[pct-l] A good word for caching

[pdhoffma at swbell.net (Peter Hoffman)]

I want to put in a good word for caching.  On my '03-'04 AT hike I 
cached food and other supplies about 20 - 25 times.  I was shuttling a 
truck along with me and would move the truck ahead about 7 to 10 days. 
 When I moved the truck I would place two or three caches in the woods 
at three or four days intervals.   I never lost a cache.  There was one 
that had some teeth marks from some small critter, like a possum or 
raccoon, otherwise they were undisturbed.  

I used the Ursack bags and had a cover that I made from camo silnylon 
fabric that the bags fit into.  I tied the bag to the base of a small 
tree and throw some leaves and stick over it and it would literally 
disappear.  As another poster mentioned, I had trouble finding the first 
few.  I evolved a system of marking several trees leading to the cache 
with duct tape.  Each cache was out there for a few days to a week, not 
for an extended period of time.  

It was probably a wash on time because of having to arrange with 
shuttlers to drive me back to the starting point of the section.  It did 
keep me on the trail without having to hitch to town.  For instance, in 
'04 I went 15 days without leaving the trail, just picking up the caches.