New York Letterbox Hiking Challenge Patch Info

Announcing the New York Letterbox Hiking Challenge! The NY Letterbox Hiking Challenge is a fun way to encourage hiking for letterboxes to improve health and spend more time in the great outdoors of New York. By logging miles on the trail while letterboxing in NY, we hope you will have fun finding, planting, and maintaining letterboxes and find more of our NY’s natural treasures.

The incentive? A beautiful 100% embroidered patch to commemorate your achievement. Patches will be released in 25, 50, 75, and 100 mile delineations, with 25 being the first launched at the end of April. Design for 25 Mile patch is pictured here.

The guidelines:
- Each foot mile you hike in NY while letterboxing counts. You keep track, and this patch is on the honor system. We won’t challenge your numbers, but you should challenge yourself. We recommend that you only count miles on the trail to and from letterboxes in NY, NOT miles driven to letterboxes…this is a “hiking/letterboxing” patch. We also encourage participants to make hikes that are at least one mile or more (i.e. 0.5 miles to a letterbox, and back)…yes, this is also a “challenge” patch. Miles can be counting finding, planting, and maintaining letterboxes.
- Challenge Patches will be available for both residents and non-residents completing a challenge.
- Start date for counting begins today, April 2 2009. Hikes while letterboxing before this date should not be included.
- Patches can be ordered by sending an SASE to Jackbear for a $3. Payment can be via paypal, cash, check, or money order. Your SASE can be mailed to John Ballou, 200 Hillside Ave. Rochester, NY 14610. Patches will also be available at gatherings in NY attended by Jackbear, Scout, or Sahalie.

Is this like the Treasure Hikers? Yes, this was inspired by the work the Treasure Hiker groups were doing in other states, and we are very grateful for the great ideas they came up with for such a challenge. Scout, jackbear, and Sahalie decided to go with a patch for New York instead of “pathtags” after a poll indicated that 3 out of 5 letterboxers preferred to earn a patch over a pathtag.

Again, our primary goal is to have fun and encourage hiking and letterboxing together! We hope that you will challenge yourself to get out and hike more this year, and enjoy what our state has to offer.

If you have any questions, feel free to contact Jackbear, Scout, or Sahalie and keep and eye out for more challenge patch designs as we release them in the coming months.

Now get out there and get letterboxing!