Geocaching Australia

I am thinking of going for a weekend (1 night) to either Ballarat or Bendigo, but I cannot choose in a few weeks time. I have some questions that I would like to be answered with facts, not opinion.

1. What town has more caches within a 10km radius of the town centre.
2. What town has easier caches (on average)?
3. What town has more creative caches?
4. I am a fan of nightcaches, what town has them?
5. In what town would I be able to get more completed? (what town has caches closer together).

Remember, I am purely going to cache, not do any tourist stuff etc.

Thanks

1. Showing only active caches.
Bendigo Number of matching caches: 189
Ballarat Number of matching caches: 136

2. D/T
Bendigo - Difficulty 1.8, Terrain 1.8
Ballarat - Difficulty 1.9, Terrain 1.7

3, 4 and 5 are opinion based so I can't answer based on your initial criteria.

Bendigo has two night caches
Zombie Apocalypse http://coord.info/GC2NTKF
Tigers First Night Cache http://coord.info/GC2F5GR

Ballarat also has two night caches
Left on Sturt http://coord.info/GC2JBCG
Walking on Simpson http://coord.info/GC2K0XX

Based on - within 10 km, available, with Nightcache attribute set

gmj3191 wrote:Bendigo has two night caches
Zombie Apocalypse http://coord.info/GC2NTKF
Tigers First Night Cache http://coord.info/GC2F5GR

Ballarat also has two night caches
Left on Sturt http://coord.info/GC2JBCG
Walking on Simpson http://coord.info/GC2K0XX

Based on - within 10 km, available, with Nightcache attribute set

However there is a big difference between a trad nightcache and a multi. A trad nightcache is generally false, usually the owner trying to attract people or just putting attributes in for the sake of it. Both of the Bendigo nightcaches are true nightcaches (what i am talking about anyway). I know I didn't specify the type of nightcache, but I did mean real nightcaches (like °'s nightcaches) that use reflectors, firetacks, etc.

Could somebody please tell me how difficult the two Bendigo nightcaches are? Could you do both of them in one night, and also 'HUNTING DROP BEARS AT NIGHT'? Or is that a bit of a stretch

Some additional information.
I've recently got my database up to date, so I'm confident these are all the available caches following a lot of archives lately.

Using Many Thanks to Bendigo as the Bendigo centre point
and
Ballarat Station as the Ballarat centre point for the 10 km limit,

Based on that, my **subjective** opinion based on this and nothing else would be that
Bendigo caches are larger and more interesting, but if you're interested in just clocking up finds, go to Ballarat.

gmj3191 wrote: Ballarat also has two night caches
Left on Sturt http://coord.info/GC2JBCG
Walking on Simpson http://coord.info/GC2K0XX

These two aren't night caches. They can be done at night, but there's nothing special about them.

roundcircle wrote:

gmj3191 wrote: Ballarat also has two night caches
Left on Sturt http://coord.info/GC2JBCG
Walking on Simpson http://coord.info/GC2K0XX

These two aren't night caches. They can be done at night, but there's nothing special about them.

That is what I meant. The description seems like they are just normal caches.

They have the Night Cache attribute set, rather than the Recommended at Night attribute.

Having a quick look at some caches I'm familiar with, this does seem a point of confusion.

My opinion only...
I prefer Ballarat caches, the Bendigo ones frustrate me far too much!
So maybe this is an answer to Q3?..

Bendigo has some rather devilish hides. But then Ballarat has some that are very hard because they are nano's hidden where you could place a large.
We live in Ballarat so have found the majority of caches except for some of ST37E's as they are mostly hard nano's.
I doubt you would get over 100 in a night so really each town would be a good place to cache. Especially if you avoid long multi's and set the difficulty low on a GSAK filter.
Hope you have fun and remember it is really cold in both places at night!

Each of the 3 night caches in Bendigo (inc dropbear) can be done in less than 30 mins each.

My vote is for Bendigo... a lot of caches that make you say "oooooh you tricky s*d". Nice hides there, and plenty of them.

McAdies wrote: I doubt you would get over 100 in a night so really each town would be a good place to cache. Especially if you avoid long multi's and set the difficulty low on a GSAK filter.
Hope you have fun and remember it is really cold in both places at night!

I don't plan to get 100 anyway, and I would probably leave on a saturday morning around 9:00 am and return at about 3/4:00 pm on a Sunday.

Lemmy - Drop bears at night is a lot of fun out in the scrub. If you were to go there Tigersden put out 62 caches for the pre easter event, have a look at Lancoorie (I think that's how its spelt), do the mystery at the caravan park which needs you to find the new caches. The journey will take you all around a part of Victoria steeped in history (with stacks of caches).

Don't forget to log your will attend to next years Oz Mega in Albury