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The official app, for non-PMs, is designed to get them to become PMs. Non-PMO caches above a 2.0 D or T rating don’t show up at all, and non-traditionals that are open to everyone do show up on the map, but when tapping on it, a box comes up encouraging the user to upgrade to Premium to learn more about them. They had to unlock the Earthcaches for this weekend because of the souvenir. With $30 a year being relatively cheap compared to other things – that’s only a little over 2 months of Netflix or Hulu – I’m sure a lot of the Premium memberships over the last few years were just to have decent access to the app.

We are very much an app-driven society. MLB is making a hard push for fans to have their app. As a season seat holder for the Brewers, I now have to pay extra if I want paper tickets, when I haven’t for the 10 previous years, by not using the Ballpark app. Dominos keeps trying to encourage me to download their app when I order a pizza online. Where I’m going with this is, even though all non-PMO caches are available for viewing & logging on the website, I would not be surprised at all if a large percentage of the geocaching accounts created in the last few years never went to the website, only experienced it through the app. Especially those who decided to try it out after learning about it because of Pokemon Go.

In essence, I think baby cachers like me are the exception, rather than the norm. Most either get so frustrated with the app & refuse to pay before they know if they like geocaching, or pay & give up anyway because it doesn’t magically improve upon the previous experience. Unless,of course, they’re lucky enough to find an awesome cache shortly after parting with their $30, or have a PM friend who helps them see how fun geocaching is.

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My $0.02, as a “toddler” cacher –

I recently attended my first CITO event, and yes, it was during a souvenir weekend. And I love my souvenirs. However, I would have gone regardless, as it was a geocaching experience I had yet to have, and in a location where there were caches I had yet to find.

CITO events, in my extremely limited experience, appear to take more thought & planning than many other events where it is not expected to have new caches hidden (though, the COs for my first CITO hid two, and I know the Hacks & the Wisjanines do something special for their joint CITO). For the attendee, it’s also understood that there’s more of a time commitment than just showing up at some point during the time frame of the event, signing the log, chatting with a few cachers, and then leaving. Having the two souvenir weekends (and having them be pretty stable in what weekends they are) gives COs & attendees alike a time frame with which to do a CITO. So, I understand why there aren’t many non-souvenir weekend CITOs.

But for us baby cachers, souvenir weekends are a good way to make us aware of the types of caches we’ve yet to become used to. This upcoming Earthcache weekend is another example of that. Sure, we know that Earthcaches exist, but if we still have so many physical caches to find, we may need a souvenir to get us to spend the little extra time to appreciate what an Earthcache experience is. This month’s “Caching Connoisseur” is also good one for us, as it brings focus to the quality caches that you senior cachers are always griping there aren’t more new ones of being placed, since favorite points play a factor in points for the souvenir. Though I have to say, if I weren’t trying to focus on non-traditionals as much as I could for these last ones to 1000, I would have purposely gone after P&Gs for the souvenir, just to be a punk about the way they worded it, favorite points be darned.

Oh, and Trekkin? If you’ve ever used the official app without having a Premium membership, you’d understand why people will shell out $30 a year & find less than 100 caches in that time.

 

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graphicsgirl19 wrote:

After 5 years of caching, I recently (August) joined the comma club. #1,000 was lucky enough to be my first mega at West Bend Cache Bash this year. When I got home, I was looking at my geocaching map as we all do (don’t tell me I’m the only one) and planning my next excursion. Despite having accomplished this, I felt overwhelmed based solely on the fact that…..there are still a lot of caches even in my own neighborhood that I still have not gotten. It made me realize that while 1,000 is a great accomplishment, there are still a lot of great caches out there to find and cool places to see. Here’s to the next 1,000!!!

Congrats on 1,000! I’m almost a member of the “Comma Club” – 988 as I write this. Probably would be there by now if not for tummy issues during the Bash, technical issues for almost a month after the Bash, the Brewers in the playoffs, and the fact that I’m trying to finesse these last couple of dozen by looking for non-traditionals as much as I can.

You’re definitely not the only one who constantly looks at the geo-map to plan your run – I do, too! Sometimes, I end up not going out for a couple hours after I intend to because of trying to pin down where I want to go! I definitely over-think things at times.

It is overwhelming when looking at the map to see all of the icons that are not yet smilies. But, I think that puts cachers like you & me at an advantage, especially during some of the events HQ has had this year. We don’t have to go as far to earn points! 🙂

Race you to 2000? 🙂

 

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Okay, so I’ve been guilted into entering my WGA tag instead. I’ll work with Lacknothing to ensure it’s there in time for the race to start, and in regards to the racer it’s replacing.

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rawevil wrote:

You can use whichever TB you’d like whether a WGA cachekinz, HQ, CacheAdvance, or SpaceCoast, or whomever’s.

Yes, I am aware of that. I’m sure that if the intent was to send out WGA tags, Lacknothing would have asked me ahead of time if I had one, or needed one. But, JimandLinda’s post above made it sound like any tag that wasn’t a WGA tag was not in the spirit of the game.

rawevil wrote:

CacheAdvance liked our design so much that they are now offering a similar version in their offerings (without the WGA logo of course).

I saw that. I assumed it was the other way around. So, go WGA tag/GC designer, whoever you are!

rawevil wrote:

The WGA Picnic to Picnic TB Race is the only event we offer outside of the Chili Feed, LCG Awards, Campout, Picnic, and most recently the GIFF event. The other events (caches) you mention above are put on solely by our awesome members!

Being new to the WGA scene, and relatively new to geocaching in general compared to most, I just assumed that the events I mentioned were part of the WGA, since most of the cachers I noticed had been involved were the “big names” in WI geocaching. I apologize for the assumption.

 

 

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I know Lacknothing. In fact, she presently has my two entries into the race.

This race will be the first WGA member competition event since I became a member earlier this year. And, my knowledge of previous events such as the Geo-Hunger Games and “Who Is The Great White North?” is limited to the caches that still exist that were part of those games. I did not know that the purpose of the race was to promote the WGA, nor did I consider that tags purchased through HQ or another vendor such as Space Coast Geocaching may be counterproductive to the game’s intent. I just assumed it was a fun game among those like me who enjoy the trackables aspect of geocaching.

 

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I almost feel like there’s a part of the conversation that’s missing here. Maybe it’s because there’s another conversation about the race going on via the Facebook group.

I have no problem paying an entry fee. $3 really isn’t all that much, considering. I was all prepared when handing off my 2 TBs to pay the entry fee for each. I was also all set to do the race without knowing what the prizes would be, because I’m a TB lover who thinks the race itself is a fun thing. I would just hope that mine don’t become one of the missing before the race ends!

To explain why I decided to enter more than one – when I put the first TB together, I texted a photo to another geocacher, who I don’t think is entering the race, and I’m not even 100% sure they are a WGA member. They are just a cacher who has been at this longer than I have (though, it’s rare for me to find someone who hasn’t), and who has a lot of experience with TBs. The tag is a Cachekinz tag attached to a keychain, and they suggested that for a race, I should try something smaller that could be put into a wider variety of cache containers. So, I activated another shaped tag, with nothing attached. But as I thought about it, I wondered which really would go furthest in a race, so I decided to enter both as an experiment. For me, that’s going to be the fun of this race, no matter how I finish overall. I may even try the experiment on my own with a couple of other TBs, as I somehow ended up with a good number of unactivated tags.

If a WGA board member – especially the one who has my entries at the moment – wants to work around my work schedule & the Brewers post-season schedule to meet me, I’ll gladly sub out the unattached tag I entered for my WGA tag. I was just saying that other racers may not be so lucky as to already have one, or be able to get one by the time the race starts.

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JimandLinda wrote:

I’m sure the WGA would appreciate everyone’s support by purchasing TB tags from the WGA for the race rather than supporting Groundspeak with several TB tags for a “members only” race! I would hate to see the WGA start charging membership fees to help out with expenses, like TB Race prizes. Food for thought…

Noble idea, but I can see a couple of issues with it.

First, what if a racer can’t get a WGA tag in time? I happen to have one because I haven’t activated the one I bought at the WBCB yet, but I couldn’t make the picnic because I was committed to going to another event, so I would have been out of luck otherwise. This site isn’t set up for merch sales, so unless you were a WGA board member with access to the supply, or like me, have one yet to activate, there’s really no time to get one set up before it needs to be submitted for the race.

Second, can you imagine being a random geocacher coming up to the starting cache to grab a bug? If they’re all the badger tag (or, if the racer is a hoarder, the state tag), and all have the same goal, which one do you take? Will it depend on what it’s attached to? And, what about a cacher who’s not familiar with TBs yet? They’ll see a cache full of what look to them to be badger keychains, and assume they’re swag because there are so many in there, it must be the swag theme of the cache.

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awhip80 wrote:

So there is not a fee this year? Is the race open to only WGA members? And, one person is welcome to enter any amount of TBs in the race as they wish?

Okay, I can’t answer the second question, but I just handed off mine, so I can answer the other two –

Correct, there is no fee this year to enter.

You can submit any number of TBs you want. I’m entering two myself, as I want to test out a theory that came about when deciding on a TB to enter.

However, any entries need to be recently created TBs with no mileage on them. And, they should be dropped into GC7V7F9, “2018 WGA FALL PICNIC” online. They’ll all be dropped into the physical cache at the same time.

(Hope I’m not stepping on any board member’s toes by answering!)

 

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hack1of2 wrote:

I would suggest to all geocachers, new and not-so-new, to log all the DNFs, including 1st trip, 2nd trip, etc. Contacting the CO instead of posting a DNF doesn’t help other cachers who may follow after you, especially if the CO didn’t read the email or is inactive. Having said that, it seems many newer cachers do not post DNFs. If they stick with the game over time, most begin to see the value of DNF logs and start posting them. As far as I’m concerned one never has to apologize for posting a DNF log, but they have some ‘splaining to do if they do not post their DNF. 🙂

For the record, I have never not found a Hack1of2 cache that I went searching for. All have been well-maintained, and, more importantly, there.

Sometimes, I feel I give up too early on caches. I normally cache alone, and it gets frustrating when I think it takes longer than it should to find one. And if it was just found recently? I walk away knowing it’s there somewhere, but darned if I can find it. So I feel a DNF from me would really be counterproductive, at least after the first try.

 

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rawevil wrote:

You’d like this one if you haven’t found it yet : GC2WHC5″>https://coord.info /GC2WHC5

I have not, but with all the caches around it, maybe I should plan a weekend trip to get it! Thanks for the suggestion! In the meantime, with only 2 Letterbox Hybrids to my name, there are plenty nearby or within day trip distance.

 

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Okay, let’s try this scenario –

In November of 2015, 4 1/2 months after I started geocaching, I searched for Hodag’s “Cache Cow.” I didn’t find it, and in fact, wasn’t even close. In reality, I didn’t post a DNF, but neither did I message him, because, after all, I was just getting started, and it was my first try.

But, let’s say I did post a DNF. If I remember the experience correctly, I would have posted something like “Looked around for about 15 minutes, checked all the possible spots nearby, but couldn’t come up with it. It may be missing.”

For those who haven’t found it (or who aren’t Hodag), the cache is a 1.5/1.5 peanut butter jar sized container (he did change the D/T sometime after I found it, but not the location). I should have found it within the time I spent searching for it, unless it was missing. Only it wasn’t. I found it on my second attempt the following July, and even used it to drop the first TB I ever picked up. Between the two visits, the only person who didn’t find it wrote a note that it was too rainy, which means they really didn’t make an attempt. Hodag is a good CO for this cache, and has posted regular maintenance checks without being prompted by a DNF post – a practice I will surely imitate as I place more caches, and will start when I do my first check on the one I do own in November – so the cache has never been missing. It was there in November 2015 when I looked for it, less than a month after the most recent maintenance check.

Had I posted a DNF, then claimed to have found it on my next attempt several months later, especially after no more DNFs & a maintenance check, would my find been seen as legit? Or, would it be suspect because of the earlier DNF log? Granted, I dropped a TB into the cache that was later grabbed by someone else, which can’t be done unless I legitimately found the cache, but what if I hadn’t? That’s one thing I worry about, that when I go back and find the cache after posting a DNF on a previous visit, it’ll make me look like a geocheater who’s looking to up the numbers.

 

 

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I stumbled upon this topic while looking to see if the topic I wanted to post was discussed within the last few years. Since the OP was made just two months after I started geocaching, I thought someone might find my answer interesting.

I am definitely not one who got into this as a “nature nut.” If I ever do get to a WGA picnic, I won’t be camping out among the forest creatures afterwards. Give me nature during the day, but a hotel/house at night. I found out about geocaching a couple of years before, on an episode of “Switched At Birth,” but didn’t try it at the time because on the show, they used a smartphone, and I didn’t have one. But it looked interesting, so I kept it in the back of my mind, and when I did get a smartphone, I reconsidered it. So, since I associated smartphones with the game, I guess you could call me a “tech” person.

Despite that, I don’t have what the OP would describe as a “techie” approach to the game. I do have a little bit of a competitive nature – everyone does, some are just more pronounced – but there have only been a couple of times in the last 3 years where numbers have matters. One is, every time I get close to a milestone. With the exception of #100, I’ve tried to make them meaningful in some way. The other are the two times I went for the gusto for daily highs – when I hit 51 finds, and then again with 104, that second one so I could qualify for a challenge cache.

Before geocaching, when I would go out to walk for a couple of miles, the walk would start and end from my house, which got boring after awhile even though I’m within walking distance of the Hank Aaron State Trail. For some reason, I never considered driving to another trail and walking there. By searching for caches, I’ve been on a few great recreation trails, and in some beautiful nature preserves with trails that I never would have known existed otherwise. Heck, I didn’t even know there was a butterfly preserve just a couple of miles from my house, and I love butterflies!

That said, I also love that with urban caches, once I find one, it’s like I’m in on a little secret. How many customers, for example, park right next to the one at American Science & Surplus in Milwaukee, completely clueless that it’s there? Or who use Bluemound Road to get to Miller Park not knowing they pass one on their way to parking? I take Bluemound to downtown for work, and I think about that one almost every day when I pass by it.

With all the similar activities out there, if I were to take up another, it would be the fledgling Letterboxing game. Pokemon isn’t my scene, and I keep resisting someone who wants me to become a Munzee player because I know it’s a numbers game. Letterboxing, as we know from the Hybrid caches, is all about the journey to the treasure. And that’s what I like about geocaching, even if it’s a pill bottle along a country road, and not an ammo can at the top of a mountain.

 

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bartrod wrote:

I feel the same way sometimes and, although some of my caches have gone missing at times, I don’t have your issue with ammo boxes. Yikes! I do feel that there are more than a few individuals, mostly kids with cell phones I think, that are uneducated about geocaching…think that if they find a cache, they get to keep it.

I’ve noticed that as I’ve tried to tell others what geocaching is. The first time I geocached when visiting my grandma, aunt, and uncle in MN, they would always ask “What did you get?,” thinking it was like an Easter egg hunt, even though I tried to explain otherwise.

Last year, my grandma came back to WI for her sister’s funeral. The funeral was in the Lomira area, but the burial was in Black River Falls. My grandma’s age at the time was 91, and she knew she couldn’t make the long car ride for the burial, so she and I had a fun day together. We checked out a couple of antique stores – standard for when we get together – and did a little geocaching, with her staying in the car. As luck would have it, the one closest to where she was staying was a bison magnetically attached to a sign that we were able to park close enough that she could see me retrieve it, bring it to the car to sign, and then put it back. She then understood that geocaching is not an Easter egg hunt, but rather a scavenger hunt.

HQ doesn’t really do much when new geocachers first sign up, and I think they should. Perhaps before letting them get to a map, make them take a tutorial about caches, travel bugs (as I’m sure most of them go missing because they’re mistaken for swag), and the like, and pass a quiz at 100%.

I also think they should set a firm minimum number of caches found before being allowed to place a hide. Right now, they recommend finding at least 25, but it’s not a hard & fast rule. Personally, I think a cacher should hit the 100 mark before being allowed to hide one, because I think they’d be more likely to maintain it.

If it’s one thing the “smart phone era” has created, it’s cachers who treat the app like any other app, where they download it to try it, go out a time or two, and then quickly move on to other apps. Not every cacher of the smart phone era is like that. of course – otherwise, I wouldn’t be here to make this post. But I’d be willing to bet that at least 70% of those who have signed up within the last 5 years have since deleted the app from their phone because they never geocache anymore.

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When I checked before posting, it appeared they were still available. The one complaint I do have about it is that it took longer than expected for it to arrive via free shipping – I ordered it a day or two before the Cache Bash, and it arrived Monday. Would have posted right away, but my Internet is down at home, and won’t be fixed until Friday (hopefully).

They seem to offer them at least once a year. Makes sense for them, as it gives them an opportunity to unload items that might not be moving. I’m not necessarily talking about the steampunk coins. If you look at the contents of both my bags, you see what I mean. That’s not a complaint, BTW. I don’t feel I got junk with the patches & non-trackables. They’re just items I would not have consciously ordered. Like I said, I feel I got a good deal both times.

Next time HQ offers up the grab bag, I’ll give this thread a bump as a reminder of my experience.

 

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