I got a pathtag in the mail today from geocaching.com.au to commemorate my first 100 finds on the service. The service automatically sends out these path tags when milestones, like 100 finds, are logged.geocaching.com.au is one of many listing services around the world for geocaching. As you'd expect geocaching.com.au caters to Australia caches. Frequent readers of this blog may realize that I have not been outside North America in several years, and putting two and two together are wondering how I was able to make 100 finds on an Austrailian geocaching listing site.
The answer is locationless caches. These are caches that do not have a container, nor do they have specific coordinates. Most of them require a cacher to find an object in the world, and post a picture and coordinates to claim the find.
I came across the idea of logging caches on geocaching.com.au during a discussion on Google Plus about my recent encounters with StreetView Cameras (here and here). During the discussion the fact that a locationless cache deals with encounters with StreetView cars. I was intrigued so I logged the cache. While I did I noticed that there were hundreds of locationless caches on the site.
At the same time I had a bike accident so I was off my feet for a few days. I used that time to go through my archive of pictures and claimed locationless caches. After a couple days I ended up with 100 finds.From what I understand from discussions with Geocaching Australia, I am the first person overseas to be sent this pathtag, so it is a unique momento of my caching experiences. Someday I hope to cache in Australia for real, but for now this pathtag will have to do.
