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View Full Version : March 2016 Geocacher Profile



MathSeeker
03-01-2016, 07:54 PM
The Membership Relations Committee is happy to showcase some ArkGeo Geocachers through the "Geocacher Profile". The committee thought Charles & Kay Shearer aka Zeke & George should be the next cachers to be in the spotlight.

What is your geocaching name?
Zeke & George

How did you choose your handle?
Kay replaced George when he retired. I dealt with the original George through my work. I did not change the address book and just kept calling and asking for "George." After all it would not seem right to be calling my wife while at work. And yes, she had a private office and was the only one to ever answer her phone. I found out her co-workers were calling her "the New George" whenever someone would come in and ask to see George. Then she started asking for Zeke when she called me on business. When we signed up with Geocaching we decided to use those as our names. We laughed that people would think that we were a gay couple. We laughed even harder when at an event in Paris a couple years later a young lady was shocked to learn we were a straight married couple.

How long have you been geocaching?
We found our first 3 caches on 1/19/2003. They were 3 of the 4 located on Hot Springs National Park at that time.

How did you find your first Geocache, and which one was it?
George read about Geocaching in the newspaper. She called a friend that had a GPS and told her we were going to go find a geocache in the Gorge and we wanted to know if she could go with us? If she couldn’t, could we just use her GPS anyway without her?” Mary, Trekkin Arkie's twin sister, was a good friend and of course she rushed over and played our silly game. The first cache was GoatDB located on the slope above Goat Rock. The next Saturday, while I was working in the shop, George informed me that there was a travel bug, named “Drib,” in the same cache and if I wanted to go with her to get it, I better get to the house quickly. And that is how our addiction started.

Who usually goes with you when you go caching?
The last couple of years we have gone caching a lot with the Likestocanoe Gang. Prior to that it was mainly family and muggle friends.

How long will you work on puzzle caches before you give up?
Zeke - Not Long! George - depends on the puzzle difficulty.

What town/areas have you most enjoyed caching in?
Retirement has allowed us the freedom to travel extensively with our RV. Geocaching and meeting cachers is fun everywhere.

Do you do paperless caching?
Absolutely! No longer have to print reams of paper before going somewhere.

What kind of geocaching rig do you use?
Delorme PN-60 and our I-Phones. Sometimes we record logs on the GPS to download to the computer. Sometimes we send the log immediately using the phone app. Recently Cell coverage has dictated which way we post logs.

Why would you recommend anyone else to take up geocaching?
Searching for caches takes you places no tour book would take you. Geocachers guide you to places that are important to them and give you history or a personal story about the location. That is what we like most, as we are not overly concerned about the numbers.

Where are you originally from?
George moved to Hot Springs with her parents from the Chicago area during her junior year of high school. Zeke has always lived in the South and moved here from Dallas in 1990.

In what states have you geocached?
Every state, the District of Columbia, 4 Canadian Providences, China, Costa Rica, France, and Turkey.

What was your first event ever attended?
Arkansas Meet Alabama! on 3/18/06 at Petit Jean State Park

How many caches have you found?
5346 effective 3/1/16

Which type of cache container do you prefer over the rest?
Big enough to have toys for the kids.

What was the most famous cache that you have found?
Mingo! The oldest cache in the world.

Do you use disposable batteries or rechargeable batteries?
rechargeable

Do you enjoy hiding or finding more as your part of the hobby?
George says hiding and Zeke says finding.

Do you have a personal goal in mind when you make a hide?
We like to take people some place special or have a Geocache that's so special for some reason that it makes the finding of it good, even in spite of a not so good location. No, we do not have the goal to only make hard to find caches.

What is your favorite type of cache hide?
Something that is made by the cache owner.

Out of all your hides, what are your personal favorites that you take pride in?Transportation Plaza & Lake Overlook. And yes, those were meant to be hard finds.

What do you think the proper hide to find ratio should be to keep the sport fresh?
Hmmmmm.....we’d have to get into a lengthy discussion to figure out what that answer might be! That discussion would take us days and days!

How did you end up getting into this wacky hobby?
See the answer to the fourth question.

What's your favorite geocache?
A favorite favorite??? We haven’t found it, yet!

If money was no object, where would you like to go geocaching?
New Zealand and Australia are at the top of our dream list. We will make it someday.

Do you like geocaching by yourself or in a group?
Zeke has done it by himself. George almost never goes by herself. It is definitely more fun with someone. We almost always do it together and will take friends and relatives if possible. It's lots of fun to take kids.

How many First to Finds do you have?
No idea. Not many!

Are you a First to Find person who is always set on go and if so, how many miles out do you have your settings on to get notifications?
Just not us. We do get notices for out to 15 miles, but very seldom rush out just to be FTF. We are retired and just do not seem to have time to drop everything to make a mad dash somewhere.

Do you have any other hobbies besides geocaching?
Kay is an active member of Master Gardeners, and has gardens with around 450 different varieties of daylilies and almost that many varieties of daffodils. We camp in our travel trailer monthly from March through November when we are home. However, we also take extended trips exploring our wonderful country, leaving a breadcrumb trail of smilies as we go.