Where Did All the Virtual Geocaches Go?

Virtual geocaches, depicted by a ghost icon, are cache sites that have no hidden treasure or log book to sign. These special types of geocaches are usually a significant landmark, such as a statue or a historical building. The cache logs are often a combination of puzzles, facts and a requirement to photograph your location.

In Calgary, virtual geocaches are all but extinct. At www.geocaching.com, no new virtual caches can be placed, so when a virtual is retired, it is gone for good. Here are some of the remaining virtual caches in (mainly downtown) Calgary today:

• Calgary History Tour – Politics, GC53F2 by park2
• Calgary History Tour – Cowboys and the Stampede, GC53E4 by arkyquest
• Calgary History Tour – Outlaws!, GC53E0 by Geomac
• Calgary History Tour – N.W.M.P., GC53B2 by thibaug
• Calgary History Tour – First Nations, GC53DF by Geomac.  This was recently featured as a cache of the week.
• And located at the University of Calgary is Canadian Engineering Anniversary Cairn, GC3ECC by reastick

Groundspeak, the company who hosts and maintains www.geocaching.com, instead made a secondary website called www.waymarking.com which captures the essence of what used to be virtual caches…and more. Waymarking also lists nearby restaurants and ‘common’ points of interest. The same idea as geocaching, a user can collect and tally his locations through a comment and usually a photograph to prove he was there. This website uses your same geocaching username and password, making it easy to discover something new.

Of course, there are many cachers who miss the virtual geocaches – and those that are as equally opposed to bringing them back. What’s your opinion?

Calgary Geocaching Examiner, Britton Cowman, loves to discover something new in the world of geocaching everyday. If you are as equally as curious, click the SUBSCRIBE button today to start receiving updates when new articles are posted. Carpe (the near extinct virtual) cache!