What is your real name?
Linda
What do you do for a living?
I am a technical writer for SAS in Cary.
Care to share any information on your family?
I am married to a wonderful guy named Heath and we have a dog, Biscuit, and two cats, Larry and Moe.
If you have a family, are any of them geocachers?
Heath does not enjoy the hunt, but I always refer to him as my "IT department" or the “cache driver.” He loves technology and is the one who outfits me with all my gadgets. He willingly drives me around to caches, parks the car, and reads a book while I hunt. He does enjoy the events and likes to chat with the local cachers. Biscuit, the wonderdog, is always available to cache and gets excited when I grab my caching bag, shoes, or when I open the door.
When did you start geocaching?
I started my account on geocaching.com in the summer of 2005. SAS' recreation and fitness department sponsored a geocaching event. Teams of four signed up to see who could find the most caches in two weeks. There were caches hidden on SAS' campus and we could find ones listed on geocaching.com. I had a lot of fun. My cachemates did not share my enthusiasm! We took some bad spills in the mud at GC8128: American Tobacco Trail.
Where did you first learn about caching?
I leaned about geocaching in 2002. My brother-in-law (cdmrob) started caching then and hid a cache in a park near his house in Boston and a kayaking cache (I come by my love of kayaking honestly) on a small island near a vacation cabin his extended family owns on the Georgian Bay in Canada (GC7C5A: Pointe-Au-Baril Island Cache).
My caching took off in January of 2006 when I needed something to do while walking my new puppy, Biscuit. Books on tape was just not cutting it.
What is the origin of your caching name?
I took my dog's name and slapped NC in front of it.
What has been your most memorable caching moment so far?
There have been so many. I’ve been so lucky. In 2005, Heath and I were heading up to Cape Cod for my sister’s 40th birthday party when I saw that the local Cape Cod geocachers were having a scuba event while I would be there. I asked if I could join in and spent an afternoon diving around a very cold quarry to GCNWR2: Scuba School II. I had not brought a thick enough wetsuit and had an ice cream headache for most of the dive but that did not keep me from finding the cache and the green jeep TB floating around the wreck!
I also took a wonderful winter solstice cache run around the Uwharries with wsgaskins, Maingray, 1101010, hisryboy, and emerald gardener to hike GCF3E6: Ghosts of Dark Mountain, GC555: Uwanna Uwharrie, and others. Those guys have some long legs, but it was a great day in the woods!
GW5 and especially the GW5 kayak run are also great memories. With the help of so many great local cachers, we were able to get 29 boats in and around Harris Lake for a wonderful day of caching.
I just got back from GW6 in Sacramento, CA. I had a lot of fun playing geo-poker and caching around with friends. I am amazed and impressed with the amount of planning the Billwolfs put into the trip! I even ran into my Girl Scout leader from WI there! Hadn’t seen her in over 20 years.
I also just enjoy hiking, kayaking, and chatting while caching with my friends.
What kind of caches do you most enjoy looking for?
I will hunt for any type of cache, but I particularly love caches I have to kayak to and the ones that require long walks in the woods.
What kind of events do you most enjoy attending?
I love events where I can chat with my geo-friends.
Any other interests outside of geocaching?
I used to actually clean my house! I am a volunteer Lifeguard, Swimming, Canoeing, and CPR instructor for the American Red Cross.
I am also very involved with Girl Scouting in the area. I work with two troops in Chapel Hill – one troop has about 20 middle school students and the other troop has about 30 high school students. I have been the leader of the middle school troop for 13 years as of this year. I also train leaders on how to work with teens and how to camp, help give out a lot of scholarships, and help give out a lot of awards both locally and at the council level. I got a lot out of Girl Scouting when I was a kid – especially my love of travel and the out-of-doors – so I always wanted to give back so other girls could gain the same benefits I did. I know a lot of girls stay in my troop because we do a lot of international travel (we are going to Greece in June), but we plan our trips over 3 years and the girls do most of the planning work. I think they don’t just travel but learn a lot of other life skills as well.
I was also training to run the Boston Marathon in April. My brother-in-law is a cancer researcher in Boston and they have a marathon racing team that raises money for their research by running the Boston Marathon. My sister and I signed up to raise money for the organization. Before geocaching, I was actually a decent runner. Unfortunately, foot problems due to training prevented me from running the race this year, but I hope to run next year. You can find out more about my run at the Dana-Farber web site.
Have you introduced other people to geocaching? If so, about how many people?
Due to my enthusiasm, I have introduced a number of people to geocaching. Most notably, my Girl Scouts and their families. A few springs ago, I had taken my Scouts on a whitewater rafting trip on the French Broad river and after our outing, I was sitting in the campground. I turned my GPS on and saw that there were two caches within .1 miles of my camp chair. I had to go! My Scouts asked what I was doing (especially if it involved ice cream), and when I told them, they wanted to come! We spent quite some time looking for a nano on a train caboose on the main drag in Hot Springs, NC. That was just before Father's Day weekend and two of my Scouts came home and told their Mother what they had done and thought that their newly retired Dad would enjoy this sport-so they got him a GPS for Father's Day. That lucky father is Tool King and he and his wife and daughters (Hypno_Hawk) have been caching ever since.
I also turned on one of my co-workers to geocaching. Sarah (Ovid's Owner) and I were on a business trip to San Diego when she asked me what I was doing that evening. When I explained about geocaching, she was game to go along, so we took a fabulous night walk along the beach/cliffs in La Jolla to find some virtual caches.
What type of GPS do you use? Do you use if for anything besides geocaching?
Santa gave me a Garmin 60CSx last Christmas. It has been great. We got it a new 2GB card this year so we could load all the maps of the East Coast on it so we could use it for navigating around on our travels.
How often do you geocache?
As often as I can sneak it into my schedule. My fellow and former SAS co-workers, Dash9 and jcdecker, often ask if I am up for a lunchtime cache run. We have taken some long lunches! Lately I have been trying to find those caches on a bookmark list I named “Caches I want to visit.” They are neat hikes, cool puzzles, and creative hides.
What inspires you to hide a cache?
My first hides were along the American Tobacco Trail in Chatham County. I wanted people to take a nice walk on an undiscovered trail and find an easy cache. Now I like to make folks stand in the woods and laugh.
If you could hide a cache anywhere on the planet (forget the guidelines for this one), where would you put it and why?
I would put it in one of the places I’ve always wanted to visit like Iceland or the Galapagos or Easter Island.
Can you think of a theme song that would best describe your caching experiences or do you have a favorite caching song/artist?
My cache song would have to be “Poison Ivy” by The Coasters. I can look at a vine and break out. Two years ago, Halloween came early for me. I got PI so bad that my eyes swelled shut. I was scaring my co-workers.
What do you want to be when you grow up?
Do I have to grow up? I do enjoy writing, but I think I would like to write a novel or a set of essays. I have compiled stories from my many travels with my Girl Scouts and one day will compile it into a book named Traveling with Kids.
If you were a cache, what kind would you be? What would your name be?
If I were a cache, I would probably be in the woods somewhere near a nice, long path. I wouldn’t be a puzzle, but I would probably be filled with tennis balls or other dog toys. I might also be placed in a dog park.
Do you prefer Cache run, long hike or something else?
I don’t have the stamina some of the area cache runners have. I went on a cache run to Wilson once with the billwolf1s and the horsegeeks. We had a fantastic day but they about killed me. We were driving home and stopped for gas when billwolf1 said that there was a cache at the gas station. I was done for the day and napping, but they nagged me until I got out and got that darn cache. I think I am better suited for long hikes with the dog and friends.
What is your dog's favorite kind of cache?
My dog's favorite kind of cache is one that is on a very long hike, has a bunch of cachers along, and that does not take us long to find. She gets so impatient when it takes us a while to find things!
How do you train a dog to hunt for geocaches?
Repetition! I’ll never forget the look on Kenny of the horsegeeks’ face when Biscuit uncovered an ammo box in the woods. We had been searching for a while and it was like Biscuit was sick of waiting for us so she showed us dummies where it was!
Tell us about your trip to NZ (and anywhere else you've been and cached or not cached for that matter!).
My trip to NZ surprised many of my friends. My sister had invited me to go with her and her husband to a friend's wedding a long time ago, but it didn't work out until about a week before we left that I was going to come along. I managed to get tickets and a passport in 72 hours. We flew into Auckland, rented a car, took care of wedding stuff, and drove all over the North Island. Since I had done slim to no planning, I started each day by asking what we were going to do that day.
My family knows of my geocaching obsession, so we cached all along the trip. In fact, caching took us to some of our favorite spots. We knew we wanted to visit the Huka waterfalls in Taupo, and GCGB5B: Some like it hot suggested we drive to a local park and hike to the falls. It was a fabulous trek.
Later in our trip, we had driven to the way north of the North Island (the Northland), and after dinner one evening I asked for "just one more stop." We drove up to the Flagstaff Hill lookout spot that took us high over the town of Russell and we were stunned. We were treated to a sunset over the water and the islands – it was amazing. I managed to grab the cache (GCE077) as well!
Another highlight of the trip is when I left my sister and her husband for three days when we arrived in Rotorua as the HexTheKiwi family invited me to stay with them. They were amazing hosts and I was more amazed when I found out that they had been in their house for a mere two weeks before I arrived! Clarie sat down at the dinner table and planned 3 days of sightseeing centered around geocaching for me. Some of my favorite moments were when:
· David and I kayak cached Lake Tarawera under the watch of the Tarawera volcano to GC3488: Island Hop. Our two-person kayak had quite a left lean that made our trip even harder!
· Claire and I hiked around a pristine undeveloped lake to GC10CTA: Tikitapu - The Blue Lake. It was great to see so much undeveloped land!
· Claire and the Kiwi kids and I looked at the gloopy mud and bathed in a hot mountain stream.
· David and I hiked before dinner through a beautiful redwood forest to GC2608: Clean Green Wonderland. Even I wished I had a fishing pole. You didn’t wonder where the fish were; you could just look down and see huge trout!
I also took my Girl Scout troop to New York City in November. We had so much fun and I managed to sneak in a few caches. On our last night we had eaten dinner in Times Square. After dinner, the group split up to do last minute shopping, take a carriage ride, etc. I wanted to grab the puzzle cache in Times Square (GC14QY6: Crossroads of the World) and was a bit surprised when 5 others decided to join me. We couldn't get a good satellite reading, so we had a lot of fun trying to find the hide location based on the hint. We had an ah-ha moment when we finally figured it out. Part of the logging requirement is to take a picture with a big banner in the cache that said found it! We got some drunken German tourists to snap our photo (and join us in the photo) and these guys never asked why we had our big banner. Too funny!
Part of my planning for our upcoming troop trip to Greece was to see what cool geocaches I could do along the way! There is a neat Earthcache I want to do in Santorini!
Are there any changes that you would like to see in geocaching?
Not really.
Are there any changes that you don't want or wish had not already occurred?
I’m sad I never got to find a locationless cache. I would have gone nuts with those!