How's this for "Lost & Found?"

[captaincooder]

Quoteman has a puzzle cache in Russellville by the name "Presidential Trivia" GC17RM0. I posted a DNF on 6/30/08 and again a week later. The cache was found by mtnbikermark later in July, then a month later by Saddlebags. Captain Atom DNF'd it about 6 weeks later, followed by another DNF by specialteacher at the end of the year. I tried again 3.5 months later, and still couldn't find it. At this point, quoteman gave me permission to replace the container. Going on a theory that caches are sometimes too-well camouflaged, I performed an experiment, in which I placed a new container that was bright blue with a white top, attached to a silver hook with fluorescent green tape! Surely the cache would be easily spotted by cache hunters, and yet muggles would have no reason to even lay eyes on the general area. I'm happy to report that there has not been one single DNF since I replaced the cache. But hold on a minute. Several weeks ago, I went to check on the status of the logsheet, and admire the names on the list...except mine was the only one! What on earth? Had the other container appeared again? I looked for a fourth time, still not finding anything obvious. I removed the cache container that I had placed. A short time later, while scouting the real (yet unknown to me) GZ for new cache placement, ORR spied my truck and pulled over, curious if I was looking for the cache. What cache?! AHA!! Now it's all making sense. I had been looking in the opposite corner of the field, over close to the house. Imagine my discomfort while looking over there! Chuck Walla confirmed that another cache I placed was too close to the final location of Presidential Trivia, so I knew I was getting dangerously close. With fresh eyes, I solved the puzzle again, this time coming up with the right answer. A short search later revealed a bright blue bison tube. Ahh... sweet... embarrassing.... redemption. I will leave the find as 3/18/09, rather than 3/5/11, as I was given permission by the CO for all of my effort. Plus, it's just too much trouble to rearrange my milestones. I'm extra really glad to cross that one off my list!

Has anyone else posted a find on a cache only to find out later you actually had not signed the log?

[GeoJeepers]

Well, sort of I guess. During the first ArkGeo Trail Maint CITO, we took a side line to find the cache at Keefe Falls. There was a cache there that had gone MIA back in the day and a new container placed. There were cachers with us that had found it previously, and as we were signing the log, IRBH, I think it was, realized we had actually found the original.

[captaincooder]

How about lost and found GPS receivers? I recently left one of mine at a Turtle&Hawg cache, propped on a post at a pharmacy drive-through! I had remembered placing it there so it would settle down, then smooth walked off and left it. The next day, Turtle fabricated a fun little personal cemetery multi-cache where the prize was my lost receiver. There was even a projection included! Meanwhile, CW published a new cache just minutes away. The thought crossed my mind to leave and come back, knowing that T&H was probably all over the new cache, but I didn't want to leave my GPSr. I felt that T&H deserved a few minutes head start for helping me reconnect with my DeLorme. When I got to GZ, the cache still had not been found. T&H were there, as well as CateyeTech, and Special Teacher showed up a minute later to make it a Quad co-FTF party. Special Teacher had the better story, however. She had misplaced her GPSr, and the honest muggle that found it located her via the CateyeTech pathtag she had attached to the lanyard! The muggle contacted pathtags.com, which put him in contact with CET. Now that's a story.

[Night_Hiker]

That is awesome and it's nice to see honest people out there. Only have forgotten mine once and had to walk back down a trail alone at dark and it was not fun haha

[rklmbl]

We found a GPS in a cemetery in Dallas one day some years ago. We took it with us and when we got home watched to see who logged the cache that day or the day before. Then we wrote and asked them if they had lost anything. The wrote back and described the GPS in much detail and we mailed it to them in Florida. It was another geoadventure for us that still brings smiles even today when your arkgeo thread made us think about it. Sometimes, just helping others gives you more smilies than finding geocaches. Wonder if gc.com could find a way to quantify the good deeds geocachers do for each other and those around them. ;)

[captaincooder]

That's a great story, rklmbl. Like NightHiker said, it's great to see honesty once in a while.

[captaincooder]

Had a cache container of mine that I lost turn up in the hands of a non-geocacher. It was a double dry box tied on to a metal bar in a concrete culvert in a creek for my cache "Upstream." Very shortly after placement it was washed away in a downpour, so I placed a new container--a double dry box within an ammo can, chained to the culvert! Well, just a few weeks ago, I got an e-mail from a fellow that lives downstream who had found the box while hunting along the creek. He was able to track me down via GC.com from the information that I had left in the cache. Cool.

[DaTexanBoy]

That's pretty sweet. Who knows, you may have started a new geocacher!

[thefab5willisclan]

Mathseeker had replaced a container in Jacksonville and we found the old one, we knew it was the old one because of the logs, but we never could find the new one that she had just put out.

[Coon&Bud]

Yes I have signed the wrong cache container...the one at that cemetery by Centerville. You remember! I thought it had slipped down in tree or was lost. You found the REAL container, which think was Astrodaves and my replacement cache...and placed it on some lake puzzle in South Arkansas...too funny! I have to admit that was a good one. Coon&Bud

[OldRiverRunner]

I used to have a cache along Hwy 7 in northern Pope Co. called "A Different Point of View" (GCQ1P8 (http://coord.info/GCQ1P8)), which I eventually had to archive due to it being muggled several times. On one occasion, "CacheMates" (http://www.geocaching.com/profile/?guid=3d65d1e3-c919-4b51-aa56-a8fcfe448bea) stopped to check on it on their way to Branson around Christmas time and posted a note that it was probably missing (they had found it previously, so they knew where to look). So I paid the cache site a visit a few days later, all prepared to replace it. Here's the log about what I found (dated 12/29/06):


I went by to check on this cache today, with a replacement all set to go. When I checked the hiding spot, the cache was there! Well, maybe not exactly where I had hid it, but within about 4 feet. It was a little difficult to spot and I figured that "cachemates" had just missed seeing it. I pulled the cache to check the contents and so some restocking (badly needed!) and then I read a few of the recent log entries. Well, it looks like the cache WAS missing when "cachemates" went by! Apparently, a muggle family found the cache by accident and didn't know what it was. So they took it with them to Branson, where it spent Christmas! At some point, they figured out what it was and then replaced it on their return trip back through the area. What a hoot!