A beautiful view from a path in the city near one of the geocaches
Why this GeoTour is unique:
The name says it all: Valley of the Sun. If you need a little vitamin D and dry desert air in your life, you’ll love this GeoTour location.
All the geocaches on the tour are translated into both English and Spanish, making it the only bilingual GeoTour in the nation.
In the last year, families walked a combined 3,500 miles together while participating in the KohlsFit GeoTour.
A beautiful view from a path in the city when you are finding one of the geocaches on the tour.
Best time of year to visit:
Visit October through April to beat the heat. The area is beautiful in the winter, especially if you want to escape the cold.
Must-see attractions:
All the geocaches on the GeoTour are placed in unique locations around the Phoenix area including art installations, parks, an amazing library, and beautiful hiking & urban trails.
Hidden gems only locals know about:
Our focus is to help families be active. Many of the caches are tucked away on urban trails and in Maricopa County Parks, all of which bring you to breathtaking desert views.
Prizes:
This fall, the first 150 geocachers to complete their passports will earn a special trackable. See more details on the October passport.
Geocachers pedaling away at Pedal Power, one of the geocache locations.
What Geocachers are saying about KohlsFit GeoTour:
“Very cool! I was taking a stroll around this neat park. What better way to see it than to cache. Thanks for the stash. Thanks for the cache. SL. Nice Hide!”
“A beautiful spring day to go and look and find… great flowers, nice breeze, no snakes, great hides,… what more could a gal want???”
“This was our first day of vacation. We always enjoy our visits to Arizona to see roadrunners. Thanks Kohlsfitgeo for placing these caches for us to find and contributing to our fun. from South Dakota.”
Additional Information:
Make memories, have fun, and be active along the way! For more information and to print a passport, visit www.kohlsfit.com/geocaching.
Note: All the above information was provided by the GeoTour host. Copy has been edited by Geocaching HQ.
Geocaches are placed throughout the beautiful town of Helena and its surroundings.
Why Helena is a great place to visit:
Helena is halfway between Glacier and Yellowstone National Park — the perfect midway point for your Montana tour. While you’re in town, the GeoTour will take you to some of the most beautiful Helena vantage points. Be sure to catch a ride on the Last Chance Tour Train or the Gates of the Mountain Boat Tour for a guided Helena experience.
Most geocaches are accessible March through October.
Smiles all around!
Must-see attractions:
In addition to the Last Chance Tour Train and Gates of the Mountains Boat Tour, check out the Montana State Capitol Building (GC4AJVG), Montana History Museum (GC4AG5E), The Parrot Confectionery — an old-fashioned soda fountain (near GCJZ9C) — and 75 miles of hiking & biking trails directly accessible from Downtown Helena.
Hidden gems only locals know about:
Don’t miss Two Camps Vista (GCM27T), the perfect combination of Montana history and spectacular views. This off the beaten path destination is also a monument to the Lewis & Clark Expedition.
Prizes:
A locally made trackable Geocoin!
Geocache GC2CXWT is located near the spectacular Cathedral in town.
What geocachers are saying about the Helena Montana GeoTour:
“I am visiting Montana from Lubbock, Texas, and wanted to see your capital building. It is very pretty and I’m glad Montana was able to restore it to its original grandeur. I took the guided tour — very informative and interesting. Helena seems to be such a nice little city. Thanks for the cache.” –P. M. McNabb
“We were on holidays to Yellowstone Park from Canada and when we heard about your GeoTour, we simply could not resist doing it. We changed our route and came to Helena and we are so glad we did. This was a spectacular adventure and the highlight of our trip, well done!” – Kelly S., Alberta, Canada
Additional Information:
Plan on spending two to three days in Helena in order to complete the GeoTour. Check the website for local hotel discounts.
Note: All the above information was provided by the GeoTour host. Copy has been edited by Geocaching HQ.
“Born” is a real-time adventure geocache, one of several such caches in Germany. The cache page (which is in German) sets the scene for this adventure (all a hypothetical scenario): The Federal Criminal Police Office has learned that a bombing is imminent in the city of Göttingen. Special Unit “Gänseliesel” has been summoned to begin the investigation. Chief Commissioner Schönbeck has been appointed to lead the unit. So far, the investigation has revealed that the bombs have been placed in Göttingen and are already on a countdown. The clock is ticking.
This D5/T4 geocache cannot be found alone. In fact, you’ll need 10-20 geocachers split into three teams in order to have a chance of finding it. One team stays at “Headquarters”: a location of their choosing, preferably filled with snacks. The other two teams are sent to 45 different locations around the city. At every location there’s a countdown, and all three teams are given a question/puzzle to solve.
According to the cache owners, “The teams in the city have to use the public transport to get to the locations in time and answer questions about historical or famous places in Göttingen. The team in the headquarter must deal with encryption, picture analysis, internet-research, maps and bus-timetables.”
If all three teams solve their puzzles and submit their answers before the clock runs out, they continue on to the next task. This continues until the investigation is concluded and Göttingen is saved when the bomb is diffused. In total, each team is working non-stop for five hours. The moving teams will cover about 45 km throughout the evening, and eventually reach the center of the city. The CO says, “At the end, all three teams get to know where the geocache is hidden and move together to sign the logbook. Some teams even bring a bottle of sparkling wine to celebrate the successful search.”
The T4 rating is well-earned. That’s all we’ll say here, but check out the photos below for more about this amazing cache.
What the Cache Owner has to say:
How often are the teams unable to “defuse the bomb” in time? “If your team starts the hunt for the geocache BORN, you never know if you are succsessfull. If one team is not able to reach the destination in the timelimit, the team in the headquarter cannot give the right answer. The investigation stops and the team must start another time. There ist always a tense between physical effort and moments of happiness on the one side and disappointment if you fail a task. Even though the geocache is difficult D5, some teams get it on the first attempt. Every second teams has to start a second time from a backup-point and only a few teams fail more often.”
How long did it take you to develop this cache? “The idea was created in Summer ’14. First we both made a list of locations in Göttingen that are interesting, then Hatti and I spend two days on bikes in Göttingen to visit all this places and take photos of the question-to-answer-stations. Then i took a bus map and planned two routes with basecamp that touch a lot of the interesting places. Meanwhile I develloped the homepage with all the functions you need to play this timed cache and manage teams and so on…
The biggest part of work was to invent a story to connect the 26 chapters of the cache and find 3 x 26 tasks to occupy the three groups. When all was done we two played both outside-routes in realtime to check if the calculated times are ok to get to know what the cache will look like for the teams. The last step was a beta-test with a little group of geocachers to test the complete cache. On January the first, the cache was published. I think the cache was surely over 50 hours of planning, phoning, riding in Göttingen…”
Is there anything you would like to say to the Geocaching community? “We love to invite you to come to Göttingen to find BORN or our brand-new spin-off ALERT (GC5RRQF). We want you to have a gread time and wish you that you are doing the great experience what it’s like when teamwork succeeds. We have read all the amazing logs on our geocaches and thank for every feedback. Göttingen is an interesting city and you can discover it from a completely different side, if you hurry through the streets with the ticking clock in your neck. It was a hard job to concept our two geocaches, but the feedback from the community is great.”
Photos:
You know it’s a cool cache when it has its own logo.
Unit Headquarters often look like this…
Or this…
Or this.
Find “Born” and you might end up doing this.
One of the stops along the way, perhaps?
Another stop along for the outside teams.
This team eventually found success.Smiling (and weary) faces after completing the investigation.
Those who reach this cache know ultimate geocaching success.
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.
Soweit haben wir dieses Jahr 15 Jahre Geocaching gebührlich gefeiert. Wir fanden einen Geocache am Jahrestag des ersten jemals versteckten Geocaches, haben viel über #TBT-Fotos aus den frühen Tagen des Geocaching gelacht und uns sogar mit unseren Geochaching-Freunden auf einen großen Road Trip begeben. Wie die meisten Geocaching-Strähnen wird jedoch auch das Jahr 2015 unweigerlich zu Ende gehen…
Aber hier ist die gute Nachricht: Dieses Jahr laden wir Euch ein, Lebewohl zu 2015 und Hallo zu 2016 mit zwei neuen Geocaching-Souvenirs zu sagen. Finde einen Geocache oder nimm am 31. Dezember an einem Event teil, um dir ein Lebewohl-2015-Souvenir zu verdienen. Beginne dein Jahr gleich mit dem Hallo-2016-Souvenir, das man sich auch durch Finden eines Geocaches oder der Teilnahme an einem Event am 1. Januar verdienen kann.
Wie kann ich mir beide Souvenirs verdienen?
Verdiene Dir das Lebewohl-2015-Souvenir, indem du einen Geocache findest oder an einem Event am 31. Dezember 2015 teilnimmst.
Verdiene Dir das Hallo-2016-Souvenir, indem Du einen weiteren Geocache findest oder an einem anderen Event am 1. Januar 2016 teilnimmst.
Kann man zwei Souvenirs für einen Event verdienen, wenn dieser am 31. Dezember beginnt und am 1. Januar endet?
Netter Versuch. Um beide Souvenirs zu bekommen, musst du zwei verschiedene Geocaches finden und/oder zwei Events besuchen – je einen bzw. eines pro Tag.
Kann ich aufeinanderfolgende Events organisieren, um beide Souvenirs zu erhalten?
Nein! Die Geocaching-Richtlinien verbieten das Aneinanderreihen von Events. Um das Aneinanderreihen von Events zu vermeiden, sollten Event-Geocaches zeitlich getrennt und von unterschiedlichen Geocachers organisiert sein, mindestens 30 Minutes dauern und an anderen Orten als andere Events stattfinden. In den Geocaching-Richtlinien findest Du weitere Informationen über das Planen eines Event-Geocache.
Wie veranstalte ich einen großartigen Neujahrs-Geocaching-Event?
Keine Sorge, wir haben die Lösung für Dich. Dieser Blogeintrag zeigt Dir in 5 einfachen Schritten, wie Du eine fantastische Geocaching-Party veranstalten kannst.
Ob Du das neue Jahr nun feiern wirst, indem du Trauben isst (wie in Spanien), Dein Zuhause dekorierst (wie das in Japan üblich ist), oder indem Du Geocachen gehst (wie das auf der ganzen Welt getan wird), Neujahr ist die Zeit, an das alte Jahr zurückzudenken und das neue Jahr willkommen zu heißen.
Wie wirst du Lebewohl zu 2015 und Hallo zu 2016 sagen?
But good news: This year, we invite you to say goodbye to 2015 and hello to 2016 with two new geocaching souvenirs. Find a geocache or attend an event on December 31 to earn the Goodbye 2015 souvenir. Then, start your year off right with the Hello 2016 souvenir, which can also be earned by finding a geocache or attending an event on January 1.
How do I earn both souvenirs?
Earn the Goodbye 2015 souvenir by finding any geocache or attending an event on December 31, 2015.
Earn the Hello 2016 souvenir by finding another geocache or attending a different event on January 1, 2016.
Can you earn two souvenirs for one event if it starts on December 31 and ends on January 1?
Nice try. To earn both souvenirs, you’ll have to submit two different logs for two different geocaches and/or events, one on each day.
Can I schedule back-to-back events to earn both souvenirs ?
Nope! The geocaching guidelines prohibit event stacking. To avoid event stacking, Event Caches should be separated by time, organized by different geocachers, have a minimum duration of 30 minutes and take place at a different location than other events. Please check out the geocaching guidelines for more information about planning an Event Cache.
How do I throw a great New Year’s geocaching event?
Don’t worry, we’ve got you covered. Check out this blog post for how to throw an awesome geocaching bash in 5 easy steps.
Whether you celebrate the new year by eating grapes (like in Spain), decorating your home (as they do in Japan), or geocaching (as they do all over the world), New Year’s is a time to remember the past year and welcome the next.
How will you say goodbye to 2015 and hello to 2016?
