On Thu, 16 May 2002, Eric Quinn wrote:

> I think someone needs to go find caches that have a
> higher terrain difficulty than a 2.5 before saying how
> soon someone should be able to get to a cache site.

Ouch.  That's personal.

Not that I haven't tried, mind you.  I've tried to log a number of
high-terrain and high-difficulty caches.  Oddly enough, a lot of them tend
to not be there.  I wonder why.

Being as I don't own a 4WD, and I have medical problems that restricts my
ability to attempt some of the longer hikes, I don't have the liberty of
pursuing the most difficult ones.  If you'd like to remedy the situation
and take me offroading on cache finds, I'd appreciate it. 

But I have attempted.  Watch Your Step had really piqued my
interest.  However, I'm not going to risk life and limb to pursue a cache
that might not be there.  I had gone so far as to drive to the base of the
hill before I decided that it just wasn't worth it, especially when recent
reports show the cache as missing.

And on that note, I've pursued a few (Bloody Basin comes to mind) that did
push my abilities as an owner of a large sedan.

I could retaliate that somebody who hasn't become a Charter Member equally
has no right to complain.  But that wouldn't be fair, would it?


> You'll find that a large number of people believe that
> maintaining a cache involves checking to see if it's
> there occasionally and seeing if the finding is
> damaging the terrain.

Based on your reply, I'm going to assume that you disagree with this.

> I personally don't see an ammo box sitting in the
> desert for a few months between visits as littering
> any more than a utility box is.

Because what if the ammo box's contents somehow get liberated?  I've
encountered more than one cache who's contents had been raided (usually by
homeless, so this is largely an urban problem) that have been strewen
about.  But that's urban caches.

As far as ones in the middle of nowhere.. you see utility boxes in the
middle of nowhere?  I recently drove Apache Trail, and I don't recall even
seeing as much as a phone pole in some of the more remote parts.

If Nature didn't put it there, it's littering.  Justifying it by saying
"well, it's no worse than a utility box" is pretty pathetic.

Especially considering that usually utility boxes get visited once every
couple of weeks and are actively being monitored 24/7 by remote... I'll
bet you if something happened to that utility box, somebody would be there
within 24 hours.

-Fedl