What if the whole world could be a treasure hunt? Turns out, it already is. Beginning in May 2000 with the public release of GPS technology, “Geocaching” is an outdoor activity where players use coordinates on GPS devices or smartphones to find hidden containers called geocaches.  

 

Whether it’s a thumbnail-sized capsule stuck to the back of a road sign, a pill bottle tucked into a guardrail, or a plastic container hidden in the forest, geocaches can come in any form. According to the Geocaching website, there are more than 3.4 million active containers listed worldwide, hidden in 191 countries across all seven continents. Some are hidden in the Boothbay region.

 

Boothbay Harbor's Martha Cowdery and husband Mike Tomko have been geocaching for 12 years and have found 435 caches in locations across the U.S. Back when the pair first began, players had to write down coordinates from the Geocaching website and hope they had luck out in the field. Nowadays, the app makes tracking easier. Each geocache has a display page with features that can visually guide players and sometimes offer hints from the original hider or other visitors.  

 

“The thing that we love about this is that we'll go off peninsula ... and we'll look for these stops along the way, and it takes us to places that we wouldn't normally have been able to stop and see,” said Tomko.

 

Cowdery added, “Or even know there was access to. Some beautiful stone beach, or just different kinds of historical places that people bring you to that you would never have thought about.”  

 

People are incredibly creative with their hides, whether in aesthetic execution or camouflage. One of the pair’s most memorable finds was a mushroom made from painted spray-foam urethane, placed in the grass like a real fungus. There can be surprises inside, as well. Alongside a log to record the find, some will have little trinkets to keep, or trackables to deposit in other caches.  

 

The pair has included such prizes before in the 17 geocaches they maintain throughout the region, including spots adopted from Boothbay Region Land Trust. One of their most popular is “Beware of Ducks,” a spot next to a very active duck pond on Road’s End in Boothbay Harbor, which players have been known to leave little plastic birds inside. On the couple’s end, one trackable they placed in a cache made it to Scotland.  

 

“We developed a series that would lead people (down the peninsula) because we were thinking, ‘What a great way to bring people to the area if they start following the trails of geocaches,’” said Tomko.  

 

When players log their find, they can leave a message, and the pair loves hearing stories of favorite restaurants or beautiful sunsets from visitors hailing from all around the world. “It’s just very uplifting,” said Tomko.

 

Geocaching is free, but an annual membership of $40 unlocks the coordinates to more caches.