GeoWoodstock is a fine tradition started by an icon in caching today, a man that I consider a friend, JoGps. The first GeoWoodstock was held in Kentucky with the stated purpose of gathering the top ten cachers in the world. The following year it was held in what is sometimes mockingly call Cacheville...Nashville to the uniformed.
I traveled to GW2 with some of my friends from Jacksonville to see what caching was like in the Capital of Cache Density. I enjoyed some of the best caching I had ever experienced. Though I heard Nashville was called the King of Micros, I soon found it was much more. So was GeoWoodstock.
Sometimes in our effort to define caching, we focus our perception of what caching is about. We often hear that caching is not about the numbers, it's not a competition, and it's not about this or that. So, as I approached Woodstock I was a little unsure of what it would be like.
On the way to the event, we stopped to catch a few caches to get warmed up. We arrived a little late and many cachers we already there. We began to mingle and were delighted to meet people wearing name tags bearing names we had only read about or seen in the forums: CCCooper, SBUX, ClayJar, CyBret, MtnMan, The Leprechauns, The Hobos, MonkeyBrad, CarleenP, Mustard Devil and so many more. Suddenly, the man himself, the Organizer of GeoWoodstock, JoGps, stood up on the side of an old pick up truck and said, 'Welcome to GeoWoodstock, where it's all about the numbers." I knew I was home.
I also knew I wanted to host a similar Event in Jacksonville. It would be a great opportunity to showcase our caching community in Florida. As the event wound up, I introduced myself to Jo. We began to talk about what GeoWoodstock was, how it had grown from the beginning and where it would go from there. I expressed our interest in hosting a future GeoWoodstock in Jacksonville before even consulting with my fellow cachers from NEFGA.
As Jo and I were discussing the event, one thing Jo said struck me, and I am continually reminded of it as we plan for GW3. Jo said, "...this is the closest thing we have to a National Convention for cachers." I have often pondered what a national convention for anything would be like, but that day in a park in Tennessee, I realized what it was to be a part of the caching community. We all have our opinions of what caching is and what caching isn't but I realized on that day, underneath what everybody says, it is okay to get together once a year and have an event "Where it IS all about the numbers."
So, the Northeast Florida Geocachers Association would like to extend an invitation to all cachers to come to Jacksonville, Florida on Memorial Day Weekend 2005 for the National Convention of Geocaching, GeoWoodstock 3. We are working to put on the premiere Geocaching event of the year for cachers from around the world. Our hope is that, for one weekend, we can all take time to celebrate our sport together in a sandy beachside park. We will have many opportunities for cachers, young and old, long hikers, micro hunters to just plain old Number Hos. Please make your plans to come and be a part of GeoWoodstock3 "Where it's all about the Numbers."
