/ Carly /

Three Cheers for January’s Geocacher of the Month Nominees

Each month, the global geocaching community meets three outstanding geocachers. As part of this community, your task is to help decide which one will be known forevermore as a Geocacher of the Month.

These exceptional people stand out among others for their demonstrated dedication to the game we all love. If you’re lucky enough to someday meet one of them, give ‘em a high five. Each of the nominees below will receive a prize package from Geocaching HQ in Seattle, but only one will be the next Geocacher of the Month. A  panel from Geocaching HQ will use your comments, community input and other data to decide the winner.

Now it’s your turn to help us select the next Geocacher of the Month. Write a supportive comment below for the nominated geocacher you feel should be awarded the title.

 

Timpat

0820de7c-38b3-4c79-a028-656dc0c33c36Timpat is known in the New York geocaching community for his impressive hides, supportive nature, and extensive GPS and mapping expertise. With nearly 10,000 finds and 400 hides, he is a true inspiration to all. Not to mention, his kayak geocaches are amazing.

Renmin says, “Impressively, he records tracks on his GPS as he travels unknown trails. He  converts them to a map file to share with others to use on their gps units. He also has supplied local preserves with trail maps of their land to which they use at the kiosks for any who hike them. Through his volunteer work in helping these preserves with better maps, he has been able to put a good face on the local geocaching community.”

 

 

family Behrens

3b0c2482-8303-4ef9-b4f6-0db9a4c1e10cDescribed as “the ultimate geocacher”, family Behrens (aka FB) has helped geocaching bloom in South Africa. He is known in the local geocaching community for his creative and challenging geocaches (all 88 of them) and for his well-organized, highly attended CITO events.

Earnst Gucken states, “In short “family Behrens” has become somewhat of a legend in our neck of the woods. family Behrens is always trying to encourage others to hide their own geocaches. He does this by leaving his micro trademark cache containers in other larger containers, with a note attached; urging others to take his container and place it. He even adds basic instructions to help a novice CO.”

 

 

Koouye

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Koouye is recognized throughout the Belgium geocaching community for being a dynamic, passionate, and devoted geocacher. He is a social butterfly, known for hosting great events and for attending other’s events (133 so far!)  With over 7,000 geocaches and 161 hides, he is a geocaching pro.

According to TREGASTEL, “Koouye has an engaging personality. He does not hesitate to share his passion with new geocachers and give them valuable advice. Many creative geocaches were hidden by Koouye which has helped spearhead geocaching in the area.”

 

 

 

 

Comment below to tell us who you think should be the January Geocacher of the Month. Comments accepted through through February 25th.

 

If you know an outstanding geocacher who should be considered for the honor, simply fill out this webform.

/ Paige Edmiston /

Nimm an der letzten stattfindenden Block-Party teil!

 blockparty_weeklymailerFBblog_Blog_vFinal

Geocaching-Block-Party 2015: Der letzte Vorhang

Nach vielen Jahren des Feierns am Geocaching-Hauptquartier in Seattle, ist es jetzt Zeit für Veränderungen: Sei dabei, wenn wir »15 Jahre Geocaching« mit der letzten Block-Party im August feiern!

Melde Dich im Listing zur Geocaching-Block-Party 2015 an. Und wenn Du schon dabei bist, kannst Du Dich auch gleich fürs Internationale Geocaching-Film-Festival 2015 anmelden.

Und nicht vergessen: Das CITO-Wochenende findet am 25. und 26. April statt. Mach mit und reinige gemeinsam mit tausenden Geocachern die örtlichen Geocaching-Gebiete, pflanze Bäume oder entferne eingewanderte Arten.

/ Alex /

It’s the Same Old Story: Romancing the Geocacher

It’s the same old story.

Boy meets Girl. Boy takes Girl geocaching. Boy falls in love with Girl. Girl falls in love with geocaching. Eventually also warms up to Boy. Here are the 13 dates that made up this imaginary geocaching love story. This is a fictional account, so, basically steal any tips you find here to make your own moves on your potential geo-crush.

 


THE FIRST DATE

GC274GK

TamsinTugboat and I found this one on our walk through Discovery Park. I got us to GZ, but she
made the find (her first). Had a really great time, hope she did as well.
(Haven’t read her log yet…here’s crossing my fingers).  

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THE SECOND DATE

GC24H25

Cheers to making this incredibly tricky D3 cache my fifteenth! RusselltheSpaceman and I
spent the good portion of Sunday afternoon looking for this one. We gave up several times
and decided to re-energize with fresh pears from Pike’s Place Market. He convinced me
to try this really odd looking peanut butter drink. After that feat, finding this cache among all the
red-herrings was a  piece of…gum!

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THE THIRD DATE

GCPD31

Time to spice things up with some good ‘ole EarthCaches. Thanks for bringing
TamsinTugboat and I to this part of the world. Despite living across the water from it,
neither of us have made it out to Bainbridge Island very often. We had a heck of a time
figuring out whether this was glacial till, outwash, or silts and clays…but
guess who’s taken at least one geology course in college? (Hint, of the
two of us, it’s the prettier one.)

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THE FOURTH DATE

GCWTP1

Let’s get one thing straight—I was not the one to suggest this 4am hike up Sun Top Mountain. 
RusselltheSpaceman thought it would be “appropriate” to get to the top at sunrise, given
the name of the mountain. I thought it would be appropriate to sleep in. 
Guess who thought wrong?
‘Twas a beautiful hike, I’ll admit, and this geocache was a worthy reward. TFTC. 

eb2fe2a4-d8ac-4965-8dae-8072d49dee23

 

THE FIFTH, SIXTH, AND SEVENTH DATES

GCPWDY (among others)

If a 4am hike to a geocache on top of a mountain to reach a ‘cache didn’t discourage
TamsinTugboat, I think it’s safe to say she’s hooked on geocaching. She came on this
three-day camping trip in the Cascades with me, so things must be going well. This cache 
our fourth find of the trip, and the first island cache for both of us. The swim
was frigid, but there was no getting around that. Thanks for the T4 ‘cache!

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THE EIGHTH DATE

GCK25B

Geocaching Headquarters on the eighth date?! Smooth move, my friend. Smooth move. 

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THE NINTH DATE

GC53PD0

I reached GZ with TamsinTugboat. We weren’t sure what to expect from a 
Terrain 4 cache in the middle of a residential neighborhood. If we’d known we’d be 
climbing this pine, we probably wouldn’t have worn flip-flops. Okay, so shoes off, and 
up the tree we went, barefoot as Mowgli. Due to technical restrictions, we each 
went up separately, but I caught this shot of TamsinTugboat waiting patiently for me to 
get over my vertigo and climb down. 

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THE TENTH DATE

DNF

It was bound to happen eventually — the dreaded DNF. According to RusselltheSpaceman,
the streak of 45 finds and 0 DNFs we had going was unusual. Even when you know
you’ll have to DNF eventually, it’s hard to accept. But it’s a bit easier to accept when you’re 
with a friend. 

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THE ELEVENTH & TWELFTH DATES

GC4DG0T

First Geocaching Mega event! TamsinTugboat and I took a road trip up to Saskatchewan 
to attend this awesome event. Met so many other nice folks and found over twenty geocaches.
She’s almost caught up to me (has someone been geocaching alone on the side?!).

8a44c8c7-90d0-464e-8ba7-26761bb04e7b

 

THE THIRTEENTH DATE

GC2WVHP

We came back to the park where we found our first cache to celebrate our 100th find together!
(Actually, this was my 140th find and RusselltheSpaceman’s 132nd find, but who’s
counting? Well, I am of course.) This EarthCache took us to the stunning sea bluffs at the edge
of Discovery Park, and as luck would have it the weather was gorgeous. From GZ we could 
see the little lighthouse at West Point. I’d love to someday restore that old lighthouse to
live in. Beautiful buildings like that deserve loving inhabitants.  Answers to the required
questions have been sent off to the cache owner.  We’re both crossing our fingers on this one. 

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/ Derek H /

Take a 32-Stage Journey Through Central Park — Bridges & Arches of Central Park (GC17MX1) — Geocache of the Week Video Edition

Geocache_of_the_Week_vFINAL_122314

 

Geocache Name:

Bridges & Arches of Central Park (GC17MX1)

Difficulty/Terrain Rating:

3/2

Why this is the Geocache of the Week:

If you haven’t yet, watch the video above. This geocache is an epic, 32-stage multi-cache that takes you on a journey through Central Park in New York City, NY, USA. The stages of this multi-cache focus on the park’s bridges and arches, which are beautifully crafted but often overlooked. Waiting at the final stage for the intrepid geocachers who make it there is a custom-designed geocoin to commemorate their journey.

 

What geocachers are saying:

“This cache was incredible. It took my son and I three trips starting from September to hit all the points. Finding the rock and coin gave us a great memory of a fun adventure. Thank you very much for this.” – teamtrimble13

“Yay! WooHoo! What a cache, what an adventure! This probably is my biggest personal geocaching achievement. Loved it! I really enjoyed discovering Central Park and the many many ‘hidden’ trails. There is so much to see, I had no idea. Favorite point for sure!!!!” – wanderlusta

“Fantastic, must-do, classic cache! Having placed nothing but the final on this prime real estate, the CO has created a wonderfully researched experience that will delight any explorer, young and old. This cache, unlike any other cache visited, convinced my muggle friend, Tinstaafl2, to create an account and finally join the game.” – Baxter929

 

What the geocache owner, addisonbr, has to say:

“…At some point while roaming around the park I stumbled across the fact that no two bridges in the original design are alike.  We had just started hiding our first caches a few months earlier, and I thought that maybe the bridges and arches could form the backbone of a pretty interesting tour.  I started paying more attention to them while in the park, reading up on them, etc.  I found some out-of-print books that had a lot of background information and details about Olmsted and Vaux’s original designs and started making some trips out to scout them, sketching out some descriptions, looking for information that cachers could retrieve from each site (and that could combine to form coordinates).  After coming up with a route, I play-tested it a few times to see how long it would take (and make sure that I hadn’t made any errors).  It seemed like it was going to take most people 4-6 hours or so, which is on the long side, but I hoped that if I gave people something interesting to read between waypoints it might not seem so bad.
…My biggest concern was that the cache would take too long for people to really enjoy it.  Whenever I play-tested it, I was pretty wiped out by the time I got to the end, so I wasn’t sure how it was going to play out for other people.  When you publish a cache you’re kind of asking people to trust you with their time, and if your cache takes several hours – it just felt like a lot of responsibility.  I was mostly hoping that when people got to the end they wouldn’t feel irritated about all the time they invested writing down numbers and making calculations and otherwise jumping through all of the hoops they’d been jumping through all day.  Then after it was published and the logs finally started coming in… a tremendous sense of relief.  I always read every word of every log that hits my inbox and it’s heartening that people will take so much time to write as much as they do about their experiences.

Especially for people who attempt this cache while visiting New York – thank you for trusting me with so much of your vacation!”

 Photos:

Bridges, arches and geocaching, #2. Photo by geocachers mcjeeper and stukboy
Bridges, arches and geocaching, #2. Photo by geocachers mcjeeper and stukboy
Bridges, arches and geocaching, #1. Photo by geocachers mcjeeper and stukboy
Bridges, arches and geocaching, #1. Photo by geocachers mcjeeper and stukboy
One of the parks many cool bridges. Photo by geocacher guinea gal
One of the parks many cool bridges. Photo by geocacher guinea gal
Two happy geocachers on their way. Photo by geocacher ChrisAtLarge
Two happy geocachers on their way. Photo by geocacher ChrisAtLarge

 

What’s the best Multi-Cache you’ve ever found? Tell us and post photos in the comments.

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

/ Eric Schudiske /

Your Path to Platinum EarthCaching

 

earthcache platinum

Written by: Gary Lewis, Senior Director of Education and Outreach, The Geological Society of America

EarthCaching is different – while part of your geocaching experience, it involves a lot more than finding, logging and replacing a physical geocache.  A visit to an EarthCache involves a lesson, a opportunity to think, discuss and ponder and a chance to be rewarded with achievements beyond your number of finds.

gardenofthegods-jamieric-02
Garden of the Gods Earthcache GCND0E

EarthCaching started in January 2004 when I placed the first EarthCache with my daughter on a headland in southern Australia.  My goal was to teach geocachers more about the wonderful geology of our planet.  So Earthcaches involve you visiting a site and undertaking a logging task that teaches you some aspect of geology related to what you see.   There are now over 18,000 active EarthCaches around the globe – and at least one on every continent!

Can you name this EarthCache? Do so in comments below!
Can you name this EarthCache? Do so in comments below!

I realized early on that the effort required to place an EarthCache needed to be rewarded.  On top of the normal geocache needs, an  EarthCaches require some research and planning to meet the guidelines. Out of that realization was born the EarthCache Masters Program – which rewards caters for visiting and placing EarthCaches.

The genius of the EarthCache Masters Program is that it’s quite simple.

  • The first level, Bronze, requires you to visit and log three EarthCaches.  The trick is, those three EarthCaches  cannot be in the same state/province/country. We want you to travel to experience the geology away from your home location.
  • The next level, Silver, requires you to visit and log six EarthCaches and develop and have published one EarthCache. So after you have visited a handful of EarthCaches you get rewarded for the effort you put into having your very own EarthCache published by the Geoaware team.
Can you name this EarthCache? Do so in comment below!
Can you name this EarthCache? Do so in comment below!

 

  • Beyond this the levels are Gold (visit 12, create 2)
  • Platinum (visit 20, create 3).

You record your efforts via the EarthCache website here and are rewarded by an icon you can place on the profile page.  You can even buy Masters coins.

Being an EarthCache Master shows the community that you are not only committed to learning about our Earth, but committed to having even more fun geocaching!

Here’s my challenge. Lets see if we can’t double the number of people who are at each of the EarthCache Masters levels by International EarthCache Day (Sunday 11 October)  this year. You have more than 18,000 EarthCaches to choose from to start!

Current Number of EarthCache Masters by Level

Bronze     = 14122

Silver        = 3731

Gold          = 2086

Platinum  = 1678

 

TOTAL = 21617

 

Can you guess this EarthCache location? Do so in comments below.
Can you guess this EarthCache location? Do so in comments below.