The proliferation of the powertrail
Have you ever done a powertrail? Whether you have or haven’t, I noticed something this morning which has me curious as to what other folks think.
Months ago, Groundspeak removed the “powertrail” verbiage on the listing guidelines. In doing so, it now allowed for individuals to hide a large amount of caches all in a single row. Previous to this, the reviewer had the option of denying a listing even if it met the distance guidelines. I know several cachers who experienced this first hand during the initial creation of the Dobson trail series.
A suggestion has been posed to Groundspeak to reinstate the anti-powertrail guidelines, and Jeremy Irish (GSP CEO) himself has commented on the suggestion by saying “I’m updating the status as “under consideration” since this is becoming an epidemic of poorly placed hides. The original intent of geocaching is to bring people to new places, not to a lamp post a tenth of a mile from another lamp post.”
It has spawned a very large group of responses both for and against powertrails. It seems that GSP opened a can of worms when they removed the powertrail guideline and things like the ET Highway have popped up and many more trails have appeared.
For the uninitiated, a powertrail is basically a big long line of caches hidden as close together as possible, and used primarily for cachers to up their numbers quickly. The ET Highway series for example is 1000 micros along an old highway in Nevada. There’s also the Tribute series in Maine which many folks from NB have done. There was also a short lived trail in Nevada called the Trail of the Gods (which has since been archived and should not be confused with Viking’s trail here in NB).
What’s your take on power trails? Should they be allowed? Should they be restricted to hike only trails? Have you done powertrails and if so did you like them? Do you think they promote the “all about the numbers” game?
hmmm touchy subject I’ve done a portion of the vikings trail of the gods and while it was cool getting out doing 61 caches in a day it’s also very tiring and somewhat boring. I’m a numbers guy but even to that extent I’m not a big fan.
I am torn on this issue. I have done a few portions of the Dobson trail, and absolutely loved it. the trail is beautiful, and I enjoyed grabbing the caches all along the way. The same goes for other similar hiking trails, such as in the Hopewell area. I have done other powertrails though, that i didnt enjoy nearly as much. Powertrails that you do by car, like the one in Maine, and i assume, that one in Nevada, kinda take the fun out of it for me. Dont get me wrong, if the caches are there, i will go find them! I just dont think i would be too upset, if these park and grab powertrails were disallowed.
I think that all walking trails should be filled to the max and the roads should be about 500m apart depending on the road.
There is actually one word that pops up in my head when I think about powertrails: BORING!
Now, boring for me because I, I mean WE are so not into power caching. I’ve said it many times before; finding 20 caches in a day is even way too much for my liking and makes me lose interest. But some others just love doing 50, 100, 500 in a day or so and that is fine.
The thing we love the most about geocaching, the one at the very very top of our list, is when we have that feeling of “Wow, cool, no way we would have stopped here or been here if not because of geocaching.” This is why we geocache in the first place, this is why I try to get at least one of those Wow moments each 50th milestone, at least. Doesn’t have to be a 20km hike, it can be a little P&G where there is a nice stream nearby, but it’s something nice. Is there a need for 50 caches along the same little stream?
It ALL depends on everybody’s liking. Some will not hike 30km for just one cache at the very end. Some will. I remember hiking Turtle Mountain (maybe 16 or 18km in total if I am correct). There were 3 caches on the trail and just one close to the top. PERFECT if you ask me. Just enough. More than that would be just repetitious. How would have we liked it if there would have been 10 caches along the way, 25, 50, one each 100m? More than a couple of caches on the same trail gets pretty boring to us. My preference would be that on a specific hiking trail, not more than one cache each km could be nice, I would say even way less. Different in a park like say Mapleton or something, where it’s nice to have a bit more caches. But see, this is sooooo just a personal preference.
We love quality over quantity. Quality either in the location, the meaning, the hide, it can be in a whole lot of ways, but QUALITY.
If Groundspeak starts to disallow powertrails I cannot hide that I would have a little grin on my face. I like to see a lot of new caches popping up out there and it’s nice to see that geocaching is more and more popular. But I just hope that there will never be a day where there will be 50 caches hidden between us and the lady down the street, as that day we will have to store the GPS in the closet: BORING!
Powertrails are both good and bad and it depends on how you look at it.
I see Nemo’s point in that in can get a little bit boring, but I also think it makes a difference on who you cache with. Whenever I have gone on big raids, it’s been with a decent group of fellow cachers, and really, the caching has been secondary to the “hanging out” time with the guys. The caching was just a bonus. To me, power trails offer that kind of time if done right.
Put like that, I guess you are right as well. You know, everything considered, if it comes down to the point where there is 50 caches between our house and the lady down the street, I’ll give you a call, and we’ll go caching together. Just don’t tell Didi about the lady (I just got another one of those big slaps in the back of my head!).
😈
I’m curious to know how power trails or maybe rather a string of caches affects ones willingness to go for a great cache. This might be more of a poll question or maybe a study would be needed to get the answer… However, it seems to me that if you place that awesome cache with that great something to see very few will search for it if it is off the beaten path. Now my first thought is this is because of the numbers and everything along them lines but I think there is at least one other thing we forget about. This would be that even though we have the latest navigational tools we all still suck at navigating our way in and to unfamiliar locations. I really believe most people don’t know where to start or how to get there so they don’t bother. Now when you place a number of caches showing the way it takes the intimidation away and as an added bonus you get lots of similes…lol
that’s a good point there was a nice hiking trail in Fredericton that a cache was placed at the end practically nobody went out to get it then two more caches were placed one at the trail head and the other half way out and all of a sudden everybody was heading out. i think the saying “if you make it a series they will come” is very applicable some times. of course if there isn’t a goal at the end and it’s just a string of caches this rule doesn’t apply at all.
The social aspect of the power trail is also a point to consider there was a huge organized hike for 20 caches this winter and and the time i did part of the viking trail i did it with two others. even my power caching run in northern NB this summer i went out with a local cacher i wouldn’t have met if it wasn’t for the cache run.
so really there are benefits to a power trail but at the same time we could probably do without.
I think its all in the eye of the beholder, some days I head out to cache for numbers and powertrails are great, if you are looking for a great adventure you do not want to hit up a powertrail. I do not believe that GroundSpeak should ban them, its all part of the game, and if you dont like them dont do them, but dont limit other peoples ability to play the game. Its very much like TV if you dont like what your watching change the channel.
I did the power trail in Maine in two sections.
One with Markirene and Ron568 and the rest with incepit.
Other than the great company I had on the hunt, they were the most boring
caches I ever done. All hidden in the same way, we didn’t have to shut the car off as the caches were about 15 meters from the road.
I also did Hillbilly Bob’s Powertrail on the Dobson Tail and Islander’s Puzzle Street Series. They were great.
The Dobson trail was a nice hike and nicely hidden caches and Puzzle Street as they were also a hike or bicycle ride and I loved solving the puzzles.
I quess I’m not a power trail fan but if there is a bike or hike
involved with them, I like them a lot more.
Right now I’m working on Falach-fead Puzzles caches which are on a rails to trail in NS ( about 28 puzzles. )
We could force our town councils to place all new lampposts a tenth of a mile a part…
Here is my view of the history of the powertrails. Because it is only my view, it may not be accurate.
Long long ago, Cacher A would put out a cache that required a 3 km hike. Some time later Cacher F on his way to the cache would put 1 or 2 two new caches on the route to the cache. There would sometimes be negative comments from other cachers who said that Cacher F was a bit lazy and could have found another area for caches; they also didnt appreciate having to do another long hike on the same trail. Cacher F, on the other hand, would say that having more caches on the trail will encourage more people to discover the area and will also help guide cachers along the trail.
Over time a few more caches would get placed in the empty spaces and you could have maybe 7 caches or 1 every 500 to 600 meters on the trail. As the sport grew and more people joined, you had different attitudes about the activity. People liked to go out and hide a string of caches for their friends and their friends loved to go out and find a bunch of caches in one outing. Caches could be placed within 167 meters of each other so the new caches were often placed that distance from each other. Those knds of trails became known as “powertrails”.
When I first heard that term, I thought of trails such as multi use trails, hiking trails, bike trails, footpaths etc, not of roads. Even for a hiking trail, I thought that 167 meters was too close. As one cacher once said: You no sooner finish making your notes about one find, when you have arrived at the next one. For that reason, the minimum distance between caches on a trail was increased to 320 meters in our area.
I dont mind a lot of caches on a trail while I hike, but I also want to hike. For example, I recall that the hike aong the multi use trail in the Port Elgin to Sackville area was a good hiking challenge with a large number of caches spaced out at least 300 to 500 meters apart. It was a good series to do with a vehicle parked at both ends. It should be noted that some cachers actually drove their car on the trail to do the caches.
We had done a lot of caching on trails in Quebec and the distance bewteen caches was usually more than 400 m, even before the powertrail decision. This was likely because they expected most cachers to be on their bikes and a shorter distance would just be a hassle. When our friend Valpin from Gatineau, does these caches on his bike, he stops at every second cache and then turns around and does the others as he returns to his vehicle. The first few times that we did the bike trail caches in the Victoriaville area and Rivieredu Loup, we did them on foot. It made for long walks for few caches, and then we had to walk back to the car. But we enjoyed it.
The introduction of the 320 m rule caused a bit of a problem at first. Some cachers had placed caches along trails before the change was announced and had not been approved yet. Some of the caches were now too close and were rejected by the reviewers
Like I said I never thought of a road when I thought of powertrails. In my mind, those long series close together along roads should be another sport. I dont see it as what geocaching is all about (I know some feel the same about puzzles). When those new powertrails are placed, I am sure nobody is thinking about quality, maintenance and abandooned geocaching garbage.
We just placed 8 caches along a 3km trail out in the wilderness near Adair’s; there is 1 cache at each end and 6 long the trail. The trail is easy but the return trip is a 6 km hike. If we had only placed 1 or 2 caches very few cachers would have been tempted to do the trail. We thught the larger number of caches would be an incentive to have cachers check out the beautiful trail and the stops for the caches would let them enjoy their surroundings. I certainly dont consider this series to be a power trail. The same goes for our 14 cache series along the multi use trail in Scooudouc. The caches are well spaced out, and their numbers and location has encouraged families and groups to have caching outings along the trail.
NUFF SAID
Ha ha… “Nuff said“.
I placed my caches on average about 500m apart on the Catamount Trail. I wanted to place them in locations that would help people find their way on this “lost” trail. Also, I love returning to the same location over and over again and was hoping to encourage others to hide caches in-between. My idea of a great trail starts out with a few caches by one cacher then more from another and so on. By the time there is no more room you have a variety of caches by many different cachers. However, I know that people would rather wait till they are all placed and go out just the once and never think about the boring place again. I even had some pretty negative comments from people who whish I would have placed them all at once or waited till I listed them. Then again if I was to make everyone happy I would have to paint a large arrow pointing at the cache with an attendant near by to help them retrieve the cache but that’s another topic. I believe maybe this could be why people hide a bunch all at once to avoid the negative comments from those “go once” cachers.
Now I know we are probably thinking about two different things when it comes to power trails. However, I think they have a purpose when it comes to hiking trails. I would have never had the nerve to do sections of the Fundy Footpath if it wasn’t for caches showing the way. Especially when it comes to getting to the eye of the needle it has made if safer as it prevents you from bushwhacking your way off a cliff. Also I appreciated the caches along the Dobson Trail and if it wasn’t for Geocaching I would have never tried it. I foolishly thought it was a boring trail before these caches took me out there. Now with this trail near Adair’s I wanted to do it for a long time but was also afraid of having to pretend I wasn’t lost. I’m excited that I’ll finally have the chance to discover these wonderful less popular trails. It will be hard not to hide a few more when I discover a nice falls or swimming hole but to prevent anger from the caching community I’ll resist.
Well said Tetagoucher. We plan on going to do some of the Catamount caches near Wallace Falls next week with Belladan. He has never been in that area so I am anxious to see his reaction.
The caches near Adairs just came out and I am excited about it. We are hoping to have Dan do some of that series also.
Here is the text that I wrote for the caches in that series
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As you drive through the Fundy wilderness region with its hundreds of logging roads, you are often left with the impression that it contains only clearcut areas and softwood plantations.
However a bit of research and exploration will show you a lot more. Geocachers have now placed geocaches and earthcaches in many places in the wilderness. Geocaching will lead you along old roads to abandonned cemeteries that tell you that people used to live in this wilderness. Geocaching will also lead you to narrow river gorges and brooks with walls a few hundreds feet high and dozens of waterfalls. It will bring you to the Fundy Footpath which hugs the Bay of Fundy coast for 50 kms from Fundy National Park to Big Salmon River on the new Fundy Trail It will bring you to the Catamount Trail and to beautiful Wallace Falls. It will bring you to pristine rocky beaches along the coast with their majestic cliffs. All around you in this region, you will find serenity and peace.
On the edge of this beautiful area, you will find Adair’s Wilderness Lodge. A wonderful 3km footpath wanders through the woods from Adair’s Wilderness Lodge to Walton Lake. You will be surprised to discover that most of this footpath wanders along a beautiful hardwood ridge.
You begin the trail by going around the pond to the first cache. The trail then leads to a footbridge, follows a wide trail through softwoods, comes to a beautiful little double waterfall and then gently climbs to hardwood ridges. As you walk along the ridges with the soft earth beneath your feet, you will notice that the terrain slopes away from you on both sides to little valleys and gulleys. Eventually you will see through the trees on your right that the terrain slopes down to a lake. Later you will descend slowly to the lake and finish your trek at the shore of Walton Lake.
Most of the trail has been blazed Appalachian Trail style with the 2 inch wide, 6 inch long white blazes painted on trees and rocks in strategic locations. A double blaze indicates that the trail will be making a turn. One of the caches that we placed is near a double blaze. There are a few places where the trail is marked with red trail tape.
We hope you enjoy this fantastic trail.