Geocaching

[Ali9321]

Just being nosey and wondering if anyone here geocaches? I did a search and was suprised the caching didn't come up in the discussion (ok it's a book forum but I thought it might have come up in the general waffling area....)

 

 

I love it - I blame the dog for getting me into it, it's a great way to find new dog walks, esp in areas you are visiting. Two years on Sunday, I guess that makes me an addict!!!!

 

And if anyone hasn't heard of it http://www.geocaching.com

[julie]

Hi Ali

I have never done geocaching,but my Hubster does. He has done it for 9 years now and has done 4,793 caches. Whats the neatest thing you've ever found, or the coolest hiding place you have ever done ?

My husband used to have one set up in our front yard ,and we had all sorts of people tramping through the yard. I'd be here at home,and see some guys standing right outside our big picture window. Kinda gives you a little bit of a start to look up and see strangers right outside the window !

We had old people young people ,and everything in between . We had 117 people come to it . He took it down last summer though,but has some other ones set up in our area .

[frankie]

My husband used to have one set up in our front yard ,and we had all sorts of people tramping through the yard. I'd be here at home,and see some guys standing right outside our big picture window. Kinda gives you a little bit of a start to look up and see strangers right outside the window !

 

Haha, that's hilarious :D Did it ever bother you?

[Brian.]

I do

 

I started years ago but due to a lack of caches I slowly stopped it. Then, all of a sudden towards the end of last year I happened to mention it to a friend of mine and he seemed really interested in it. After checking out the website again I found that the number of caches had really ballooned. I love the fact that its taken me to many places I would never have otherwise found in my local area.

[Ali9321]

Yeah, there's loads of stuff around my village I wouldn't know existed if it wasnt for caching - shameful considering some of the old buildings I'd walked past, just never found out what they were (gunpowder mill, ice house etc!)

 

Julie, those are impressive numbers! I'm slowly approaching 900 - hope to pass that number this weekend. So many different types its hard to choose a favourite. One of my current ones is one of a series which has no clue or size information, this one is a tiny 0.2ml tube attached to some fake greenery hanging in the middle of a thorn bush!!!!!!!!!! Another favourite was where the coords took you to tree where inflatable lilos and the foot pump were hidden, you blew them up and used them to get across a wee lochan to an island where the cache was hidden, genius!!!!!!

[julie]

Frankie

Most of the times it didn't bother me much. Most of the people looked fairly safe and nothing to worry about. It sometimes gave me a start, only because we live in such a wee little boring place,and we don't live in a high-traffic road ,and rarely see anyone in the neighborhood that doesn't live here .

Once, though, I was home alone and happened to notice the shape of a man right beside our big front window. We used to have a small fountain right outside there ,just for decoration . When I looked again, there were TWO guys .They looked a little unusual for our area .... older men,but both had kinda long scraggly hair . I wondered for a split second what they would be doing at our picture window, but then remembered that cache thing was out in the front yard .Nowhere NEAR the window, but here they were ,overturning rocks ,then running their arms down into the fountain . I guess they thought the thing was hidden someplace near there .

I went out and told them they were looking in the wrong spot and asked if they needed me to give them a hint and head them in the right direction . They said,no ,then kept fumbling around out there for a bit before finding it . They were the only ones that kinda gave me the willies there for a minute .

Edited March 10, 2012 by julie

[julie]

^{Ali and Brian}

^{I'll post a few photos here of some of my husband's favorites . He takes pictures everytime he goes .He usually goes with a friend ,and they are also a member of a geocaching club which has monthly meet-ups and dinners .}

^{They also host their own hunts twice a year here : http://wildernesscenter.org/}

^{They get usually around 125 people or so .}

^{Pictures are all clickable to make them bigger .}

^{This one was in a Camo Can in an old outhouse in someone's backyard .}

^{This was a shovel on one of the world's oldest strip mines .}

^{This was Ohio's only castle ,near Youngstown Ohio .}

^{My husband's first one --}

This was a miniature outhouse haging in a tree that was where the cache was .

Edited March 10, 2012 by julie

[pontalba]

Julie......ONLY FOR A MINUTE???

 

I had not even heard of Geocaching before this thread!

Julie, those two guys sound creepy, don't think I'd care for that a bit. /shiver/ Even out here in the country where we live now. Much less in the City years ago.

[chaliepud]

I'm going to have to look up Geocaching, it sounds fun!

[julie]

Pontalba

I guess you can chalk up the fact that I didn't get too flustered to see the 2 guys by our picture window.to 3 reasons :

 

1- I will talk to ANYBODY, ANYTIME,ANYPLACE .

So far, I haven't run into a carjacker or a serial killer. ,but if I do, I will be a prime target,because I'd walk right up to them and start YAKKING . I wouldn't get worried til it was too late .

 

2- Our town is so small,and this is the only place I have lived, so I don't guess I've run into a scarey situation with a stranger .Everybody knows everybody here,and we have just about no crime . If you'd leave money laying in your unlocked car all night, it might not be there when you looked the next day,.but it might . Depends on if some kid walked by and saw it that might want it bad enough to steal it .

 

3- I might just be stupid

 

 

 

Chalie

My husband loves geocaching ,and used to go every single weekend. He's got a gang of people who also go,so it's something he really enjoys .

The way a lot of them are,is that they have a container of some sort in the "hiding place". When you find it , if it's a container filled with small little items, like maybe a keychain,a small toy car,just all kinds of stuff. For those type, you take one item,then replace it with one item .He used to get the toys for our grandson,but he is almost out of the toy stage now,so he usually doesnt do those anymore .

The others have a small tablet inside that you write down your name,where you are from,and the date and time you find it.

They have an online place where they log in (maybe like here, I'm not sure),and log the hunts they do ,dates, times,etc.

I don't know much about that part of it ,but there's someplace they keep track of how many they do .

 

Anyhow if you like hiking and being outdoors ,you might wanna give it a try sometime .

[Ali9321]

Thanks for the pics Julie, and second what you say about it...

 

I love walking and the outdoors but get bored with my own company (less so now I have the pup) - geocaching motivates me to go that bit further than I would for a normal walk. For example, 29th Feb I went up to Dundee and ended up walking for 5 1/2 hours round a lovely wood area they have just outside Dundee, followed by meeting up with fellow cachers for scran before setting sail for home - great way to spend a day I refuse to work on principle!!!!!!!!!!!!

[HoneyGirl]

I have never ever heard of this before - is it more popular in America?

[julie]

Ali

What is scran, if I may ask ?

Sorry, I don't know all the terminology of the wording over your way .

 

Danielle ,

I'm not sure if geocaching is more popular in one place or another . I'd say lots of people over here have never heard of it either . They seem to have several special events of it each year all over our area and have good turnouts for them . So, I'm not sure how many people actually participate .

[HoneyGirl]

Thanks for that Julie.

 

And I am sure that scran is food

[chesilbeach]

Yes scran a dialectic / slang word for food, although my mum always said "scranny Anne" - no idea where it came from as I've never heard anyone else use it!

[Brian.]

I think geocaching is more popular in the USA but mainly because that is where it started. After the USA I think the UK has the next most caches and it seems to me to be fairly popular. There are a fair few urban caches where I live but I prefer ones in the countryside by a long way, its tricky not looking too dodgy doing urban ones.

[julie]

Morning folks

Thanks for letting me know what scran meant . I'm sure learning a lot in here,for an old hillbilly who lives such an ordinary life .

 

My husband said the geocaching website,listed on post 1 tells a lot about it's history ,etc. He said he thinks that it started here, possibly out in Washington state .

He said there are over 1 million geocaches around the world to search for .

 

He was gone from morning til evening yesterday and they logged in 42 more yesterday . You can really rack up a lot of them if you hit an area that has several all in one general location . Also if you can find the big ones that groups put on,they have several of them all in one park or wooded type location .

 

Maybe some of the others interested could give it a shot . I think you need to have a GPS to look up the exact coordinates . As I said ,I've never gone on one myself ,so not too sure of how to do it. My husband has brought our grandson on quite a few (he's almost 10) ,and he liked them too. He calls them treasure hunts ,since some have the little boxes filled with little treasures .

[Brian.]

Although a dedicated GPS helps a lot you can use a smartphone app especially when just starting out.

[Hyzenthlay]

I do it! It's great. There are so many! Once I even found this weird caching coin that had traveled from the states to Germany to Norway - and I brought it to Poland.

[Ali9321]

Heh heh Sorry for the scran - I blame my Cumbrian friend for introducing me to that word!!!!!!!!

 

Caching is pretty popular in UK - can get a fair number of people turning up to events. Today I was in an area which has had a couple of events previously (and caches set out for the events that stay out) Did 21 (darnit should have done 22 to get to 900 finds but couldnt count and had issues to resolve for journey home!) and that was a good 6 hours of walking around Falkland Still enough caches left to spend a wee while longer there. Absolutely lovely day - pup is snoring on the sofa after his exertions and I can feel my legs tingling - sign of a good day!

 

 

Hyzenthlay - I love the trackable side of it too. I have a wee Scottish Bear keyring on a dogtag that is currently in Australia and trying to get to New Zealand - started in Edinburgh and hopes to get to Dunedin!! Also have a few random keyrings I stuck dogtags on and left em in caches to see how far they went - California via Canada is the next furthest after my Oz resident now!!!!!!!!!

 

ps I have a GPS for my riding but smartphone gets me to most of the caches. Means I have the clues/coordinates and last logs for each cache too A posh GPS would also do that side of things for you but I just have an old forerunner 201 Tells me how far and how fast my pony has gone so works for me!!!!

[Brian.]

Picked up another 62 today, covering a distance of 14miles cross country on foot. My legs sure are going to be sore in the morning. I really love the weather we've been having recently, out in the countryside it just seems so peaceful.

[Ali9321]

62!!!!!!!!!!!! ouch! That's impressive!!! I managed 22 the other weekend in Falkland to reach my 900th and I thought that was pretty good! Wow - that's a great number to get in a day!

 

Hope the radox is ready and raring

 

 

Do love tho how it gets me walking further than I would otherwise, even with the mutt. Motivation and all that ("just one more cache before lunch" !!!!!!!!!!!) FlashMob event in Glasgow next weekend, chance to meet other likeminded nutters :

 

agree re weather too - and now light nights to enjoy too WOOPWOOP

[Brian.]

62 isn't normal and I don't think I will be repeating it any time soon. I usually go for 30 or so when I head out for the day as I don't get out caching all that often. I also have the bonus of living in an area where there are loads of caches within a 10 mile radius of where I live.