Never Lose Hope – The Return of Missing Trackables
I just received a pretty amazing log on a geocoin that has been missing 4.5 years.
Context: Some of you may remember back when the ACGA commissioned a geocoin design (a souwester), where you could order a number of coins with your name personalized on them. I ordered three; I kept one and sent the other two out into the world. Both went missing.
forestfauna’s other itsy-bitsy, teeny-tiny, go anywhere, Atlantic Canada Souwester Geocoin did pretty good for itself after release on August 29, 2009. It ended up travelling through the States before ending up in a cache in Tennessee, at which point it went missing. The last official “discovered it” log was on April 4, 2011; after a few more logs indicating the coin was not where it was supposed to be, I set the geocoin as “missing” on September 17, 2012.
Today, September 27th, I received this amazing log:
“I am delighted to have possession of this TB! Apparently a cacher discovered a stash of TBs they had and placed them all in a cache I was fortunate enough to happen upon afterward. Since I really enjoy moving TBs, this is a special privilege to be putting some bugs that have been out of circulation for four years back into play! forestfauna, I know you are delighted that your cute little geocoin has been resurrected! I will place it in a higher difficulty or premium cache in the hopes of giving it a better chance to stay in circulation.”
I’ve learned over time not to get attached to TBs and coins that I send out. Only one out of eight of my TBs/geocoins that I have sent out is still in circulation. Some people forget they have the trackable; some pick it up at their first ever event and never truly geocache again; some people leave the sport; and unfortunately, some people are thieves.
Quite honestly, I was stoked to hear that this coin was found, and will once again be travelling to caches worldwide. I almost feel like a kid at Christmas.
So don’t lose hope that one of your trackables might someday rise from the proverbial ashes.
Anyone else have any good stories of trackables returning from the dead?
I once received a trackable from a muggle who knew I was a geocacher. Her Son was given a lesson in geocaching at an elementary school. After class the boys returned to the cache and needless to say the cache was archived shortly afterwards. Somehow the Mother researched the trackable that was missing for years and knew I could return it back into play.