[Az-Geocaching] YAALWP! (Yet Again Another Long-Winded Post…

One of the issues I've been wrestling with as we approach The Meeting on
Friday is how the growth of Geocaching increases the probability of
things happening on cache hunts that I think we'd all agree are
undesirable. I'm talking about everything from trailblazing to failing
to properly re-hide a cache.

I think that many times these types of things happen not out of malice
but out of inexperience. I can think of many things that Judi and I did
or didn't do on our earlier cache hunts that still make me shudder with
embarrassment. One of the things one gains from experience is the
realization that you once goofed, but you're sure not going to goof that
way again in the future.

But more beginners means more goof potential. Here's a couple of stats I
just pulled of azgeocaching.com: There were 209 teams with one AZ cache
and no out of state finds. Besides those, there were 478 more teams with
5 or fewer AZ finds AND 5 or fewer Out-of-State finds (trying to
eliminate experienced cachers who find one or two while vacationing
here). Now, even if we assume that half of the finds in the second group
are locationless caches based in Arizona (Yellow Jeep Fever, Carousel,
etc.), that's still over 400 "Neocachers" that are or have been caching
in our state. As a point of comparison, I think when we started caching
about a year ago, finding your first cache automatically put you into
the top 300 in Arizona.

Unlike many of you, I can't even remember how we learned about
Geocaching. But how many of you can remember how (or when) you learned
about azgeocaching.com? (Brian and Jason excepted, of course.) Or the
list server?

I'll bet that the subscribers to this list server (counting the untold
numbers of you who read and don't post) have hidden somewhere between a
quarter and a half of all the caches in the state. Here's what I propose
(and it wouldn't surprise me if some of you are doing it already): Every
time you get a notification that someone's logged one of your caches,
check out the team name. If you don't recognize it, go to the log page
and check out their find count. If they're Neocachers (let's say five
finds or fewer), send 'em an email! Welcome them into the fold, thank
them for finding (or hunting) your cache, let them know about
azgeocaching.com, invite them to the listserv, and offer to help them
with any questions they have. If they wrote about anything in the log
that seems as though they were struggling, mention it to them and offer
to help them out with it. Send them your email address, so they don't
have to go back through geocaching.com. (If you want, check out their
other finds first, and email those cache owners to see if they've beaten
you to it, but it's probably better if they get two or three welcomes
than none.) In other words, become a Geomentor.

I'd love to have us able to tell the land managers on Friday that this
is one of the things we do to promote responsible Geocaching. Please let
me know what you think.

Steve
Team Tierra Buena