Geocaching is delightful because of the people who play it — adventure-seekers, makers, parents, astronauts and (sometimes) celebrities. Read their stories.
Live the adventure of the Lord of the Rings by finding the geocache “Entrance to Mordor” (GC14NA0). The search to find this cache takes geocachers into the darkness of an abandoned underground train service station in Sweden. Norpan & rand althor hid this mystery cache.
In order to crack the mystery and find the cache (referred to on the cache page as “your precious”) treasure-hunters decipher information at the cache coordinates. Geocachers take the information and plug it into a formula found on the cache page to discover the “Entrance to Mordor.”
Gollum?
More than 100 geocachers received a smiley for this cache since the difficulty 3.5, terrain 3.5 cache was hidden in 2007. “Entrance to Mordor” also has 22 Favorite Points so far. Geocaching Favorites is a new feature on Geocaching.com.
Continue your exploration of some of the most engaging geocaches from around the world. Explore all the Geocaches of the Week on our blog or view the Bookmark List on Geocaching.com.
WINNING CAPTION: “I got this by making a fair trade – equal or greater value – I left the cat.” – ljhuston
Try your caption writing skills in the twenty-first installment of our Geocaching.com Caption Contest. You could become the proud winner of a barely coveted prize! What caption would you write? “Dogs’ best-friend is a geocaching frog?” You can do better!
Barely Coveted Prize
Submit your caption by clicking on “Comments” below. Please include your geocaching username in all entries. Then, explore the captions that other geocachers have crafted.
You can influence the voting. “Like” the caption that you think should win. If you think your caption should win, convince your fellow geocachers to “like” your caption. Lackeys decide between the top captions to crown the winner of this Geocaching.com Caption Contest. The winner receives a barely coveted prize from Groundspeak Headquarters — this Cache In Trash Out pin. The annual international Cache In Trash Out Weekend is approaching on April 30 & May 1, 2011.
Click on the image to see the winner of this Geocaching.com Caption Contest
14 Lackeys voted to award the winner of the twentieth Geocaching.com Caption Contest a barely coveted prize. Click on the image at right to discover the winning caption from the previous Geocaching.com Caption Contest.
In June of 2000 geocaching reached Europe in the form of a plastic container hidden along the Irish coastline. It was only one month after the first geocache in the world was placed in the U.S.
“Europe’s First” (GC43) is rated as a difficulty 1, terrain 3. It’s located south of Dublin and geocachers from around the world make this cache part of their holiday plans. One of the more than 500 logs from “Europe’s First” reads, “Our trip to Ireland would have not have been complete without a small diversion to pick up this very important landmark cache. Even the sun came out to give us a lovely stroll along the cliff path before a short scramble to the cache. I’m very pleased to have ticked this one off.”
Geocachers who log this cache, also cross one of the Top Ten Oldest Active Caches off their list.
Continue your exploration with some of the most engaging geocaches from around the world. Explore all the Geocaches of the Week on our blog or view the Bookmark List on Geocaching.com.
“My first cache in Korea. Nice place, nice hide. A beautiful place to calm down and enjoy silence.” Geocachers have been writing logs just like that for “BongEun-Sa Revivial” (GCXNRW) since Healthpia hid this cache in 2006.
The difficulty 1.5, terrain 1.5 traditional geocache rests near the heart of Seoul, South Korea.
Its proximity to major hotels draws travelers out of their rooms to begin an urban treasure hunt. More than 120 geocachers have discovered the unexpectedly quiet and serene grounds of Bongeunsa Temple in the middle of this major city.
The Bongeunsa Temple was founded in 794. It’s a popular tourist destination where visitors can experience the life of a monk for two hours. The cache owner reminds people to be respectful and also to use stealth when hunting for the cache.
View of Buddha statue from near geocache site GCXNRW
This traditional cache is tied for the most Favorite Points received out of more than 4000 geocaches in South Korea. Geocaching Favorites is a new feature on Geocaching.com.
Continue your exploration with some of the most engaging geocaches from around the world. Explore all the Geocaches of the Week on our blog or view the Bookmark List on Geocaching.com.
The world of an 11-year-old is a complex ecosystem of school, sports, family and play. In 2011, play as a kid seems to only involve the pollicis brevis and abductor pollicis longus muscle groups. Those are the muscles that move our thumbs, as in playing video games.
But one 11-year-old is using his thumbs for something else. Evan works the buttons on a GPS device to hunt geocaches. He also recently picked up a pen and wrote a letter to Groundspeak.
The fifth grader is an avid geocacher. Evan writes, “Me and my dad go caching a lot.” He describes geocaching as, “fun-ga-cational.”
Here’s why. Evan says, “[Geocaching is fun-ga-cational] because first of all it helps with math, (working with miles and feet). Second of all because it helps with geography, maps and sometimes social studies, working with latitude and longitude, maps and sometimes you learn about the area around a person. And third of all because it is super fun.”
Well, thank you Evan. We work hard to make sure geocaching is as super fun as possible.
This fifth grader’s letter is peppered with ideas for geocaching and questions for Groundspeak. We thought we’d share a few of Evan’s questions.
Where did you get the idea for geocoins?
Geocoins, including a Moun10bike coin
Geocoins are the creation of Jon Stanley, alias Moun10bike. He now works at Groundspeak as a Lackey. We even did a video with Jon about the invention of geocoins. He placed the first coin on September 30, 2001. Did you know, Moun10bike has thousands of geocoins in his personal collection? It’s true. He has books and books of geocoins.
Can you put locks on geocaches?
Yes, if an answer or a key you discover unlocks the cache. Geocacher Richard Garriott has a lock on his cache called, “Necropolis of Britannia Manor III.” We did a video about this spooky cache. The clues you find on this puzzle cache give you the combination for the lock. You can watch a story about the cache here.
Can one put more A.P.E. caches out?
Evan's letter to Groundspeak
Nope. There’s only a couple A.P.E. caches left in the world. In 2001, fourteen geocaches were placed as the movie Planet of the Apes hit theaters. Each cache represented a fictional story in which scientists revealed an Alternative Primate Evolution. These caches were made using specially marked ammo containers. There’s one A.P.E. cache left near Groundspeak H.Q. and one still active in Brazil.
Will you ever branch out and make multiple HQ caches?
Seems unlikely. There’s only one H.Q. We’re located in Seattle, Washington. You’re always welcome to visit. Just check out our cache page.
Thanks for writing Evan. I hope this helped! And we’ll see what we can do about your suggestions. We like the idea of miniature Signal and Lackey figurines. But we’re not sure Geocaching will ever be an Olympic sport. Who knows though? Thanks again.
