What is your real name?
Graeme McGufficke
What do you do for a living?
Financial Advisor with Edward Jones Investments
Care to share any information on your family?
Karla (wife, middle school math/science teacher), Megan (daughter, 8th grade student), Ian (5th grade student)
Fun with the family
If you have a family, are any of them geocachers?
All three have GC.com accounts but I wouldn’t call them active geocachers. If they are with me and we find a cache I will log their finds for them.
When did you start geocaching?
First cache find was September 1, 2003 (Geoduculla Rock, GCCDEF)
Where did you first learn about caching? If another geocacher, who?
A student in my daughter’s fourth grade class had a birthday party where they all went for a hike and found a geocache. I remembered hearing/reading something about this activity so I did a little research and a GPSr was soon winging its way to me from Amazon.
What is the origin of your caching name?
My nickname as a teenager was “Guff”, taken from my last name. I tried to get this as my caching name but it wasn’t available. Since I was born in Australia – often referred to as “The Land of Oz” – I added it to Guff to get OzGuff.
What has been your most memorable caching moment so far?
During a trip Down Under in 2004 I found a cache called Mount Beerburrum Lookout (GCJTHY). It is an incredibly steep, though paved, stroll/hike/climb to a fire tower lookout with absolutely awesome 360-degree views of the Glasshouse Mountains. What made this even better was that I was accompanied by my wife and our two kids, my father and his wife, my sister and her husband and their two kids, and an uncle and his wife. Oh – and we found the cache!
What kind of caches do you most enjoy looking for?
Though I will find any cache I definitely prefer the hikes in the woods that bring you to a great view or an amazing waterfall.
What kind of events do you most enjoy attending?
Though I haven’t attended all that many events – 30 or so – my favorite so far was my one and only CITO event. 20+ insane cachers cleaned up parts of the Gorges State Park a few years ago – in a light rain – and had a ball!
Describe your ideal cache hunt.
Nuwati calls me up late one night and says he has the next day off, and asks if I am available. I ask my wife – practically asleep and not terribly coherent – if I can go caching. She mumbles something that sounds like, “OK”. My caching partner arrives early the next day and we are out the door before anyone else is awake. (And before my wife can take back her mumbled assent.) The day is made up of a combination of all sorts of caches – some nice hikes, a few park-and-grabs, a multi that shows us some interesting historical spots, etc. The day is all about caching so we don’t waste much time, and have a great day caching and making fun of each other. [Warning: Nuwati will sweep the knee in order to beat you to a cache!] No DNFs and many smiles. (And a few smileys!)
Oz in a tube
What famous person, dead or alive, would you like to take caching?
Andrew Barton Paterson (b. Feb 17 1864, d. Feb 5 1941). I assume that this name is virtually unknown to most folks frequenting the NCGO forums, but some may have heard/seen works that he penned. Most Aussie children grow up learning a few famous poems. None are more famous than Banjo Paterson’s “The Man From Snowy River”. Some of you may have seen the movie “based” on his poem. You may have also heard a song made from a poem of his called “Waltzing Matilda”. He obviously loved rural Australia and I think he may have enjoyed walking the countryside looking for caches. (I would also like to ask him if he based “The Man From Snowy River” on any one particular person. My father was born in the Snowy Mountains and he was told as a boy that the poem was based on the exploits of a McGufficke.)
Any other interests outside of geocaching?
No. Should I? (OK -- swimming, reading, having fun with the family)
Have you gotten other people interested in geocaching? If so, about how many people?
I think I am up to about 15 geocachers – many of them are family (father, sister, father-in-law, sister-in-law)
What type of GPS do you use? Do you use if for anything besides geocaching?
I started with a Garmin Legend but when I smashed the screen I
upgraded to a Garmin GPSMAP 60CSx. I use it to navigate when driving around the
country, but since I am likely still figuring out how to find a cache while
driving to the in-laws – and without my wife getting upset -- I consider this a
geocaching use too. 
SC Caching, now that’s tough terrain!
How often do you geocache now?
As much as possible. Too much. Not enough.
What inspires you to hide a cache?
When I first started hiding caches it was because there were very few where I lived at the time. My logic was that if I hid some caches maybe other cachers in the area would hide caches for me to find. That didn’t work out so well for me – at least with regard to new caches appearing for ME to find – but I just kept on hiding caches. The inspiration for a cache differs from cache to cache: Some are all about the location (great view, nice waterfall, etc), while some are numbers-driven (park-and-grabs). Once I got a little bored with P&Gs I still hid them in the same old places (guardrails, light poles) but incorporated some sort of puzzle, the idea being that though the hide was lame the finders still had to earn it through a quasi-intellectual process. I’m not all that mechanically adept so I have few deviously camouflaged caches, so a puzzle is the way I make it a harder smiley.
If you could hide a cache anywhere on the planet (forget the guidelines for this one), where would you put it and why?
A series based on the Seven Wonders of the World would be pretty cool. (And I don’t care if you are talking Ancient, Modern, Industrial, Medieval, or Natural – all would be cool!)
Can you think of a theme song that would best describe your caching experiences?
When it comes to music I’m an 80s sort of guy. Pick any of these classics: 99 Luftballoons, Der Kommissar, I Want Candy, Janie’s Got A Gun, Kids In America, Loveshack, Safety Dance, She Blinded Me With Science, Take On Me. (Not sure what the list means, but they are some cool songs!)
What do you want to be when you grow up?
I have no plans to grow up. (Seriously. Ask my wife…)
If you were a cache, what kind would you be? What would your name be?
I would definitely be a puzzle cache. Possible title, “OzGuff: A Riddle Wrapped In A Mystery Inside An Enigma”. (Of course, others may prefer “Lame Cache #1”…)
You have over 1,000 hides now, how do you find the time to hide and maintain them all while still finding over 5,000?
I usually hide caches and perform maintenance while out on caching runs. But it really isn’t as hard as it sounds. For possible missing caches I usually wait until I have received a couple of DNFs in a row. (It also depends on who the DNF cacher is – a newbie DNF doesn’t have as much weight as a more experienced cacher’s DNF.) For true maintenance issues – wet/full logbooks – I sometimes post a note requesting the next finder to replace the log; this keeps my actual maintenance visits down. But those caches go on a list and I try to get out to check on them within a few weeks of the Needs Maintenance log. In the main I think I have a decent track record of keeping most of my caches in good shape.
How did you get started with AsheCache and your involvement with the Asheville Chamber of Commerce?
There is a cache located on the grounds of the Asheville Chamber of Commerce. When they came up with the idea of using geocaching as a tourism lure they checked GC.com and saw that some guy named “OzGuff” had a bunch of hides in the area. A few emails later and we were meeting – with another local cacher – to discuss ideas for how geocaching could increase “heads in beds”. (This sounds bad but is a phrase they use to indicate tourists staying overnight in area hostelries.) The AsheCache program developed from those early meetings; a 2008 version is in the works and may be more open to the geocaching public.
Have you seen any benefits to geocaching from that relationship? If so, can you expand?
The folks at the Asheville Chamber of Commerce have contacts with everybody in the area. They have even met with local Parks and Recreation management to let them know about geocaching, and promoted it as a family-friendly activity. Since the Chamber is so pro-geocaching it is easier to talk with local land managers about placing caches on their property.
Any tips for people in other cities that would like to form strong relationships with their local officials?
I sort of fell into this relationship, but I would recommend being proactive and contacting someone local. There is no doubt that Asheville/western NC benefits from the high number of caches hidden in the area. Folks DO travel to the area in order to cache, and they spend money while they are here. It is a pretty compelling argument – cachers travel where there are caches. And we don’t travel to places where there are no caches – like NC state parks. Tell them the story and they might just listen… (Also, if anyone is interested in pursuing this in their area and wants to chat, email me at ozguff@gmail.com.)
You have cached in many places. What would you say is, generally speaking, your favorite area of the state to cache in and why?
I love the mountains of western NC! There are so many awesome hiking trails out here, and they all need more caches! Maybe I will change my mind when/if I get around to completing the NC DeLorme Challenge…
Anything else you would like to share? – the soapbox is yours!
One of the things that worry me most about the proliferation of caches is the rise of the park-and-grab. When I started in 2003 most of the caches in the area were hikes in the woods, and finding a cache meant expending some energy and effort. (And by that I DON’T mean opening a car door and walking two steps to a light pole!) I know that there are some cachers out there who will never hike eight miles to find a cache, but there are also some who MIGHT but the availability of a couple of hundred P&Gs closer at hand makes that less likely. We all know what the “geo-” part of geocaching refers to, but does that include Wal-Mart parking lots and Cracker Barrel porches? [In case anyone is thinking, “But doesn’t HE own some of those crappy caches?” I do. I am definitely part of the problem, but am trying to see if there might be a solution.]
Every time I see a media report on geocaching the pictures/footage are out in the woods or at a local park. Apparently the local special interests reporter isn’t interested in following someone to a guardrail behind a local fast-food restaurant. And do you blame them?
I keep telling people that geocaching is about the journey. Yeah – signing the logbook is part of it but the interesting/exciting part – for me at least – is what you see along the way. I would much prefer that the things I see along the way be waterfalls and beautiful vistas rather than dumpsters and sewer grates.
My point – if I actually have one – is that just because you CAN place a cache there doesn’t mean you SHOULD place one there. If you are thinking about hiding a 35mm film canister in a guardrail or an Altoids tin on a road sign, how about you go on that mile and a half hike to find that cache. Maybe by the time you get back to your vehicle that micro-related thought may have evaporated…
Thanks!
Graeme/OzGuff
