Geocaching Travelbug Swap 🐞

@rebeccasswaps I’m new to geocaching so what’s a travel bug and where do you get one?

@PrettyAlice Check this site out and you'll learn more :) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travel_Bug

Thank you @Pei04 :)

Just so everyone knows....I did find out that you can mail travel bugs, but when you receive them, you need to mark them as "grabbed" and not "retrieved"

Just activated a travel bug for this swap. Looking forward to getting it going.

So we're supposed to send already avtivated travelbugs and not new, unused ones?

*already aCtivated

@DelennaGaribaldi - yes an already activated one is what I understood this swap to be.

I am concerned that less than half of the people in this swap, have anything mentioned on their profiles about geocaching. I hate to be the stick in the mud but a trackable is a $10-$15 cost, added to it shipping and the promise that they will continue to move it. Makes me pretty nervous when people don't have a word iota about geocahing on their profile and one person is a new member... It's on my car, my facebook, my lanyard for work, its one of the first things I mention when someone wants to know about me...

If someone who can flush out their swap bot profile with their geocaching info, wants to commit to a private swap, I'll consider it but for now I'm moving this to the watch list...as I'm not feeling comfortable about this swap.

@washingtonmaverick maybe this swap is what got us interested in seeing what geocaching is all about and trying it for the first time! That is what swap-bot is all about - learning and trying new things! And as for the new member, I was excited about this swap and told my daughter about it because she loves nature and hiking and we decided to try a new adventure together - something we can hopefully bond over! Swap-bot is all about taking a leap of faith on every swap anyway - there are no guarantees that people will follow through, but luckily I have found that most people on here are genuinely good and honest people! And on geocaching.com I found some trackable tags that were only $2.50 for us to send, so I am willing to take the risk for a new and exciting adventure. I have found we have many exciting cache locations near where I live! And hopefully my tag will go on some exciting adventures that I can track! Sorry you feel that we aren't up to par for your expertise! Happy swapping! :)

@DragonflyDaisy sadly a travel bug doesn't really tell you what geocaching is. A Travel Bug is an item that travels from geocache to geocache... you still have to find a geocache to launch the travel bug in.

Geocaching is a hobby of mine. I've been geocaching for 8 years, have met many wonderful people and have planned entire vacations around geocaching. It's a sport/hobby I strongly promote to people. If you wish to learn about geocaching, go geocaching, a travel bug is an accessory to the sport. When my son had to have a major operation 2 hours from home, and I was in a hotel for a week, while he was in the hospital, geocachers from that community banded together and either brought me food or picked me up to get food and get me out of the hospital. My geocaching family at home among themselves pooled the funds to cover my hotel room.

If you really want to learn about geocaching and can't figure out how to do it yourself, see if there is a local event you can go to, a geocacher is the most willing person to teach another about geocaching. I've helped a soldier stationed in Iraq find a geocache on the military base, when he had told me he was bored, he'd never found one before in his life. He just studied the map and walked to it. It took him looking 2-3 trips to find it but he got to the location just fine, he just wasn't entirely positive what he was looking for til he found it.

I'm all for taking a leap of faith. I'm not up for taking a leap of faith when the person conducting the swap has only been a member for a few short months and is also a hot topic on the forums about being a double/triple profiler... It has zero to do with you and the other swap participants and everything to do with the coordinator.

I also happen to have about a dozen trackables that are already activated and traveling at my house that need to be dropped in a geocache and probably have a dozen more that haven't been registered. I was thinking about sending one of the trackables that belonged to someone else (as that's what can be done) but how would you feel if I sent your trackable to someone who didn't know anything about geocaching, what if you decide it's not your thing and keep it?! That trackable belonging to someone else is now lost/gone.

So sorry if a geocache who has geocaches in 11 states, over 1800 finds and has had her hands on over 1000 different trackables in a span of 8 years wishes to preserve her fellow player's trackables, and that offends you.

If you want some help in finding an event nearby you or possibly helping you find a geocache near your home I am more than willing to help, I'm not willing to subject someone else's or my own trackable to possibly going missing all together. I am 110% for introducing people to the hobby, swapping a trackable is not an introduction to the hobby. You can geocache for years and never pick up a trackable, it's not a requirement, and many geocachers don't even participate with trackables.