Author: OpenCaching North America

Bad Ideas, Bomb Scares, etc.

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It’s no secret that many, many Geocaches have caused bomb scares in the U.S. and Canada since our game was invented in 2000. Elsewhere in the world too, of course, but we are a North American based blog, and the majority of these incidents occur in the United States. We doubt that anyone keeps statistics on the number of bomb squad incidents, but the Blogger, who has checked in and read the Geocaching.com forums several times a week for almost 10 years (where almost every incident is reported), would estimate the average to be between two and three per month.

A Google search of the phrase “Geocaching Bomb Scares” generally returns two Geocaching.com bookmark lists in the top results, both of which we at the blog have been aware of for several years. Bomb Scares and Other Fun Stuff, is the older of the two. However, this list has essentially been abandoned, and a quick scan of it tells you it hasn’t had any new caches posted to it since 2007, although the adopted owner of the list is still an active Geocacher. The other top result, Bad Ideas, Bomb Scares, etc. is a very well maintained and regularly updated bookmark list, and is is the subject of this Blog post. The bookmark list owner, David Brierley (Geocaching.com Username: dbrierley), has graciously agreed to be interviewed by this Blog.

OCNA Blog: Where are you from, how did you first hear about Geocaching, and when did you start?
David: I’m from Rhode Island and I started geocaching in 2005. I probably heard
about geocaching while looking into buying a GPS receiver for hiking.

OCNA Blog: What would you say inspired you to create this bookmark list?
David: Sometime after starting in geocaching, I found the earlier “Bomb Scares and Other Fun Stuff” bookmark list, which was no longer maintained at that
point.

OCNA Blog: Many Geocachers (myself included) have noticed that you advertise this bookmark list on Google AdSense ads. Why do you do this?
David: Nearly all of the geocaches in the bookmark list are archived, making them
unavailable by searching the geocaching site or through search engines; so
advertising the list is the only way to generate awareness.

OCNA Blog: How do you hear about the unfortunate caches that make the bookmark list? Do you use Google News alerts? Do you have to do a lot of research tying the news reports to a particular cache?
David: The geocaches are mostly discovered through Google News alerts; the likely geocache can often be found within minutes.  Some caches have been suggested by other geocachers via email and others have been found through the forums.

OCNA Blog: Do you feel that a majority of Geocaches that cause bomb scares are
due to them being on private property without permission? My experience over
the years from reading the Groundspeak forums suggests so. Not all of them,
but I’d have to guess over 50% of them.
David: I haven’t done any counts, but absence of permission seems to be a major
factor.  Another factor seems to be the container type — unlabeled
nontransparent containers, especially pipe-like containers, in areas where
there are many people.

OCNA Blog: When a cache causes a bomb scare, the cache page usually turns into a “forum”, with local cachers (many of whom have found the cache in question) chiming in. The theme generally leans towards the authorities being overzealous. Do you believe the authorities are being overzealous in many cases?
David: Law enforcement personnel have to consider all possibilities, especially
when dealing with an unlabeled and opaque container: it could be trash, it could be an explosive, it could be a geocache or letterbox, it could be an explosive placed in an actual geocache, etc.  Assumptions probably cannot be made as to what a bomb or a geocache is supposed to look like.  There might not be time to search the various listing sites for geocaches and letterboxes and the geocache/letterbox might not even be listed with any service. Complaints about law enforcement responses often seem to be attempts to divert attention away from permission issues.

OCNA Blog:  Do you have any advice for cache hiders to stay the heck off of your
bookmark list?
David: There are no guaranteed ways to avoid problems, but there seem to be
precautions that can be taken to reduce the chances. These are not new; people have been talking about them for years in the forums:

  • The most important precaution for caches on private property is to get
    firm permission, preferably written, from the owner or manager; seek
    permission from someone in authority to make decisions. Show the
    owner/manager the geocache and where it will be hidden.
  • Make sure the container is location-appropriate.  Media reports mention
    law enforcement requests to use labeled transparent containers in areas
    frequented by the public. 
Thanks to David for doing that interview with us! I really liked his answers. Again, here is the link to the Bad Ideas, Bomb Scares, etc. bookmark list. There are limitations to what you can do with Geocaching.com bookmark lists, but David has done the best you can do, with what you’re given to work with. He has used BB code to insert links to relevant media stories, forum discussions and nearby caches in the description for the caches on the list, where applicable. And in the main list description, he posts links to his Facebook and Twitter accounts, where he posts updates to the list. And he also has a Geocache, Bomb Scares, etc. board on Pinterest. This blog post was a little short on graphics this week, but we didn’t want to copy any of the mostly news media in orgin copywrited photos that appear there on Pinterest. Feel free to check those out.

Also feel free to comment on this blog post! We’re always a little short on those too at the OCNA blog, although Blogger and Google Analytics stats show this blog has decent readership. Are you one of the plurality of Geocachers who feel law enforcement overreacts almost every time a Geocache is called in as a suspicious container? Let us know!

Sporadically featured OpenCachingNA Cache: Ohio’s First Dead drop!!!

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Xenia Station, hub for 5 bike trails

As mentioned in the last post, the Blogger recently went on a little Road Trip to the great State of Ohio, where he attended Midwest Geobash 2013 in Wauseon, Ohio. That was not the focus of his trip, however, and he spent only about 2.5 hours at the event, and most of that finding caches and capturing Munzees. Zero of which, for either game I might add, were very challenging! After the event, the Blogger, and his two traveling companions (his 13 yr. old son and 14 yr. old nephew), headed 3 hours south to the greater Dayton, Ohio area, for a two day stay at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base, where he hoped to find some of the 16 Opencaching.us listings in the greater Dayton area, with a focus on Ohio’s First Dead Drop!!!, the sporadically featured cache.

Little Miami Scenic Trail, one of the five

 The Dead Drop Cache is located in The City of Xenia, Ohio (ZeeNeeUh), 12 miles SE of Downtown Dayton, and very near Xenia Station (pictured in the paragraph above), a hub for five bike trails. The building is a replica of the City’s 1880’s Rail Station, not original, but is very nice, and has a lookout tower you can visit. Shown to the right is one of the five trails, The Little Miami Scenic Trail, with a bridge over Shawnee Creek. The City of Xenia touts itself as “The Bicycle Capital of the Midwest”. The slogan is even on one of the water towers in town, which I later visited for an Opencaching.us listed cache. You can read about the five trails on the Xenia Station wikipedia page.

Required caching equipment

 Some of you may have read this far, and are still wondering “what the heck is a Dead Drop?” They are probably more commonly known as a USB Dead Drop, and they are computer USB Flash Drives hidden (sometimes in plain site) in public. We at OpenCaching North America have only adapted the concept to Geocaching; the world-wide peer to peer file sharing network was invented by German Media Artist Aram Bartholl in October, 2010, and he maintains the official website. The concept of public USB Dead Drops is not without controversy though; anyone can intentionally or unintentionally infect the flash drive with Malware such as a trojan horse or keylogger, for example. The flash drive itself could become corroded from the elements, and short out your USB port. We at OCNA feel our Dead Drop caches are much safer then the public Dead Drops, at least from the standpoint of receiving Viruses or Malware, as the drive will typically only contain two text files, a “readme” file, and the log. This is outlined in the article on that cache type in our OC Wiki. 

The readme.txt file on the flash drive

Ohio’s First Dead Drop!!! was placed on September 1st, 2012 by username Bernoulli on our website (Bernoulli and family on Geocaching.com). We asked him how he first heard about our website, and what he liked about it. Of course he couldn’t remember exactly where and how he heard about it, but he had a lot to say about what he likes about the unique cache types available on our website: “I spend a lot of time outdoors in the woods and on the rivers but I also have a young family who is into everything so I get busy and can usually just work it in when I can.  That’s where virtuals and other cache types come in – I love taking the family to interesting places that others should see but I can’t always place a physical cache there because of restrictions, as there should be.  Both the Hocking Hills Region of Ohio as well as the Red River Gorge of Kentucky fall into that category and Earth Caches are OK but it’s hard to get confirmation that someone was there.  You can’t require a photo anymore with EC’s and there is no option for some sort of required code to prove you were there.  With the “numbers mentality” of many cachers, it wouldn’t be too hard to fudge a log to some of those EC’s and I hate having to delete logs.  With OCUS virtuals, I can require a picture and a confirmation code that can only come from being there.  Caching is about the journey anyway, so virtuals make perfect sense”. We agree! Did you know that about 97% of Geocaching.com accounts were created after they stopped accepting virtual caches? We are happy to allow this cache type, and, contrary to popular belief, we rarely, if ever, receive any “lame ones”.

The Blogger’s find log; ignore the fact he forgot to date it

Well, the Blogger and his traveling companions arrived on site at Xenia Station, and found the cache relatively quickly. We would say we consulted the hint, but the “hint” was pretty much on the cache page in plain text. We did sort of need it, the USB Flash Drive was extremely well-hidden to the casual passer-by, and we did have some difficulty locating it before consulting the cache page on the GPS! On the left, you see the Blogger’s find log on the computer screen. Complete with a reflection of him taking the picture of it, in the 9:30 or so AM sun. It almost looks like it’s supposed to be the background image on the computer, doesn’t it? P.S., ignore the fact that he forgot to date it. :-). 

An excellent cache, in an excellent location, near the hub of five bike trails. And a unique cache type, which is only available on Opencaching North America. How could you possibly go wrong here? Thanks to Bernoulli for placing the cache, and congratulations for being the second Sporadically featured OpenCachingNA Cache on the Blog. 

OCNA Blogger heading out on the road!

OpenCaching North America 1 Comment
It’s a Mule, not an Ass

That really is Mr.Yuck, AKA Jim, the OCNA Blogger, at a photo opportunity available at one of his own caches, which is listed exclusively on the Opencaching North America websites. That would be this cache at the Erie Canal Museum, in Lockport, N.Y. This is what we call a guestbook cache, where you sign the guestbook at a museum (in this case), or just about any tourist attraction you can think of. You could also use it for a trailhead register, or even a summit register at the top of a mountain. The blogger has made the high point of Ohio a guestbook cache on opencaching.us, for example; although technically a summit register, it’s admittedly not too much of a hike for that one! It sits on the grounds of a Technical High School, which was formerly a cold war era Air Force Installation. Anyways, you can read more about this cache type on our OC Wiki, which is not a wiki in the traditional sense, as it’s “closed”, but there is a wealth of information about our website there, including the many unique cache types we offer. Please check it out.

So yes, we’re heading out on the road! We will be attending what is often touted as the World’s 2nd largest Mega Event, the Midwest Geobash, which has made it’s permanent home at the Fulton County Fairgrounds, in Wauseon, Ohio, in the extreme NW part of the State. Geocachers Unlimited is hosting a little “event within the event”, Geocachers Unlimited Meetup @ The Mega II  which is listed on our website, as well as being cross-listed on other alternative Geocaching websites Terracaching.com and GPSgames.org. Check us out if you happen to be at MWGB!

CacheFace.com launches CacheBlogger.com, a microblogging community for Geocachers

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OCNA NOTE: CacheBlogger.com shut down in late 2014.

Paul Suggitt AKA Pilot Suggs from CacheFace.com is at it again with a new website; CacheBlogger.com, which was launched at Midnight GMT on June 28th, 2013. Twitter, of course is  referred to as a microblogging website, and CacheBlogger.com very much resembles Twitter, in both look and feel. Why a microblogging platform dedicated to Geocachers? Says Paul: “CacheBlogger was developed to compliment cacheface.com in such that geocachers have a dedicated social network AND micro blogging platform at their disposal where they can shout about their geocaching adventures, make new friends and share the geocaching love, no matter where they are on the planet. Other platforms may have the volumes of people using them in general, however the idea behind CacheBlogger (and indeed cacheface.com) is that the platforms are developed for and dedicated to geocachers so its easy to find cachers, make new caching friends around the world and even share ideas and adventures with people you have never met, knowing they all share the same passion….geocaching.”

OCNA CacheBlogger feed, click to enlarge and view in lightbox

Above is the OCNA CacheBlogger feed, as it appeared on the morning of this blog post. You see some big names in Geocaching there, headhardhat and Podcacher. Hopefully Hikerjamz, also shown, will be a big name in the future! You’ll notice you can type a message (shout), and upload a photo or video. There is one major difference from the Twitter website though; you get to use a maximum of 200 characters, rather than 140. Paul explains, “CacheBlogger is a micro blogging platform like twitter, and as we geocachers have a lot to shout about, I decided to set the character limit to 200 instead of the adopted 140 on other platforms.”  We here at the blog agree, 60 extra characters is an excellent choice. There is a visible character counter while you are typing your post, and it “goes red” at 20 characters remaining.

Most of the other features Twitter users are familiar with are on the right hand sidebar, including the users Avatar and Bio (160 characters), a link to their “Gallery” (all the photos and videos they have uploaded to the site), the users “Mail” from other members (1,000 characters allowed!), number of posts, number of people following, and number of people they follow. There is also a “keyword search” box on the side bar. You may also link to your Facebook, Twitter and Google+ pages, as well as display your Geocaching.com stats banner, all of which are chosen under “settings” on the top banner, which is explained below in the next paragraph.

General Settings screen, click to enlarge and view in lightbox

The stationary blue top banner or frame (seen in either of the two screen shots posted) contains a “people or places” search box, as well as several links on the right hand side: My profile, Mentions, Messages, Settings and Log Out. Shown is the settings page, when you can upload your profile image, including the option of using the globally recognized user avatars provided by the website Gravatar.com. There are also some background image choices for your page, and boxes to add the links to the social media sites, as well as one to paste the URL for your Geocaching.com stats banner. Of course Opencaching North America itself doesn’t have a Geocaching.com stats banner. Which brings up a good point, although we are not, some Geocaching websites are commercial entities, and there are may other commercial entities who sell Geoaching goods and services. According to Paul, “Geocaching companies can also create accounts on CacheBlogger and use it to blog about their SWAG etc. and gain a following to their products and services.”

CacheBlogger.com couldn’t be easier to figure out, and if you’ve spent any amount of time on Twitter, there is almost no learning curve at all, you’ll be set up and running within minutes. We wondered how long CacheBlogger.com was in the works, seeing as it was released about nine months after it’s sister site, CacheFace.com. Paul replied “The idea for CacheBlogger came not long after I started developing CacheFace.com so I decided to press on with the development and launch of CacheFace first, and then concentrate on developing CacheBlogger. This way, each project got full attention. I wanted to give the global geocaching community a dedicated set of platforms to interact socially where they can share their adventures and love of caching with other geocachers.”

From a technical standpoint, Paul informed us that like CacheFace.com, CacheBlogger.com runs on a dedicated server, is secured by 256 bit SSL encryption, and was written by himself in PHP. Also, like CacheFace, you can “share the adventure while you are on the trail as CacheBlogger is fully mobile enabled”, said Paul. We at the blog can attest to the fact that the mobile versions of both CacheFace.com and CacheBlogger.com work flawlessly. Paul thought it very important to release them both with fully functional mobile sites. Of course Smartphone apps (iOS, Android and Windows Phone) are in the future for both websites as well, stay tuned.

As mentioned on the about CacheBlogger page the site is free, and always will be. That page, incidentally, is an excellent overview of all the features of the site, we couldn’t cover everything in this post. So give CacheBlogger a try! It’s only three weeks old, you can say you got in very early on something big! And if you haven’t already, consider joining it’s almost one year old sister site, CacheFace.com. Thanks to Paul for answering a few questions, and providing the CacheBlogger.com banner.

An interview with Stormgren-X on the 4.5lb Walleye Cache find

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The Find!

This is the third post we have done here on the OCNA blog covering the epic eight day Canoe trip (nine days to reach the final destination, the village of Fort Albany, Ontario), to find the world’s then oldest unfound Geocache, the elusive 4.5lb Walleye, placed by Jamie Matear way back on June 21st, 2001. This journey was undertaken by Chris Wereley, AKA Stormgren-X, of Sudbury, Ontario Canada, and his long time friend Gordon Morris, a non-Geocacher. This involved a 400 Km (250 Mile) paddle from Limestone Rapids, just North of The Constance Lake First Nations, and NW of Hearst, Ontario, to Fort Albany. The Rivers traveled on were The Kabinakagami, The Kenogami, and finally, The Albany, 1 Km (.6 Mile) wide in spots. The 4.5lb Walleye cache being along The Albany River, only 65 Km (40 Miles) shy of Fort Albany. This is one of the biggest stories in Geocaching in years, and was completed a month before this blog post, so we assume readers are at least somewhat familiar with the story. If you’d like to become very familiar with their trip, you can download Chris’ 29 page journal as a .pdf from wikisend.com, a file that is only available for 3 weeks from the date of this blog post. Chris has also let us host this 29 page .pdf on our server at https://www.opencaching.us/AlbanyRiver-4.5lbWalleye.pdf but your web browser and internet connection will pay the price!! We will eventually convert that to an HTML page. On with the interview!

OCNA Blog: What did you two eat during this 9 day trip? By the way, I had to Google what a Bannock was. Did you catch and eat any fish?
Chris: We brought and ate mainly dried and dehydrated foods.  Some instant meals that you just add hot water to, dried meats, instant mashed potatoes, dried fruits, nuts, trail-mix, bannock, granola, powdered milk, gatorade powder, cheese, crackers, chocolate, onion, garlic, tea.  The only liquids we brought were honey and a small bottle of after dinner drink to sip on.

We attempted to catch fish, but the water level made for poor fishing.  Even the First Nations people were not having much luck, and they also told us this was due to high water levels and the water being “dirty”.  This area usually has a great abundance of fish.

Kabinakagami in the rain

OCNA Blog: How about drinking water? Did you just boil water, or use purification tablets? The first river, the Kabinakagami, didn’t look very drinkable!
Chris: All the water was boiled using a Kelly Kettle, some of the water had sediment suspended in it, but it was a very fine sediment and it didn’t bother us.  The Kabinakagami river did have a lot of sediment in it, but after boiling was ok to drink.  We did try to filter it with a ceramic filter and pump, but the sediment was so fine that a lot of it went through the filter.  Boiling kills everything I suppose, and we didn’t have any side effects.

Tin Cabin near Mammamattawa

OCNA Blog: I was amazed by the amount of gear you two were carrying in the pictures from the tin cabin near Mammamattawa. Was the barrel for food only, or did you stow other gear in it, in case the unthinkable capsizing of the canoe happened?
Chris: The canoe was rated for about 700 lbs. of total weight, and we were well under the maximum.  The barrel was for food only, and the rest of the items were kept in dry bags and we kept all our electronic gear in a Pelican water proof case.  Getting gear and food wet in the event of rain or capsizing would pose a problem.

OCNA Blog: Did you encounter any mentionable rapids on this entire trip? From some of the videos posted, it looks as if the water was flowing fast enough that you could just float down these rivers.
Chris: We did encounter some minor fast water and rapids.  Nothing of the kind we are accustomed to in the rocky and hilly Canadian Shield.  The high water levels we encountered in the rivers also contributed to smoothing out the rapids as the rocks were well below the water surface.  There are a dozen or so rapids listed on this route, and are more challenging during mid-summer water levels.  Some of these rapids need to be lined during lower water levels to prevent canoe damage.

One could just ‘float’ down these or any rivers, but the trip time would be extended greatly.  At least once a year, the First Nations people build a raft and do just that.  Float along the river all day and night.  We heard a story about one guy who built a raft and placed a brand new truck on it to bring to Fort Albany and made it!  Out of the 8.5 days, we traveled for 7 days, making good time due to high water levels and stronger current.

OCNA Blog: I assume you were very happy with your Goal Zero solar battery charging device? (NOTE: The device can be seen in this video, and an iPod rocking The Doors can be heard).
Chris: The Goal Zero solar powered battery charger worked very well for us during the trip.  It kept all our devices charged and worked as advertised.  Of course it works best under full sun and we were able to take advantage of that during sunny days.  It charges the battery pack that can hold AA or AAA batteries, and then in turn, the battery pack will charge any device that can be charged via USB.  They do make quite a few different solar powered products.

Cemetery at Ghost River, Ontario, along the Albany River

OCNA Blog: As someone who was closely watching everything on the SPOT tracking device, I saw you stop for lunch short of Ghost River, and was wondering if you were actually going to stop there. But you did, and spent a few hours there. That had to be one of the most interesting stops during the trip. Do you have any idea who is maintaining the cemetery there, some 60+ miles against the current from Fort Albany?
Chris: Ghost River was one of the spots that we did want to stop at and explore a little.  We had read about the graveyard from a 1983 trip report and wanted to see if it was still there and also see if we could find remnants of buildings.  It was one of the highlights of the trip and we do not know who maintains it.  Someone still cares and respects these hardy pioneers from the past.  Apparently there are some old First Nations burial sites along these rivers as well.  We did see one other cross up on the river bank on the Kenogami river that we did not investigate as we were on the other side of the river when we spotted it. (NOTE: The 1983 trip report, a blog post, can be seen here).

OCNA Blog: The SPOT tracking device tells us you spent about 2.5 hours in the area of 4.5lb Walleye. How long did you spend actually looking for the cache? It sounds like it was pretty much “buried”. How deep under Moss would you say it was?
Chris: We didn’t measure the time we spent at GZ, but estimated a few hours once we set off again on the river.  We probably spent about 1.5 hours of actually searching for it.  I say at times we were “digging”, but at no time did we need a shovel or other digging instrument.  The container was placed under moss as per described on the cache page.  It was under perhaps four inches of moss.

OCNA Blog: I was surprised at how many other people you saw out on these rivers during the trip. I assume everyone is very friendly and helpful out there in the wilderness?
Chris: We were surprised as well to see so many people during the first part of the trip to Mammamattawa.  There were boats on the river and float planes coming in!  Just happened to be there when the First Nations peoples were having a gathering from the different communities.  After we set off again from Mammamattawa on day 4, we only saw one other boat heading upstream on the opposite bank until day 8.

All the people we met along the river were very friendly and helpful.  I found that once you approached them and showed some courtesy and respect, the same was given back.  After all, we were in their neck of the woods.

 

OCNA Blog: So you gave the canoe away in Fort Albany? No problem finding someone willing to take it off your hands?
Chris: The plan from the start was to leave the canoe as it was an older one with many fiberglass patches.  No problem giving it away, although we kept our paddles as a souvenir!  We also gave away our unused food and ammunition.  The cost of transporting the canoe was too great, and sometimes you need to wait until the cargo plane can take it, adding days to the trip.

OCNA Blog: Your longtime friend and trip partner Gordie has no desire to create an account at Geocaching.com, and log this cache?
Chris: Gordie has no desire to start a geocaching account or to log the find.  He just likes the adventure and the challenge of the great outdoors.  If I would have had another geocacher on the trip with me, I probably would have arrived in Fort Albany alone….  😉

Thanks very much to Chris for taking the time to answer our questions, we here at the blog really appreciate it. We know he’s been very busy with other such requests, and answering emails from all over the world. He has stated that after he finally logged on to the internet at the Lodge in Fort Albany, he was astounded by the interest in his trip in the Geocaching.com forums, and all the emails he had already received while on the water. He has also stated that he is most touched by people commenting that they were inspired by the trip, and want to challenge themselves, even if it is just a little bit more. We agree. Reading his 29 page journal, with all the excellent pictures, and links to 15 videos posted to YouTube, one can’t help but be inspired; what an amazing journey. Maybe one can even be inspired to take the same trip, after all, he did leave a Geocache at the Ghost River site!

$10 Travelfleas.com Gift Certificate winner announced!

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Sorry, our graphic artist wasn’t available. We have a winner in the $10 Travelfleas.com Gift Certificate contest!! Louis, AKA Nighthawk700, a Geocacher from Baltimore Maryland, was the lucky winner. His name was drawn last night, and he responded within an hour to claim the prize. We won’t disclose how many entries there were, but we hinted at it in the last blog post, and we can say dozens. The Google Doc storing the entries has been deleted as promised, along with all the entrants email addresses, which we would never use or share. Thanks to Travelfleas.com for providing the prize, thanks to all who entered, and congratulations once again to Nighthawk700. This was our first contest at the OCNA blog, hopefully the first of many, so stay tuned.