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E = Mc2

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Everything posted by E = Mc2

  1. We have caches in the Louisville area that are under 20 feet of water for some months. They're really only available for about 6 months out of the year, and for several of those months can only be reached by boat. They're behind a dam in the Ohio river. An example of only being available during certain times of year and one of my favorites is near the South Pole. It can only be accessed during the Summer, because it's dark the other 6 months and no one can get there.
  2. unknown is also code for nano. Not always! I listed the larger of the two containers as 'Unknown'... By way of explanation, we have a local 'toss a film can out the window every 528 feet and call it a cache' hider who swore that it was impossible to hide anything other than film cans in a local park. The park rules restricted caches to within 20 feet of the trail. In my description of the cache, I said I couldn't decide on a container, so I followed what surprisingly seems to be becoming the norm here and used one of those small black containers with a gray lid. I placed it to get his goat, but he never went out and found it. Apparently hiding is all he wants to do, to the extent that some of his 'caches' have been recycled three times (without ever having received any maintenance, since he doesn't do that, either).
  3. In my experience with 4 year olds, they don't care whether they are FTF or 32TF. They're happy to be out and about with Daddy and finding Geocaches! If you want FTF then set yourself up to get the FTF. Have your stuff ready to go so all you have to do is walk out the door, and keep yourself informed about what is going on. I have a pocket query for caches 'that have not been found'. The link to 'Preview this Query' is on my links bar at the top of the page so I only have to use one click to see the results. Do I run out for the FTF? Sometimes. Right now, for instance, there is a FTF opportunity about 20 minutes from home. I noticed it around 8:00 this evening, (7 hours ago) but I just don't feel like heading out for it. I do get a little irked when someone has found the cache but waits to log until someone else does. It's frustrating to head out only to find that someone else found it the day before and decided to wait to log. If I have a bunch of logs to do and don't think I'll get to the FTF log until later, I always post a 'Found it' placeholder log as a courtesy to my fellow FTF hounds until I can get around to writing something more worthwhile.
  4. I've been approached several times by officers while Geocaching. Most in my area know about the game and just keep on trucking. One day, however, I was searching for a cache when the county sheriff's deputy pulled up and fired up the strobes. I talked to him for a couple of minutes and then he pulled his car off the road and helped me look for it. Our area reviewer co-hosted an event recently with the Louisville Metro Police Bomb Squad which was eye-opening, to say the least. They have blown up several caches in the area and the official attitude was trending towards "Why can't these folks find something else to do?". Every bomb squad call out costs money, and some of them cost lots of money. The $250,000 robot gets wear and tear and for what? Blowing up a loc-n-loc filled with golf balls and junk in a public park? To the bomb squad, if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck, it's a duck. A PVC pipe cache looks exactly like a pipe bomb. An ammo can leaning against a tree with no visible label is a bomb. <-- That's a period.
  5. The same way you originally set up the map. This sounds like the information I was given by the police directing traffic this afternoon at the U of L / UConn game. We asked where gate 4 was and one of them said "Right next to gate 3". Looking at your profile page, I see that you got your map from World66 <--LINK!. You can go to their website at that link and check off the states you've visited, then copy the HTML they give you after, -or- you can just put the state abbreviations in the html on your profile page. I'm thinking that your question really is more about "How do I edit my profile page"? Yes? Click here. Somewhere on that page, you will see a piece of text that reads <img src="http://www.world66.com/myworld66/visitedStates/statemap?visited= The letters that follow the equals sign are the abbreviations of the names of the states you've visited. You can either replace that bit of code with the one from the World66 page, or just manually add the state abbreviations yourself. I'm not really sure if they have to be in alphabetical order, but that is the way that World66 delivers them.
  6. The longest single visit for me was 6 hours, but that was a 12 stage cache and I drove 138 miles to DNF it. Turns out there was an error on one of the stages and, after that was corrected, I found it after two minutes of searching. Counting separate attempts: One of Show Me The Cache's caches took 12 trips and about 7 hours before I finally saw the light and started looking in the correct spot. Coords were good, I just wasn't thinking outside the box.
  7. I've run across several caches accidentally. Two of them were placed within 100 feet of other caches. Another was the final to a puzzle cache that was placed before Groundspeak required CO's to post the final stage coordinates. That cache was less than 50 feet from a newer, traditional cache. I found a couple of Letterboxes near caches. The closest was 6 inches away and had "NOT A GEOCACHE" written on the lid.
  8. I always talk to folks when I think they're Geocaching. More often than not, I say "Greetings, Geocacher!". I've met some really nice folks and had great conversations with cachers that I met like this. On one occasion, I saw the Groundspeak logo in someone's back window and asked them if they were Geocaching. They told me that they weren't, at which point I said "Too bad, as there are several new caches that just published on this trail". They immediately changed their story about what they were doing.
  9. I'll go out on a limb here and say that your appeal has been made and denied. If the area needs another cache, then you will need to find a spot at least 528 feet away from the other cache or make it a multi. The excuse that 'Multis aren't popular' doesn't hold water. If you hide it, they will come if the area is special enough that you need to put a cache there. Another suggestion if you can't find a spot that's 528 feet from the first cache is 'move the first cache'. Just a thought.
  10. Regarding the "I was with them when they hid it" finds: Okay, so what would you do? Never log the cache because you were there when it was originally hidden? Throwdowns aren't a big problem here, but I've seen it happen and, in one instance, it did irk me a bit. After spending half an hour looking for a cache and not finding it, I logged a DNF. (it was, indeed, missing. the property owner found it and removed it) Before the CO could come out and get permission to replace it properly, the next group to come along threw down a film can and everyone logged it. Personally, though, I'm not going to get my panties in a bunch because someone logged someone else's cache without actually finding it. Play the game honestly and don't worry about the other people. Next on 'Dredging up 4 year old forum threads week'...
  11. You can get a basic eTrex at Wally World for $99. That said, it just that: a basic unit. If you use one more than a couple of times you will probably want more features. Figure out what you need and check eBay as well for deals. Example: I bought a nearly new Magellan Meridian for $60. Since I already had an SD card to put in it and I own teh mapping sopftware for it, I got a nice mapping GPSr for $60.
  12. GeoGeeBee touched on this, but I'll elaborate. The problem with that definition is that the caches that are going to add memories instead of numbers probably won't be the ones with the most logs, or the highest find count per time measured. I had a series of caches, for instance, with a great view after a nice little hike through the woods and a stream crossing. The logs I got from finders made me proud to be the owner. In 16 months, there were less than 30 find logs. I have another cache that was put out to satisfy the requirements of another cache (place one, log this one). It's a neat hide, but nothing particularly special. Thanks to its proximity to a local annual event and its ease of access, it has had 301 logged finds in 6 years, with 101 of those finds in the month of October (when the event is held). To the OP: What others have said makes sense. Contact the locals and see what they recommend. Looking at your route, I can recommend that you take a break in Elizabethtown, KY and do KY Hiker's cache Making The Connection. It can take about an hour to complete, but is well worth it. As an added bonus, you might just meet the owners if you do the cache during 'normal business hours'. If you're coming through at night, a friend recommends that you try KY Hiker's Not Diurnal.
  13. <smacks myself upside the head> I just spent the better part of twenty five minutes typing up a reply, then thinking that I wrote it up for the wrong GPSr, deleted it all and wrote something else, then realized that I had it right to begin with and had to type over yet again. An hour later... GSAK is truly a wondrous tool, and one that I wish I could understand a little better. That said, you can connect your GPSr (short for GPS receiver) to the computer and then send the waypoints directly from GSAK. On the menu bar select 'GPS' and then 'Setup'. Select Some trial and error may be required re: COM ports, but it shouldn't be too difficult to get it right. Since you using the Meridian series, the baud rates must match or it won't work. You can select the baud rate on your GPSr by going to Menu, Setup, Baud Rate. Higher numbers are going to be quicker. Of course, since you're using a Meridian you can send the waypoints directly to the SD card and then load them from the card into the GPSr. In GSAK, go to File, Export, Magellan eXplorist and SD card. Select the drive letter your SD card occupies and type in a name for the file and send it to the card. Put the card in the GPSr and then upload the file to the GPSr (Menu, Card Utilities, Load waypoints). Presto! Be aware that there are certain limitations to the Meridian series in regards to the quantity of waypoints. You can not have more than 500 waypoints loaded on to the GPSr at one time. Any more than that and they won't load off the card. I usually go to 'Menu, Setup, Clear Memory, Wpts/routes' before I load any new waypoints off the card. You can, of course, have as many files on the card as you want. I keep a set of waypoints for my local area, another for the city I layover in, etc. As to the second part: Correct settings? If you haven't had the unit operating, then it will be necessary to perform an initialization in order to set the date and time and tell the GPSr where it is. Doing so will tell it where to look for the satellites. (Menu, Setup, Initialize). Other than that, most of the settings are going to be 'personal preference'. I, for instance, turn the screen contrast down to the low 40's to preserve a bit of battery life, but it really isn't necessary since I'm using rechargeable batteries. I've turned certain screens off because I never use them, but again, that's my personal preference. I change the backlight timer depending on conditions (driving, it's on all the time. Caching, it's set for 30 seconds). I also leave the electronic compass turned off on my MeriPlat because I hate to have to calibrate the blasted thing every time I change batteries. The compass rose has the sun/moon on it, and that works just fine when I'm not carrying my Silva Ranger compass with me. One simply aligns the sun/moon icon on the screen with the real sun/moon, and the arrow points at the cache. Welcome!
  14. I would say small, but that's just my opinion. Quart sized or larger is a 'regular'
  15. I think perhaps you may have misunderstood what others are telling you. The file you receive in your email is not in a format that the GPSr can do anything with. The programs mentioned above (GSAK, EasyGPS) will take the file you receive in your email and turn it into something you can then, in turn, load into your GPS (and PDA). GSAK is the more robust program but, at least in my opinion, it is a bit more difficult to learn to use. Aha! I now see that there is a 'getting started' link on the GSAK home page.
  16. Without bringing up the micro debate, many of the urban caches are quite easy to find without a GPSr provided you use a decent map. I found one a couple of nights ago based on the description and distance from a known location without GPSr or flashlight. That said, having a GPSr does make it a lot easier when looking for any cache, be it a lamp skirt micro or a decent sized cache in the woods.
  17. To answer your question: No, they are not essential. I have units with an electronic compass and units without and they all find Geocaches. I do carry a Silva Ranger and a topo map when I go in the woods so I can find my way to civilization if the electronics go bad (I had a GPSr tell me that I was at 16,000 feet of elevation and moving at 40 mph while I was standing still at 600 ft above sea level). To be honest, I don't use the electronic compass all that often. All of the GPSrs I use have the position of the sun and/or moon on the compass rose (arrow page). Simply aligning the sun(moon) icon to the actual sun will align the bearing arrow with the actual direction to the cache.
  18. I'll stand corrected if it happens, but don't look for any more 'top ten' stats any time soon. They hit the server pretty hard, and it just caused too many problems in the past. You may want to check out Cacherstats as well. The log stat is based only on "Found" logs. I've never had any issues with uploading a PQ, and I've been using it since before it became 'official'.
  19. cough - snerk - BWUHAHAHA!!!! Congratulations! I've wanted to do a 100 find day for the longest but always seem to get sidetracked by life. What I'd really like to do is find a sponsor for my "1000 caches in one month" trip.
  20. Must be nice. Our local stores (sounds like mall wart) have stopped carrying lock-n-locks and instead carries a cheaper brand that doesn't hold up as well.
  21. Usually, when one of our local cachers has a reason for being gone an extended amount of time, they'll post it to their profile page or contact someone else locally to ask if that person will watch over their caches. If someone drops out of the game and no one can contact them, then the usual process of 'wait and see what happens' takes place. Perfect example here occurred when someone got caught caching during working hours... and in a city-owned vehicle at that. He ended up just dropping out of sight. As his caches become unusable, they've been SBA'd and then archived. And... Of course there's always the hidden subtext here that someone could (knowing that the person won't be back) remove the offending cache, post a SBA log, and then hide a new cache after archival... but I didn't say that.
  22. Having the feature as requested would circumvent having to pay to access Premium Member features. There have been many times when I've wanted this because I have a wife and three kids who all have accounts. It would be prohibitively expensive to pay for all of us. A workaround would be for your friend to run their query, you run yours, then compare the two in GSAK. I've wanted to search by 'Hidden By' for years now. One of our local cachers has more than 300 hides, many of which fall outside of my closest 500 caches query. Yeah, yeah, I've found almost 200 of them so far, but there are days when I want to only look for his caches...
  23. Simple solution, really. You become a premium member, then set your caches to 'Members' Only'. Your 'friends' would then have to pay to see the coordinates to the caches AND you can see who is looking at your cache pages... True example: A couple of local cachers had a disagreement with someone about Earthcaches. Shortly thereafter, someone then went and destroyed all of their caches (and only their caches) in a local park, hiking in excess of 10 miles to do so. They put out replacement caches in the park and someone went out and destroyed them again except for the one that they urinated in. Since making the caches members' only, they haven't had any more problems. Just a suggestion, and it helps support the website!
  24. I agree, but do know the reason that some people use that method. I've run across a number of caches where the previous cacher couldn't find the cache and posted a N.M. log to the cache because "it's OBVIOUSLY MISSING" if they, in their supreme dog-like state, couldn't find it. The Needs Maintenance log throws a reviewer flag as soon as it is posted. Say you have in excess of 100 hides and you work for a living. Getting to the cache before the weekend (which may be planned out already) is impossible. You post a note to the page that you will be able to check it on _____. Your busy reviewer doesn't read your 'Note' that you will be out to fix it next weekend and posts a nasty-gram to your cache page. Two days later, they want to archive it because you haven't 'fixed' the problem (which may or may not even exist). I've actually seen that happen. Posting a Performed Maintenance log takes the attribute off the cache page and pulls the flag from the reviewer's queue. While I don't agree with doing it that way, it does reduce reviewer workload and CO hassle. Hopefully the CO would disable the cache at the same time to keep it from showing up as available until they've had a chance to check it (but that also pops a reviewer flag). Personally, I had a cacher post a N.M. log to one of my caches and the reviewer posted a note to it the VERY NEXT DAY, stating that it had come up as needing maintenance "for some time", and asking when I was going to go fix the problem. Due to the fact that I am on the road for days at a time, I wasn't able to check my email for two days and came home to find that... Fortunately, I understand that the reviewer is a, likewise, busy person who may not have had time to do more than note the N.M. log and click off the 'post canned reviewer note' tab.
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