Warning! Newby speaking. (Sort of: 6 months caching, 199 found)

I can see that for some of you who have been around a while and/or have high numbers of caches, the lame urban "been there, done that" caches could get to be a nuisance. Seeking mo'bettah, mo'interestin', mo'challengin' caches is normal. But, I have to tell you, I learned to do this sport--hobby--activity turned obsession-- on those easy urban hides. We had a GPS for two years before we started caching and had used it only to keep from getting lost on long Colorado trails. To actually use it to find a set of coordinates which lead to a light pole in a parking lot was a new experience. I can still remember shaking my head in disbelief the first time we drove all the way across town to look under a mail box and find an altoids container! I was thrilled! Same for light pole caches! Two weeks ago we took one of our friend's who was here visiting from Wisconsin, to a nearby convenience store which happened to have a cache. She had never heard of geocaching and had never seen a cache of any kind. When we nabbed the quick find, she was in awe. Talked about it for days: "Where else can we go? Where else are they hidden?  Is there one there?  Or there?"  Sooo, I think the lame ones have their place. Sure no one wants it to get out of hand, but I am not sure what criteria would be used to determine what is enough,you know? If we had tried to find one of graldich's evil canal mini-micros first time out with our friend, she would have thought we were nuts. Why would anyone in their right mind put themselves through that on a regular basis? :-)

Personally, I love the big ammo cans in the mountain hides, but let's face it, I can't hike enough everyday to feed this addiction. We consider ourselves to be "serious cachers" (it has taken over our lives in fact) but maybe we are still just learning and not ready for the big leagues.  We still love to find them all: easy, hard, creative, no brainers, it doesn't matter.  Once we reach # 500 we will rethink!