The Most Elusive Icon In Geocaching

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

If you look at the stats for any geocacher, you’ll notice that for each geocache type, there is an icon. Traditionals, multi’s, puzzles, etc.

As you start to scroll down the list of geocache types that a person might find, you’ll begin to notice some icons that are rarely seen on your geocaching map, or even on a persons profile. For our article of the week, I thought it would be interesting to showcase some of the lesser known icons for geocache types that are still available for finding, depending on where you are, and how ambitious you might be.

Geocaching HQ Geocache

This icon is unique to the actual headquarters of geocaching.com. Located in Seattle, WA, one can obtain this icon if they go into the offices of Groundspeak. Usually this is done on Fridays and people can make appointments to go in, see a portion of the office, check out a huge trunk filled with TBs, and see the live geocaching logging map.

GPS Adventures Maze Exhibit

This icon represents an actual moving “exhibit” that showcases all things GPS related, including geocaching. This particular type of geocache retired in the United States after 7 years. It is now only available in Canada and certain parts of Europe. It is currently available in Edmonton at GC58J1B

Giga-Event Cache

Now the most recent elusive icon (as of this writing), the Giga-Event icon represents an event cache that is intended to have more than 5,000 attendees. The first one of these ever held was in Germany in 2014. Two other Giga events were announced for this year, of which one of them has already gone by.

Lab Caches

Pegged as a research and development type of cache, these caches are exceptionally rare. The only places you will find lab caches today are at mega events. These caches are unique in that they can be anything, anywhere, and they do not fall under the saturation, or commercial guidelines. In most cases, it involves you going somewhere and finding a code which you can then use to log the lab cache. These are not logged the same way as other caches but are logged through a unique portion of the geocaching.com website. Lab caches will be available this summer at the M3 mega.

 Geocaching Block Party

This unique geocache refers to the block party events that are held near geocaching HQ in Seattle every year. A portion of the streets near the offices of Groundspeak are blocked off and a big celebration of geocaching is held there. This event has been going on since the 10 year anniversary of geocaching. This years event will be the last block party.

Project A.P.E Geocaches

Originally conceived as a tie-in to the remake of Planet of the Apes, these caches were hidden all over the world in limited numbers. Each cache represented it’s own fictional story tied to the movie. Only 12 were hidden and now only one remains. Mission 4: Southern Bowl, is located near Sao Paulo, Brazil and is  considered to be somewhat of the holy grail of geocaches since it is now the only remaining one in the world. Once archived, this cache type will be gone forever.

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So for those of you who are looking for new challenges in the world of geocaching, why not try and tackle one of the above icons. Have you found any of these?