Welcome!!!!

You have reached the homepage of the Michigan Geocaching Organization (MiGO). The purpose of our organization is to promote the sport of Geocaching in Michigan via improved communications and to provide information to the public about our activities and the sport of geocaching. Please spend some time on our site. If you have any questions, feel free to contact us or visit www.geocaching.com for more details.

Join MiGO Today! Membership gives you many benefits. MiGO is one of the oldest and most respected Geocaching organizations in the country. Since our inception in April, 2002 we have grown both in size and stature. In 2007 we were granted an organizational land use permit by the Michigan DNR. This permit enables MiGO members to place caches on permitted DNR lands, with the appropriate permit where required, at no fee. This is just one of the many benefits of your membership. You'll also become part of a local and tight-knit Geocaching community with an active interest in caching in our state. Members have access to our forums and are encouraged to participate. We also have a very active Facebook Group which is a great place to meet cachers and learn the game.

To Join, renew or upgrade your membership, pull down the Membership Menu.

Announcements

Thank you to all the volunteers who helped make the 2023 Winter Social a large success. There were upwards of thirty people involved in this effort, too many to mention here. Thanks also to all who attended, bought SWAG (etc.), donated to the Silent Auction, bought items from the silent auction, and just plain made donations to the organization. We are collecting photos and will create a Winter Social 2023 photo album. We are also gathering information to show off the gadget and creative caches.

The ZFC Winners Photo Op Contest rolled out at the end of January. This is all-year contest for winners of the monthly ZFC Photo Contests. See the announcement below.

The Pick Your Poison contest is open for entry and will runs March 1st through May 31st. See March Promotions for more.

The new Executive Committee and RVPs take office March 1st. The Leadership page will be updated after the March 7th EC meeting.

The February ZFC Photo Contest photos and winners are scrolling below. The March Contest is also open.

Welcome to our new officers:

Our new Executive Committee Secretary: Robb Lamer (CCSquire),
Our new Executive Committee Member At Large, Peter Hoyt (KazooOtters).
Our new Southeast Regional Vice President, Grace VanCamp (Grayseelou).
Our new Southwest Regional Vice President, Sarah Johnson (Sarahjo27)

Congratulations to:

Our new Executive Committee President, Jodi Spalding (LiteOnCache). Jodi has been on the EC as a Member At Large and most recently, Vice President.
Our new Executive Committee Vice President, Dan Cable (DanTMan&Co). Dan been a Member At Large.
Our new 5th Chapter Vice President, Joel Wilkins (iatsemedic). Joel also continues as an EC Member At Large

And a huge THANK YOU to outgoing officers:

Executive Committee Member, Steve Bassette (RemSpec), who served 5 years as MiGO President.
Executive Committee Member, Nikki Wolfin (Nikkiwolf25) who served 5 years as a Secretary.
Southeast Regional Vice President Laura Lisiscki (llski) who led (2022) and contributed (2023) Winter Socials.

Bios for our Board Members, Executive Committee Members and Regional Vice Presidents can be found on the Leadership page under the About menu.

MiGO Susan K. Schug Scholarship

The winners of the 2023 Susan K. Schug Scholarship were announced at the 2023 Winter Social. They are.

$300 - Jared Christensen, a junior at Lake Superior State University, study wildlife conservation focusing on fish and their habitat. Jared is the son of member Barb Christensen, Fabulousfour1975.

$150 - Sara Landon, RoaminThirtiesGirl, a MiGO Member. Sara is working towards finishing an Associates Program in Accounting at Lake Michigan College.

$150 - Kollen L. Dault, a freshman at Mott Community College, studying Nursing. Kollen is the son of member Janice Dault, babybluejay.

2023 Silver Coin Awards

Congratulations to the 2023 Silver Coin Award Winners:

Lou Ann Cousinaw, a.k.a. DirtBikeGranny
Robert and Claudia Councell, a.k.a. RDC4106
Joel Wilkins, a.k.a. iatsemedic

The full text of the awards can be seen at: Silver Coin Awards 2023
The list of past winners can be seena at: Silver Coin Award List

Zoom... Focus... Click! - February 2023
Congratulations to:
1st Place -LiteOnCache
2nd Place - AdventureMike
3rd Place -llski
Honorable Mentions: K&A Enterprises & grizz-rider

Prizes (non-personalized) ware available to be mailed.
or you can wait a couple weeks for a personalized version.

Aside from first place, which was won by a landslide by LiteOnCache, this was another incredibly close monthly contest. The rest of the top five, plus one, were separated by just four points. A tie breaker was used to reduce the top six to the top five. Again, there were lots of great entries. Some probably lost due to missing the theme by more than others. Congratulations to the winners and all who participated. Thank you to our members who helped select the winners. Keep up the good work. Let's attract some more new photographers.

Lake Superior Member 2023 Geocoin.

Another beautiful Chris Mackey design. This is the preliminary artwork for the 2023 version of the Lake Superior Member Geocoin. All Lake Superior members get one of these coins as part of their membership.
If you are not in the renewal cycle and you want to upgrade your membership to Lake Superior, use the Upgrade process in the Membership menu.

The coins will be ordered December 1st for delivery by Winter Social 2024. Become a Lake Superior Member or renew your Lake Superior Membership between December 1st, 2022 and November 30th, 2023. Use your Additional Data in your profile to tell us how to get your coin to you, to express your interest in purchasing additional copies and if you want yours personalized.

The MiGO 20th Anniversary Geocoin is available to order in the MiGO Store. Get yours before they are gone.

May Promotions

Coming May 20th

We Need Your Help

MiGO is assisting the Houghton Lake Area Tourism Bureau and the West Branch Visitors Bureau get the ORB GeoTour up and running. We need your help building some creative caches. We are not looking for gadget caches that are very difficult to get into. We are looking for caches that will put a smile on cacher's faces and favorite points on the log page.

We need 15 or more creative caches ready to hide. They should be:

Large enough to hold lock-n-lock with interior dimensions large enough for a 3x5 spiral log book.
Large enough to hold a second container for SWAG.
Optional: Large enough to hold a third container for trackables.
Builders can be reimbursed up to $25 per cache with receipts.
No placing required. ORBTour Team members will place the caches.
No maintenance required. ORBTour will maintain the GeoTour.
ORBTour will own the caches.

Message Merlin1392 on Geocaching.com to volunteer a cache.

March - May Promotions

Geocaching Contest

In this contest you will be picking your own challenges to complete. There are ten challenges in each of four categories. The categories correspond to various poisons ranging in strengths and difficulties. Do one, do ten, do some in each category or do them all. This is a longer than usual promotion to give you time to complete as many as you want. There are prizes along the way and more prizes at the end. Click the button below for details.

Pick Your Poison Contest Page

Entry
Opens:
2/25/23

Contest
Starts:
3/1/23

Prizes Along
The Way:
21st of Month

Entry
Closes:
5/18/23

Contest
Ends:
5/31/23

Data
Submitted by:
6/1/23

Unofficial results as of March 21st...

Entrants:
Challenges Completed:
1 point Challenges Completed:
2 point Challenges Completed:
4 point Challenges Completed:
8 point Challenges Completed:
Most Challenges Completed:
Most Points Scored

Bonus points not included. Additional verification is still being done, so the results are preliminary.

53
58
38
5
11
4
13 by bgscrabble
40 by RXWranglers

Zoom... Focus... Click! - March 2023

The MiGO Photo Contest runs for each calendar month.
Reminder: only photos taken during the contest period are eligible.

Winners (Top 3) will get a special trackable that can be used in the Photo Op Winners Contest that runs for the calendar year.

The theme for this month is:

Third Winter & Mud Season

Click the button to submit a photo.
You may submit 1, 2 or 3 photos per contest.
Please submit only your own current photos.
Remember, landscape photos look better on our scroller.
Membership picks the winner.

February Promotions

Winter Social, 2023

February 23-26, 2023
A Long Weekend of Winter Caching Fun in Manistee

Registration closes February 13th!

2023 Winter Social Webpage

SWAG Package pre-order is closed, but there is a limited quantity of the pathtag set and the geocoin available in the MiGO Store for a somewhat higher price. If there are any left, they will be available at the event for an even higher price!

2023

Winter Social

Gadget Cache and

Creative Cache Contest

2023 WS Gadget & Creative Cache Contest

We are trying to find photos of all of the entries for a follow up post...

ZFC Winners Photo Op Contest
A contest just for MiGO Photo Contest Winners:

This is the long promised, year-long contest for 1st, 2nd and 3rd place winners of the Zoom-Focus-Click Photo Contest. It is a bit like a travel bug race, with a twist: We are counting photos, not miles.

What is the object?

Get photos posted on your ZFC trackable's web page. The more photos, the more points.
The contest runs for the calendar year, starting at the January publish date, through December 31st, 2023. It is open to all ZFC prize winners (first, second and third Place) of the ZFC Photo Contest from November 2020 through June 2023. July and later winners will be eligible for the contest in 2024. The playing pieces are the ZFC Trackable tags that were the prizes for the photo contest. There are multiple ways to score more points, and more ways to win prizes.

This contest is open only to ZFC prize winners. Others are welcome to look, but to play, you must first finish in the top 3 of a monthly ZFC Photo Contest. Access to the contest page is through a private Announcement Forum for the contest. All members who are qualified to play will get an invitation to the contest page via email.

ZFC Winners Photo Op Contest

Ongoing Promotions

Now Live!

Michigan Waterways Adventures

7 Adventures in 4 Regions

10 Labs per Adventure

5 Labs per county
Record the Key Words

visit
Michigan DNR Geocaching Page
for details.

Download the Waterways Adventure Labs Log to record your keywords to earn the prizes.

For questions and help with the Waterways Adventures email MichiganWaterwaysAdventure@gmail.com

Note: Many of the Lab locations are in places without cellular service. ALs can easily be completed without cellular service. Click HERE for instructions.

The Latest from the GeoTour

November 10th, 2022.

We reached 7500 Favorite Points!

Michigan State Parks GeoTour
has been officially extended through
September 24th, 2024!

Here are the latest GeoTour stats, as of November 3rd, 2022:

Logged
Finds:
50,546

Individual
Cachers:
7,828

Favorite
Points:
7500

Geocoins
Earned:
Silver:
249
Gold:
210

News from the DNR: For those of you who have earned your Silver and/or Gold coins, the DNR has more coins ordered, so please be patient. It takes time to get them.

As many of you know, our own "Kneel More" is an avid and prolific filmmaker with regards to the game of Geocaching. Kneel and his friend Bob Billy have dozens of informative and often hilarious videos in his YouTube collection. Kneel has created a series of videos while caching the MSPC GeoTour. To view the videos, click on the images below.

DNR Centennial Geocache Trail -
Trust the Tradition

The Michigan Department of Natural Resources is celebrating its Centennial year in 2021. Jay's Sporting Goods is celebreating their 50th anniversary. To celebrate, The DNR is partnering with Jay's Sporting Goods with help from MiGO putting together a geocache trail (not a GeoTour) of fifty caches in four regions of Michigan, one region at a time. Jay's is supplying the actual geocaches that will be hidden with our assistance. Search the state for caches named "DNR TTT - Adventure" in their name.

We want to recognize the following cachers for stepping up to help. Numbers in parenthesis indicate multiple sites:

2277, aghudley, Bainers1103, bgscrabble, ccsquire, Cinamuck, coolmamaof5, DanTMan&Co (2), Gdpunkgirl73, Grayseelou' HelloLola, iatsemedic, IFollowRoads, K&A Enterprises (2), kirtlandii (2), kitedancer, LiteOnCache, Loumiester, Mermaidsh, Piperollie1, Pirate Sunflower (3), Ranger4+1, redwings01win, SeasonsGuide (3). Stuffedcabbage, Team Nix (2), The Macho Homemaker, theworldisoutthere (5), TJPost (2), Traveling Dave, usyoopers (5), Ypsimom (2).

We would also like to recognize the following additional cachers who volunteered as backupsfor the primary hiders:

beenhere, DirtBikeGranny, epoch13, Working4Cache

Thank you all so much for helping bring this joint effort to fruition.

More From MiGO

Promote MiGO on your Geocache Page

MiGO members are encouraged to identify geocaches as being owned by a MiGO Member. We have had a page containing sample logos and other graphics for MiGO Cache Owners to include on their own cache pages. Recently, HQ tightened their security, breaking many COs links to graphics and other pages. Neither our old host or our new one were included in the acceptable list.

The good news is, we have placed the graphics on our own Google Drive space and updated the page with the logos and code to go with them.

The bad news is, we would like all of our members to update all geocache pages that used our older host with code for the new location of the graphics.

Click the link below to see what is available and copy the new code to your cache pages.

Add a MiGO Logo to your cache page

Notable Membership Activity over the Last Two Months

Trial Members

MrandMrsMan (new)
Boom_Boom_143 (new)
RunningTurtleMI (new)
Trailmixymel (new)

Lake Huron

catgirldo (new)
SP500 (renew)
sci_bugs (renew)
vamsplus (new)
StepsideWally (renew)
KWGT (renew)
debgeoseeker (new)
Etharyl (renew)
__Marie0317 (renew)
Holmer4Manistee (rendng)
Kite Dancer (renew)
MichiSeekers (renew)
cgamboy (renew)

Lake Superior

mboensch (renew)
TSR_TeamStellaRick (renew)
MoDaRiMa (renew)
Team Nix (renew)
Ranger4+1 (renew)
candzsloot (renew)
Woodtrain (renew)
TheDeeJays (ren&upg)
OakCrestGal (renew)
scook (renew)
The Seed Spreaders (ren&upg)
snowflower722 (new)
Team TopKat (renew)
Mom1of6 (renew)
ORM3757 (renew)
AdventureMike (new)
Markox (new)
kmans (renew)
Bdaay05 (new)
iatsemedic (renew)
RedhedMary (renew)
ORBGeoTour (new)
Moldslug (renew)
Edelweiss in MI (new)
MaxB on the River (renew)
N8theGR8 (renew)
WanderMI (new)
MsPackrat (renew)
dpbotkin (renew)
musical note (renew)
afishoutawater (renew)
tandembiker (ren&upg)
BinderyGuy (renew)
DucksLanding (renew)
ScoutMom5 (renew)
TPM2013 (renew)
Tjslady (renew)
GeoNiffs (renew)
FarkleTime (renew)
smitherington (winner)
Mermaidish (renew)
BigBucknasty (renew)

Lake Superior
Honor Roll