I fixed the locations search form, so a search does not cause your criteria to be deleted 
Should be a much more pleasant experience searching now!
https://github.com/paviliondev/discourse-locations/commit/53cad800fd3f696bf3a26a211c5d8dbc6d89c9c3
(cleanup: https://github.com/paviliondev/discourse-locations/commit/0153eab68f145c78e6c04540ae8932758e8c3235)
thanks for @jrgong’s report and for being patient.
this is a free, presently unmonetized plugin, so it’s tough to justify a lot of work on it.