Geocaching #GeekoftheWeek - witzend

Welcome to our second edition of the Geocaching #GeekoftheWeek, this week featuring true Renaissance man - witzend.

witzend has been geocaching since 2004, where he found his first geocache while visiting his hometown for a high school reunion. While he enjoys the hobby and has passed on his enthusiasm to several others you may be surprised that his "find count" isn't among the top in his area. 

This is because he continually seeks out innovation, quality, and social aspects of geocaching over find counts. This is evidenced by having finds in 20 states and four countries, being a frequent familiar face at geocaching events, and being a proud owner of an A.P.E. icon.

Growing up in Southern California, witzend is a true Disneyland junkie but also considers the Northwest home as he's lived here his entire adult life. Living in the Northwest has allowed him access to people and places where he can enjoy some of his passions including camping, geocaching, photography/videography, amateur radio, and schuhplattler.  

Like we said - a true renaissance man who is a life-long learner and always making something new or improving on something in his garage which doubles as his podcasting studio. Of course, when not attending to family, work, or these hobbies, he's helping with the local amateur radio enthusiasts or working as a freelance videographer (including 20 years on the crew at the Puyallup Fair).

He is proudest however of his family - "My children have grown into amazing and wonderful adults in spite of my parenting and of course my wife of almost 29 years is a big reason for that."

You can catch witzend every week on the Caching in the Northwest podcast recorded live Thursday nights at 9:00pm Pacific on YouTube. 

Do you know someone who deserves being recognized as a Geocaching #GeekoftheWeek? Let us know by commenting on this post or tweeting your nominee to @LANMonkeyGC #GeekoftheWeek

How to Get a Canadian TB Contest in 4 Easy Steps

How many of my fellow Geocachers are also tired of “residents of the USA only” Geocaching trackable promotions? Well, I’ve tried the route of complaining until I’m blue in the face and that didn’t work. But here’s an idea that will.

If all of us follow these four simple steps, we’ll get the attention of Canadian outdoors & activity retailers and soon have our very own Canadian Geocaching Trackable promotion. 

An important point to understand is that it is not Geocaching.com who decides where a trackable promotion will be active - that decision is primarily made by the marketing (and legal?) teams from the company sponsoring the promotion. So let's motivate some marketing teams to get on board with this!

1. Share the Message on Facebook and Twitter

Sample Twitter Messages:

Hey @MEC want a deep reach to 30k #Canadian #outdoor enthusiasts? Try a #geocaching TB promotion! https://www.geocaching.com/promotions/

@CanadianTire DYK there’s 30,000 active #outdoor enthusiasts across #Canada you could get to promote your message? https://www.geocaching.com/promotions/

Sample Facebook Messages:

There’s a huge marketing success secret that @TimHortons doesn’t know! Like and share if you agree they could get 30,000 Canadians passionately sharing their message if they launched a #Geocaching Trackable promotion! https://www.geocaching.com/promotions/

Like and share if you think @CanadianTire should launch a #Canadian #Geocaching trackable promotion for us 30,000+ awesome Canuck geocachers, eh! https://www.geocaching.com/promotions/

2. Make Sure to Attach a Picture

It’s a proven fact that photos add “stickiness” to tweets and posts, and attract more attention. Check through this post for some pictures you can use, but don’t let me limit your awesome creativity!

3.  Support Each Other!

If you see one of these posts or tweets from a fellow Geocacher, make sure to like, repost, retweet, etc. the message. The more activity these messages have the more the target companies will pay attention.

4. Share Your Awesome Ideas

I KNOW you’re smarter than I am, so if you can think of other companies we could all be targeting these messages to, share your ideas with all of us Canadian Geocachers by using the hashtags #Geocaching and #TrackableCanada on Twitter, and posting to Facebook groups like “You Might be a Geocacher if…” and the other various Geocaching online groups.

The more of us that get active posting these messages, and the more likely sponsors we target, the better our odds of getting a CANADIAN trackable promotion launched!

Geocaching #GeekoftheWeek - DarrylW4

Welcome to our very first Geocaching #GeekoftheWeek feature!

Today's #GeekoftheWeek is darrylW4, host of the GeoGeardHeads podcast.

Darryl is acknowledged as an authority on Geocaching and geo-location technologies, and shares his insights on these topics weekly on the Thursday evening GeoGearHeads podcast with his co-host Chris of the Northwest and various guests.

What may be lesser known is that Darryl also loves cycling, and started in the podcasting world talking about cycling. His love of photography has also brought him to be at the leading edge of 360 video and photography, as well as real-time video social media technologies like Periscope for sharing his geocaching adventures.

Through the GeoGearHeads podcast listeners are introduced to great ideas in the geekier side of Geocaching including 3D printing, caching in education, puzzle caching, and many other topics.

In 2016, Darryl & Chris interviewed the hosts of several other Geocaching related podcasts to provide a "behind the scenes" look at how the podcasts came to be, and are made. You can check out the Geocaching Podcast Profiles at this link.  


Perhaps lesser known outside of the geocaching podcaster community is how much Darryl has helped other podcasters get started and tune their shows through his own knowlege and experience. 

Check out GeoGearHeads live every Thursday at 9:10pm Eastern or 6:10pm Pacific on YouTube. You can subscribe to the audio version of the podcast through iTunes, Play, RSS, or Stitcher, watch the shows on YouTube, and check them out on FaceBook, Google+, and Twitter.

Do you know someone who deserves being recognized as a Geocaching #GeekoftheWeek? Let us know by commenting on this post or tweeting your nominee to @LANMonkeyGC #GeekoftheWeek