We are planning an East TN version of the Amazing Race to be held April 1-2, 2006. The Event will be more of a "Quest" than it will be a race, due to some concerns some people have had over the safety of an event involving geocachers racing in cars.

This will be a 2 day event with a mandetory reststop at the end of the first day. There will be about 80 caches on the total route. Camping will be available at the rest stop or motels are nearby for those who don't camp.

The individual caches will be asigned points. Whoever has the most points at the end of the event will win some cool prizes. There will be a time limit but there will be no need to "race" to find the caches. Everyone should be able to find them in the allotted time. There will be some challenges that a team will have to perform in order to move on, and a few more surprises thrown in to spice things up.

There will be divisions for beginners, intermediate , and experienced cachers to make the playing field a little more even. Teams will be limited to 4 people per team/vehicle. No radar detectors will be allowed.

The start of the event will be in Knoxville and wind through the hills of E. TN.

We would love to have anyone here come and join us.

Updates will be posted at http://www.gsmgc.org in the forums.

Sounds like a lot of fun! We couldn't make the Alabama event, hopefully we will make this one

T1

Ok we want to be in in the quest,
Kat6 and GA Cacher

Hi. I'm Cymbaline. You are?

This sounds potentially fun.

I find this interesting. I was just in Knoxville a week ago, and there was a normal level (say, 20 within 4 miles, not bad for a downtown area) of caches. Hopefully this will stay the same.

A few questions for the original poster. (Yes, this means Fluffy/Itchy, drag them back if you have to.)

Will this activity produce an unusual number of temporary and/or normal caches in the process?

Is this a "cache-run" type of event? You say there will be 80 caches, but you don't mention how many (50? 60?) might be in your pockets vs. a regular cache.

Of these 80 caches, how many are ammo boxes, or similiar kin?

Of these 80 caches, how many require me to be out of my car for an hour or more? Preferably, how many can I get by going on one hike along XYZ trail, etc?

Of the remainder, how many require me to actually get out of my car? Rest stops and camping areas not included?

I look forward to your replies before I submit my participation!

Oh! Any attempts to direct me to http://www.gsmgc.org/ for further information will be given a blank stare and a request for $20 for my inconvienence. Thanks!

quote:

Originally posted by Cymbaline:
Hi. I'm Cymbaline. You are?

Pretty easy to search out.
fluffy&itchy

Good luck with your event Fluffy. You better watch out though. That TeamPez guy might just come back up there and win the event again!

quote:

Originally posted by Cymbaline:
Oh! Any attempts to direct me to http://www.gsmgc.org/ for further information will be given a blank stare and a request for $20 for my inconvienence. Thanks!

Sorry, I was just informed there was a bug in the website that was preventing people from signing up on the site so they could view the forum section.

Is this what you were refering to in your post?

I was sending everyone to our club site because it would be easier on me to post the info for the event in one place.

Thanks,



It is fixed now.

quote:

Originally posted by Cymbaline:
Hi. I'm Cymbaline. You are?

fluffyanditchy from Knoxville, TN

quote:

I find this interesting. I was just in Knoxville a week ago, and there was a normal level (say, 20 within 4 miles, not bad for a downtown area) of caches. Hopefully this will stay the same.

Yes, There are approx. 500 caches within 30 miles (as the crow flies) of Knoxville. we are placing more and more each week. A good variety too.

quote:

A few questions for the original poster. (Yes, this means Fluffy/Itchy, drag them back if you have to.)

Will this activity produce an unusual number of temporary and/or normal caches in the process?

The caches will be a mixture of current and new ones. In an event this big, it would be very difficult to place 80 or so new caches, seeing as one would have to maintain themm after the event too.

The other events like this one that I have been to, used this same setup and it worked well. If you have found any of the current caches that were being used for the event, you are permitted to log them again as a find. The existing caches would not nessesarily be in the same hiding spots, but their names would be used for the event.

quote:

Is this a "cache-run" type of event? You say there will be 80 caches, but you don't mention how many (50? 60?) might be in your pockets vs. a regular cache.

They will be regular caches that you can log on gc.com with their own waypoints. I don't anticipate having pocket caches at this time.

quote:

Of these 80 caches, how many are ammo boxes, or similiar kin?

That is yet to be detremined.

quote:

Of these 80 caches, how many require me to be out of my car for an hour or more? Preferably, how many can I get by going on one hike along XYZ trail, etc?

These will not be on a hiking/walking trail. You will be driving to each cache location. The driving route will take you in and around our part of East Tennessee. There will be individual team challenges mixed in to your route. These will be things some one from the team or the whole team will have to do in order to advance to the next cache on the route.

quote:

Of the remainder, how many require me to actually get out of my car? Rest stops and camping areas not included?

I guess the short answer to this one is all will require someone from the team to get out of the vehicle.

I hope I've answered your questions. If you have any others, feel free to contact me.

quote:

Originally posted by mtn-man:

quote:

Originally posted by Cymbaline:
Hi. I'm Cymbaline. You are?

Pretty easy to search out.
fluffy&itchy

Good luck with your event Fluffy. You better watch out though. That TeamPez guy might just come back up there and win the event again!

I figured that out, after the fact. Wish I would have seen your post beforehand - much websurfing time could have been saved.

quote:

Originally posted by Fluffy:

quote:

Originally posted by Cymbaline:
Hi. I'm Cymbaline. You are?

fluffyanditchy from Knoxville, TN

(Cymsnip of the bulk of Fluffy & Itchy's Most Excellent Response - see their original post 2 posts above for full context)

I hope I've answered your questions. If you have any others, feel free to contact me.

Thank you for your frankness and completeness of answering. It's most refreshing!

So, it's a cache run/cache numbers thing, in the quickest/shortest (though staying legal) time possible. Caches are being placed in anticpation of this event. They may or may not be there after the fact. For the most part, these will be drive-by caches - that is, at least one member of the vehile will have to get out of the vehicle(s) to leave a signature (or, more probable, a custom "sticker" of that parties' participants, or their logo for that trip, or something similiar) - and not require any getting-out-of-car by the entire party for a short hike (greater than two tenths of a mile or more).

Hmmm.. Yes. Interesting. Not for me, though. I do thank you for the thoroughness of your answering my questions. Well done!

Good luck to you in you venture, and I hope that nobodys' sticker-printer breaks!

quote:

Thank you for your frankness and completeness of answering. It's most refreshing!

You are most welcome.

quote:

So, it's a cache run/cache numbers thing, in the quickest/shortest (though staying legal) time possible.Caches are being placed in anticpation of this event. They may or may not be there after the fact. For the most part, these will be drive-by caches - that is, at least one member of the vehile will have to get out of the vehicle(s) to leave a signature (or, more probable, a custom "sticker" of that parties' participants, or their logo for that trip, or something similiar) - and not require any getting-out-of-car by the entire party for a short hike (greater than two tenths of a mile or more).

No, not really. Maybe this will help clarify. Even though you may not decide to attend, I will post the following for anyone else's benefit who may be reading this thread.

Here is a copy of the post I placed over on our local site. It might clarify for you. The original question on that sight was that the event was going to be a race. Although that is not your question/concern, the info in the post should clairify a few things for you.

(me quoting post)"OK guys/gals, let me restate.

This will not be a RACE! Not a road race anyway.

Due to the concerns of those in "higher command" about safety issues, it will be a "Quest". Meaning, it will be an event that will have you searching for points (caches) to add to your coffers. You will be aquiring points from the caches along the way. Some of the points you get will be doled out at random. Some of them will be gained by completing challenges your team will have to do to move on to the next cache. There will be some surprizes thrown in along the way too.

The time you take to gather all your points WILL NOT be a factor. The amount of points you have at the end of the event will be what you will get the prizes for.

There will be a time limit but it will be very generous. Everyone should be able to get to all the caches and challenges in a reasonable time WITHOUT RACING! Thus, a radar detector will be of no use to anyone participating.

Where the difference in total points acquired will come into play will be determined by how well your team performs in the challenges and the secret points you may or may not acqire from the cache finds.

(sorry, not saying any more on the secret stuff, otherwise it won't be a secret :-)

The only reason for the time limit is to try to get everone in to get things counted.

Nothing is set in stone yet and we will be tweaking things as we go along.

Anyone who doesn't want to enter the event with a team, is welcome to help out with the logistics, proctoring, etc. I know we will need voluteers to help in this regard.

We are trying to make this event something that anyone, of any level of skill, age, or physical ability, can participate in. Thus the proposed divisions of competition.

That doesn't mean it will be a "walk in the park", but it does mean we would like to have a wide variety of participants sign up. We want everyone to feel welcome. Young, old, newbees, and "old hats" alike." (me unquoting)

quote:

Hmmm.. Yes. Interesting. Not for me, though. I do thank you for the thoroughness of your answering my questions. Well done!
Good luck to you in you venture, and I hope that nobodys' sticker-printer breaks!

Sorry to hear you won't be in attendence. You, or anyone else, for that matter, are always welcome to come camp for the weekend anyway. If you come over and camp, you won't get to log all the Quest caches but there will be some others you can log and of course you will have the pleasure of cheering the rest of us on

The GREAT SMOKY MTN GEOQUEST has been posted on gc.com

GCRMN6

Great Smoky Mtn GeoQuest

We are planning a great event. Feel free to email me if you have further questions.

quote:

Hidden: 4/1/2005

Darn! We missed it!

There are a bunch of future events listed as 2005 when they are really 2006.

I'm going to go to this one. Too many coin folks planning on going that I want to meet in person

Ooops

Too many late nights.

Correction-

April 1-2, 2006

Wow that sounds like lots of fun....I will check our schedule to see if we can come up. Also try to get some more adults for team members...