4 years strong

April 2nd was my four year geocaching anniversary. I didn't mark it in any special way, but it does offer a good time to reflect on what geocaching has meant to me over the years. When I started geocaching it was a good way to get out and hike and explore on my own (as opposed to climbing which required needing a partner) which made it perfect for my off-work Fridays and other random days that I would have time to do something on my own, but not always enough foresight to plan a trip with someone else. I pretty quickly got sucked into just finding a lot of caches though, especially those in the Organ Mountains. The Labors of Hercules series and TOH series were also instrumental in getting me hooked. The CO for both of those series was about my age, loved hiking and climbing and worked out at WSMR/TDRSS. I found a kindred spirit in this geocacher even though he had moved out of town before I even started caching. And anyone that tackles either of those geocaching series is bound to either abandon geocaching altogether, or become a big fan. I did the latter.

Now four years later, I am still geoacaching at a pretty steady rate. While I like to consider myself a hiker/adventurer geocacher, someone who does geocaching in order to get out and explore new areas, I will admit to being more of an opportunistic geocacher. I have found more than a fair share of urban caches, and strip-mall caches, because whenever I go somewhere, whether it be for running errands, or commuting, I find myself wanting to know if there are geocaches around, and then I want to find them. The one kind of geocaching that I have yet to really get into is high-numbers geocaching, whether it be power trails, or simply finding a ton of geocaches in one day. After 10 caches I've usually had my fill, and I rarely have found more than 20 caches in a day.

Over the years I've hidden quite a few geocaches as well. I currently have 48 caches under my name, and several more that I adopted out I still keep an eye on. And I have to say, I enjoy getting an email whenever someone finds one of my caches. Probably, this is because most of my caches are very rarely found, so when they do get found by someone I'm very interested in who they are and what their experience was like. I've gotten some great stories on my caches, and hope that will continue.

My family still puts up with my geocaching habits pretty well, they even take it into account whenever we are traveling somewhere. The kids love getting new toys, but could care less for micro caches these days.

None of this is really new. Geocaching has just become part of what I do. Kind of like rock climbing used to be for me. Will I still be playing this game in another four years? Guess we'll ahve to wait and see. For now I am about as happy as can be with the game, and am planning to go after some more great caches in the area, explore more parks in Tennessee, and hide more interesting caches for the locals.