[twitter]Geocaching is the world’s biggest game of hide and seek. More than 2 million caches have been hidden on this planet, just sitting their waiting to be found.
In our family, geocaching is used as a way to ‘gamify’ outdoor activities. A hike in the woods becomes a game of pirates following a map to find treasure. We have found caches near Gramma’s house, in the mountains, on vacations, and around our neighborhood. We have even hidden our own set of caches in some of our favorite playgrounds.
This week, we unlocked an achievement – after 3 years of geocaching, we uncovered our 100th find. My son’s favorite part about geocaching is trading the treasures. Think of the sort of things you’d normally leave in a birthday party loot bag, and that’s what people trade.
In our 100th geocache, we found perhaps the greatest tradeable of our career: a bona fide Thomas the Tank Engine vehicle. My son’s eyes lit up when he saw Cherry Picker sitting in the jar. He quickly grabbed it, dropped in a figurine to trade, and ran off to find his little brother to show off his haul.
On our hike in The Weaselhead at the west end of the Glenmore Reservoir, we watched the Elbow River thaw, we waded in snow past our knees, we stared at the deep blue sky, and we even saw the Easter Bunny’s tracks (okay, maybe they were from White-tailed Jackrabbits).
100 geocaches down, still 2 million to find.
If you’d like to learn more about geocaching, check out this how-to geocache article.