Cacher Incognito: The Art of Stealth

This article was originally published on Cache Up NB. It has been mirrored here for archive purposes only.

I haven’t found myself doing a lot of urban caching in the last year or so. I’ve gone out and done a few trails here and there, and while on the road for work, I’ve snagged a few here and there but many times I focus on getting virtuals which are easy to snag without being spotted.

A quick glance at the official forum and there’s a discussion about “covering up” what you do. It got me to thinking about the art of being stealthy. As my caching career has gone on, I have found myself less and less stealthy in some of the caches I have found, whereas others I am still very careful not to be spotted.

If you’re out on a trail, or in the middle of nowhere, there really isn’t a need to conceal what you are doing. However, in the urban areas, it’s very likely that someone may spot what you are doing and wonder if it’s nefarious in some way. It’s for this reason we use the “stealth” attribute on many urban caches. This let’s folks know that you should do your best to try to conceal what you are doing, for fear that a muggle might remove the cache.

In some ways, I like the idea of stealth. Can I get that container out from where I know it is, without someone seeing me, and having to explain the entire concept of geocaching to someone who will probably look at me and think I’m crazy. Those tricky hides that are concealed so well but when spotted by a cacher cause us to smile or grin in knowing that we’ve finally found it.

On the other hand, there’s also the part of me that quite frankly doesn’t care if someone spots me. In my early days as a cacher, I was excessively paranoid about being spotted. Now, depending on where I am, I’ll just go for it, because in most cases, no one is really going to notice anyway. Unless you’re climbing up on something and really obviously doing something you shouldn’t, there are times where I just snag the container, sign the log, and put it back.

Both the art of stealth, and the “just go for it” have their own merits. I’ve purposely thrown a set of car keys into a bush as an excuse to search through it. But I’ve also pulled the skirt up on a lampost in the middle of a park knowing full well someone might spot me. It’s never lead to an issue, but I do think that in some cases, the art of stealth really should be exercised.

Do you have your own stealth techniques? Have you pretended to talk on your phone to cover up the fact you were looking for a cache? Has anyone ever asked you what you were doing and you had to explain it to them?