Garden Tool Set

Gold Earthcache Master

April 2012 saw us achieve our silver mastery of Earthcaching goodness. At the beginning of this year we decided that we wanted to reach gold level and if possible reach the highest master level, platinum.

We like doing things like this as they're little challenges to ourselves. They may not mean much to most people, but to us they're a way of adding a little excitement into our lives and doing things as a team. As neither of us know much about geology, it's also a nice way of learning a bit more about the wonderful Earth we call home!

In order to reach the gold level we needed to visit and log twelve or more Earthcaches in four or more states/countries and have developed two or more Earthcaches.

Piggle Dene

Developed Caches
The two Earthcaches we've developed are both in our home county of Wiltshire:
1) Westbury Zig Zag (GC3J11Y) was the our first Earthcache creation and it's based at a massive chalk quarry. Earthcache must have an educational element to them. It's one of the things that make these cache types so special; as you're not just visiting a wonderful place, but also learning about how it was created or why it's special. In this Earthcache we provided information from an old interpretation board (sadly now gone) about the accumulation of chalk. Using this information we ask cachers to provide an estimate of how long it would have taken for this chalk deposit to have built up.
2) Piggle Dene Earthcache (GC4XCBD) is our second creation. It's part of a wonderful National Nature Reserve and home to a 'train' of sarsen stones that were deposited during the freezing and thawing of glaciers. With this Earthcache we ask a fun question: Why are the sarsen stones nicknamed grey wethers? Along with asking for the size of one of the stones and asking cachers what the stone feels like and asking for their suggestion of why the stone feels the way it does. We've had some wonderful suggestions, both serious and fun - including one cacher who said that the stone feels wet and suggested that this was because it had been raining!

Beautiful cottages at Lockeridge Dene, GCQV4Y

Found caches
Since we gained the Silver Earthcache Award we've found the following Earthcaches, in chronological order:
1) GC1JR9Y North East Lincolnshire, England. This cache is about the formation of sand dunes and the habitats of Sand Dunes, Mud Flats, Salt Marsh.
2) GCQV4Y Wiltshire, England. This cache is part of the same National Nature Reserve as our Piggledene Earthcache and gave us the inspiration to make our Earthcache as part of the Fyfield Down series of Earthcaches.
3) GC16PVH Wiltshire, England. This cool cache is about the limestone rock that makes the iconic Bath Stone.
4) GC4RM5T Wiltshire, England. This cache is based at a rock circus. A stone circle that was made from rocks, fossils and minerals for the sole purpose of educating anyone that comes across it.


Along with the Master Awards there is also an award for finds only, called the EarthCache Discovery Awards. The first award is for 50 finds and ranges up to 1000+ finds! It'll be a long while before we've amassed enough Earthcaches to start this series! Until then, we're happy with our Gold Level and hope to get to Platinum in the next year or so. I'd encourage anyone and everyone to give it a go - it's fun and it's free!