2015 Year in Review & Goals for 2016

Wow, it’s already 2 ½ weeks into 2016 already. I’ve been meaning to write a “Year in Review” post but just haven’t had the time. So here it goes.
As of the end of 2015 I have been geocaching for 1 year, 4 months. 2015 was a great caching year.

• I found 564 caches (plus 12 lab caches) on 145 caching days
• I attended my first Mega event, ASP Geobash X in May, along with Berkshire Geobash in July
• I made a trip to New York City in April and completed the Bridges & Arches of Central Park multi (GC17MX1) along with many other highly favored caches in the Big Apple
• A trip to Arizona in April for a family reunion allowed me to find the oldest cache in Arizona (GC57),  and my furthest from home cache to date, 1990 miles away
• Thanks to the Summer Geocaching Road Trip, I found my first of several 5 star caches
• I found 8 cache types in 1 calendar day
• On a trip to the Bahamas, I found my first international cache, “Atlantis” (GCC418)
• I added 6 new states to my caching map
• I published my first and second Earthcaches (GC5TZ00 & GC633EQ)
• I hosted 7 events and attended a total of 22
• I completed the New York State Star geoart (GC52TQV) (minus 1 DNF)

While these may seem like small accomplishments to some people I take great pride in what I have accomplished over the past year. Geocaching has allowed me to get outside and do things I probably never would have otherwise done; I went kayaking, I hiked up a mountain, I traveled, I went camping more times in a year than I ever have before and I made friends I never would have met without Geocaching. I’m hoping that 2016 brings many new, amazing memories.

Here’s some of my goals for this year. I’m fairly confident that most of these will actually happen but some are stretch goals. But how can you get anywhere in life if you don’t set the bar high, right?

• Make it to 1000 finds
• Host more events, including a CITO
• Hide more creative and fun caches
• Find caches along the kayak trail at Oak Orchard

• Make it to GeoWoodstock 14er and hopefully attend a Giga event!
• Attend more Megas; ASP Geobash XI (GC66H9W), Midwest Geobash (GC66A5W), L&A County Geocaching Event (GC64BR7)
• Find caches in more new states (Going to GW14 will make a huge impact on this one)
• Meet up with cachers I have gotten to know through podcasts and Twitter
• Find Mingo (GC30)! (Going to GW14 will also help this one happen)
• Publish another Earthcache
• Complete and find more challenge caches (we’ll see what the 1 year moratorium brings for this)
• Fill in more spots on my Finds Calendar, Jasmer and Fizzy grids

And most importantly get outside and have fun!