Cache hunting for Newbies
and the Gurus

After putting the first chapter of this series online, its appears to come across as discouraging rather than encouraging to those interested in cache hunting. That was not our intention at all and here we wish to elaborate on encouragement for newbies.

Many treasure hunters cache hunt as a hobby. While there's no doubt these people enjoy what they are doing it really is a serious undertaking. It will take weekend cache hunters and newbies a long time, to gain enough field experience to make a strike. Still, the outdoor fun and exercise is worth the attempt. Again and it can’t be stressed enough, family men just don’t have the time required to complete the necessary research and field work without it weighing heavily on family life. It takes a strong wife to allow a man the freedom he needs to become proficient at cache hunting. It is far better if the spouse joins in the treasure hunt. However, you can’t take children treasure hunting in the desert or forests where danger lurks beneath and around every nook and cranny.

In years past, countless cache hunters dropped out of main stream America and did nothing but search for buried treasure. The families of those, for the most part, suffered from loneliness and financial distress. Probably 99% of those treasure hunters died poor and left a family in dire poverty. Is it worth it? I’d say no. Not unless the person had some truly useful information that could lead to treasure. Then, still its one chance in a million for a payday.

If you weigh all the above and still think you have time and means to treasure hunt, go for it. If you do please bear this one thing in mind. A very smart man named, Arthur Hays Sulzberger said: "A man's judgment cannot be better than the information on which he has based it." Truer words have never been spoken and this is fair warning to all of us. We must be as sure as humanly possible that the information we are betting our time and money on is the best available.

Never take anything you read or hear nor anyone you meet at face value. Here are a few things to watch for:

1. Beware of anyone who seeks you out to help you with a treasure hunt.

   (If they were really experienced they wouldn’t need your site. There are far too many, easy to find, treasure areas out there without trying to jump someone else’s claim. I once met a guy who was driving 400 miles one way to treasure hunt in Oklahoma. He was from a Midwestern state that I knew had lots of KGC treasure. I bet him $500.00 that he was driving past at least a dozen KGC depositories on his way south. He took me up on the bet and I paid him a visit a few months later. I showed him three treasure areas within 50 miles of his home. Needless to say I had no out of pocket expenses for the trip.)

   (Another time I attended a treasure show in Oklahoma and some friends accompanied me home after the show. They spent two days with me touring three different KGC depositories. I pointed out what to look for identifying KGC treasure sites. One of them was born and raised in Kansas. After his visit with us, he went to visit family in his old hometown. As he drove to the old farmstead where he was raised he spied KGC markers along the road and within a couple of hours had discovered a complete depository. True story!)

2. Walk away from anyone who brags he can positively find the treasure and quickly.

   (Any experienced cache hunter knows finding buried treasure is the most difficult thing a person will ever do, even if he’s found several other caches previously. Those burying the treasure put a great deal of thought into laying a trail of clues that would lead them or others in their group back to the treasure even after many years. You are not apt to walk around waving a metal detector and just happen to find the cache. If you do not have a map, the clues in and around the treasure area must be deciphered and a map drawn from them to locate the cache. Treasure areas are usually very large and it’s impossible to cover every foot of earth with a detector, no matter what you use. Nope you must play by their rules and you won’t even know what they are until you finally solve their puzzle.)

3. Run from any stranger or new friend who claims he’ll spend his own money finding your treasure.

4. The second part of that is always, "but you’ll have to trust me and tell me all you know about the situation."

On the matter of getting a treasure hunters education there are certain individuals we should be leery of. We've all met this guy. One or more of these gurus live in almost every town. He is always an older man found hanging around coffee shops or restaurants. (For whatever reason the gurus seldom hangout in bars and beer joints, maybe they can’t afford to be drunks.) The type we are talking about here is the one you'll find setting at a table with several other old timers and usually has control of the conversation. He only drinks coffee never ordering breakfast, nicotine stains cover the first two joints of his cigarette holding fingers and his old feed store, freebie, cap is about due for an oil change. The Guru can repeat word for word every treasure tale ever told. He has them memorized so well they sound like a record played over and over. He can converse, with seeming intelligence, on any buried treasure you care to mention. In his lifetime he has known practically every treasure hunter who ever was. He can talk for hours on end about his treasure hunting but seldom mentions anything being found. That's okay! Few treasure hunters admit to finding treasure. The joke is, that as the Guru talks treasure, he asks around the table if anybody can spare a cigarette! Now are you quite sure you want to trust any advice received from this Guru? Would you spend $500 or $1,000 chasing a tip you got from this man?

Lately a few books are appearing that give away some of the facts needed to pursue "Knights of the Golden Circle" cache hunting. Please don't think these books provide the whole package. They are sort of kindergarten primers for primary students. They provide a starting place for people to begin to learn the ropes of cache hunting. It will take the best students several years before they are close to being proficient at searching for K.G.C. treasure.

Education can be gained in only two ways, either someone teaches you or you learn on your own. Unfortunately apprenticeships for cache hunters are seldom offered. Too many of those who seek out real cache hunters turn out to be thieves and crooks. Those few undesirables prevent honest people from learning some of the secrets.

Yep! I mean the type of bird that listens to what you say and then repeats it over and over. They are found on treasure hunting forums too. They are the ones that post on nearly every subject brought up and claim to be experts on all phases of treasure work. We don’t need to spend much time here as you already know the parrots. Never tell a parrot anything, they’ll repeat it to everyone who will listen and of course they never admit the information was learned from someone else. I suppose they don’t think anyone but themselves ever reads anything.

This concludes the chapter on Newbies and Gurus.

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