Another Fun New Puzzle

 Local hider Serenity Now is known by many.  They have been caching since 2002 and have over 38,000 finds.  They have also placed a number of puzzling puzzle caches over the years.  Their latest, A George By Any Other Name, is a mix of crossword puzzle and face recognition.

Puzzle solvers first need to identify a number of famous Georges...

After identifying the George's the fun begins with filling in a crossword puzzle.

The puzzle fun can be found here at GC9ME7B.  Enjoy.

Geocaching in Ohio State Parks and Forests

Strouds Run State Park

Ohio State Parks has made changes to the state parks' geocaching policy.  It no longer permits placement of premium-member only caches with the following statement...

"Caches shall only be permitted if available to the public without a fee. Caches advertised only to a fee-based membership group will not be permitted."

                                       Barkcamp State Park

Hiders in Ohio State Forests are still required to obtain a special use permit for hide in state forests.

"Special events and activities held on a state forest often require a waiver of specific rules.  The chief of the division has to approve these activities.  Filling out and sending in this permit begins the process.

Examples of when to use this permit:

• Placing a geocache."

The site has no mention of geocaching in State Nature Preserves where geocaching has been typically off-limits in Ohio since the start of geocaching although there have been permission exceptions granted in a few Nature Preserves over the years.

Ohio State Parks offers great opportunities for hiding and finding caches.

Nelson Ledges

Printed Containers

 We've seen a couple printed containers.  We recently found a trail of them.  All we have seen seem well designed and appear to have a chance at remaining waterproof.  It would be interesting to know how much one of these cost.  I spotted one printed owl cache container at Cacher's Corner Store.

2020's Images from Geocaching

January: Cleveland Metroparks South Chagrin

February: Fakahatchee Swamp

March: Lakeview Cemetery

April: Garrettsville

May: East Harbor State Park

June: Bendigo State Park

July: Quehanna Wildlife Area

August: Mentor Lagoons

September: Garrett State Forest

October: The Wilderness Center

November: Dunham Siding

December: Ashtabula

How Did You Spend Your Halloween?

 

All Aboard Knox County's C.A.&C. Geotrail

We visited Knox County in 2019 to find the park caches in their first geotrail. This year, we were back in the county visiting a super bike trail located on the path of the old C.A.& C (Cleveland, Akron, and Columbus) Railroad. We started our journey in Centerburg and employed a minion to hail our train.

There were enough interesting sights to keep our nature nerd side happy.

Buckeyes are less common in northeast Ohio.  The streamside trees were bearing fruit.

The Mount Vernon depot is a nicely preserved example of an old small town station.  It appeared to be closed from COVID.  If not, I would have stepped inside to see the remaining railway artifacts.

We made a detour from the Knox Trail to visit the Brown Family Environmental Center for a walk in the wildflower fields and the pine plantation.

I enjoyed this old twin trestle on the journey.

2020 is the 80th anniversary of this Alco's build.

Ali says come down, we'll finish the trail tomorrow.

With only a pair of caches left in the series we started our day in Westerville completing the Adventure Lab.  We made the cache near the Bridge of Dreams covered bridge our last in the series.  We enjoyed the bridge, but this stop concerned me most of the journey.  The bridge area was crowded with little mask usage.  We wore ours, but still felt at risk.

As a reward for completing the trail we were sent a coin.  It is a really attractive design and a nice memento of a fun journey.  This is the second Knox County geotrail we have completed.  Both were well done and very enjoyable.

Like last year's coin, this one is not trackable.  We have used a new trackable code to make the coin trackable.  It can be found here if you wish to discover.

Charlie... RIP

The cacher Charlie, or Charles Reno passed recently.    He placed clever, challenging caches.  I only had the pleasure of meeting Charlie once at an event.  He was a pleasant, engaging person.  He loved talking about caching.

Charlie started geocaching about a year before we did.  I was impressed that he was one of the early cachers to make the journey of finding caches in all the states.  He finished all 50 states and the Ohio 88 county challenge in 2007 at a time when caches were much less plentiful.

source: Geocaching.com

Rest in Peace Charlie

Ohio Caches By County

 Someone posted this to a social media site recently.  I stay away from most active social media as a rule, but this was interesting.  The counties I have 100% coverage are highlighted.  There are a few others where I have small portions.  I guess I stay busy as a reviewer. 😉  In July, I reached thirteen years of reviewing.

Years ago I helped Cleveland Metroparks craft their current geocaching policy.  When we started caching, Cleveland Metroparks would place a few hides and issue at most one permit per park for geocachers to place hides.   All permits expired in a year leaving a practical reality of about 10-12 hides in CMP parks per year.  Since the new policy, geocaching has grown to where there are now almost 500 hides in the parks.  Not all of those hides are in Cuyahoga County as some CMP holdings are ouside the county, but that still means the caches placed in CMP parks in Cuyahoga County are a significant part of the reason why Cuyahoga is #1 in Ohio counties for active caches.  That makes me happy!

Imagine how many more could be in the area if Summit Metroparks would get past their outdated belief that that leaving a cache in a park is the equivalent of leaving trash.  Summit's justification of As the saying goes, "Take only photographs, leave only footprints." makes no sense in a park system that allows archery, builds baseball and basketball courts, soccer fields.  Its fake tree hugging.  In Cleveland Metroparks far more damage is done to the parks' nature by runners creating their own trails to suit their desires.

So You Want to Host a Geocaching Event...

Part of the joy of geocaching is meeting with friends who also geocache.  In times of COVID that means risk.  A team at Georgia Tech as put together a tool to help people determine just how great that risk can be.  Since we primarily live in northeast Ohio and fifty people attend the event, the risk that one attendee will be COVID positive is...

67% in Cuyahoga County.

37% in Lake County

35% in Summit County

34% in Lorain County

31% in Medina County

25% in Portage County

25% in Stark County

23% in Geauga County

That's great!  Look at how much safer an event in Geauga County is than one in Cuyahoga County...  maybe.  Remember, geocaching events are open to everyone so an event in any county will most likely be blended with all those counties by the attendees.  It might even have an attendee from Huron County where the risk of a COVID-positive attendee would be 56%.  Maybe one of the attendees recently visited the Lake Erie Islands for some summer fun.  The risk in Ottawa County is 68%.

Now, just think if your event were being held in Kentucky...  and maybe 500 people were expected to attend.  The entire area around Daviees County shows a 99% risk that at least 1 attendee will be COVID-positive.

Actually, when the map zooms out a good portion of the eastern US shows a gathering of 500 people would virtually be assured of at least 1 attendee who is COVID-positive.

It makes one wonder how big an ego one must have to try pushing an event to a mega in the time of a pandemic...

I am saddened to see so little regard not just for the geocachers attending, but for their families who will be put at risk, the exhausted medical community that might be needed to find even more to offer to serve geocachers who might become sick.

This year's play appears to be a part of a ploy to get the next GeoWoodstock.

Geocaching at Kent State

If you are planning a visit to Kent State to geocache, you will need a mask for the visit.  The university now wisely requires facial coverings while on campus.  Be responsible!  Wear a mask!

Give Brain Plaza a visit while you are there.

Ohio Geocaching Events Continue to be Restricted Under State Orders

Governor DeWine citing increased positive tests for COVID-19 and R values greater than 1 for significant areas of the state announced the current ban on mass gatherings would continue indefinitely with no date of expiration on the state order.  The R-value indicates the average number of people who will be infected by a COVID-positive carrier.  At an R-value greater than 1 every positive person will on average infect more than one person with whom they are in exposed contact.

As of the 4th of July, Ohio's R value was 1.15 which ranked Ohio as the 18th worst state in the country for COVID spread.  As of the the 4th only 11 states had R values lower than 1 contributing to increased illnesses and greater near-capacity hospital usage.

(Source: rt.live)

As Geocachers we can help by wearing a mask to protect others, maintaining social distancing of at least six feet, not traveling to geocaches in the same vehicles as other cachers with whom we don't live, and reducing the number of group selfies that seem such an important part of finding a geocache.

(Source: rt.live)

Events in Ohio will continue to remain unpublished.

NE Ohio continues ot offer great places to cache socially distanced.  We visited Girdled Road recently to find a puzzle cache in a series.

Stay Safe.