A question for the masters….

[Trekkin and Birdin]

I’m content to get a few finds and enjoy some new scenery anytime we go out, but Trekkin’ says he wants to “step out of the box” and try to hit some big numbers days. We’ve tried a few times, but I guess we’ve chosen poorly.

How the heck do some of you manage to log 20 or more finds in a day?

[Lostby7]

@Trekkin’ and Birdin’ wrote:

I’m content to get a few finds and enjoy some new scenery anytime we go out, but Trekkin’ says he wants to “step out of the box” and try to hit some big numbers days. We’ve tried a few times, but I guess we’ve chosen poorly.

How the heck do some of you manage to log 20 or more finds in a day?

*WEST BEND
*APPLETON

In both places I have hit 30 plus in a day without breaking a sweat…..

Also a GPS with autorouting is VERY helpful!

[AuntieNae]

Waukesha, and the cache owner will give you his cell number for phone a friend if you get stuck at any.

[marc_54140]

Pre-planning your day is the biggest item.

Download a pocket query for the are you think you want to cache in. Always – I repeat ALWAYS – cover a bigger area than you plan on. Perhaps a couple of PQs will be in order.

Load those waypoints into a mapping program, such as M/S Streets & Trips, and look at where the caches are. Zero in on where you want to go, and pick out the caches you want to try.

After looking at the mapping program, you might find it handy to open GSAK, and create a list of caches in the order that you want to do them.

GSAK has a Usort column that can be used to create this list.

[Trekkin and Birdin]

I wonder if we have autorouting on ours? It’s a Magellan Explorist 400. We still have to figure out how to use the streets and maps progam.

I do think part of the “problem,” if you want to call it that, is our area. There are clusters of caches, but often, they are still challenging due to the topography here. The day we thought we’d go for 20, we just didn’t have our heads on straight. Black River Falls has a ton of them, but lots of those are within the vast state forest, and many of them are big hill climbs. So you drive on these back roads, find the hill and start the climb. Actually, I *love* those kinds of caches, but they sure don’t make for numbers. I think we had something like 15-18 targeted that day and managed to get to 9, one of those being a delightful DNF final stage of a multi in Perry Creek. Four of the ones we did were big fire tower climbs, at least a half mile from parking to hilltop. Two others were multis. We just kept laughing the whole day at our inability to choose wisely for a numbers day!

[RSplash40]

Several things that help:

1. West Bend – Appleton – Oshkosh(yup, can get 20+ here)- Green Bay
2. Small group of people – 3-4 is a good size, one drives, 1 checks routes, others run switch positions to relieve boredom.
3. Decent sized cache-mobile, easy entry/exit for all 4, room for spare equipment, coolers, etc.
4. Routing software and a well planned route is a absolute must. It could be done with paper but a laptop with gsak, routing software and a usb gps is the best way to go.
5. Stick to 2/2’s or 3/3’s at most, anything more and you are going to be burning a lot of daylight. Use the gc.com pocket queries to get them.
6. Plan extra’s in case of dnf’s.

We found 40 in about 6 hours in west bend, that included a lunch, 2-20 minute finds and 2 potty stops. Some will say that was slow.

[marc_54140]

Oh, yeh….forgot to mention: do the easy ones!

Planning is usually for when you leave your home territory. At home, I pick caches up in dribbles as the time allows. That means no big numbers, unless you have been letting things slide for a while.

Multis and long hikes complicate things, but I still want to get them off my list.

Puzzles are another matter. You can sit at home and solve a bunch of them. Then, off on a road trip to find them.

[Lostby7]

@marc_54140 wrote:

Puzzles are another matter. You can sit at home and solve a bunch of them. Then, off on a road trip to find them.

Which is my next planned road trip to Appleton I have planned my next caching spree around the about 12 puzzle caches I have solved in that area….

So basically MAP the caches and then pick the ones closest to your planned route skipping the tough ones. I number the caches in my GPS as well so that I just hit goto on the unit and it will take me to the next site on my list (which also follows my planned route).

[RSplash40]

@Lostby7 wrote:

@marc_54140 wrote:

Puzzles are another matter. You can sit at home and solve a bunch of them. Then, off on a road trip to find them.

Which is my next planned road trip to Appleton I have planned my next caching spree around the about 12 puzzle caches I have solved in that area….

Ditto – I have 4 solved and a couple of new ones to figure out yet for my next appleton trip, add them to the 8 or so dnf’s in town and I’ll have a full days work.

[bandits]

All we do is figure out what city we want to cache in and then load 1000 waypoints around the area and go! No other pre-planning unless we have solved a puzzle before hand. We do not have autorouting nor do we have detailed maps on our GPSr’s. Fly by the seat of our pants and can easily hit 20 but usually are not satisfied unless we hit at least 25-30. We cached with Honeybunnies and they have autorouting and it was great! Saves some time and money and you can get a few more caches.

[marc_54140]

Which is my next planned road trip to Appleton I have planned my next caching spree around the about 12 puzzle caches I have solved in that area….

Wow! Twelve whole puzzles! Are you kidding?!!?

[Lostby7]

@marc_54140 wrote:

Which is my next planned road trip to Appleton I have planned my next caching spree around the about 12 puzzle caches I have solved in that area….

Wow! Twelve whole puzzles! Are you kidding?!!?

Fortunately for me the puzzles are far enough not to tempt me to strain myself too much so yes 12ish puzzles……

[marc_54140]

😆 Ah……yes……..the strain!

[Team Honeybunnies]

If you have the time and the tools, Marc’s brand of wizardry really does help. Pre-planning can really make things easier. We’ve had many successful trips that relied on a GSAK Usort list and a few good Streets and Trips maps.

Auto-routing can make a huge difference, especially down in coulee country where the road you think is heading right to it can suddenly be a mile away and parallel. No more driving around a country block until you find the right way in.

More often than not these days, I just don’t have as much time to plan meticulously, and just choose an area we’d like to see and go for it. We pretty much always plan on hitting at least 20 caches in a day, even with long, difficult ones peppered in. We point the car and stop at everything, unless we just got off a three-mile walk, and the next one is five… 😯 . Usually there are enough park’n’logs everywhere these days to mix it up with the hikes, even in the country.

Don’t limit yourself to city runs either. Down by you we’ve had some really good numbers days in Tomah and points south (thanks Shrek & Fiona 😉 ), and in the Portage, Dells and Baraboo area(more thanks to Sloughfoot and others). Winona is another good one near you, with plenty of other opportunities up and down the river. The Mayville-Waupun-Horicon triangle is packed with caches and would fit in well with you birding. All these are more our style too, just wandering the countryside at will.

As you see some more areas, you’ll get a feel for where you’ll get good numbers and sometimes not. Being close to LaCrosse, you’ve probably found that the hides are getting tougher, with lots of nanos on big metal objects and some caches with “challenging” coords. Jackson county has fantastic caches, every one a summit it seems like, with long walks and great vistas, but definitely not a numbers destination. Other areas seem effortless.

Most important, pick ones that look fun, because if you’re bored, the numbers won’t fill the void. It’s a big, beautiful world.

[Trekkin and Birdin]

The ones in the Black River area are definitely fun ones, we still have a lot of them to visit. We got the fire towers south of I-94, but there are a bunch more up in Bear Bluff country. We also enjoyed a bunch of them in northern Trempealeau county, and went down by Westby a couple days ago. Every time we get close to having half of them in our 50 mile radius, a bunch of new ones pop up. So even if we never get out of this area, we can stay busy.

Bandits, we’ve been doing what you guys do, picking a direction then planning out an order. I’ve looked on the google maps on the gc.site to figure out order and write out some road directions. This has been just fine so far, but Trekkin’ just wants to experience a few high numbers days to see what it’s like. I contend he already knows from his years doing crazy volkswalking runs, but he claims “this is completely different.”

O-kay.

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