The Original Stash

The geocache The Original Stash (GCF) is the one with which it all began. On 2 May 2000, the United States switched off the jamming that deliberately degraded the civilian GPS signal: accuracy went from around a hundred metres to less than ten. The next day, Dave Ulmer decided to see what difference that made. He buried a black plastic bucket in the woods south of Portland and published its coordinates on the Usenet forum sci.geo.satellite-nav: "GPS Stash Hunt... Stash #1 is there!". Along with a five-word rule that still holds: take some stuff, leave some stuff.

The contents of the bucket became famous: a pencil, two CD-ROMs, a mapping program, a VHS tape of George of the Jungle, a book, four dollars, a slingshot and a can of beans. Three days later, Mike Teague was the first to find it and to report on it online. At the end of May, the word "geocaching" replaced "stash hunt", judged too ambiguous; in September, geocaching.com opened with seventy-five caches listed.

The bucket itself did not last long: the mower of a road maintenance service ground it up. In 2003, a geocacher from Phoenix, TEAM 360, decided to place a commemorative plaque on the spot of the cache. As he dug, his spade struck metal: the can of beans came out of the ground, and Dave Ulmer, present for the ceremony, identified it there and then. Straightened, cleaned and varnished, the Original Can of Beans today travels under glass from mega event to mega event, turned into a trackable.

GCF is archived and nothing remains on the ground, but the address can be visited: the plaque is at the roadside, with a logbook to sign a few metres away (Original Stash Tribute Plaque, maintained by Geocaching HQ).
The icing on the cake: Dave Ulmer filmed the preparation and the hiding of the cache with a camcorder. That video has survived (findable on YouTube under the name "Dave Ulmer & The First Geocache").
So, tempted by the pilgrimage?