Trivial Opinions

A couple of months ago, I went to get a cache (a D1/T1) and signed what I thought was the log. The CO deleted my find, telling me that I only found the swag container, not the actual cache itself. It almost killed my streak (that I’m not officially keeping, but whatever), but I had a bunch of challenges sitting around so I used one of them in its place. A couple of days ago, I went to get a cache (as I am wont to do), and decided to go back and vindicate my ignominious defeat. The cache was cute, a bison with butterfly wings, magnetically attached to the underside of a rock, attached to a key for the swag box (which was now missing from its previous resting place, no doubt stolen by some ruffian or mendicant). Cute as it was, it annoyed me to no end. Why? Maybe it’s just me, but I believe that a D1 cache should be so simple that not only is it obvious to a cacher, but it should be almost obvious to a muggle as well. I think if the CO makes any attempt to hide it, it shouldn’t be a D1. We all know LPCs, and they’re incredibly obvious to us because we’ve seen a ton of them. We are all, aside from the very newest cachers, familiar with the hide type. But such a hide should still be a D1.5. An attempt was made to obfuscate it. Putting some kind of camo on it, even if it is so garish as to make it stand out, is still making an attempt to obfuscate it, making it a D1.5. Hiding it under a rock? Definitely a D1.5. I’d say this one should have been a D2, because the hide was counterintuitive enough that it could have taken a few more minutes to figure it out. I only found it so quickly this time because the hint made a lot more sense once I knew where the cache wasn’t. But my first time through, I saw an obvious container at the GZ of a D1 cache. I think I can be forgiven for looking in the wrong but completely logical place. The pad inside resembling a log didn’t help things, either.

Yesterday, I found a true D1 cache. It was literally out in the open, placed behind a rock, but not in such a way as to obscure the container to anyone standing at GZ (its coordinates were thirty feet off, but that’s a completely different kettle of fish altogether). There was no search. The cache was obvious. That’s a D1, alright. Yes, I know that rating guidelines state that a D1 should be “easy to find or solve within a few minutes,” but still! I am the most correct and ’twas ever thus!*

_{*I mean no disrespect to our Groundspeak overlords, and I grovel at their all-knowing feet!}