I “justify” some of my caching by using the price difference in gasoline. If the norm is $3 / gallon (pick your value) and it’s now $4 / gallon that means I’m paying an extra $1 / gallon. At 20 mpg that works out to an additional $0.05 / mile. It all depends how far you’re going to travel and certainly a personal decision for each of us, but this is how I analyze it.

@Mister Greenthumb wrote:

We eliminated trips to the doctor and visiting relatives so we would have enough gas for geocaching.

I suppose you’re cutting back on those weekly visits to church, too. 🙄 😉

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I view geocaching as using discretionary income. That includes gas in addition to all of the other costs involved. If you have money to spend on recreation or entertainment, you choose how to spend it: movies, sports, eating out, concerts, museums, geocaching… whatever. It’s like what you do with every expense: prioritize, make a budget, stick to the budget, reassess.

So if geocaching is what you want to do and you have some extra money with which to do it, just figure in a bit extra or stay closer to home if the price of gas goes up too high for the budget.

I view it similar to Mrs. S. We have a gas budget (we budget every dollar and yes, some is budgeted for entertainment so geocaching falls in that.) That’s a variable budget item though and if we have to choose between food and gas for work/school vs gas for geocaching, food and the livelihood come first.

Not everyone manages their money that way. We have one fixed income and need to do it that way. That doesn’t make it right or wrong, just the way we need to do it.

I understand Todd’s original post concern as I plan my daily routine based on gas lately. My kids go to school across town, so I stay on that side of town to avoid the gas back and forth. This morning I spent an hr at one school and another hour at the other. If the weather had been less sloppy, I probably would have picked up some smileys that I loaded last week for that side of town. For geocaching, we plan our caches based on proximity to one another.

I will say to Zuma’s point though, in Oshkosh, I’m already seeing a need to expand our area as we’ve found the majority of the traditionals. I’m the only one that really likes puzzles or multis, so I have to solve them and then work them into a route when we go. I have our sights on a series here in Oshkosh that takes us all over town before you can find the final and I am figuring in the price of gas to see how we can get it done.

I do believe overall that it is an inexpensive family oriented sport. It is getting more expensive for us though as the price of gas rises and we will have to do it strategically if that price goes up too much. (one change for us might even be to take the car vs the van because of better gas mileage.)

It really is a matter of you perspective I believe. When we were a two income family, this would have been a non-issue (which saddens me to think of all the $ we blew!)

I’ve started donating blood to cover caching costs 😉 but I don’t see us slowing down anytime soon. The benefits to the family make the extra expenditures worth it for me.

Somebody publish a new cache in Central Wisconsin and I’ll see if I can control the urge to chase after it or not 😆

@sandlanders wrote:

@BigJim60 wrote:

Somebody publish a new cache in Central Wisconsin and I’ll see if I can control the urge to chase after it or not 😆

When do you want it? 😈

Right now would be good 😆