We had an appointment at Geocaching headquarters for the afternoon. So we drove to the Fremont district, a kind of artists' quarter, and sought out the origins of geocaching. Since we had some time before our appointment at 2 p.m., we first completed a geocaching tour. This tour, consisting of nine caches of all currently available geocaching types, was very varied and beautifully designed. We passed the Fremont Troll, the Public Library, and a small rocket. We also came across one of the world's largest trackables on a newspaper box.
Geocaching HQ
Right on time at 2 p.m., we took the elevator to the 3rd floor of a new office building. The Geocaching headquarters has been located here for a few years now. We were very warmly welcomed by Holly (hollywollyoxenfree) She receives visitors. She organizes all visits to headquarters and then looks after the guests.
Today we met up with geocachers from Texas, California, and Belgium. We started with a brief history of geocaching and some other interesting information. Then we got to search for the special Geocaching HQ cache. Of course, we won't reveal what it looks like here. But it's not that hard to find. :) Anyway, it contains a logbook, a photo album, and countless trackables (TBs). There's a photo booth for the album. We took four fun instant photos and then pasted them into the album. Afterward, we settled down at a picnic table and signed the logbook. We also had time to discover some of the numerous TBs. We also left two TBs that we had brought from Germany and took two others with us. On a monitor behind the picnic table, an interactive Google Maps application showed where a cache was currently being logged. Pretty cool how you see a different spot on Earth every 20 seconds. We noticed that there were many German-language logs.
Derek, one of the first of the current 78 employees, then brought us two special TBs. He had received them from a school class in Colorado who were using them for an interactive biology experiment. There are four TBs, each representing a component of DNA. We received thymine and adenine. Everyone who picks up one of these TBs is supposed to take a picture of themselves with it. The seventh graders then analyze the different faces to see how DNA is distributed across various countries and cultures. The group whose TB travels the farthest wins a pizza party at the end of the school year.
Holly also told us about a new type of cache currently being tested as a lab cache. This type will be based on iBeacon technology. There was already such a cache at headquarters, but unfortunately, our smartphone and the technology didn't work. So, we admired some special trackables in a display case, including the first trackable to have been in space on the ISS.
