When Should You Archive A Geocache?

Geocaches were never designed to be a permanent fixture in the landscape. Of course it’s fun to find a cache that’s been around for years (especially one that gets a lot of traffic!) but at some point you need to think about archiving it.

042315-RetireACacheAnd archiving doesn’t JUST mean archiving it on Geocaching.com – you also need to go pick up the cache container and deal with it!

Here are three ways you know it’s time to archive a cache:
1. The only container that will fit there is also prone to damage.
I have a great pill-bottle cache. It’s the ONLY size container that will fit in this spot. But it leaks! It’s fine February – June when we get little rain, but come monsoons… The cache turns into a soggy mess. It’s time to either pony up for an expensive cache container or archive the geocache.


2. You no longer are living in the area.
I got special permission by the developer of my subdivision to place a geocache in the nearby park. But now that I’m moving to the other side of town, I’ll be archiving the cache and removing it. Sure I COULD ask another close-by geocacher to adopt it but the developer gave ME permission and only me.

3. You’re tired of maintaining it.
There was a series of three caches a friend placed for me – and then made ME take care of them. One of them was ALWAYS getting muggled. And I just got tired of dealing with it. So after the last time it was stolen, I just archived it and called it good!

When should you archive a #geocache? 3 tips! Click To Tweet

Geocaches really aren’t meant to survive forever. It’s okay to decide they’ve had their day and it’s time to archive it.

As the cache owner, when do YOU archive a geocache?