Geocache Challenges

Challenges are one of the most interesting 'unofficial' aspects of geocaching. Basically Geocache Challenges are a simple traditional cache with coordinates, anyone can go and find the cache. Logging it is the tricky part. There are various rules that a CO (cache owner) can create for geocachers to be able to log the cache.

For example, I've already said that I am taking part in the Ontario Holiday Challenge. But there is a literally limitless amount of challenges! Endurance challenges encourage you to find a cache once a day for a month or even a year! Chart challenges make you fill out your Difficulty/Terrain Chart (or your Year Chart or month (finding a cache for each day of the year or month (sometimes including leap years! 2012 here I come...).

A Vancouver Island challenge where you have to find a cache in every box

Keep in mind that these can all be in specific locations too. There's DeLorme challenges where you must find a cache in every section of a map. Challenges where you have to find a cache in every county of a state. Caches where you have to find caches with names that start with each letter of the alphabet. 

Geocache Challenges are pretty much unlimited. You could have ones where you have to find a cache on every mountain in an area, or the 10 highest mountains in North America, one on every river, who knows? They're a fun and interesting part of geocaching and it's only a matter of time before they're made a bigger part of the game.

OpenCaching.com... Competition or Plan B?

There's been a lot of buzz surrounding OpenCaching.com, and rightly so. GPSr manufacturing juggernaut Garmin opening it's own geocaching website is huge. Garmin directly competing against GeoCaching.com seems almost like an attack on a site that has practically built geocaching (and sold a lot of Garmin products in the process).

And that's not going to go without controversy. Delorme and Magellan have both backed Geocaching.com Of course no one expected otherwise. But the question that needs to be answered: Why is Garmin doing this at all?

Market share is a part of it. But the real issue: Stability. Let's face it, car navigation systems are on the way out. Cell phones are quickly adapting to GPS and people don't want to buy a GPSr if they don't need it. So who is going to buy Garmin GPSrs? Geocachers, that's who.

Geocaching is unique in that there's really only one source, that being geocaching.com. Garmin knows that relying solely on geocaching.com is dangerous. Terracaching.com is closing and that took a lot of people by surprise. Anything could happen, Groundspeak could be breaking some tax law you and I have never heard of and be shut down. It could be hacked or have a DOS attack, who knows? This is the Internet and things happen. So what would Garmin do then? What would YOU do then?

If this were really about promoting Garmin products, why are other GPSrs allowed? In fact I don't see any mention of Garmin GPSr products on the site, even the "GPS Devices". People can go on all day about competition and how it advances things. But really the win here is that not only Garmin, but the Geocaching community as a whole has a back-up to geocaching.com. Opencaching.com might just keep our community alive and, at least for now, sleep a little better at night.