2022 Fall Picnic
2022 SLAGA Christmas Party
Bellefontaine CITO November 2022
Cachemas 2022 Bonus Day
SLAGA at GeoWoodstock 2023
2024 SLAGA Spring Picnic
2025 New Year's Day Hike, Fort Bellefontaine
Cachetur 101 Class - March 2025
2025 Winter Potluck
2025 Spring Picnic
2025 Spring Picnic
2025 GigaStock in Morgantown WV
2025 GeoWoodstock, Morgantown, WV
SLAGA at Ted Drewes 2025
2025 Christmas Event
2026 NYD Hike
Crazy Beards!
2026 Winter Potluck
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- Written by Terri Nealon
- Hits: 1428
It is said that January is a 'magical' month to welcome the new and cherish possibilities and surprises that lie ahead. SLAGAs Adventure Awaits 2025 embraces this adage with a first time 'park-theme' for the monthly challenge, as well as their unusual pictorial method of informing this journalist of the January monthly winner.
What a surprise indeed? After having participated every month during the inaugural year of the Adventure Awaits Challenges, and after writing some very interesting articles about other geocachers that won, this journalist knew the slim chance of having her own name pulled from the many qualifying entries. While thrilled to have won, it quickly dawned on me, however, that I now had the strange task of writing an article about myself. So here goes...
As many of you know, my geo-nickname is TerriBikes+, so you've probably also guessed that a favorite hobby of mine is bicycling. I started riding a hybrid mountain bike in spring of 2012. While searching online for new and different trails to ride, I came across a review that mentioned that there were several geocaches along the trail. "What the heck is a geocache," I remember saying aloud, but it didn't take long for me to find out and soon discover a whole new world of outdoor fun!
So in July of 2012, I started caching during the few remaining warm weather months. Having little experience with this game, and not knowing many people, I assumed cold weather months were a natural hiatus, haha, so I then accrued a 118 day 'slump' before caching again. Fast-forward a year caching and experience, and I felt a driving need to continuously find daily caches until my find streak outnumbered my slump. Prompted by the 2013 HQ incentive of "31 days of August" souvenirs, I did just that and cached for the next 120 days. Since I still love bike riding, I often now blend my two favorite hobbies for an even better adventure. I am thankful my love of cycling introduced me to my new love of caching.
Obviously, I go caching in the winter months now. I've enjoyed participating monthly in SLAGAs Adventure Awaits, not only as my way of supporting this great organization, but because it gets me outdoors (often with a more defined purpose) especially in weather or at times that aren't all that convenient for me. It also encourages me to attend events and socialize more often. For this January's 'park' criteria, I could have found any cache in any park, but I challenged myself a bit more. I chose to find geocaches with the word 'park' or the name/initials of a park in the title. My qualifying caches include:
GC8H15J Just a preform in JB
GCAHFEZ Walk in the park (Drace)
GCANFPM A Walk In The (Stookey) Park
GCAW583 Queeny Park 2024 - 20 Years of Hides
GCATKRT SLAGA Winter Potluck & Cabin Fever 2025 (Jefferson Barracks).
These monthly challenge incentives are fun, but my very favorite type of geocaches are the far and few between earthcaches, of which I have found 365 to date, of my 8250 total finds. That total includes caches from all 50 of the United States and 13 other countries so far. I enjoy geocaching and especially ECs probably due to my natural love of outdoors and my degree and young adult career of Geological Engineering. But I'm an odd mix actually. I'm outdoorsy, yes, but I have a passion for theatrical arts as well. If you don't find me biking, hiking, or kayaking for a cache, you may find me wearing a costume at a Halloween geo-event or at a Mega 'Gumshoe Ball' (with my partner in crime MrsSpongy), or donning festive face glitter at a holiday Happy Hour event occasionally.
While I enjoy socializing at geoevents often, I'm not actually that social of a butterfly. I don't mind and am quite comfortable spending time alone and have trekked many a mile on solo adventures too. Don't get me wrong though....I love my caching buddies, look forward to planned outings, welcome new caching friends, and wouldn't trade a single moment of fun I've had with my friends.
Some of my favorite geocaching memories include attending the first ever USA GIGA with friends, GC5AX15 GeoWoodstock 2018, and traveling to the northwest states with my husband to experience some geocaching history, which checked off some huge geo-bucket list items. Not only did I visit GC Headquarters and the 'Original Stash Tribute Plaque,' but I thoroughly enjoyed bike riding through the long, dark Snoqualmie Tunnel in Washington to find "Mission 9: Tunnel of Light" APE Project geocache at the far end. Another memorable cache find was "Europe's Oldest GC43" when I climbed up the hill from the path along St.George's Channel near Bray, Ireland for that smiley. And still, there's a lot of world I'd like to see and geocache in, including returning to Thailand some day, I hope, as I remember that beautiful country fondly from living there for six months when I was in grade school.
I'm grateful for winning the January Adventure Awaits challenge, but feel lucky too as the month represents fresh starts and new possibilities. For me, that's exciting both personally and for new geocaching adventures in my future.
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- Written by Terri Nealon
- Hits: 1421
During the month of endless sizzling summer days, Su&Sco/Susan Bevis, with the help of her husband Scott, geocached her way to the August Adventure Awaits monthly challenge win! With the interesting challenge of finding an event cache plus five caches, one each starting with a letter in our group's acronym, she had her work cut out for her. But Susan made it look easy and qualified for her win with the following geocaches:
Some of Susan and her husband's favorite geocaches are: state oldest, FTFs, geoart, state stars, and puzzle caches. As with many cachers, Susan mentioned that geocaching has taken them to so many places they would never have visited if not for the game. In response to whether there was a memorable geocaching experience, Susan shared this story. "On a canoe caching trip at Lynnville Lake in Indiana, we pulled over to sit by a waterfall at the far end of the lake and take a break. Before getting back into the canoe, we walked over the falls to take a selfie. I slipped and fell breaking my right hip. The resulting evacuation by emergency boat and ambulance ride resulted in a partial hip replacement. This has slowed my pace, but not my enthusiasm." Sadly however, Susan did comment, "I can't count the number of broken bones that I have incurred" anymore.
Other interests of Susan's are photographing nature and grandchildren and spending time with her sidekick Scott, whom she takes geo-vacations with across America. She also enjoys reading, watching crime shows, and "even at my age, I still like to color with Crayolas, chalk or pen." She and Scott serve as greeters in church weekly. They also participate in several other Geocaching organizations and "enjoy meeting, talking, and geocaching with geocaching friends."
It was a wise decision to complete the August challenge, and enter qualifying caches, that led this duo to their sizzling win. Now the SLAGA community gets to extend a huge CONGRATULATIONS TO SUSAN AND SCOTT!
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- Written by Terri Nealon
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June, when days are brighter and smiles are bigger, was the month to chase dreams and bask in the glow of new found adventures! And that's just what Uga_Mom, Cindy Smith, did during her participation in the SLAGA Adventure Awaits Challenge. She utilized longer days to chase caches, earn smileys, submit her geocaches for the monthly challenge, and then WIN June's challenge Gift Card prize and sticker. Congratulations Cindy!
Cindy's qualifying caches for the two different states finds plus an event requirement, chosen simply from her recently learned search technique for recent caches that fit the challenge parameter, were the following.
GC9CYCQ Go With The Flow, IL
GC5E3PR THE CACHE CAN/CACHE ME IF YOU CAN, IL
GC77A9R Crooked arrow, MO
GC8KX6N Where is the lady dolphin of the park?, MO
GCAQFJ0 Happy solstice- Penguin Event, MO
When asked why she participates in Adventure Awaits, Cindy commented that "after learning about the Adventure Awaits monthly challenge, from another cacher (cootie_man), I thought I would give it a try. I was able to qualify several months ago, but then missed a month. This last month I tried again and SURPRISE I won the fabulous prize! I’m very excited."
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- Written by Terri Nealon
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{This article was written by Laurie and John Elfrank and submitted here on their behalf with some minor additions and editing.}
Geocaching is a community driven game, and it relies on the support of more than 400 community volunteers. The volunteers are a diverse and dedicated group from over 35 countries who give their time to translate content, moderate forums and review cache pages on behalf of the global geocaching community. Community volunteers are required to adhere to Geocaching HQ’s guidelines and are said to “Obey the Frog” (Signal the FROG is the geocaching.com’s mascot).
In the early 2000s, Groundspeak hosted a reviewer event, and it was called Obey, as in "Obey the Frog." But as the number of volunteers grew, HQ stopped hosting the event, and instead let the volunteers take over hosting in different cities. In North America, they changed the name to (Dis)Obey.
In June 2024, around 30 community volunteers descended upon St. Louis for their annual multi-day gathering in North America, hosted by Missouri reviewer MrHarmonica. Attendees included community volunteers from all over the U.S. and Canada, one from Germany, their families, and a Lackey WatermanHQ (a Geocaching HQ employee from Seattle). They started arriving on June 19, and spent the next four days enjoying activities that appealed to the volunteers and families. MrHarmonica’s schedule included a guided tour of Bellefontaine Cemetery, mini golf at Swing-A-Round Fun Town, a hike at West Tyson County Park, an evening at Breakout Games escape rooms, a tour of St. Louis craft breweries, and time sampling the local cuisine.
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- Written by Terri Nealon
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Our SLAGA board is spicing up the game of geocaching by sponsoring a TRACKABLE RACE! The race, which will be monitored by our fellow SLAGA member and volunteer HobbitTaz (Mark Derr) once again, will run from late May 2024 till January 2025. This exciting new addition to our adventurous pastime is definitely a fun little competition that you may want to consider, but first a little explanation of what a trackable is, for those that may not be familiar.
A trackable is a geocaching game piece owned by a geocacher that has a unique six-digit tracking code etched into it. These codes allow you to track its movement on geocaching.com, as other geocachers retrieve and drop it in different caches. They are different than the small swap items or SWAG that you might find in many cache containers, because trackables are moveable and traveling game pieces. They may appear in many shapes, sizes and styles, and owners often attach a meaningful or fun personal 'token' to the trackable, especially if it's a dog tag type 'travel bug.' Owners often set goals for their trackables, as well, like travel to as many beaches as possible. Geocachers, who retrieve a trackable from a cache, try to help move it to another cache that helps fulfill its goal. When a geocacher moves a trackable, the owner gets a notification. Guidelines for 'logging' trackables and protocol for moving them can be found on GC.com. Most importantly, a geocacher should move a trackable and place it in another geocache preferably in line with its mission and within a reasonable timeframe. Besides the dog tag travel bug, there are also trackable geocoins and other uniquely designed trackable pieces, which many geocachers send out into the world. Trackables are popular items at events too, where cachers 'discover' each other's game pieces.
While geocaching certainly is a favorite pastime, the owning, collecting, discovering, retrieving, moving, and racing trackables is another avenue of fun altogether! Placing a new trackable in a race, with prizes for winners, is always an exciting adventure as cachers track their game piece over many months and places, while competing with the other trackables in the race.
* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *
For this year's SLAGA Trackable Race, there will be three winners, each receiving a $10 gift card prize. There will be one winner for each of three categories. In case of a tie, the tie is broken and winning trackable determined by the most mileage accumulated. The three race categories (with clarifications) are:
* Greatest distance/miles the trackable has traveled during the race.
* Most geocaches that the trackable was dropped in and remained overnight at least,
with the exception of Event caches in which case they may be retrieved the same day.
(A trackable may not be retrieved from a geocache by a cacher who dropped it in that cache.)
* Most unique 'Regions' visited by a trackable ('Region' as defined on GC.com).
(Example: If a trackable visits Canada it receives one point, and if that's in Ontario province,
it receives another point, but if it is moved to a geocache in Quebec,
then it receives that region's one point, but not one for Canada again.)
Additional SLAGA Race Information:
Any style of trackable is permitted entry into this race, but must have ZERO accumulative miles, be in the hands of the owner and been activated. ONLY ONE trackable per Geocaching account is permitted entry in this race.
All entries need to be in the SLAGA boards hands no later than May 15, 2024, where they will all be taken to a major out-of-town event and released all at once into the geocaching world. Turning over your activated trackable to a board member at the SLAGA Spring Picnic Event on April 20th is ideal, however if you are not in attendance, but wish to enter a trackable, then you must arrange getting it to a board member by May 15th.
For convenience, SLAGA will be selling dog tag style travel bug trackables at the SLAGA Spring Picnic, but you may wish to bring an attachable token, charm or toy to personalize your racing trackable before entering it into the race.
So let the race begin by getting your personal trackable game piece ready and entering it into the SLAGA Trackable Race this spring. You'll be glad you did as you follow its progress and its ranking among the other competing trackables of your fellow SLAGA members.
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- Written by Terri Nealon
- Hits: 2468
SLAGA WANTS A MASCOT!
The board is asking for members' help to give SLAGA it's own named mascot. A mascot is anything including an animal, person, character, or object, that is adopted by a group as a symbolic figure. Mascot characters for organizations help engage the community and can create an inviting and fun atmosphere when they appear on organizational announcements, social media, and promotional merchandise too. Mascots are terrific advertising tools. Our own Geocaching.com has "Signal the Frog," and other caching organizations have mascots as well. So if your creative, artful, clever, or not, and want to participate in the SLAGA mascot design and mascot name competition, keep reading.
For this friendly competition, members may submit either a design Or a name Or both, since these two catergories will be voted on separately. More than one entry is permissable from members so we have a variety of options from which to choose. All entries must comply with the following guidelines.
- Mascot design/artwork must be 2-dimensional ORIGINAL work only (to avoid copyright infringement). Any submission that is intellectual property of another company or sports entity will automatically be disqualified
- Mascot design/artwork entry must be submitted without a name on the image, because design entries are separate from name entries. And since there are two separate voting categories for this competition, design and name, it is possible that the chosen design entry could end up with a different chosen name than one that may have been submitted by the winning design creator. Please be aware of this.
- Mascot design and mascot name entries must be FAMILY-FRIENDLY.
- Mascot design and mascot name should reflect some aspect(s) of SLAGA or SLAGAland, or geocaching in general.
- The winning/chosen mascot design and mascot name will become the sole property of SLAGA.
- All entries must be in the hands of the SLAGA Officers no later than midnight May 19, 2024 via email or snail mail attachment.
Email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.
Mailing Address:
SLAGA
101 W. Argonne Dr.
PMB226
Kirkwood, MO 63122
If you are artistically challenged, but have a creative design idea, you are encouraged to join up with another more 'artistic' geocacher to submit your mascot design as a team.
All entries received by May 19 will be presented for voting purposes via email to all members with photos of the design entries and the name entries along with a ballot for voting for your favorites. Voting instructions and the 'respond by' date will be included in the email. This will be conducted similarly to the voting for board officers every term. After the votes are tallied, sometime in early summer, the board will announce the winning design and winning name. Note that final approval of the SLAGA mascot and name will be by the SLAGA board. The winner(s) award will be the recognition, thanks, and notoriety for years to come for having created the SLAGA mascot.
Our geocaching organization's mascot should stand out, entertain, engage and be fun! They should be designed with merchandise like pathtags, trackables, and apparel in mind especially. So get your creative juices flowing and submit your mascot entry by May 19, and give SLAGA a new 'face!'
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