The Travel Bugs and geocoins that make it to this TB hotel in Germany are in for a treat. The cache — which you’ll only be able to find after solving the puzzle on the cache page — is probably as close to actually hotel-sized as a geocache can get.

Muggles who catch a glimpse of the adorable little geo-house will assume it’s meant for kids. Little do they know, most of the house’s visitors are fully-grown!

The entrance to the house is clearly marked as geocaching territory.

Inside the hotel, a reception area contains bins for organizing trackables by their destination.

For a while, the cache owner was mailing trackables that landed in the “America” bin to a contact in the United States. Although that service has been interrupted (according to the cache page), it will hopefully continue again in the future.

When visiting this cache, take a seat at the window, gaze out at the garden and street below, and contemplate the words you’re about to write in the logbook…

…then open the window panes and smile out at the camera-person outside!

The TB hotel is located on private property, with the permission of the property owner (who also helped to build and paint the house, by the way). It’s a fine example of a big cache with lots of room for oversize trackables. The 445 favorite points it’s garnered in just three years are well-deserved.

It’s not too late to enter your trackable into the HQ Duck Dash race this summer! If you do, your TB might end up at this or one of many other amazing travel bug hotels around the world. Enter the Race.

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Love lock bridges and gates aren’t all that uncommon. You’ll find them in Belgium, France, Germany, Argentina, Finland, Canada, Italy… it seems the practice of choosing a lock to symbolize a special relationship, then fastening that lock to a public structure has really caught on. It’s made its way to South Korea, too.

At the N Seoul Tower on Namsan Mountain in central Seoul, a less traditional type of love-locking is happening. Seven “trees” at the base of the tower are being festooned with thousands of colorful locks.

One of them is not like the others. The relationship it represents is that between cache owner and cache finder.

Fair warning: this cache is not a quickie. Unless you’re very lucky or have insider information, it’s going to take some time to figure out which of these locks contains the cache. Needle-in-a-haystack caches aren’t for everyone, but if you enjoy that sort of challenge this cache should be on your bucket list.

Words with the Cache Owner

Geocaching HQ: What inspired to you to hide a sneaky lock cache in this spot?

bluesky61: Six years ago I attended “10 Years! Event” for my first event geocache. I remember that there was a disabled cache in the nearby area. I thought that there should be placed a very nice geocache, because the N tower is one of the most renowned landmark in the city of Seoul. Later I found the disabled cache had gone. I wanted to make a very pleasant-to-find geocache and gave it a thought over and over. And finally, I was able to make this love lock cache. It was very good to hide among the great many locks and the lock trees.

Geocaching HQ: What advice do you have for people looking for this cache?

bluesky61: There are so many love locks, and also so many muggles around. However, you don’t need to fear. Nobody would think you are a geocacher looking for a cache. They would think you like one of them examining various kinds of different love locks and the names on them. Just blend in with them. Yes, that will do!

Geocaching HQ: Is there anything you’d like to share with the geocaching community in general?

bluesky61: I think geocaching is a game of consideration of others. All the activities including placing a good cache, exchanging trade items, finding and replacing the caches are based on the thoughts how we can please our visitors to find the cache and have them enjoy the processes to a find. I think that’s why geocaching [is] growing and attracts muggles to become philosophers.

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“Ponale Canyon Adventure” seems a pretty nondescript name for a 9-point multi-cache that could easily be the plot of a post-apocalyptic video game or movie.

The route takes intrepid geocachers along the Ponale River, which plunges into a canyon so lush and green that photos taken there look they’ve been layered with some sort of over-saturated Instagram filter.

Cache Owner deline says, “Ponale Canyon Adventure is like a guided tour through the valley with some challenges along the way that everyone should be able to master and still invoke that I did it! feeling in the end.”

Well, not everyone can master the challenges. The cache has plenty of DNFs. But, the 178 people who have found it so far definitely did their geocaching happy dances at the end.

Climbing gear and a secure knowledge of rappelling are required tools, which is why this cache is a T5. Several of the waypoints are literally hidden inside waterfalls, so the CO’s suggest bringing a towel and bathing clothes, though apparently, “it’s really wild down there, no muggles will see you searching, hence the tendency to nudeness.”

To each their own.

As if the route through the Italian jungle weren’t magical enough already, it also skirts the site of an old, abandoned waterworks plant that appears to have been re-purposed by the jungle as a fairytale castle.

The most challenging part of the cache isn’t what you’d expect. The CO says, “The hardest part seems to be finding the final box, despite our attempts to provide foolproof hints and some photos in the logs that are pretty revealing. Maybe it’s because they’re too exhausted after the trip or they’re afraid to stick their arms in every hole as far as it goes, but that’s what it takes!”

You know you’re a geocacher if:

1. You rappell down the side of a waterfall looking for a box
2. You strip down to your underwear and swim across a pool to look for a box
3. You stick your hands into dark, mossy holes because you’re looking for a box
4. You read this article and immediately put this cache on your bucket list

For more photos of Ponale Canyon, visit the geocache’s gallery.

 

Continue to explore some of the most amazing geocaches around the world.
Check out all of the Geocaches of the Week on the Geocaching blog. If you would like to nominate a Geocache of the Week, fill out this form.