Firth of Forth

And hearty congratulations from me too! Onwards to the half century - perhaps I can catch you up then??!!

Now, the PPs bagged their 100th down south in England, probably thinking noone would notice, but Snaik found them out. Today they sneakily achieved their 200th cache in Germany. They even appear to speak fluent German!! Well Done the PPs!!

There's no excuse for poor swaps, IMHO. There are lots of inexpensive things that are good to use - batteries, battery cases (look at 7dayshop.com), a book of stamps, keyrings, bookmarks, wee toys and cuddly toys for kids, books (as has already been mentioned), stationery items, packets of seeds etc etc. I cant remember the last time I saw a McD toy in a cache in Scotland - it was certainly a very long time ago. An English cacher touring Scotland recently commented to me that the cache contents here are much better, and I wonder whether one of the reasons might be that we are a relatively small geocaching community, and would feel that we are letting others down by leaving rubbish. Or the myth about tight-fisted Scots is just a load of rubbish. Most caches I have done recently are very well stocked, often with things like PC games, matchbox cars, computer leads, personal organisers, calculators and so on.

I use both Bill. I tend to use the arrow at the beginning, and the map more when close to the cache. I think this is because sometimes the arrow starts jumping about all over the place in the vicinity of a cache and cant be relied on, whereas with the map it gives you a better sense of the direction. It's probably down to a personal preference rather than one being better than the other!

A few years ago I had to have some dealings with some US banks. Unfortunately I gave my address as being in Edinburgh, Scotland, and left out the UK bit. None of the letters from them got to me, as they all did a grand tour of the US seeking some place in the US called Scotland. Nothing important exists outside America; doesn't everyone know that??!!

Brian, I'm a happy snapper too: 405 photos, but for 380 caches done. I enjoy looking at others' photos, and it usually gives some idea of what a cache will be like.

Add this link to your favourites! Uk Cache Map There used to be a direct link to it from the main page when I first started caching over a year and a half ago, but this disappeared quite a while ago. Its a very useful but, for some reason, obscure link which not everyone seems to know about.

Not counting event days, at which there have been numerous sightings of other cachers... Met MDFlyer at Craggis of Gorgon; the same afternoon narrowly missed introducing myself to Murrin & Spioradsaor at Under Iron - we were all trying not to look too furtive; DeputyDawg at Peden's Stone; Marmal at Witch You Were Here; Ullium & Angela at Ivy's Bridge; One half of The Stubbornly Oaks at Kensington Gardens no4; and most recently, Team Clova at Sightseeing in Ceres; not to mention narrowly missing Highland Nick twice, Snaik once etc etc. And these locations are all over Scotland - The Borders, Lanarkshire, Lothian.,Fife as well as London. These days, I expect it to happen rather than not!

The whole concept of geocaching centres around altruism. Cachers set caches for others to find; many put huge amounts of effort into creating good caches. Cachers finding caches also help to maintain them by renewing logbooks, containers etc. I think that those who get excited about geocaching will inevitably begin to get the urge to place their own caches. They will have done one or two that particularly grab them and give them ideas for their own. It is a bit of a leap to take to place the first one, but there is nothing more satisfying than receiving positive logs for your own caches. This in itself makes the whole thing worthwhile, rewarding and provides the motivation to do another! I have seen new cachers starting out who initially are only interested in finding; however, once they have placed their first cache, the 'setting' bug kicks in. There are always going to be individual reasons why some cachers don't place caches: time, locality, physical mobility problems etc etc. It probably doesn't matter on the whole, since the number of new cachers and caches seems to be increasingly exponentially all the time as this pastime becomes more and more popular in the UK. Having said all that there's no excuse for a certain cacher, with over 200 finds, who I won't name to shame, not to take the plunge and place his first cache!! (Only teasing....)

3rd SGDO write up has been send off to Inukshuk for the online mag at Geocaching Today. Many thanks to Haggis Hunter, Ullium and Perth Pathfinders for their contributions. Lots of good photos included too.

I was in the Vendee in the summer - there are only 3 or 4 caches in the whole area and I didn't manage to do any of them. The cache map of Europe is also a good starting place and can be found here. You can see the French border outlined by huge numbers of caches in the surrounding countries.

The maps at Uk Cache mapappear to be functioning properly again - there are suddenly lots of new green boxes withing striking distance of home.

And 220 Corbetts (you've already done 1 of them!)

I'm pretty sure that you have to reach the summit.

I would also like to add my congratulations. I didn't find out until I was home that it was the PPs first Munro, otherwise I would have made a big fuss when we got there. Number 1 done, only 283 left to do (I think).

Ah ha!! It's easy when you know how. I keep discovering new things that you can do on the g.com pages. Thanks John.

I think I know what you mean. I am feeling like taking a break too, especially after a particularly busy caching month in October. And there are plenty of things at home that I have rather neglected. However, just at the moment, there are a lot of excellent new caches appearing within fairly easy reach of home, and each time that happens, my enthusiasm is rekindled. However, what I recommend for any jaded English cachers is a trip over the border to sample some unbeatable scenery and well stocked caches. BTW - sorry to digress - Ive been meaning to ask for ages how to get the quote copied to appear with its author at the top of it?

As another lone female cacher, I don't really worry about being attacked, but I do worry about being out in the wilds and breaking a leg or something. Mobile phone coverage in the Scottish countryside is not brilliant. So, for remote caches it's advisable to have some company (hence our Scottish Geocachers' Days Out!), but otherwise I enjoy my solo jaunts. I have done some caches as dusk is falling and even one or two in the dark, but I have not really enjoyed that experience, so I'm going to stick to daylight caching.

The weather was superb, the company fantastic, the scenery spectacular, and a great time was had by all. I would especially like to thank Snaik and Team Clova for their caches and the extra effort that they both put in to get caches ready for the event, Haggis Hunter for his map reading skills and Perth Pathfinders for keeping me company and somehow finding an extra bottle of juice in a backpack when all of my water had run out. Now I wonder where and when the next SGDO will be?

No muggles will see me now!

1 : 20.83 or 1 : 17 if we are not counting locationless caches. I keep telling myself that I've placed enough caches, for fear of not being able to maintain them all properly. But then I get another idea...

Congratulations Ullium!! I was very pleased to be there for your 200th. Didn't we have a grand day out??

Anyone who wishes to join those of us who are staying at Glen Clova Hotel for breakfast on Sunday morning is welcome to do so. It's £5 for breakfast, but I need to let them know of approximate numbers, so please post a note on the cache page if you'd like to do this.

I normally rely on checking the UK cache map at UK Cache Map for the green cache boxes to alert me to new caches. However. it's not showing any of the new caches that have gone live in the last week, in Scotland at any rate. Does anyone know why this is?

Well, I wish I lived nearby to join an adventure like this. The outing sounds similar to the 'Scottish Geocachers' Days Out' that we have been organising this year in Scotland, although yours is perhaps a little more ambitious. Our first SGDO was climbing Ben Nevis, the UK's highest mountain at over 4,400 feet. The second took place along the 12 mile Water of Leith Walkway which runs from the Pentland Hills on the south side of Edinburgh, right through the city to the Firth of Forth. Our next outing is on this coming Sunday, and is another 12 mile return walk into the Angus Glens, along an old drovers road called Jocks's Road, bagging a Munro called Tomount. (A Munro is a Scottish mountain over 3,000 feet.). All of these events have been great fun, as well as good ways to bag some remote caches involving rather arduous walks. The meet up in the pubs afterwards is also good fun too, of course!