TX Hokie

My girlfriend got a Legacy wagon a few months ago. She loves the car, but the dealer she bought it from is another story entirely.... Anyone who might be living in Austin and considering buying a Subaru, I can definitely tell you where NOT to go!

Couple comments.... First, I went to school in VA, and from my recollection, it was in fact illegal to have a radar detector anywhere accessible in the car. At least that is what I was always told. I always put mine in the glovebox (although that is arguably accessible also). I did get pulled over once in my (then) home state of NJ with my radar detector. I just left it on the dash, and the cop was really cool about it. Basically said, "I see you have a radar detector there, maybe it went off too late for you" and all I got was a warning. That radar detector, which I had had since before I had a license (17 in NJ), was stolen from my car years later when some loser smashed out the passenger side window for the detector and a couple CD's. Yes, I shouldn't have left the detector in full view, but the thing was so darn old I figured noone wanted it anyway! I never bothered to replace it.... And to keep it on topic... I routinely drive around with my GPSr in a cradle on the windshield (but I hide it when I leave the car!). Finally, for an interesting hybrid of GPS and radar detector, see my post in the GPS Units forum about the "GPS Road Angel". TX Hokie

Here in Dresden, there are some permanent speed cameras around the town. You are right that there are mobile ones as well. However, even the permanent ones are easy to miss until it's too late, if you don't know where they are! I've gotten flashed a couple times since I've been here, but no tickets in the mail. I think sometimes they don't bother if it is a rental car.

I was looking at a UK-edition FHM magazine the other day and they had a holiday gift guide with an item called 'Road Angel'. It consists of a GPS receiver that you use in the car that does a couple neat things. For one, as you approach accident-prone areas, it warns you, but even cooler, it is programmed with the locations of all known speed cameras in the UK (which I'm told by UK friends are everywhere). It's database is updatable via the internet. Anyway, here is one link for a place selling the thing, there are plenty of others that Google finds. <http://www.avoidfines.com/trolleyed/4/16/> Anyway, I thought it sounded pretty cool. I'm in Germany for a few months, and there are a few spots around town that have those speed cameras. Would be nice to know where they all are *before* I see that flash!

I believe I've read that GPS units built into cars use more than just the satellites for positioning. They also have a connection to the speedometer (not sure if any take into account changes in steering angle, etc) so they can better approximate your position even when you lose signal lock. Not sure what you mean about it telling you which deck of the bridge you were on. Did you determine this just based on the elevation of that deck vs. the elevation the GPS reported?

I use Instantlogic. Check out http://photo.instantlogic.com to sign up. Free, 200 megs of storage, no ads or popups. It seems to be everything I was looking for (free being very high on the list!)

My random thoughts on this subject.... I've never really thought about someone hiding out near a cache for bad reasons. We went hiking/camping a while back in Big Bend Nat'l Park. Hardly saw anyone over 3 days. Pretty remote, no cell phone service. I was more paranoid about "a bear could come kill me and drag me off and noone would ever find me" than I've ever been when geocaching. With that said, the few times I've felt uncomfortable geocaching have been when either: 1) there is obvious homeless activity nearby, or 2) the location I'm hunting in could easily be seen as suspicious (for a totally different reason than #1). Sometimes I bring my dog hiking/geocaching with me, but true to typical Labrador behavior, his best defense to someone meaning harm would be to lick them to death.

For your particular case, c2c2c, if you are already getting/have gotten a PDA, then what do you have to lose using it also for geocaching? My work provides a PDA, I use it also for geocaching. Would I have bought one on my own? Maybe, maybe not. But since I already have it, what the heck! Here's one more reason I like having it that noone has mentioned. Depending on what program(s) you use on it, a PDA can save a lot of time decoding hints. Back when I was using paper, it could sometimes be frustrating decoding by hand. Ever had a "hint" that reads something like "This cache is so easy, it doesn't need a hint!"? Nothing worse than taking the time to decode that by hand only to find it useless! I have also had hints that can be very lengthy. Call me lazy, but I'd rather click on button on the PDA and have it instantly decoded than take time away from the hunt decoding by hand. As others have said, I like the ability to go wherever I want and have those cache descriptions/coords at hand. I've had situations where I planned to hunt, say 5 caches. If I find those 5 quicker than I thought I would, I just look in the PDA to see what else might be near. If I'd been using paper, I might be unable to hunt those. I don't know if I agree with BassoonPilot that all that's required to hunt a cache is coords. If that were true, you could easily spend an infinite amount of time hunting a cache, never knowing it was a virtual. The same thing could apply if you just uploaded a bunch of geocache waypoints into your GPSr without having the cache page. It's no fun looking for a container when it's really a virtual, or driving to a location not knowing the cache page says "THE POSTED COORDINATES ARE BOGUS!". Well, at least that's no fun in my book. Whew, this might be my longest post yet in these forums. The wine must have be going! Enjoy the long weekend, all!

I don't mind multiple caches within walking distance... in fact, it makes me do just that - WALK and get a little exercise instead of hopping in my car and driving to the next cache (where I can). I was recently in CA and found 3 or 4 caches along a certain trail. It was a nice walk, and a trail that I probably wouldn't have spent any significant amount of time on had there been only one cache.

As others have mentioned, the main use I get from my PDA (a Toshiba e335 PocketPC) is for storing cache pages so I don't have to print them out. I generate pocket queries, then process them in Spinner (freeware) and upload the HTML files to my PDA for viewing. No need to decode the hints unless you need them. I can also upload the Spinner-processed gpx file directly into my GPSr with ExpertGPS. Works well for what my needs are. The drawback is so many gadgets to carry! GPSr, PDA, digital camera...

Thanks Jeremy. That makes sense. I guess based on that section of the T&C, I don't understand what some people are concerned about. At any rate, it doesn't sound like something I personally am going to lose any sleep over! TX Hokie

The part about "anything you post becomes the property of localhikes.com" - can someone clarify? If I post a picture as part of a trail report, but then post that same picture on my personal website or photo gallery, is there any problem with that? Could I potentially get into some trouble?

So here's my question/concern with what I understand this change to be... (similiar to what I've read recently about the localhikes.com T&C). If I upload a picture that I took of some trail, does that mean that if I then upload it to another site (even my own personal photo gallery) that I can get sued or something? Sorry if this is a stupid question, but hey, I'm no lawyer and can't decode all the legalese! Thanks.

Here are a few birds we ran across hiking this weekend in McKinney Falls State Park in Austin, TX. I think they are doves. Notice anything strange? They are plastic decoys. Note also the Home Depot bucket hanging in the tree - didn't dare look inside for fear of what might be in there. Further down the trail, there were 2 plastic deer decoys, then an owl, then another bird... Reported them all to the Ranger's office. I think they were placed there by someone trying to be funny, or just silly, as opposed to for poaching, but either way, I doubt they are welcome in the park. <BR><BR> Pics of the deer at http://tinyurl.com/l26y

I've got an A70 and am happy with it too. I don't consider myself much above an amateur photographer, but should I decide to try to learn a few more things, the A70 is flexible enough with its manual settings. Like others have said, the fact that it uses standard AA batteries is a nice feature. I have a gallery online, but I see that Moosiegirl has already mentioned it above!

I did manage to find the cache page, my real question was, Why didn't a keyword search of "jeep" find it? Thanks.

OK, so I've seen a bunch of references to a Yellow Jeep locationless cache lately. Since I've seen at least 2 over the past couple days (someone at my work drives one, saw another at a restaurant parking lot), figured I'd look up the cache. Go to keyword search and type "Jeep". Nothing. Try "yellow" and I find it that way. Yellow Jeep Fever. So why doesn't the keyword of "jeep" find it?

I recently purchased my first digital camera, the Canon Powershot A70 BrianSnat mentioned above. I'm very happy with it so far. I got it after reading a bunch of very positive reviews on various websites. Seems to have a lot of features for the money. The biggest problem was actually getting it - it is in very high demand and/or low supply right now so a lot of stores are out of stock. If anyone's interested, I have some pictures at http://txhokie.instantlogic.com These pictures are reduced size/quality for the website, but they give you an idea. Also, a good website to watch for digital camera (and other) deals is http://www.headlinedeals.com Hope this helps!

Woof!, The link you gave didn't work for me, but this one does: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2003/07/11/CC281007.DTL I see a picture there with two people going down the road in a Lexus with their GPS units... Even the driver is looking at the GPS and not the road! Shame, shame!

Never mind, I found a discussion that explains it (and my GPX file just showed up in my inbox!). TX Hokie

Is there a certain time of the day pocket queries are generated? I leave tonight for Philadelphia and really want to get my PDA set up with some caches in that area! Thanks!

I think this is a decent deal (not sure as I haven't shopped around for a GPS V before) and I thought it might help someone: Computer Geeks has the GPS V for $324.99 after the $75 rebate. <http://www.compgeeks.com/details.asp?invtid=GPSV&sourceid=00397605656290710978>

What the heck, I'll add my "me too" if you're still sharing. I'm in Texas and have seen some pretty devious urban micros when on business trips in CA. Many of the caches here are full size caches hidden in the woods... TX Hokie

In case anyone is interested, I came across this deal on AA alkaline batteries: CircuitCity.com has the Maxell 48-Pack AA Alkaline Batteries at $17.99 - $10 rebate (Exp. 5/31) = $7.99. Search for "MAX LR648BP". Free shipping.

quote: But a LEAK? Are you sure it is not just the icy pack sweating? Mine sweats A LOT... even in the desert. But COLD water is so fine! I just tried my new Camelbak Blowfish last night on a hike, and it too leaks where the hose connects to the bladder. It was a fair amount of leakage, so I'm going to take it back to REI (100% satisfaction guarantee on everything they sell) and see if I can get a new bladder. My girlfriend got a MULE and that didn't leak at all.