What info needed for 100 club?

Hello all.
I've just started letterboxing with our two small boys, signing books as 'Tall and Small' and had a very successful and happy time on Bonehill Rocks this afternoon - thanks to the recommendations on here for it being a good beginner's place.

Now ... How should I be recording our finds?
I'm going to feel very silly if the day comes to send the list into the 100 club and I don't have the right notes ...

At the moment I have a grid reference for the whole of Bonehill Rocks, two 6 figure grid references actually but I haven't figured out which boxes were in which half as yet.

A description of the site, mostly which direction or notable place it was facing and the type of rocks, bank, vegetation, etc.

The stamp, (all this on an index card)

Notes about the boxes appearance, if distinctive, the book - again if distinctive or one of the many soaked ones, the name of the owner if it was legible, and sometimes where they had come from,

and that's about it .....

Afterwards I walked back around the rocks without the kids and took some photos, many general ones and a couple of the letterbox sites that I noticed again as I passed - but I'm hoping that I wasn't required to take a photo of each box as we found it?

Any advice gratefully received - while I still have chance to sneak back up there and correct our records if this is necesary!

Thanks, Helen

welcome to the game Tall and small.

I sincerely hope the 100 club don't want quite that much info. We just do the stamp and write box name and date found on same page. If I find a box with out knowing its name I'll list where approximately it was.

We also box with a small boy , used to sign with a very small pink penguin, now use

ED
SZ

pink or orange or what ever bright colour the boy chose to bring along.

That's a relief!
On several occasions the hubby and boys had found the next box before I'd finished writing up the previous one!

Thanks, Helen
(and Tall and Small, who went to sleep surprisingly quickly tonight!)

There might be a bit of contention here...
Bonehill Rocks is a site where there are a lot of Kids boxes - not that I am saying there is anything wrong with them but I think you have done the right thing in recording some of the info about them - its a good habit sadly one I don't do!

The trouble is very few of these boxes are actually registered with the 100 club and they may not accept them as legitimate boxes, most genuine letterboxers I know do not count them in their total of boxes collected.

Don't get me wrong but I think places like Bonehill rocks is an ideal safe location where kids can get experience of letterboxing.
However from a personal point of view these unregistered cheap commercially available stamps are spreading across the moor like a plague which will not do the hobby of letterboxing any good.
I know I sound nasty and mean but if you were to go to Haytor and to the West of the Tor you will find 6 identical commercial stamps of the same fish.
The other day I went upto Hound Tor where all the stamps I found (12)were commercially available stamps and I think only two were genuine catalogue stamps.

There used to be a time when the catalogue number was written on the side of the stamp or in the visitors book - but sadly this also has become a bit of a discontinued practice which makes it harder to identify the stamp.

But keep the names on a list and when you get to see the catalogue you will be able tofind out which ones are genuine and which aren't

And just to confuse the issue... there are Word of mouth boxes (WOM) which are not in the catalogue either - but they do count!

Someone commented to me the other day "it is rare to find a hand carved stamp like we used to find." Sadly the observation is true.

I hope the above comments have not put you off but as part ofthe letterboxing world it is hard to hang onto the older traditional ways

Happy hunting!

I rather suspected that the kids' boxes to be found at a beginner's site like Bonehill would not be catalogue ones ... I expected those to be more challenging and that we would be more likely to need the catalogue in order to find them!

I thought that the idea of finding 100 on your own was to 'wet the appetite' so that letterboxers would then want the clues in order to search for the more genuine boxes as their hobby progressed?

So that a 5 year old starting out might find their 100 boxes by being merely taken to a different tor on different days over a year or two, and would then be bitten by the bug and be motivated to take longer walks and go on more difficult hunts to tick boxes off from the catalogue ....

I would guess that one of our 8, the Trotting Horse, might be a genuine catalogue letterbox. It had a different air about it somehow. However there is absolutely no way of telling unless I discount every one that says it was placed by a child, a family or a school.

What do you forum letterboxers suggest?
Helen

Maybe that I am a bit wrong in my summations but having looked at this set of posts and others of the same vein on other posts and even I am confused what is 'today' required to acquire membership of the 100 Club!

I hope PC has not invaded our domain and now creating an unbelievable achievement as a pre requisite to membership!.

Does it really matter that much who`s stamp has been found, where and when. It certainly didn`t back in the 1980`s.

We should be encouraging the next generation of boxers not PC`ing them!!!!!!!

TWA

It's always seemed to me that the 100 club is not prescriptive about this and leaves it to the individual to set their own standard. As is said above, a lot of letterboxers will ignore the kids boxes and apply a higher standard to those they list. On the other hand, if you've got young children different standards probably apply; you can raise the bar as the children get older (and if they're still interested).

Duckpool

As I understood it, its find 100 letter boxes. If your being hard core and not using a clues catalogue or charity walk sheet, those first 100 boxes might be any thing, how would you know if they were part of a series or WOM or a kiddy box.
Now the clues catalogue can be sent off for with out being a member of 100 club its possible to start your letter boxing on more challenging to find boxes.

Generic stamps may be boring, but finding a hidden box is always bit exciting , we don't HAVE To take an impression of a stamp we don't like. Curiously its not just old school letter boxers who refuse to take an impression. my nieces didn't take an impression of a stamp they simply didn't like, also one they didn't understand as it was in German.