Forum Replies Created
-
AuthorPosts
-
Acknowledging that the initial question was a legitimate one, I do feel that so much debate over “the rules” is, well, to put it mildly, interesting. This is a game, one intended to help improve the quality of caches in our state. Team Deejay has done an incredible amount of work putting this together, with the idea of taking care of those caches that might have gone missing or fallen apart. Look at that interactive map, I can’t even comprehend how he pulled that together for our use! 😯
In the interest of full disclosure…in playing this game, I’ve replaced three containers. Two were cache revisits, so I knew where and what should be there. Still looked a long time. Contacted cache owners offering to place a new one for them. Around here, after the August rains on our hillsides, many smaller caches simply washed away, and in the case of both cache placers, they do not live in the area. In the case of the third one, many previous finders had commented that the container needed replacing. Knowing I’d be up that way, I contacted the owner, checking to see what kind of replacement would be reasonable. After a tough search, I did locate the original and placed the new one. When the owner and I can connect, he’ll get the original back. In all three cases, I guess I didn’t log a find without having actually found the original in the first place, so it’s a little different than perhaps whatever brought up the question.
Whether I get points for these gestures or not is really irrelevant. I’m happy to be seeking these out, because they’ve been in really cool spots, and if they’re missing, helping the cache owners will ensure others can appreciate the cool spots. I know from others’ experiences, some states are not very vigilant about cache archiving/disabling, and it’s very frustrating to travel and hope to find one, only to see that it’s long gone. This game’s ultimate purpose is to avoid that situation in the Badger State, and I applaud the efforts of all who have taken any small part in helping this effort. Yes, there are prizes to be won, but isn’t the real prize is knowing that all this effort will help ensure that the only reason I DNF is my own caching failure, not the result of one gone missing and unreported?
Remember, it’s just…a…game. 😉
Congratulations Pete, it sounds as if you guys had a fun and adventurous day!
As proof of these statements, observe……
This was taken at a geocaching event last weekend. Honest! And Trekkin’ started that fire with a show-off display of his firestarting skills with flint and steel.
I have witnesses! Some of them post here, too!
Can I develop an EarthCache in a cave area?
Cave areas are very sensitive. For this reason EarthCaches developed around caves in North America will go through an additional approval stage with the National Speleological Society to ensure that research and other factors are not being affected by people visiting the cache.I pulled this text from the FAQs on the earthcache site. It might explain why my new one is taking longer to be approved. I did submit it as a cave/karst feature, which it is. I was kind of hoping it would be available for interested searchers by the weekend, but I guess another week won’t matter!
Great idea, Anne! Thus far, our earthcache searches have been pretty much limited to our region and I know there are lots of other amazing ones out there. In no particular order, I’ll list the top three of our 30 finds.
GC19A4V The Weeping Wall by lagrac
Wow! Just wow! A person might *never* find that spot driving by here. We jumped the creek more times than necessary, but that’s part of the journey, right? We stood and listened to the cracking of ice echoing off the natural amphitheater, and noticed the ravine running back with the spring trickling down near GZ.
The wall of icicles is nothing short of awe inspiring back here. A Downy Woodpecker rapped out his tattoo just overhead as we captured images of the scene displayed before us.GC16KZC The Rock Elm Disturbance by Lostby7
We went for this one on a glorious day of fall caching. In retrospect, it’s amazing how many we found on that day, but this one in particular stood out for us. We found the others in the park placed by zuma along the way, and then approached the meteor site. It is a bit mind boggling to stand in front of something like that and consider how it came to be this way. Plus, I’ve been lots of places around the world, but never, ever encountered an “underlook” before!GC16E8C Big Spring Earthcache by lagrac
Even though the weather threatened, we really wanted to do this earthcache, and the weather obliged us. This is an incredibly peaceful and lovely hike through the bottomland forest. The tops of the hillsides are turning, but down along the creek, most leaves were down. Birdin’s favorite bird, the Pileated Woodpecker, was cackling away as we walked alongside the creek near the little dam. Gotta love a bird that even though big and flashy, remains secretive in spite of that crazy laughing call!
The stream crossing really showed its spring origins. After doing several biking caches, it felt wonderful, though Birdin’ noticed her feet had turned red and perhaps shrunk a size by the other side. We found the cave, had it all to ourselves even. The crows and jays were carrying on up above, must have been an owl somewhere, but Birdin’ maintained her focus.Frizz, I’m wondering if you’ve met our niece (also Timberline Echoes’ niece), who now lives in DePere and is a gifted violinist. She’s 18 and I’m guessing she’s with the symphony there, too. Her instructor is at Lawrence and she’s waiting to hear back from colleges for next year.
We won’t talk about our own kids. 🙁 We live vicariously through our nieces’ and nephews’ accomplishments these days. Our younger son played violin for a few years and he and Gina went to Suzuki camp together when they were about 9. They are just two weeks apart in age, but light year’s difference in their musical skills!
What a great way to mark those milestones! Congratulations.
Hey, did you see I managed to post the 5000th post in that thread? I think that calls for something like the solution to Sagasu’s Sinister puzzle for the prize! 🙄
Well, both Trekkin’ and I are special ed teachers, so between that and our own alien lifeforms called young adult sons, everything is a puzzle and I find the caching puzzles to be a nice distraction from the real-life ones. Seems most of the ones I’ve solved don’t require the computer as much as time and a pencil and some lateral thinking. Engineer’s daughter and all, maybe.
Oh yeah. I’m also a professional storyteller. Like you couldn’t figure that out from the logs I write. 🙄 Family black sheep, all the rest are in engineering! LOL
Why don’t you just put that Semantic Search to rest and do that one? LOL
Congrats on a milestone, I remember when we first met you, you were on your way to do Saddle Mound for #200 (a most excellent choice, too!)jenhen and zuma hit it for me, too. I will seek out a cache in a really neat place far from the madding crowd, and give it “tarpaper,” as my Yooper husband would say, and if I don’t find that one….so be it. I enjoyed a nice trek to a new place out in nature. I spent a loooooong time carving ice near Black Earth the other day with no luck, but it didn’t bother me a bit, because I enjoyed a nice hike along a trout stream on a day that finally hinted at spring. Singing birds and all! 😉
We’ll hunt them all, because as Ralph said, sometimes you don’t know that one that looks boring will actually be clever. But if I spend time looking for those and don’t find them, it makes me grumpy. Also, we really get a bit nervous in parks trying to look stealthy. Trekkin’ did a bunch in Rochester when I was at a storytelling thing last fall. One took him to some playground, and required him to crawl under the play structure. Some middle school girls came over to see what was up, he got into a conversation with them about geocaching, along with sports (he coaches kids this age and they played the same sports) and they ended up crawling under to help him retrieve it. (“Sweet! Can we sign it, too?”)
That’s a cute story, but I shudder to think how it could have played out very differently. Adult male, all alone, crawling underneath slatted play surfaces, chatting up 12 year old girls. It could have ended up very differently and that scares me a bit.
Yep. For some of us, such caches should perhaps be on an ignore list for our own safety!
A person can always list the cache without the bells and whistles, then go back in and edit to your heart’s delight. When I’m listing an earthcache, I’ll do the write up in Word, paste that into their submission form, then when it’s listed and my adoption from geoaware is complete, I can add all the pretty stuff.
I haven’t found the html stuff I’ve wanted to do for my listings to be all that complicated. As Gary and others have said, you can click to keep the listing from being reviewed, then when you’re happy with the appearance, change the click to submit it. You can view your listing repeatedly, as I do, and only when you like the way it looks, submit away. If the html is troubling, folks here can help you figure it out. Onc important thing to remember is that IF you choose to list it in html, be sure to check the little box right above that it’s in html. Otherwise it will look like a run-on sentence. Not that I’ve had any personal experience with that! 😉
I do wonder about one thing. For those of us who like to include pictures and such in our listings, does that scare away folks with slow connections who don’t want to wait for it to load? I’ve always wondered if that’s much of an issue.
03/12/2008 at 12:47 pm in reply to: Ferris Wheel Competitions-Where are Some Really Big Ones? #1886152The London Eye, owned by British Airways, is supposed to be the world’s tallest. I’ve ridden that thing twice. Originally it was just intended to be a Millennium thing, but it made more money for British Airways than air travel, so they’ve kept it going!
I agree with the stealth ones, although creativity in trying to look nonchalent can be fun at times.
We’ll search any kind of cache, but rock hides under bridges are our least favorite. We’ll still hunt them, they just aren’t our favorites. Too easy to stand up too quickly when frustrated turning over rocks! 😯
Ralph, If it’s at all like it is around here, the snow is for crap for cross country skiing already. I was at the Bangor Forest today, where Bostwick Overlook is located, and though there were ski tracks still, there’s no grooming and I decided not to bother with my skis. Didn’t need my “rock” skis there, but it was just icy, cruddy snow.
But as a skiier, I do appreciate cachers like you. It bugs me when I’m in the groove and hit some footprints in the tracks, usually cause it causes me to wipe out if I’m really moving! LOL
-
AuthorPosts
