Geocaching – Why Me?

[Ray]

Geocaching – Why Me?

I got to thinking about why we got involved in geocaching. Trudy says because it gives us the chance to get some exercise together. I think there’s more to it than that. There are so many activities we could participate in for the exercise. Why geocaching?

We could have joined a couples bowling league. Unfortunately, our averages are rather embarrassing. The equipment is rather bulky and heavy. Compare to carrying a GPS and compass in your pocket. Geocaching also provides a little mental exercise that isn’t really needed for bowling. I don’t intend to disparage bowlers. It’s just that the only thought required for bowling is to concentrate on being consistent.

Lots of folks our age get involved in golfing. They don their silliest ensembles and take to the links for a day in the fresh air. That last part is a lot like caching, except with caching you can call it quits for the day anytime you want. With caching, you don’t often have to contend with others pushing you to speed up your game or let them play through. The cost of golfing is rather high. One could buy a nice GPS for the price of greens fees and a cart rental for two. Geocaching saves us a lot of money.

Hunting and fishing require licensing and State Park Permits. Geocachers need only the park permit and they have no bag or size limits to contend with. Cache police are a myth, Wardens are not.

Tennis, volley ball, soccer, soft ball and even Bocce ball or Croquet require some skill, agility and stamina to varying degrees. Nobody tells me I am holding my GPS wrong, or that I need to flex my knees or keep my arm straight.

There are no lines on our playing field. We need to determine what is out of bounds for every cache. We play with thousands of other players and only communicate with them when we wish. If we muff a play (a not found), nobody gets upset. Our score doesn’t measure how good we are and nobody really cares if it’s high or low. Our score only measures our progress for us.

The geocaching rule book is one page, have you seen the rule books for baseball, football, or soccer? The NFL rulebook uses enough paper to print geocaching rules for every cacher in Wisconsin and Illinois combined. Try folding up a basketball rulebook and stuffing it in your back pocket.

Interacting with other players involves lies, exaggerations and critiques in most sports. But geocachers only seem to talk about the fun side of the sport. Discussions tend to support each other rather than inflating egos. There is less talk of I, me and my and more of you and your. This makes the conversations a lot less boring. And what a happy bunch; who has ever seen Genius Loci without a smile? Who has ever talked with jthorson and not heard at least a half dozen little quips stuck randomly in the conversation.

I guess geocaching has a lot of advantages we rarely think about. Besides, it’s something we can do with our grandchildren.

tb

[wzbt03]

The one important thing you forgot to mention Ray was…..
Physical size and skill are not a factor in this activity. Everyone is on the same footing. There is little advantage to being tall or short, male or female. We all compete within ourselves and at the same level as everyone else.
Its a great activity to have chosen.

[kbraband]

I agree with The Beast’s treatise on geocaching. There are also some additional appeals for me.

The “connectivity factor”
It gives you a feeling of connectivity to go on-line and read about other people’s hunts, finds, no-finds, and yes even mishaps. And if they post photos, all the better. It lets us feel part of a community of geocachers and learn more about each other than we would normally get to know if we depended only on face-to-face conversations.

Silent Sport
You don’t have to depend on a motorized machine to provide your recreation. Your own muscle power supplies the fun. This is also why I prefer cycling over motorcycling, canoeing over powerboating (although I own a power boat too), cross-country skiing over snowmobiling, walking or running instead of 4-wheeling. Many types of geocache hunts qualify as silent sport too, especially our big WGA events such as the campout and summer picnic when we park our vehicles for the weekend and find all the caches via walking or bicycling.

Alone again naturally
Even though there is a geocaching community, the opportunity to get away from it all in the great outdoors has great appeal. Getting out into the still of nature, being led there by others without being part of a large tour group, and pointing out trails and places for others to go — those are strong attractions of geocaching for me.

[This message has been edited by kbraband (edited 04-28-2004).]

[buck09]

quote:

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Originally posted by Trudy & the beast:
Geocaching – Why Me?

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You should pass this on to Today’s Geocacher magazine – great post!

[Author]

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