Carlsbad area.
I went looking for my first geocache in January 2002. It was missing. The container had been taken or moved and there was nothing at the coordinates. This seemed like an appropriate introduction to the hobby.
I went back in April and found one.
Geocaching is, at its core, a very elegant trick for making you go somewhere you wouldn’t otherwise go. Someone hides a container in a location — often a scenic or interesting spot — logs the GPS coordinates, and other people go find it. The activity gives you a destination. It makes a walk into a search. It gives you a reason to be in places that you’d drive past.
I found the second cache near Palomar Airport after lunch with Art, who I’d spent the meal complaining to about the job. The walk was better than the lunch.
At Carlsbad beach I’d pick up a giant load of rocks along the way. That was the secondary activity. The geocache was the excuse to be at the beach, which let me pick up rocks, which was the actual activity.
I had a rock tumbler at home. It was making noise at all hours. The rocks had to come from somewhere.