Covering 15 countries in one day is one of the most complex geocaching challenges, both logistically and in the field. Very recently, a Polish team took on this major challenge. I’m offering an interview with kranfagel and marcin3243 to tell us how this adventure unfolded and how they prepared for it! [Version française]
I) The Team
Hello, and huge congratulations on this amazing adventure! Could you introduce yourself and the team who took part in this rather crazy challenge?
K: I’m kranfagel, my name’s Wojtek.
M: I’m marcin3243 — that’s also my real name.
K: Our unbeatable team for the 15-country challenge also included Dominisia_krk, daksya (Piotr and Agnieszka), m2mPL, Fishu, piechurek7, and kara-kum.
II) The Origin
It’s a challenge many of us have in mind… But there’s a big difference between thinking about it and taking action. Could you tell us how the idea for this project was born? I understand it’s been in the works for a long time.
K: It often starts with Marcin saying something as a joke — and then I try to make it happen.
M: Haha, yeah, that’s true! Though I don’t remember if this particular idea started that way. We were planning to go for this achievement in 2024, but a month before the trip, two major obstacles appeared. First, several countries reintroduced border checks back in September. And second, a key tunnel in Austria was closed for renovation, which made our route much longer.
K: Oh yes, and it was actually the first time that tunnel had been closed since it opened 42 years ago! So we had to cancel our plans last year. Funny enough, we didn’t use that tunnel this year either.
III) Preparation
This is a project that must involve a huge amount of advance preparation. Could you explain how you prepare something like this? What should you watch out for? What were the difficulties?
K: You start with a rough plan and check if it’s even doable. I remember plotting the 15 countries on Google Maps, and it showed a driving time of 22 hours and 30 minutes.
M: And we just looked at each other and said, “Yeah, we can totally do it.”
K: Haha, yes — that’s exactly how we work together. And that teamwork is one of the most important things. You need people you can rely on and trust. You simply can’t pull off something like this on your own.
In the past, other teams have attempted the adventure — were you able to benefit from their experience?
M: Absolutely! We actually contacted members of the first Polish team who managed to do it back in 2018 — _Teodor_ and CopernicusHigh. They shared their route with us, and that became the starting point for designing ours.
K: We also kept an eye on events at the Polish or Dutch borders, because many teams announce their 15 country attempts with a starting event — just like we did. We often reached out to them to talk about their plans and experiences.
M: And just a month before our trip, a German team tried the challenge but didn’t make it — they reached Belgium as their 14th country. It was a good reminder that it’s not as easy as it sounds, but we really admired them for sticking to the rules and not taking shortcuts.
I imagine in this kind of case you plan for Plan B… Plan C? Plan D??? Were there any specific criteria for selecting the geocaches?
M: Just one main rule, really — the cache had to look like an easy park-and-grab, with parking right next to the GZ. That was our ideal target.
K: Some of the caches were so easy that we actually spotted them on Street View while planning the route! So we mostly picked caches in motorway rest areas or right near motorway exits. We assumed we could spend up to five minutes searching, but in reality, most finds took less than two.
M: We also chose a backup cache for almost every country. Actually, the only exception was France — there are very few caches at motorway rest areas, at least along the route from Luxembourg to Switzerland. Our backup caches were also placed in different regions, so we could aim for a secondary goal: finding caches in as many regions as possible on the same day.
Organization is certainly the key to success for a project like this. Were there any tools that helped you plan the route or track your progress in the field?
M: Project-GC helped us a lot, especially when picking caches for each country and region. And of course, Google Maps was essential for estimating the driving times between checkpoints.
K: And then there was the spreadsheet. We created a detailed sheet with all the caches, map links, estimated driving times between them, and the planned arrival time for each stop. It also had a live-updating column we filled in during the trip — it constantly calculated whether we were still on track or not.
M: Yeah! And Wojtek even color-coded it — red when we were behind schedule, green when we were on time. We started the trip in red… which was a bit discouraging!
Finally, what route and goals did you end up choosing?
K: Our list included 34 caches, covering all 34 regions we planned to pass through. Based on the mileage and time estimates, we realized we’d need about two extra hours to complete everything.
M: That’s why, at the start, we were really racing against the clock and stopped for only one cache per country. Skipping a few helped us catch up, and we kept adjusting until the spreadsheet finally showed we were back on track.
K: Until it turned green again — exactly! It worked perfectly and kept us both motivated and organized.
IV) The Journey
At last, the big day! Well, the day before! Since you planned a special kickoff—could you tell us about it?
K: Many teams announce their attempt with an event — that’s actually how we got in touch with a few others. So we decided to host one before our start as well.
M: And there’s a challenge in Kraków to attend events in 15 different countries, so this one counted as another step toward that!
K: Unfortunately, no one else showed up, but we used the time well — we repacked everything, moved the essentials from the trunk to the cabin, went over the final rules for the trip, and recorded our very first audio clip for the podcast. [Ed. note: the PodCacher podcast]
Once you got going, how did your organization work? Did everyone have a clearly defined role, or not really?
K: Some people had clearly defined roles — and even backup roles, in case someone needed to sleep. We had three drivers whose job was to drive safely and rest when they weren’t behind the wheel. There was also a navigator who selected the next point and announced the distance to it, so the driver could decide whether to swap or keep going. And we had a “spreadsheet and risk manager” who monitored our progress so we’d always know how much time we could afford to lose.
M: And of course, we had our cache seekers — the hunters who jumped out first at each stop to find the container as quickly as possible! Everyone on the team took on this role at least once.
How did you choose your vehicle?
M: We needed a 9-seat van, and given our plans, it was important to have no mileage limits and insurance that covered all the countries we’d visit.
K: And we found it! A company in Poland — CarNet — offered exactly that. It was pretty funny when I had to list all the countries on the rental form. The guy at the desk looked at our list and the three-day rental period and laughed, saying if anything new popped up in our plan, we should just call the hotline.
Were there any incidents or anecdotes during the journey—and were there moments when you feared you wouldn’t make it on time?
M: From the very start, I was constantly trying to narrow the plan down to just 15 countries, but Wojtek wouldn’t let me.
K: Exactly. Plus, a German team had tried this just a month before us and only managed 14 countries, reaching the Netherlands after midnight. That made Marcin even more anxious.
M: But things got better once we hit the road. We almost immediately ran into a closed motorway in Luxembourg, but thanks to our planning, we lost almost no time by taking a detour.
K: And when the spreadsheet finally turned green in Liechtenstein, we knew we were on track — barring any accidents.
M: Luckily, we didn’t encounter any problems at all. We were really lucky on such a long trip.
Do you have some numbers to give us so we can grasp the scale of the adventure?
K: Sure!
M: Yeah, we are the numbers!
K: We covered 4,000 kilometers over the weekend, with 2,137 kilometers just for the 15-country route. We burned over 300 liters of fuel and only slept 7 hours total — staying in a bed just once near Frankfurt.
M: On the day itself, we found 25 geocaches across 25 different regions in 15 countries.
K: We also had two police checks — one before the challenge and one right after.
M: And Magda managed 10,000 steps.
What steps?
K: Haha, m2mPL tracks her daily steps and needed at least 10k that day. Not easy when you’re in a car for 22 hours! But she made it by walking around the bus whenever she could.
What were your favorite or most memorable moments during this journey?
K: My favorite moment was definitely when we finished. Piotrek (daksya) had an alcohol-free champagne ready for the occasion! It was a mix of huge satisfaction and relief all at once.
M: My favourite moment was near Bratislava, when Wojtek and I knew we would make it, so we relaxed and started running to the geocaches.
I believe you benefited from a little help from the calendar… was it useful, or could you have done without it?
K: I don’t accept failures. The date we chose wasn’t random — it was the last Sunday of October, the day of the DST change. Most European countries turn the clocks back an hour that night, making the day actually 25 hours long.
M: We treated that as a backup, but in the end, we completed the trip in 23 hours and 36 minutes — so technically, we could have done it in a normal day too.
K: As a bonus, we got an unplanned coffee break during the trip and found a cache in one more region in Poland. We wouldn’t have done that without the extra hour.
Was there a moment when you said to yourselves, “We’re good”?
M: Our spreadsheet told us we were on track after the Liechtenstein geocache.
K: Much sooner than I expected!
M: Then we hit a German motorway where we could drive faster than anywhere else. That’s when we really felt we could make it — and it was only about 8 AM!
K: But when we tried to push the speed after crossing the German border, the car warned us we wouldn’t make it to the gas station, so we actually had to slow down 😀
I imagine that when you undertake this kind of project, you also use the trip to meet a few other objectives or enjoy certain places. Were you able to make the most of your outbound trip for fun?
M: Absolutely. On our way to the start of the 15-country challenge, we found interesting, favorite, or rare geocaches along the route. It took us two days to get there because we stopped for all the special things we planned.
K: We visited two webcams, the oldest geocache in Germany, and even one of those escape-room-style geocaches. We collected over 100,000 FPs on geocaches!
M: And we even rode a horse to reach a logbook — that was amazing!
I think that if you’re not a geocacher—or even not a somewhat “extreme” geocacher—it’s hard to understand this kind of expedition. When you tell your colleagues or family about it, what kinds of reactions do you get?
K: I love it when people ask, “Oh, so you’ve been to all these countries! What did you see in Italy?” It’s both weird and funny to explain that all we saw was a bus stop, and what really interested us was what was under he bench.
M: Yeah, most people just don’t get it — our goals are different. It was my first time in Italy and Croatia, and I didn’t even see the Mediterranean Sea!
K: I also hosted an event afterward, and an Australian geocacher came. When he heard what we’d done, he laughed and said he could drive for three days and still be in Australia — but we did 15 countries in one day. Totally impossible!
V) Tips and Future Plans
This kind of adventure inevitably inspires other geocachers; do you have any advice for those who would like to follow in your footsteps? If you were to do this trip again, are there things you would change?
K: Oh, just go for it — this idea or any others you have. Don’t let them gather dust in a drawer.
M: We wouldn’t change a thing. It was just perfect. If our resources or plans can help you, use them — or better yet, make it your own adventure.
For those who want to give it a try, do you have an idea of what this kind of road trip might cost?
K: The total cost — including van rental, fuel, road vignettes, and one night’s accommodation — was about 180 EUR per person.
Do you have any other slightly crazy projects in mind?
K: Sure!
M: Many, actually 😀
A huge thank you for taking the time to answer all these questions! Would you like to share a final thought with French geocachers?
K: I visited France a year ago and fell in love with Dinan and Saint-Malo. You have a beautiful country — just go out and explore it!
M: And set up more geocaches on motorway parkings 😀
A huge thank you to Wojtek and Marcin for answering all these questions so kindly! And kudos again to the whole team of geocachers! I wish all of them every success in their next adventures.
To dive even deeper into their wild challenge, I recommend listening to PodCacher episode 923: “Geocaching 15 Countries in a Day.” You’ll hear short audio snippets, recorded on the spot, from the various key stages of the trip.
You’ll find more details in the article about their journey on Geocaching.pl.
If you want to see the exact route and the list of geocaches, you’ll find the track here and the list of geocaches with timestamps here.
And you—what will your next adventure be?