Sometimes the hype train crashes headfirst into reality.
Saturday we loaded up and headed to Morgantown, West Virginia for what was advertised as a Mega Geocaching Event. If you’ve ever been to a good Mega, you know the expectation. Hundreds of geocachers. Vendors everywhere. Trackables changing hands by the thousands. New friends. Old friends. Stories. Energy. The kind of event that reminds you why this hobby has survived for 25 years.
Instead, we walked into something that honestly felt more like a small local gathering wearing a “Mega” name tag.
There were vendors, and some of them had some genuinely cool stuff. Shirts, geocaching gadgets, custom 3D printed swag, patches, containers, and all the usual collectibles. But you could walk the entire event in just a few minutes. Most of the time there were more empty spaces than people. I kept thinking maybe everyone was off doing caches and it would fill up later. It never really did.
That was probably the biggest disappointment. It wasn’t that the event was bad. Everyone we talked to was friendly, the vendors were nice, and it was obvious people put time into organizing it. It just never had that “Mega” feeling. When you drive a couple hours expecting something huge, it’s hard not to compare what you imagined to what you actually got.
The undisputed MVP of the day wasn’t a geocacher.
It was Jersey.
She got attention everywhere she went. Kids wanted to pet her. Adults stopped to say hello. She happily posed for pictures, soaked up every bit of affection, and looked like she had just won the lottery because every five minutes someone wanted to scratch her ears. If there was an award for “Best Time at the Event,” Jersey would have walked away with it without breaking a sweat. Frankly, I think she enjoyed the people more than most of us enjoyed the geocaching.
After realizing we’d pretty much seen everything there was to see, we decided not to force the day into being something it wasn’t. Sometimes you’ve just got to call an audible. We left the event and spent the rest of the afternoon wandering through a few thrift stores around the area. Oddly enough, that ended up being the highlight of the trip. You never know what you’ll find in a thrift store. Unlike a disappointing Mega, at least there’s always the possibility of stumbling across some forgotten piece of 90s tech, an old punk CD, or something completely ridiculous that absolutely has to come home with you.
Not every road trip turns into an unforgettable adventure. Sometimes it’s just a reminder that expectations are dangerous little bastards. The destination wasn’t what we’d hoped for, but we still spent the day together, Jersey had an absolute blast, and we found a few treasures along the way.
I guess that’s not the worst way to spend a Saturday.