokes with me about the amount of earth caches Erin and I have accumulated this past winter. Albeit it is only 13 total, that is a lot to a man that I believe has zero of them. He likes to make fun of the fact that in the area we find them, Bloomington-Normal, there is a lot of erratic rock caches. Therefore you will see pictures of us by rocks which is apparently a riot to him. I understand where he is coming from and although it may seem funny, I think there are solid reasons for earth caches being placed where they are. For instance, these rocks that we are finding are usually in a distinct area in which a glacier passed by some millions of years ago. Because of this the landscape is often more exciting than the typical Illinois farm field per say. I think that a majority of these earth caches are placed to bring the cachers out to discover certain areas and in turn reward them with a cache find for doing so. It is a win-win situation in my opinion. I can recall my favorite earth cache we have done this far. It involved driving out to a wind farm that is several miles in the middle of nowhere. In order to get credit for this cache we had to answer various questions about these fantastic turbines and also take a picture with one in the background. Basically, we were able to gain knowledge about something we would have otherwise not known too much about. Not to mention, the information is actually really neat once it is put into perspective. Then we had the opportunity to get up close to one of these things. Let me tell you, they are gigantic once you are right underneath them. It was a great experience that I would not trade for the world. Earth caches are a valuable asset to the geocaching world and as long as they exist, we will keep on finding them.

What May Happen Next

It was beautiful to have finally cached again this past weekend after such a long layoff from the field. What scares me most now is the duration that is about to occur before we get the opportunity to cache again. With Erin deep into student teaching and myself rapidly approaching crunch time in school it may be months before we get the chance again. It is depressing because geocaching is something I look extremely forward to doing on the weekend because it takes my mind off of all this school stuff that clogs my brain Monday through Friday. Our goal of having 500 finds by the time of our Arizona trip in May looks very bleak at this point and that is sad as well. I realize that it is really time to get my work done to insure my success following my graduation from college. Everyone needs a break from time to time though. I just will not be able to utilize my breaks to go geocaching because A. Erin has the GPS with her back home in Crystal Lake and B. Erin is back in Crystal Lake geocaching. I suppose that if my urge became way too large to handle I could go back to the old times and try to find a few using Google maps. Then again, Erin will not be able to accompany and I do not enjoy myself when I am not with her. Besides, caching alone can indeed become very lonely in itself. Basically, it is going to take a while for me to convince myself that geocaching is going to have to be put on the back burner for a bit. School is very important to me and there is no sense in slacking too much now. I am really hoping that by keeping up with this blog and my website, my enthusiasm will stay positive and when the times comes for me to cache again I will be totally ready.

What a Weird Day of Caching

This weekend Erin and I were finally able to cache again and in doing so we collected a mere 23 finds. It may not sound like a lot; however, we were deep in some crazy forest that had many ups and downs, literally. My dad had talked with his caching friend and they both decided that if we all went caching this weekend that it would be in a park in Oswego, Illinois. I had no problems with this idea because I know that spring is upon us meaning that the weeds and bugs will be back sooner rather than later. I really wanted to take advantage of the fact that it was going to be nice out without the annoyance of the bugs or weeds yet. Naturally, I figured that it was going to be the typical, yet exciting journey into a new park. We would discover many new places that would undoubtedly shock and awe us as they usually do. I was not mistaken with the shock and awe, however it was kind of mixed emotions. These were not your typical hiking trails. In fact, they were built for horseback riding which still surprises me as I write this. The paths went up and down constantly bringing us down steep hills and then forcing us to jog up the other side. It was indeed a nice workout. Not only that, but when you tried to bushwhack, it was nearly impossible due to the thickness of the brush. Some caches did get a little aggravating because we were walking through walls of brush that just scratched at you relentlessly. Not to mention, there were a lot of creeks and streams that we had to traverse. Erin did not enjoy this seeing as she got wet on nearly all of them. In the end, the park turned out to be alright once we found better paths to take. It was a very large park that we were able to clear out and discover every cache. I can only imagine how hard these caches get in the summer.

Ideas for Unique Cache Containers

Lately I have been unable to cache nearly as much as I would want to so I have had time to begin thinking about when and where to hide our next cache. Now, I say I have had time to do it, but it does not mean I have done that much as far as making progress is concerned. There are a few things I am sure of that must occur in our next hide. First off, I want to probably make it a micro because we have yet to hide one of those. Next, I want this hide to be fairly tricky for even the veterans to find quickly which also makes a good case for it to be a micro. In thinking about this much it has occurred to me that in order for it to be genuinely tough I will need to think of the perfect cache container to place. There are numerous routes I can take in approaching this as well. Basically, the first step for us is to decide on an area for the next hide so I can search out the surroundings and assess what kind of micro will blend in the best and cause some trouble for the finder. Here is my dilemma though; should I buy a pre-made container or build one with the numerous materials available? I think it would be more unique to build my own but then I look at the ones online and they look so elaborate and perfect that I am tempted to buy those. I am really at odds about this one because I am afraid that I could not build a good enough micro to satisfy my urge to have a cache that is actually very tough to find. I guess I am trying to find out feedback from people who have hidden pre-made ones versus built their own. I have found both and they seem equally hard to find if done right. It looks like I am going to be thinking about this up until we find the place to hide it which at this rate may be awhile.

Finally

I have had enough of sitting and waiting to get out a cache. It has been over a month since Erin and I have done a substantial search and my patience is wearing thin. Not to worry though because this weekend my wishes will all be granted. I will be heading back home to meet up with Erin as it is her Spring Break for where she is student teaching. Even better, this weekend it will be a complete double whammy! My dad is going to join us on a trip of a minimum of 25 finds come Saturday. You have no idea how excited I truly am. With the weather being as nice as it has been lately I have been itching to get out there. Not to mention, as the warmer weather comes, so does the poison ivy with it. I want to get out in the woods at least one more good time before I have to really watch what I am doing. In fact, my dad just asked me today what kind of caches I thought we should go after this weekend and my answer was please no park and grabs. Since we have been away for so long I want to make sure we have a nice trip into the wilderness rather than drive-ups. To be honest, this next time I am totally not focused on numbers for one of the first times in a while. I know I mentioned a minimum of 25 finds, but you got to realize if I was after numbers 40 or so would be what I would be willing to minimally attain. Even then, if we do not hit 25 I will not be too upset. The main thing is that we will be back to the old grind and even have the luxury of my father coming along as well. Be prepared for the stories that are inevitably going to come out of this journey taking place this Saturday!

Our First Travel Bug: Update

A while back I wrote about the turmoil of our first and only owned travel bug. At that point it had only traveled roughly 30 miles in a matter of five months. Here we are two months later even and the travel bug was up to 150 total miles. What I must mention though is that those 80 miles added on were thanks to Erin and I. We took matter into our own hands. The bug was not moving out of the cache it was in so we decided to go out and grab it. It was a good thing we did because the cache was at risk of being either muggled or destroyed. Anyways, we made the decision to move it back to Erin’s hometown. A few weeks passed and we finally drove there on a weekend to take some time off of school. We planned a very basic day of caching and in doing so also intended on replacing our travel bug. I hope you can kind of see where this is going. The bug was placed again in a semi-decent cache that was just hidden. We figured that since it was new cachers would flock to it for quite some time. We were wrong, very wrong. I came to find out the other day that it appears this cache has been muggled. There are two DNF’s in a row stating that they looked for quite some time with no success. This cache was a very simple find in the first place. The fact that they looked around for a long time only reassures me that it is gone. I was slightly worried when hiding our bug in this cache but I was hoping it was just nerves. It is kind of depressing to have your first travel bug move a grand total of 150 miles before it disappears forever. Instances like this only make me angrier with muggles and their willingness to steal something with little or no value inside. It is going to definitely take some time before we decide to take the now risk of putting out a new travel bug. If and when we do, however, we are going to make sure it is hidden in a well hidden cache that is still found quite often.

A Few More FTF’s to Finally Keep Us Moving

It has been a long time since Erin and I have been out in the field collecting multiple caches in one outing. As a matter of fact, it will continue to be a long time because although I was able to snag two caches a few days ago, they were unfortunately without her. I had actually been at work at The Home Depot on Sunday and a fellow cacher came in to buy some stuff for their house. Naturally, we began talking about geocaching because that is what we do. After a little chit chat he hinted to me that he hid two caches on his way to the store and that I should keep my eye out for them to be published that night. He even went as far as telling me that they were going to be close to my home. I know that some people may not agree with this, but it was all harmless. Everyone had equal chances once they were published because all the hardcore cachers in my area all get text messages the moment a cache is ready to go. Immediately when I got home from work I filled my dad in on the information that I had received and we decided to wait it out and just see when the caches published. It had been getting pretty late and still no caches were popping up as new. Finally, at about nine at night I got two text messages regarding two new caches in the area. It was them! After a few minutes of deliberation with my father, we decided to give it a go and see if we could get first to finds on both of the caches. We did the one closer to our house first thinking that was our best shot and turns out it was. We found it and discovered a clean log inside of it. It was nice to get another FTF under our belt. Then it was time to head to the other one further from the house and just hope that one of the other cachers did not snag it up yet. I must say that I was not to confident with this one, but turns out we were indeed FTF again! Basically, in a nut shell, I still am itching to have an all day cache hunt with Erin the next time I see her, but the satisfaction of achieving two FTF’s in one night should at least hold me over a little while longer.

My Progress Thus Far

So as I have said numerous times, this blog and website can all be attributed to one of my college classes during my senior year. With that said, here I am halfway done with the semester and I am going to attempt to evaluate myself and the project as a whole. Caution, this will probably be one of the very few blogs that have little mention of geocaching events. Anyways, I can tell you that being given this project has helped me a lot so far. First off, I never really thought I would enjoy blogging from the beginning. I have come to like it more and more every time I post a new blog. I realize that the traffic aspect takes time or may never happen. However, you learn that blogging and website building is not just all about that. If you enjoy doing it, then continue with it. I believe that traffic will eventually comes once the search engines decide that what you are doing is legit. At this midpoint I can tell you that I do intend on continuing this blog and website even after the semester ends. I know that in order to also be considered a legit blogger that you need to blog regularly. While I am trying my best to keep up with this, it is a little tough at this point with my heavy workload in school. I hate making excuses and I don’t want that to be, but it is the truth. I can only hope that after school I am able to be a little steadier with my posts in order to achieve more recognition. With that said, I am pretty sure I will never run out of geocaching stories to tell, so blogging should become easier and easier as a I learn this new gig. As far as my website goes, it is definitely still a work in progress. Not to mention it is done on a free platform which will take even longer to become found by searchers. This aspect I definitely do not mind because I need the time to develop the thing into exactly what I want it to be. All in all, this project is real exciting and I look forward to seeing how far I go with it.

Having Those Bad Days

There definitely will come days when you are out geocaching and it just seems like it is not your day. I am not going to lie; these can severely ruin my morale when I am on a mission to find at least 20 in any particular day. The worst way to begin a day full of geocaching is beginning with a “did not find” on your first attempt. Then it just feels like the day is going to continue to roll downhill. I have come to learn that with more experience eventually comes more patience. I am going to be honest, there have been times where we will DNF our first three searches and you do not want to talk to me after that. However, I think that there is a combination of patience and calmness that need to accompany you when you are searching for caches. It seems like the days that I get extremely angry will continually get worse. Imagine that. I have noticed that the more calm and collected I stay when we get a few DNF’s the better off I am as we continue our search. Not to mention, I like to plan a few extra caches in order to accommodate for those few DNF’s that will occasionally occur. I know that may have come off as being somewhat negative, but I like to accomplish my find goal each day and if that means taking DNF’s into account, then I am going to continue that. Moreover, patience has become my best friend as of late. There have been times when I search for five minutes and get frustrated because the cache has not jumped out at me right away. I have become much more patient with my searches and have even come to realize that the moment I am about to walk away I will find the cache. Talk about bitter sweet. I think the best thing for any cacher to realize is that DNF’s are going to occur no matter how good of a cacher you are. It is just up to you on how you want to handle them. If you stay positive then there is no reason you could not still have a successful day. This has helped me immensely over the past few months.

Going the Distance

I know this is kind of early to post something like this, but I have said before that I fully intend on finding as many caches as possible before I ever even think about quitting this sport. It is my hope that one day we can reach 20,000 finds and then some. I am honestly unsure of the exact amount that the highest finder has found but I intend on finding more. I know that some of you will assume that it is wishful thinking but that only gives me the motivation to actually get there. I can promise you that the moment I graduate and figure out exactly what I am doing with my life that I will then figure out just how I am going to accomplish this monstrous task. It may take years on end, but then again, that is what motivates me. I find geocaching as my way to step out of the typical thing that we do every day. After along day’s work I can definitely see myself coming home and wanting to go caching to basically take my mind off of the day’s work. It is a release that if you have yet to feel then you are missing out. I realize that I am probably preaching to the choir on this one, but I feel everything I say needs to be said. After all, that is why I started this blog. I want to express my ideas in hopes of responses to elaborate on anything I say. I think it is many cachers’ goal to be the best one day and I am ready for the competition. However, I like to think that I thrive under pressure and the idea of everyone trying to beat me only makes me want it more. I guess the only way to see if this actually happens is to check in with me ten years from now and see my stats. I am hoping that I can impress many cachers with my accomplishments one day.

Our Upcoming Journey

Coming this summer, Erin and I are planning a road trip to Arizona. This is a prime opportunity for us to finally branch out of Illinois and find caches in numerous different states. I can only hope that we are able to snag as many as possible. I figure that by road tripping we will be able to experience many different states. We will take the northern route down to Arizona and then take the southern route home. This will allow us to cache in at least 10 states I presume. There are a few ideas of things we want to do before we embark on this new journey. For instance, we are contemplating buying as many travel bugs as the states we plan on caching in. This way we will place one in every state and see where they end up moving. It seems like a good idea mentally, now we will just have to see if it pans out physically. After our rough experience with our one and only travel bug I can tell you that we are a little nervous to place more travel bugs out in the game. However, we know that we will eventually and what not a better time to do it. Not to mention, during our drive out there we are planning on doing some of the most scenic drives in America. We bought a book that tells you how to get to them and we look forward to finding caches on these routes. If I think that finding new parks and such in Illinois is amazing, I can only imagine what my opinion will become after this trip. I get more excited everyday and the trip is still a few months away from occurring. What I can assure is that we are going to have fun going about our mission of finding as many caches as possible on our journey to Arizona.

What I Value About Geocaching

I know I have posted something similar to this in the past but I feel it is important to reiterate the reasons why I enjoy geocaching so much. I stress this all the time and I feel like it is never enough, you discover totally new places. I cannot even begin to count the numerous new places Erin and I have stumbled upon caching. We only have 400 finds mind you at this point. I am so intrigued to get back out in the world and find even better and exciting places that I know exist but I just do not know where yet. Geocaching pushes for us to enjoy nature’s true beauty through and through. If you go out knowing you are about to embark on something new it makes the experience that much better. I enjoy myself caching so much more when I know we are going to visit places we have never heard of nor been to. Caching also brings together a lot of different people. There are events and such that allow you to meet the cachers in your area. This can be a great experience for when you are out in the field. If you happen to meet up with a cacher you previously met it will make that encounter much smoother. Sometimes it will even help when you are out attempting to find those difficult caches. This way if you have befriended some fellow cachers and know they have found them you can give them a call. Provided they give you their number, then you have a phone a friend for life. Lastly, I believe that geocaching has brought Erin and me even closer. I realize that some couples cannot geocache together because one of them does not like it. I acknowledge that I am lucky and I take full advantage of it. We have a blast every time we head out and I feel it has made us closer all together. Geocaching is definitely something that I want to continue until I physically cannot or until it disappears, which I hope will never happen.

My Recent Span of No Geocaching

I wonder if other cachers become as antsy as I do when I go a long time without caching. It has been a few weeks now and we are still sitting on 400 finds. I have been so busy with school and tests and job interviews that geocaching had to be put on the back burner for a little while. At this point, though, I am just itching to find an excuse to go out and find a quick five finds or so. That is quite impossible for me though seeing as our GPS in Erin’s possession who is three hours away from me for this semester. It is a break like this that merits a long day of caching the next time we are together. Hell, probably when I am done writing this blog I may go and begin to plan a nice day of 50 or so finds for us. Although I am always motivated to find many caches each time I go out, it is after these longer breaks that my motivation is through the roof. The worst aspect of this break is that I know it is going to continue for quite some time still. I do not think I am going to see Erin for a lengthy period of time until the end of March. My only hope is that my dad lets me tag along with him for a few finds when I am home for Spring Break. At least then I am able to get out and do what I love, even if it has to be without my partner. I can guarantee you this that the first chance we get; we will be out caching again and trying to reach our next plateau, 500 finds. Moreover, after finding 400 in our first year of caching, I think it is safe to say that our goal for the next year is to at least hit 1000. I will stand for nothing less than that come February 25th 2010.

Caching Story from Back Home

My father is the one that showed me geocaching and got me into it. So naturally when I go home from school for any reason I enjoy caching with him as much as possible. However, while I am away, he has found a few good caching buddies to accompany him on days. One of which I would say that they have become rather good friends in and out of geocaching. Anyway, the point I am trying to get at is that my dad’s buddy is about to reach the 1000 find plateau and it is up to my dad to hide the infamous silver ammo can. Now, he has yet to hide a cache and after what we have been thinking for this one I can see why. My father is very picky when it comes to his hide having to be perfect. There can be no rock unturned or else he will feel like it is not a good enough hide. I went home last weekend to help him out and I think we have a solid idea of what we want to do with this cache and I truly think it is brilliant. My dad is intending on making this cache a multi that will incorporate everything that his buddy hates to encounter while caching. Ingenious! I think there are about five stages that add up to about 1.75 miles of walking, but it is going to be interesting none the less. My dad acknowledges that this cache probably will not be found very often due to the difficulty he is making it and the duration it will take to find the cache. I tend to think that only the hardcore cachers will snag this one simply because it is yet another cache to pop up on their radar. I keep calling him and seeing if it is all hidden yet, but the hide has yet to be complete. It is my hope that I can be home the weekend they go out to find this because I really am going to get a kick out of seeing my dad’s friend try to accomplish this find. It is definitely a cache where I will be able to tell him that he earned his 1000th find.

The Adoption of Our First Hidden Cache

Since Erin and I are only here in Bloomington-Normal only to go to school we try to do as much caching as possible. This way when we move back to our homes we will feel successful in what we accomplished while being at school. Also, since a lot of our caching occurs down here, we decided to hide a cache in the beginning of last fall’s semester. It was going to be our first hide and we wanted it to be in a place that we had cached a lot. It only made sense to do it that way at the time. However, now we are coming up to a rather large dilemma about to be on our hands come the beginning of May. We will both be moving back home for good with not much of a reason to frequent the Bloomington-Normal area very often. This is going to pose an obvious problem in that we are going to be unable to check on our cache and keep up with it. Our first thought was that we may have to archive a cache that is not even a year old. Right away I was against it but at the time I was unsure of what else we may do. After thinking about it and looking around, now I am fairly certain that we are going to look for a fellow cacher in the area to adopt it. That way we know it will be taken care of and still be out there for other cachers to find. It is our first cache and naturally we want it to last as long as possible. It is our hope that within the next few months we will be able to convince one of our caching peers to adopt our cache and take care of it like their own. There is high hopes for this cache and they do not stop with us moving back home.

The Reason for This Blog

I have said this a few times in other writings, but the reason this all began was for one of my business classes during my senior year of college. I must admit that when starting this thing I was unsure of how long the motivation would last. Although it is still very early in this whole blog, but I can tell you that I am glad I was given this opportunity. My teacher told us to create this project out of something we loved. That was the easiest decision for me to make. I may have only bee geocaching for a year now, but I can tell you that I want to do this until the sport disappears. If it does not disappear, which is my hope, then it looks like I am a lifer. It is my goal with this blog to allow fellow cachers to read up on some of my adventures and ideas. More so, I love to hear other ideas and adventures as well. This is a perfect opportunity to share out stories and thoughts and I hope that eventually it will be taken advantage of. Along with this blog, I was given the task to create a website. Now, it is nowhere near from being done at this point, but I am currently working on improving it weekly. It is nothing too high tech, but it serves as another great place to read about the sport that we love, geocaching. By clicking here you will be directed to my website where I advise you to be very critical of. Contact me with ideas and criticism so I can further improve my goal, and maybe get a good grade on this project. Although we were told to do all of this with free platforms, I hope to one day buy a domain name if this project takes off like it possibly could. Regardless, the most important part for me is to have fun doing it. Writing about geocaching comes easy to me. It may not be formal, but then again, I am not here to be formal about something such as caching. I just want to be real and lay as much out there as possible about one of my passions.

As Winter Caching Comes To An End…

I am sure I have mentioned it already in the past, but winter caching is my favorite time of the year. I love to cache year round, do not get me wrong. If I had to pick a time to get a lot of caches found though, I would pick winter in a heartbeat. With that said, another season of caching is upon us and it is bitter sweet for me. No longer will there be days when I can wander wherever in a forest without the fear of poison ivy creeping up on me. Not to mention the spider webs that you seem to walk through with every step. I realize I am probably sounding like the anti-warm cacher, but in all reality I am not. I love to cache when it is warm because I do not have to bundle up like I live in Antarctica. At this point in time, I have a few more weeks of safe “jungle” caching before it is more time for the urban caches. I still try to cache in the woods as much as possible in the warmer months; however, I have to be much more careful. So long go the days where few muggles are around as well. I think that everyone can agree that winter caching is peaceful in that there are not many eyes on you at all times. It should be expected though. As much as we love it when the weather warms up, everyone else does as well. The best part of the future months ahead of us is definitely the longer days. Now, instead of being limited to caching until 5 before it is pitch black we will have until virtually 9 by the summer time. This is going to allow us to get out for longer periods of time and hopefully up our numbers even more. If not, at least we will be able to decide at 4:00 p.m. if we want to go caching or not because we still have 5 hours of daylight. You just have to love that!

Climb to 400 Finds

I know a lot of you veteran cachers out there will laugh at me for being proud of how quick we got to 400 finds, but it is something that I did not think would occur this fast. For us being rather new cachers, climbing to 400 is definitely a nice feat for us. We jumped from 300 finds to 400 in a matter of less than a month and a half. That is more than 2 finds per day. I realize that some cachers can grab 100 caches in a day! However, our journey to gaining 100 finds in a month and a half is totally satisfying. Not to mention, we are coming up on a year of caching at the end of this month so reaching 400 is definitely another nice milestone to have under our belt before reaching our one year anniversary. After sitting back and thinking about it, I am not sure exactly how we got there so fast. We did have a weekend of 47 finds, but the other 53 kind of crept up on us. Even writing this I am struggling trying to figure out how we racked up 53 more finds past the weekend we found 47. I am assuming that it was the few times we would go here and there and grab a few caches. For instance, this weekend we went to Chicago to visit the Field Museum and grabbed four caches while walking to the museum. However, yet again, I am stuck at 49 finds that I am not accounting for. The downside to this feat for us it was is going to occur over the next couple of months. Our finds are going to drop of severely due to how busy Erin and I are going to be. With us both graduating this semester, we are about to approach the home stretch of college work and we are beginning to acknowledge that caching is going to have to be put on the back burner for the next few months. Good luck caching!

Country Road Caches

Cachers all know the extreme variety of caches that can be found on any given day. Me personally, I love to find myself driving out into the country nabbing all the country road caches that I can find. With that said, I am very allergic to poison ivy so the only time I really venture out into the woods is the winter time. This gives me the unique opportunity to see the world from the country point of view. Some cachers may complain because this type of caching can put a lot of miles on the car, but I take full advantage of it. Sure, half of the country caches are bridge and cemetery finds, but even some of those are real cool. Plus, I have visited cemeteries in which I would have never stepped foot in otherwise. There are some real interesting old graves out there in this country, trust me. Another reason I love it so much is the serenity it brings. There are not very many muggles out to disturb me while I search for cachers. Besides the scarce passerby, I am alone out in the country and have my peace to cache. Don’t get me wrong, I love to cache anywhere, but if I had to choose a full day of country caching or everything else, I would probably pick the back roads. Erin and I have had so many awesome experiences on them that I have already lost count. From the cache entitled, “Baby Doll”, that actually was a baby doll’s head on a pole (I know it sounds disturbing, but it was not) to the numerous cemeteries with grave stones dating back to the mid 1800s. There is never a dull moment out there even when you are just driving. If you have yet to experience a day like this I highly recommend you schedule one as soon as the weather warms up and you are up for an adventure. Let me know how it goes.

The Decathlon

Back in my hometown there seems to be a true caching frenzy occurring. More or less, the area is becoming a literal hot bed for new caches to pop up at any time. Not to mention there is a great group of core cachers around the area to keep everything in a positive motion. There is one cacher in particular that comes to mind when I think of home though. He goes by the name of Brijac and he has become famous for his insanely tough puzzle caches that sometimes stay unfound for weeks and months even. In December he decided to do a little caching “decathlon”. His goal was to place ten different caches all throughout the area and see who was the quickest to find them. If you knew my area, you would know that this was spelling instant success for a time like this. He hid a cache introducing the decathlon idea and laid out all of the ground work for an amazing series that I probably will never forget. He was going to hide different types of caches all in ten different fashions. I thought this was ingenious and wished I could have come up with it myself! From the night of the first event up until now, every time he posts a new cache in this decathlon the cachers go nuts. My dad will call me asking me to direct him where he needs to go while he is driving. Picture this: I am on the Geocaching website looking at the maps and descriptions while my dad is frantically driving to wherever I tell him. Yes, it can get extremely stressful. On the other hand, the few times he has been FTF on these particular caches I have felt pretty good because I had a hand in making that happen. None the less, it is now February and the decathlon has yet to finish. I think they are on hide number nine so the results should be almost clear who the best cacher back in my hometown is. My father would tell you he is not and I would have to agree. However, for only having roughly 370 finds compared to the thousands of finds the others have, I am pretty proud of him. If I had to guess right now, he is probably going to finish up somewhere in the middle of the road at fifth place.

Ten Reasons Why Geocaching Should Be Your Hobby

So I realized that I have been writing a lot about this and that a lot lately. So I want to share with you my top ten reasons why you need to geocache:

1. It is overall relatively cheap and free to join the website.

2. It appears like this sport will not be going away anytime soon.

3. It can range from easy to extremely challenging. We all know we need a challenge every now and then.

4. There are at LEAST 10 (could be way more) caches within a five mile radius of your home. You have no excuse to not get those convenient ones.

5. You can do it in almost any weather.

6. Meeting new cachers is very fun and advantageous for when you can’t find that tough cache and you need a friend to call.

7. You get to be outdoors!

8. You are allowed to do your part by hiding caches of your own.

9. Believe it or not, it stimulates the mind a lot.

10. The world is indeed your playground! You will discover so many new places that it will blow your mind!

These are just a few of the reasons why I think it is worth your while to get into geocaching. If you do not want to take my word for it, just go out and give it a try. If you have a decent reason for not liking it, I will respect that fully. Now get out there and enjoy!

Getting an Automobile GPS

Before this Christmas, Erin and I only owned the GPS that was given to us when we first began geocaching. I know I have harped that geocaching is virtually free minus a few costs. However, I am pretty sure many people either own a GPS for their car or have one built in. If not though, I highly suggest looking into buying one. You will not be disappointed, I promise. Up until this holiday season I always had to look at maps and plan routes out as to the best ways to get to the caches we were hunting. I realize that some cachers will just use their handheld to get them there but I sometimes feel like I am driving in circles using that seeing as you never know the exact street to turn down until you have went too far. So writing these routes out would sometimes take hours on end. I do not know how some people do it. They were especially bad when we were planning trips out on the back roads because I would have to zoom in so far to A. find out the name of the road, and B. make sure it did not dead end two miles down the road. I am convinced that it was this route making that would occasionally turn me off from geocaching for a few days. So I figured out a solution to the problem. Christmas was here and since I had nothing else that I really wanted I asked for a GPS for my car. I got a beautiful Garmin Nuvi 260 and am absolutely in love with it. Her name is Hilda by the way. I even turned her accent on to mock an Australian because I think they have the coolest accents. None the less, I never have to create routes anymore. I simply plug the coordinates into her and she tells me exactly where I need to be. Don’t get me wrong, these things are never perfect, but with as accurate as it has been thus far I am not concerned. In case you have not gotten the picture yet, I am telling you that if you have the money go out and buy a GPS for the car. It will strengthen your love for geocaching, I guarantee it!

The Four Seasons of Caching

When it comes to living in Illinois and caching all year round, it is safe to say that we cachers experience something different in each season of hunting. Me personally would choose to cache in late fall to early winter any day over the summer months. My explanation is simple; I am extremely allergic to poison ivy. Every time I go out to cache in the late spring and summer I am taking a very large risk of infecting myself with some of the nastiest outbreaks of poison ivy I am pretty sure you have ever seen. I guess the cliché is true though: “with no risk, comes no reward.” Although I do cache in the summer, I attempt to make sure the caches are less in the area of dense forest and close to paths and even more urban. If I am to get poison ivy I am out of the game for at least a couple of weeks and it will spread like a fire all over my body. Yes, it is not comfortable at all and I do everything in my power to avoid being put in that situation. None the less, there are other reasons for enjoying the hunt in the winter as well. For one, all the undergrowth in the forest’s are dead making it easier to walk through what used to be thick forest. Now, instead of trying to find the best route to the cache you can walk straight to it with no problem. Some cachers will argue that this makes the sport too easy. My response to that is that you have to play the weather in your favor. If there is one important thing I have learned while caching it is that each and every weather scenario has an advantage to cache in. The hard part is determining which situation works best with the particular weather. I have yet to figure it all out yet, but I am confident it will come with more experience. If you have any hints feel free to let me know as well. I am always up for good advice.

Our Only Travel Bug

Since joining the Geocaching community we have only activated one travel bug of our own. We intend to put out many more in the future, but at this point we are sitting at one. We can only hope that the luck of our future TB’s are far greater than our very first. For our first travel bug we wanted to play a little bit into our name like we try to do so often. So we looked up key chains online that had puzzle pieces on them. We eventually found the perfect one and before we knew it we had a TB ready to go into a cache. It seemed very fitting to activate our first cache at the same time so we decided to put the bug into our first cache. Now it begins to get intense. The person who was first to find on our cache ended up taking our travel bug like we expected. What we did not account for was the fact that they were going to forget they had it for about three months. At this point in time I decided to e-mail the cacher and sure enough he told me that he had forgotten that he even had it and it was buried in his glove compartment in his car. Sigh. Finally he replaced the TB back into the world where it belongs. However, he decided to place it in a cache that he owned and consisted of roughly 9 stages. It is not as bad as it sounds until you actually go out and try to accomplish this cache. At least three of the stages were incorrect information and we ended up finding this cache ourselves by using brute force. I want to back up a little real quick. He did not place our TB in this cache until we had already found it and told him that the stages were error filled. It almost seemed like he did it to spite us. I know it may seem like I am making cachers out to be rude, but this makes for a good lesson in geocaching. We ended up being the last people to find this particular cache for about the last three months now and I sent him another e-mail asking if he could move our TB. Shockingly, he obliged and moved it to another one of his caches. It is now time to play the waiting game on our travel bug that has moved a grand total of 28 miles in 6 months.

Story Time: The Tale of How We Got Our First GPS

Since Erin and I are your typical broke college students, finding money to buy a GPS was going to be hard for us when we first began this journey. Plus we were anxious to get out in the field to begin collecting caches that we did not want to wait for any kind of money to come our way. So we decided to go about caching in a very primitive way: Google Maps. It seemed like a brilliant idea at the time. We figured we had no money, so why not try and “beat” the system. Looking back on that idea now I would have told myself that I was crazy for thinking a blurry icon on a map would show me where a cache was. However, we gave it a go and actually came up with 7finds on our first day of caching GPS-less. It was sort of a triumphant day for us that I think we will always look back on a laugh. So here I was all excited to log these finds and in doing so I wanted to make it clear that we made these finds by using Google Maps and not a GPS. I thought it would make us look hardcore or something. Interestingly enough, a fellow cacher in the area was reading our logs and decided to shoot me an e-mail. He mentioned that he saw we used Google Maps to find our caches and wondered if we planned on getting a GPS. Naturally, I responded and told him that a GPS was in our future plans since it was something we really could not afford at the moment. Later that day I got his response telling me that he had an extra GPS and was willing to give it to us for no charge. Now, I may be a college student, but I know that in today’s day and age it is rare to receive anything for free. Sure enough though we met him for lunch a few days later and he gave us our GPS that we still use today. It really was a blessing that he found our logs and was gracious enough to do that for us. Not only that, he also became a good caching friend. In fact, we have been on a few cache hunts with him and hopefully more in our future. If he ever does read this, Thank You from the bottom of our hearts!

Our First Ever “First to Find”

The story behind our first ever first to find (FTF) is actually ironic and funny. It came back in December when I was home from school for winter break. Erin was visiting me on this particular weekend because it was my annual work Christmas Party and I wanted to bring her along since I was allowed to bring a guest. Now, I am about to get off topic a little here, but it will all tie in I promise. Anyways, Erin tends to bring me good luck and at our party my work was doing a present giveaway and the way to win was to be drawn from a hat. She claimed I was going to win if she was there. It just so happened on the first drawing I did win a tool set and a real nice set of LED flashlights ideal for geocaching. That was not it. They did a second drawing for much bigger prizes and guess who won? Yes, I won an iPod touch in that round. I could not believe it. Now I call Erin my good luck charm. Now back to the FTF story. We just got back to my house from the Christmas party and my dad begins telling me about a cache that was just posted right by our house. How nice, it was dark and I just won LED flashlights. See the irony in this one? Someone definitely knew something that I did not that night. So we headed out to get the cache right then at about midnight. I forgot to mention it was sleeting out too pretty good at this time as well. Here we are with about a 500 foot walk to a cache in sleet and darkness. The flashlights definitely came in handy. I ended up finding it before everyone else to cap off a great night overall. That is definitely a night I will never forget. We have since to land an FTF, but hope to sometime soon.

My Personal View on Travel Bugs

When first getting into geocaching, the whole idea behind travel bugs and geocoins very much captivated me. The thought that some items were able to be tracked and could be checked up on at any time was very appealing to me to say the least. I made it my goal to attempt and collect as many TB’s (travel bugs) and coins as possible and to move them as far as I can each time. However, I have come to notice that not all cachers share the same passion I do towards these unique items. Before it appears like I am complaining, I want to clear up that I have respect for all cachers and I know there is a rhyme to everyone’s reason. I just have to respectfully disagree with the way some cachers go about TB moving. When I find a travel bug I always make sure to read the goal and try to accommodate it to the best of my abilities. If it says it wants to visit Alaska, for example, I am obviously not going to be able to take it there, but I will move it more west to at least keep it going in the right direction. Moreover, after I replace a TB, I enjoy checking in on them from time to time. Since it shows me the TB’s I have found I like to take that to my advantage and have a look see every now and then. This is when it baffles me to see some bugs being held for months on end. I am not sure if some people just quit the sport and forget they have TB’s in their possession or just forget they have them in the first place. This is when I put myself in the bug owner’s position. Personally, when I place one I want it to move as much as possible. I think I am just venting at this point now. None the less, the point I am trying to make is that although collecting TB’s is something I enjoy, I also make sure to replace them as soon as I possibly can.

A Few of My Ideas for PuzzlePiece915

When Erin and I decided to partake in geocaching, there were a few ideas that we threw around that we thought would make it even more interesting for us. Don’t get me wrong, caching is intriguing just the way it is, but we wanted to spice it up a bit from our end. Our first idea was to play off of our caching name, PuzzlePiece915. We thought it would be neat to buy a few puzzles and kind of integrate leaving puzzle pieces behind at the caches that we found. I guess we wanted to make it our calling as some might say. Anyways, so we took these puzzles, built them, and then proceeded to flip them over and write neat quotes on the back of them. Next, we would break the puzzle up into an even amount of pieces. The ultimate goal was to find the ultimate zealous cacher out there and hope that they may take the time to collect our pieces and enjoy what we were trying to do. To be honest, I did not think anyone would really latch onto the idea. No sooner did I get an e-mail from a caching icon around here (Ma n Pa is there caching name), telling me that they solved out puzzle. Sure enough, there was the quote on the next line: “Be clearly aware of the stars and infinity on high. Then life seems almost enchanted after all.” It was very gratifying to say the least. Not only did someone solve our puzzle, but it happened to be the one with our most favorite quote on it. Moving right along, our other semi-neat idea was to attempt to pick up a different item from each cache. We want to get the widest variety of items instead of zoning in on any specific idea. Erin then labels the items telling us where we found them and who found that specific cache. We do this because now when we want to hide a small or regular cache we are going to use those items as a starting point for swag to put into the cache. They will also be used to refill the caches when needed. We have a bag for each set of 100 finds. I realize how pathetically nerdy this may sound, but in theory it is great to us.

My Most Recent Caching Adventure

So, my girlfriend (whom I will now refer to as Erin), was in town for the weekend and we decided that we had to do some caching on Sunday. Well, I looked at the map around here and decided that we were actually going to venture out and do some caching around Clinton Lake in Clinton, Illinois. However, at the point I planned this little caching trip I was unaware of the snow that was going to be falling. Here we were on Sunday morning looking out the window at a steady snowfall and 21 caches with our name on them in Clinton. Our stubbornness persuaded us to keep to the plan and head out and tackle these caches. Everything was going well for the most part until it began to snow more and harder as well. We knew we would be going on back roads to get to many of these caches, but what we did not know was that they were going to be some of the biggest hills we have seen in this area. Big hills, lots of snow and ice, you do the math. We found ourselves unable to make it up a few of the hills no matter what we did. I even backed the car all the way back to the bottom and tried to get a head start only to make it just a little bit further. It was disappointing because we were forced to DNF some caches due to inclement weather. Having to turn away from a cache that I know we could have found is very difficult for me because I do not know if I will ever be back to where we were. After quite a few disheartening encounters, we knew the only thing to do was keep on searching. We fought through the rest of the search and were able to come up with 13 successful finds. I know it is a far cry from the 21 we had planned, but with the way the weather was on this day, we were lucky to grab any. I am quite positive we may have been the only cachers out in this area. I guess it just goes to show either we are completely insane, or love the sport enough to do it in whatever obstacles that are thrown at us.

Goal Setting

As I have said before, I have been caching for almost a year now and almost every time I go to the Geocaching website, I find myself setting a new goal as far as caching goes. My girlfriend (Erin) and I are constantly setting a goal as far as how many caches we want to find by a certain point. Albeit, we are only at about 350 finds right now, I am pretty proud of our accomplishments seeing as we are also full time college students. I think our goal for the upcoming summer is to go into it with 400 finds. I feel that is very much within reach since we are at 350 after less than a year. We basically have three months to find 50 and depending on how tough our workloads get, it should definitely be attainable. We also have different goals such as attempting to find a cache in as many states as possible. We both love traveling, and upon our graduation, we are hoping to begin to take as many trips as the wallet will allow. As I have said numerous times, caching allows us to see parts of Mother Nature that we would have never known existed. Why wouldn’t we want to explore as many states as possible? Moreover, a more longtime goal is to one day reach 10,000 finds and more! We realize that this one is a little on the over optimistic side, but we also know that geocaching is something we want to keep a part of our life for as long as possible. Now, after writing all this it makes me wonder if other cachers make goals as well. If so, I am extremely curious to know what type of goals they set as well.

Getting Lucky

I know that a lot of veteran cachers will know exactly what I am talking about in this post. A lot of times when one person in a relationship likes caching the other one does not. Now this is not accurate in all accounts, but I have definitely come across my fair share of combinations of haters and embracers. Now, I fully understand the main cause for it. In a lot of the cases I have seen it is a husband and wife and they usually have a family. Now either the husband or the wife enjoys caching while the other feels like they have to take care of the family while the husband/wife goes geocaching. I can totally see where they are coming from, but I also wish that the people who disliked it would just give it a chance. I realize that some families have small children. That may be a time to relax from the sport. However, the beauty of geocaching is that it does not seem to be disappearing anytime soon. When your child/children have grown a little I think it is a great idea to begin showing them the activity of geocaching. In my opinion it is completely possible for everyone to enjoy caching if gone about correctly. I know it is hard to teach and old dog new tricks, but I also know that it is possible. This is exactly where I got lucky. The first time I showed my girlfriend geocaching she fell in love with it just as much as me. We knew we liked it so much that we are now listed as our own name, PuzzlePiece915. It has been something that has brought us together even more and we vow to keep doing it as long as possible. I guess my main hope for you cachers who have a hater in the household to stay strong and hope everything will work itself out. This is way too exciting of a hobby to just let it go by the wayside if you really do enjoy it.

Take Part in the World’s Playground

When I first discovered the idea of geocaching, I was really unsure of what to expect. However, all it took was one escapade out into the world to realize just what I was getting myself into. I am sure I can speak for many cachers when I say the world literally becomes your “playground”. I found myself discovering new and exciting places in which I would have never known existed had it not been for geocaching. I know this will sound cliché, but it was as if the world stands still in that moment you take in what you are being a part of. Parks and preserves are now places that I will frequent even if there is no cache to be found. In that case, you can bet I will be looking for a place to hide one so I can share my experiences with the next cacher. I can only imagine how exciting it is for cachers just like me who find somewhere new. Hell, there are even roads that we would have never known existed had it not been for that cache placed at the end of it. Even more, if you ever get sick of searching in a specific area, there are caches placed all over the world. Expand and find out what this sport has to present in other areas. Enjoying nature’s beauty and serenity are definitely cause enough for one to at least give this activity a try. Basically, I am reaching out to you adventurous ones who love to explore our wilderness and all it has to offer. You would be surprised just how much of the world you have yet to see. This also goes for the ones who have yet to discover their exploratory sides as well. When you do decide to venture out into our playground just remember that geocaching is giving us the gift of discovery; the ability to see the world from a new perspective.

My Journey into Geocaching…

As of a little over a year ago I had no clue that anything like this was possible, let alone existed. My dad had come home from work one day and while we were sitting outside on the deck he mentioned this really interesting word, “geocaching”. Geo-what? He went on to explain to me that one of his co-workers had told him all about it and showed him the whole geocaching website. At this point, I thought they were both a little bit crazy. I had heard of doing a little scavenger hunt, but never one that involves anywhere one could imagine. It was really hanging me up and my dad knew that. This is when he decided to prove it to not only me but himself as well. A few days later he had come home from work with a handheld GPS he had bought on lunch. Now it was time to show me exactly what we were dealing with. He decided to join the site for free and made his caching name, tooltime8. There was no rhyme or reason to his name so I tend not to ask him why he made it that. Anyways, after signing up, we began looking at some caches that were surprisingly nearby the house and plugged like five of them into the GPS. Was this really going to work? With a few knick knacks in one hand to trade and the GPS in another we set out to see what we could find. I don’t want to spoil what a first caching trip feels like, but needless to say, we were instantly hooked. I never knew that people hid ammo cans out in forests just waiting to be found. We found some in woods in which I had played in my entire childhood. It was simply amazing. I am sure I will expose more stories and go into much greater detail as this blog continues but for right now I hate to ruin it for ones who have yet to cache. I can only hope that everyone can take away even half as much as I did from my first experience.