GIGA status is awarded by the folks who pull the strings at geocaching.com to only one event each year. One requirement is an expected attendance of 5,000 or more registered cachers six months before the event itself. Or some such. I'm not 100% certain. There have only been five others, all of them in Europe. This year, the annual GeoWoodstock got the nod, so I road tripped to Cincinnati, Ohio, for a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. More than 8,000 cachers (and friends and families) from all over the world took over the old Coney Island amusement park adjacent to the Ohio River, just south of downtown Cinci.
I added five new states and about 50 caches to my stats, ate some wonderful local food, and camped two nights in a tent just barely big enough for me. I tried lab caches for the first time. I spent all day Saturday with some geopals from Houston. We all had a blast! However, I think I'll nab a flight or a driving buddy for future events this far away: driving 2,000 miles solo is exhausting...
Below is a group photo of just a fraction of the attendees. Timing was sketchy because of approaching thunderstorms, so not everyone was aware this was happening. I'm in there, somewhere below the X.
