drfred

Virtuals, micros, locationless, etc...they should ALL be allowed and even more variants should be added. You "purists" need to get a life. This is a GAME and should be FUN! If people want to come up with variants that are FUN for them and others it should be encouraged. Geocaching is not just a bunch of hippies hiding tupperware containers in the northwest anymore. Relax and enjoy...

Anyone who hasn't bought into the idea of micros hasn't found any good ones! In urban or suburban areas these caches are priceless. If you think that going 3 miles into the woods to hunt for a 35mm container is painful, how about looking on the side of the road for a tupperware container barely hidden behind a tree? What a waste of time! Most of my favorite caches have been micros - whether hidden far in the woods or bored into a hole on a telephone pole. Many micros are very clever. The sprinkler head you play soccer above may well be a cache. The power outlet on the side of the building may not actually carry any power - but a cache! It opens your mind to realize that any common object you see every day may not be what it appears to be. I agree that one of the best aspects of geocaching is that it gets me into the outdoors. When you live in a city, however, getting out for 30 mins at lunchtime is sometimes the best you can do. Not many ammo cans can be hidden at the corner of 18th and 8th, but countless micros can!

Perhaps there is a way to do this now, but I don't think so. It would be nice to be able to view maps of only caches I have not found. If you 'uncheck' the "You Found/Own" option the caches still appear on the map, just without the check mark. In cache dense areas it is hard to look at the map and figure out the best route for the day when it is cluttered with caches already found. Does anyone use other software for mapping? I use NetStumbler and StumbVerter to find wireless waypoints and map them using Microsoft Mappoint and this has some great advantages. NetStumbler gets the coords from my GPS directly. Is there any existing software out there for using these programs? Would anyone be interested if I wrote a program like StumbVerter that could read pocket queries and map them using Mappoint maps? Thanks!