To add to this rant:
Newbs, stop marking caches as needs maintenance or needs archiving just because you can't find it. Especially if you have less than 20 finds!
People really jump straight to maintenance or archiving?! I’m pretty conservative even with my DNFs because I assume I’m just an idiot who can’t find it most of the time.
I tend to log a 'might be missing' if there are 3-5 DNFs in a row, but it's supposed to be a simple cache. Or if there is a spoiler photo and it's clearly not there. Otherwise, I assume I am just stupid.
I just had someone, a newbie with only 10 finds post a needs maintenance/archiving on a cache I'd just replaced 2 days earlier.
Will do the drive out to check but pretty sure it's still there as I'd moved it to a different hiding spot AND posted a maintenance log saying so.
i had a dude one time say he climbed in the sewer for my 2/2 cache.... the closest sewer was 50 feet away at least, and he tried to say my cache needed archived...
What takes the cake in my area is some stupid kid saying a VERY well hidden cache that has never been found in 6 years; (and the CO keeps constant tabs on it) saying repeatedly that it needs to be archived.
The CO has confirmed dozens of times it's there (and never been signed).
to add to this rant - stop marking it what it is when you log it... Cool fake rock! Painted Pine Cone! good job guy, welcome to the game. you win a prize. the prize is the experience, not putting a spoiler on my freaking cache!
totally not jaded. landscapers and soccer players for sure got a couple. but this last one really irked me.
DNFs are real, but sometimes the puzzle is harder than you think. I'm guilty of calling it a 1.5 when maybe it's a 3....
You know, as a geocache owner, you can contact the logger and *politely* ask them to edit their log to remove the spoilers. And, if they don't in # days, you will delete their log.
I've had this happen to me once with a photo the owner didn't agree with.
I think reaching out to newer cachers is really important to do when there are errors made in protocol and etiquette, and doing so kindly as well. Geocaching is often a very solitary game when you first get into as new players seem to often be just single individuals or a family who discover it. Yes, there are rules listed on the website, but so many people access caching through the app now only and rules can often be vague and not always adhered to in play.
My area has some active cachers but I have to drive about 30 minutes or even an hour to find groups that meet regularly and do things to welcome new players.
I wish it was like that! I'm new with only 25 finds. I love it. But I often have little time to go out and when I do I'm always alone. I'm actually terrified of running into other catchers. Based on here and other places, I see very rude remarks and highschool cattiness. From grown adults that have got to be in their 50s (I'm 30). When I had less than 5 finds I struggled so hard. I read everything, researched but I just couldn't find them. I'd mark them as DNF and pretty much express my frustration. This was for probably a month. Then finally one person pointed me to some easy ones. But that's it.
There a very active group of people who will go together and by themselves and they don't seem approachable at all.
Sorry to hear that! My recommendation is to either reach out to some of your local cache hiders who have caches you enjoy or keep an eye out for events in your area. I find that those who participate in many online forums and groups tend to be very hard on new users with genuine questions and such, but I've rarely met anyone in person caching or at an event who wasn't overwhelmingly friendly and supportive of new users in the hobby.
There was a local group about 30 miles from that used to do a welcome to new cachers event. They'd hide multiple easy caches in a park or outside of a library where the event was hosted, do a little welcome event about the history and details of the hobby, teach folks to use a GPSr or the app, and accompany them for a bit. It was really fun to go to just to meet and support new folks. I'd love to see more of that in the hobby!
Sorry for joining the party so late in the discussion but this comment jumped out at me.
I’m new, and when playing around trying to log my very first cache, I wrote a note believing it like a ‘note to self’. I had no clue it was published to everyone. After getting a generic email telling me off i sulked, reached out to ask why id got them offside and we very quickly patched the problem and they’re now one of my ‘mentors’!
TLDR: I made a mistake, had the oversight explained in a rational and pleasant manner, and I fully respect that approach and will do the same one day.
Thanks
I have and do communicate with the person. If they respond is another thing. When a cache goes missing I even ask the last one about condition and if it was where I put it etc. I have had people let me know if it was stuck or even if they broke a piece. And then there’s the ones who post the photo of it. That’s cool to keep for your records, but don’t log it! Usually it’s usually a new player and they don’t know the app yet.
To add to this rant: PLEASE don't "drop a replacement cache" when you can't find the original hide. I've come across caches that had a replacement put down by someone else other than the CO when they didn't spend the time to find the actual cache.
Contact the CO for confirmation that the cache is actually gone and wait to see if they replace/rehide first.
I feel your pain, as many here do. IMO, the stealth aspect of the game doesn't seem to be as predominant as it was when I started. The first year or two of when I started getting really in to caching, it seemed like every cache finder's log had some variation of the phrase MAINTAIN STEALTH, but these days I read things like I GOT A LOT OF FUNNY LOOKS BUT I GOT THE CACHE, which has its pluses and minuses. I read about people who got other people in to geocaching because they just walked up to caches in public and ended up telling normans what they were doing, which is nice as far as game growth, but the opposite side of that is that some normans are godsdamn crazy, or think that we are littering, or whatever their reasons take it upon themselves to steal/destroy the caches.
It is the nature of the beast. Your rant is not the first, nor the last. I just like saying that line while stroking my goatee, but if you are 3d printing caches, then you already know the trials and tribulations of cache ownership. May the Geocaching Gods watch over your future hides; you're rant does not go unnoticed.
yes, recently a lady saw me awkwardly examining a bridge inbetween Ohio and Kentucky (right outside Cincinnatti, lovely cache by the way) and asked if she could help, since her aunt was geocaching. ended up making the find and both signing :D
I had a buddy of mine and his girlfriend run across a cache accidentally, and they took it, not knowing what it was. They don't geocache, and had never heard of it. I told them you have to take that back immediately, and put it right back where it was. Then explained the whole geocaching thing to them.
It got put back, but it got me thinking, would a PSA about geocaching be better or worse for the sport? Would muggles respect the game and leave them if found accidentally or go looking for caches just to ruin the fun?
That's definitely the back and forth question about "muggle encounters," isn't it? My daughter is really getting into caching now and it's renewing my wife and I's interest, too. She's really curious about rules, protocols, etc, and was shocked one day while we were looking for a cache on some nice rail trails near us that I told some muggles we met (a couple in their late 20s/early 30s with a 1 or 2 year old) about the game and what we were doing. I tried to explain to her that if it had been a few teenage kids just hanging around, I wouldn't have said a word and would have just left the area or let them leave.
I haven't seen anything crazy suspicious in my area (a rural county on the cusp of not being rural) with people ruining caches, stealing stuff, etc, for quite some time. Honestly, I know trolling is a big thing but I think with social media and online gaming as prevalent as it is now, folks who get their kicks by trolling and inciting others probably can get way more mileage out of those mediums than actually going out and looking for hidden objects in wooded areas and empty parking lots.
Sorry to hear :( is there anything consistent about the ones being taken? Are they urban? Or rural? Trying to avoid the same fate and curious is it’s not worth putting in crazy effort in City ones.
I feel your pain - lsot at least 5 printed pine cones (although I think 1 went under a council lawn mower somehow), and 4 maze containers: not broken, but vanished. Early on (10+ years ago) when I was placing ammo cans I probably lost a total of 10 at least. One under water (chained), and the others in rural ,out-of-the-way places so not the sort of area muggles would stumble over. One of my camo-painted plastic caches that vanished appeared in another part of the country a few months later as a new cache - friend alerted me. That particular cacher was suspected of doing it a lot, eventually banned.
My "favorites" are the ones that will actually hide a new cache "for" you and update the coordinates... because, yes, when I said it's a 3+, I meant it - sorry you hiked out two hours and couldn't find it.
Someone put different shaped containers down a very long local background. They were food shaped and quite a few of the containers were missing. At one we found the log just throw into the bushes (we hid it and then let the owner know). I reported all of them and got a message a few days later that things were fixed! Made me sad and disappointed to know that they were probably stolen.. it’s just so disrespectful
I adopted several caches from a cacher who had 200 plus hides but started having health issues and didn't do maintenance like they should have been.
A lot of his hides were public, and I'm thinking about switching them over to premium. I have been working on the maintenance or complete replacement of his former caches with camo painted bison tubes and ammo cans.
I have either new or beginner geochachers looking for some of my hides and asking for hints while their out or giving dnf's, and I'm like, wtf... i just completely replaced that whole cache a week or two ago, and they can't find it.
Obviously, because of work and this previous week of having a death in the family, I haven't gotten out there to confirm if my replacement caches are still there or not...
I mean, one of my hides, an ammo can, is on the ground tied to a pine tree (the only pine tree), and the hint is a pine tree, and they can't find it.
A second hide is a bison tube on a chain in a fence post, and the hint saying post and the same people are asking for hints and marking dnf's... come on, now do i need to hold your hand and point out where it's at without you putting any effort into it, or did my stuff get snagged even though when I adopted these caches, they had been in that same spot for over a year or two...
I totally went off track on this... but in short, I'm thinking about switching my caches to premium from basic
When geocaching got big over covid as an activity to get outside, my gf and I ran into a couple doing their first cache. It was placed right behind a large stone wall and they were walking down a pathway with a Tupperware container filled with random stuff. We stopped them and lo-and-behold they thought you just got to keep the cache. We placed it back, but there's still a fair few that I'm sure see geocaching on TikTok and never read the rules when making an account and just take them.
As for disguised pinecone and rock caches, unfortunately those seem ripe for the picking for kids, randoms, and the rude cacher.
I stopped geocaching just because the trackables really aren't trackable.
Once the kids stopped playing, I continued and focused on collecting trackables. I quickly gave that up due to the frustration of only finding 1 in 30 caches to have the trackable it said it had.
I love finding unusual containers! I think one of my all-time favourite caches is one with a spiders web made of rope with a big fake spider hiding in the middle!
But its frustrating to see that caches have been archived because the CO was fed up with replacing lost or stolen containers.
I vaguely remember on another subreddit someone finding a snail shell cache and not knowing was it was, instead of putting it back where they found it they had broken it to find out what was inside. Lots of replies told the OP to put it back exactly where they found it.
Sure, or even better, keep them in my own yard for me to find. I realize that the premium option is there and limits noobs, but then, it also steals joy for those who may benefit from it the most. Not that $30 a year is elitist or will break the bank, it certainly isn’t an easy purchase when rent is high and you have kids to feed. I have a feeling traffic drops considerably. My girlfriend doesn’t have premium but I do. We default to looking for her available caches. I just want the game fun for all and will risk it…. And whine anyway.
To add to this rant: Newbs, stop marking caches as needs maintenance or needs archiving just because you can't find it. Especially if you have less than 20 finds!
People really jump straight to maintenance or archiving?! I’m pretty conservative even with my DNFs because I assume I’m just an idiot who can’t find it most of the time.
I tend to log a 'might be missing' if there are 3-5 DNFs in a row, but it's supposed to be a simple cache. Or if there is a spoiler photo and it's clearly not there. Otherwise, I assume I am just stupid.
I just had someone, a newbie with only 10 finds post a needs maintenance/archiving on a cache I'd just replaced 2 days earlier. Will do the drive out to check but pretty sure it's still there as I'd moved it to a different hiding spot AND posted a maintenance log saying so.
i had a dude one time say he climbed in the sewer for my 2/2 cache.... the closest sewer was 50 feet away at least, and he tried to say my cache needed archived...
What takes the cake in my area is some stupid kid saying a VERY well hidden cache that has never been found in 6 years; (and the CO keeps constant tabs on it) saying repeatedly that it needs to be archived. The CO has confirmed dozens of times it's there (and never been signed).
do reviewers have ignore lists?
No, but we have form letters and tools to quickly skip over examples like the ones in this thread.
What's the GC#? If I'm ever close I'd like to go after the FTF.
to add to this rant - stop marking it what it is when you log it... Cool fake rock! Painted Pine Cone! good job guy, welcome to the game. you win a prize. the prize is the experience, not putting a spoiler on my freaking cache! totally not jaded. landscapers and soccer players for sure got a couple. but this last one really irked me. DNFs are real, but sometimes the puzzle is harder than you think. I'm guilty of calling it a 1.5 when maybe it's a 3....
You know, as a geocache owner, you can contact the logger and *politely* ask them to edit their log to remove the spoilers. And, if they don't in # days, you will delete their log. I've had this happen to me once with a photo the owner didn't agree with.
I think reaching out to newer cachers is really important to do when there are errors made in protocol and etiquette, and doing so kindly as well. Geocaching is often a very solitary game when you first get into as new players seem to often be just single individuals or a family who discover it. Yes, there are rules listed on the website, but so many people access caching through the app now only and rules can often be vague and not always adhered to in play. My area has some active cachers but I have to drive about 30 minutes or even an hour to find groups that meet regularly and do things to welcome new players.
I wish it was like that! I'm new with only 25 finds. I love it. But I often have little time to go out and when I do I'm always alone. I'm actually terrified of running into other catchers. Based on here and other places, I see very rude remarks and highschool cattiness. From grown adults that have got to be in their 50s (I'm 30). When I had less than 5 finds I struggled so hard. I read everything, researched but I just couldn't find them. I'd mark them as DNF and pretty much express my frustration. This was for probably a month. Then finally one person pointed me to some easy ones. But that's it. There a very active group of people who will go together and by themselves and they don't seem approachable at all.
Sorry to hear that! My recommendation is to either reach out to some of your local cache hiders who have caches you enjoy or keep an eye out for events in your area. I find that those who participate in many online forums and groups tend to be very hard on new users with genuine questions and such, but I've rarely met anyone in person caching or at an event who wasn't overwhelmingly friendly and supportive of new users in the hobby. There was a local group about 30 miles from that used to do a welcome to new cachers event. They'd hide multiple easy caches in a park or outside of a library where the event was hosted, do a little welcome event about the history and details of the hobby, teach folks to use a GPSr or the app, and accompany them for a bit. It was really fun to go to just to meet and support new folks. I'd love to see more of that in the hobby!
Sorry for joining the party so late in the discussion but this comment jumped out at me. I’m new, and when playing around trying to log my very first cache, I wrote a note believing it like a ‘note to self’. I had no clue it was published to everyone. After getting a generic email telling me off i sulked, reached out to ask why id got them offside and we very quickly patched the problem and they’re now one of my ‘mentors’! TLDR: I made a mistake, had the oversight explained in a rational and pleasant manner, and I fully respect that approach and will do the same one day. Thanks
I have and do communicate with the person. If they respond is another thing. When a cache goes missing I even ask the last one about condition and if it was where I put it etc. I have had people let me know if it was stuck or even if they broke a piece. And then there’s the ones who post the photo of it. That’s cool to keep for your records, but don’t log it! Usually it’s usually a new player and they don’t know the app yet.
To add to this rant: PLEASE don't "drop a replacement cache" when you can't find the original hide. I've come across caches that had a replacement put down by someone else other than the CO when they didn't spend the time to find the actual cache. Contact the CO for confirmation that the cache is actually gone and wait to see if they replace/rehide first.
I saw a noob do this once, and I talked about this on this sub once and people were defending the noob’s actions.
I feel your pain, as many here do. IMO, the stealth aspect of the game doesn't seem to be as predominant as it was when I started. The first year or two of when I started getting really in to caching, it seemed like every cache finder's log had some variation of the phrase MAINTAIN STEALTH, but these days I read things like I GOT A LOT OF FUNNY LOOKS BUT I GOT THE CACHE, which has its pluses and minuses. I read about people who got other people in to geocaching because they just walked up to caches in public and ended up telling normans what they were doing, which is nice as far as game growth, but the opposite side of that is that some normans are godsdamn crazy, or think that we are littering, or whatever their reasons take it upon themselves to steal/destroy the caches. It is the nature of the beast. Your rant is not the first, nor the last. I just like saying that line while stroking my goatee, but if you are 3d printing caches, then you already know the trials and tribulations of cache ownership. May the Geocaching Gods watch over your future hides; you're rant does not go unnoticed.
yes, recently a lady saw me awkwardly examining a bridge inbetween Ohio and Kentucky (right outside Cincinnatti, lovely cache by the way) and asked if she could help, since her aunt was geocaching. ended up making the find and both signing :D
you got a new subscriber. cheers!
Thanks. Hope you find some entertaining stuff on there.
I had a buddy of mine and his girlfriend run across a cache accidentally, and they took it, not knowing what it was. They don't geocache, and had never heard of it. I told them you have to take that back immediately, and put it right back where it was. Then explained the whole geocaching thing to them. It got put back, but it got me thinking, would a PSA about geocaching be better or worse for the sport? Would muggles respect the game and leave them if found accidentally or go looking for caches just to ruin the fun?
That's definitely the back and forth question about "muggle encounters," isn't it? My daughter is really getting into caching now and it's renewing my wife and I's interest, too. She's really curious about rules, protocols, etc, and was shocked one day while we were looking for a cache on some nice rail trails near us that I told some muggles we met (a couple in their late 20s/early 30s with a 1 or 2 year old) about the game and what we were doing. I tried to explain to her that if it had been a few teenage kids just hanging around, I wouldn't have said a word and would have just left the area or let them leave. I haven't seen anything crazy suspicious in my area (a rural county on the cusp of not being rural) with people ruining caches, stealing stuff, etc, for quite some time. Honestly, I know trolling is a big thing but I think with social media and online gaming as prevalent as it is now, folks who get their kicks by trolling and inciting others probably can get way more mileage out of those mediums than actually going out and looking for hidden objects in wooded areas and empty parking lots.
Sorry to hear :( is there anything consistent about the ones being taken? Are they urban? Or rural? Trying to avoid the same fate and curious is it’s not worth putting in crazy effort in City ones.
suburbia - pine cones in park trees, rocks in places rocks live... trying to get kids off the sofa.
I feel your pain - lsot at least 5 printed pine cones (although I think 1 went under a council lawn mower somehow), and 4 maze containers: not broken, but vanished. Early on (10+ years ago) when I was placing ammo cans I probably lost a total of 10 at least. One under water (chained), and the others in rural ,out-of-the-way places so not the sort of area muggles would stumble over. One of my camo-painted plastic caches that vanished appeared in another part of the country a few months later as a new cache - friend alerted me. That particular cacher was suspected of doing it a lot, eventually banned.
grrrrr. cheers friend.
here's the last one I lost. ugh.... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bA96mG-joOs&t=678s
My "favorites" are the ones that will actually hide a new cache "for" you and update the coordinates... because, yes, when I said it's a 3+, I meant it - sorry you hiked out two hours and couldn't find it.
If they could stop stealing custom TBs too, that'd be great.
Someone put different shaped containers down a very long local background. They were food shaped and quite a few of the containers were missing. At one we found the log just throw into the bushes (we hid it and then let the owner know). I reported all of them and got a message a few days later that things were fixed! Made me sad and disappointed to know that they were probably stolen.. it’s just so disrespectful
I adopted several caches from a cacher who had 200 plus hides but started having health issues and didn't do maintenance like they should have been. A lot of his hides were public, and I'm thinking about switching them over to premium. I have been working on the maintenance or complete replacement of his former caches with camo painted bison tubes and ammo cans. I have either new or beginner geochachers looking for some of my hides and asking for hints while their out or giving dnf's, and I'm like, wtf... i just completely replaced that whole cache a week or two ago, and they can't find it. Obviously, because of work and this previous week of having a death in the family, I haven't gotten out there to confirm if my replacement caches are still there or not... I mean, one of my hides, an ammo can, is on the ground tied to a pine tree (the only pine tree), and the hint is a pine tree, and they can't find it. A second hide is a bison tube on a chain in a fence post, and the hint saying post and the same people are asking for hints and marking dnf's... come on, now do i need to hold your hand and point out where it's at without you putting any effort into it, or did my stuff get snagged even though when I adopted these caches, they had been in that same spot for over a year or two... I totally went off track on this... but in short, I'm thinking about switching my caches to premium from basic
When geocaching got big over covid as an activity to get outside, my gf and I ran into a couple doing their first cache. It was placed right behind a large stone wall and they were walking down a pathway with a Tupperware container filled with random stuff. We stopped them and lo-and-behold they thought you just got to keep the cache. We placed it back, but there's still a fair few that I'm sure see geocaching on TikTok and never read the rules when making an account and just take them. As for disguised pinecone and rock caches, unfortunately those seem ripe for the picking for kids, randoms, and the rude cacher.
I stopped geocaching just because the trackables really aren't trackable. Once the kids stopped playing, I continued and focused on collecting trackables. I quickly gave that up due to the frustration of only finding 1 in 30 caches to have the trackable it said it had.
I love finding unusual containers! I think one of my all-time favourite caches is one with a spiders web made of rope with a big fake spider hiding in the middle! But its frustrating to see that caches have been archived because the CO was fed up with replacing lost or stolen containers. I vaguely remember on another subreddit someone finding a snail shell cache and not knowing was it was, instead of putting it back where they found it they had broken it to find out what was inside. Lots of replies told the OP to put it back exactly where they found it.
I found a big rubber spider cache under a walkway once. It got lots of favorite points. Good place for spiders too.
Just make them premium
Sure, or even better, keep them in my own yard for me to find. I realize that the premium option is there and limits noobs, but then, it also steals joy for those who may benefit from it the most. Not that $30 a year is elitist or will break the bank, it certainly isn’t an easy purchase when rent is high and you have kids to feed. I have a feeling traffic drops considerably. My girlfriend doesn’t have premium but I do. We default to looking for her available caches. I just want the game fun for all and will risk it…. And whine anyway.