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Grand Traverse County Jumps Aboard Geocaching Trend

Geocaching is a trend that gains popularity during the warm summer months.

People download the geocaching app and are guided via GPS to find toys, treats and other unique things.

Now, Grand Traverse Central Dispatch is hopping on the popular trend.

They’re out and about hiding geocaches around the county to show people the importance of their location

“’9-1-1, where is your emergency’ that’s our first piece of info we need to move forward in the call to help if we don’t know where they’re at we don’t know here to send help,” said Andrea Holczman.

That’s why Andrea suggested Grand Traverse Central Dispatch gets on board with a popular trend — geocaching.

“With 911, location is the most important information we need and geocaching is all about location so we thought we would tie the two together and just have fun with it,” she said.

They’ve now started hiding a few caches of their own full of dispatch treats.

She says searching for geocaches helps people learn important lessons if they were to ever call 911.

Like learning where roads are in relationship to each other and cardinal directions like north east south and west.

“I took a right here that can mean different things depending which direction you’re going,” she said.

And using the geocaches as more than just a fun outdoor activity — may have already saved its first life.

“One person told me a friend of hers was out geocaching down a steep ravine and she got hurt she gave the dispatcher the geocache coordinates and that’s how they found her,” Andrea said. 

They’ve hid three put geocaches so far and they have plenty more to put around. For more information on how to find their specific geocaches, dispatch asks you do not call 911 or the non-emergency number, Rather, search their username “Grand Traverse 911” at .

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