WalruZ
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Posts posted by WalruZ
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geez.
you know, it might be nice to have an 'appeals process' for caches that are archived.
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If all you have are coordinates and a waypoint, you're asking for trouble. Look at the cache page before you decide to do it. Print it out or go paperless. If you're out in the woods without the cache description you are caching blind. (no offense meant to blind cachers...)
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When I'm out on a rainy day I wear my poncho. When I open a cache, I keep it under my poncho and just duck down out of the hood . I'm effectively in a tent at that point and no rain gets into the cache.
Apparently some people do it different. You can rant all you like, but they don't read the forums.
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I've seen cachers in my area start adding lines to new caches stating that the log must be signed in order to claim a find. Too many "I forgot my pencil" type logs.
"I couldn't find it, but I was there" - ? dee-leet.
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you can demo mapopolis on the palm - download the map reader and a demo version of your county map. if you are using cachemate you can also download and install a export plug-in that lets you export your cachemate records to your address book, where they show up as icons on the map in your palm.
I did so, it was nice. you can select the 'route' option off the menu, choose your current location off the map and choose a cache as a destination. The software will give you turn-by-turn directions, which is great if you don't know the area you're in very well. When I have time I will probably spring for the $40 map pack so I can downloald all my area counties. I'll have to get an expansion card to hold them though. I considered getting the $200 package that adds a GPS to my zire 71 so i could see my progress on the map, but money is tight.
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Pretty much the same thing happened to one of my TBs - someone from Arizona, no less, found 6 caches over new years and has never cached again. The last thing they did was to take a TB of mine. No answers to emails. This is how TBs end up.
Quit waiting. Make a new TB tag out of cardboard or something, make it look like your original (keep the copy), attach it to something new, 'grab' the TB from whoever they are and turn it loose again.
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Also, I am trying to keep them as simple as possible and still novel and fun
My son found a similar (but not as nice) wire puzzle in a cache recently and considered it one of his all-time favorite cache finds, and he's been with me to find at least a few hundred.
I recently got a great deal on magnetic key hiders which I turn into ready-to-go micros. There doesn't seem to be much TNLN right after I leave one of them.
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I wonder, in an idle sort of way, what it would be like to cache in nashville with a bicycle. Anyone who has been there care to speculate?
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I found my first two or three hundred caches with a 101 (which I traded away) and I now cache with a 301. The form factor is what's important to me - it is much smaller and less obtrusive than other GPSrs and fits easily in a pants pocket.
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GPX is an XML format, and if something interferes with it's parsing it's either a problem with the creator or the unparser, (duh), and they should both be informed somehow. Most likely GS isn't escaping something it should be.
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Also found an old railroad spike that I am planning on polishing up and attaching a tb to, but we will have to see how that works.
A railroad spike for a travel bug . . . ? Hmm . .
You mean like The Golden Spike?
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1. The GPS calculates coordinates using the 4 birds it can hear 'best'. Under tree cover, which ones can be heard 'best' changes repeatedly, so the result can change. Slow down and let it think. Try moving slightly so you get better sky visibility and then do a 'perp walk' - walk through the area of visibility watching where the arrow seems to want to go.
2. Really, when you get within around 30-40 feet, you should be looking at your surroundings rather than the GPS. The more experienced cachers I go out with sometimes don't even look at the GPS after they've left the car - they just search the cache site.
3. Look for events in your area and try to hook up with more experienced cachers, who are usually happy to take along a noob. You'll learn a lot just by watching.
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I don't consider the common comment, "I've raised the difficulty level for this cache because it's a well trafficed area" to make any sense. Heck, it's not my cache. If you want to leave it somewhere where people will see me searching, that's your problem. I'll do what I can to be reasonably circumspect, and yes, I examine regulars somewhere other than the cache site, but let's get real - if you jam a film canister behind a pipe on a busy downtown street, I'm going to walk up to it, take it out, sign the log and put it back. If I get seen by someone walking down the other side of the street, too bad.
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I occasionally entertain the idea of putting some special software on a machine and starting a 1-900-GEO-HINT service. Finders could volunteer hints, and seekers could call in with a waypoint and retrieve them, subject to phone charges. Profits would be split with the hint providers.
It's a thought...
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no buchwhacking.
good idea. they can get ornery, especially if you whack them for no good reason.
wrap some duct tape around a pencil. if you get a sore or blister on the trail, rip some off and put it over the affected area, layered if necessary. If mid-length hikes aren't your thing, this is probably what you'll encounter most - 4 miles is where your feet start to show shoe issues they wouldn't show after only 1/2 mile.
Extra water.
cooler with a drink or three in your trunk - it's a motivator on the way back.
as always, mark the car as a waypoint.
don't overpack.
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Travel bugs are usually 'killed' by idiots, not on purpose.
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I think it's been building, since the crack-down on virts, which seemed to encourage a rash of lame micros.
That's definitely the case.
I don't understand this - lame micros are typically in vacant or parking lots. how could you put a virt in one, even a lame virt?
I will say one thing about the virts I've done. They are almost never lame.
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Nurse Dave is very close to 1000, but he seems to be saving something special for that big round number. I wonder what?
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'needs maint.' logs are not needed. active cache owners read the incoming logs, and if they say something is wrong, they deal with it. Inactive cache owners don't respond to anything. What's really needed is for approvers to get together (as they often do) and decide to enforce some standards in regards to how long a cache can be ignored by the owner before it gets summarily archived.
Basically, in addition to a "needs archived" log, i would like to see a "cache owner is jerking us all around" log, and/or a "cache owner appears to be dead" log. Those are the two things that I keep seeing as I work my way through my area.
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I have a zire 71 and have been very happy with it. here's what I do.
I have a premium account, so I can do pocket queries. there's a link to them near the top of your 'my' page. they come in your email as .zip files.
I use GSAK (geocaching swiss army knife - gsak.com ), which is free, to open the zip file.
I use GSAK to load the waypoints into my garmin geko, using the smart tag so they look like abbreviated names. My laptop doesn't have a serial port, so I bought a USB to serial adaptor to accomodate the garmin serial cable.
I purchased cachemate for the palm for $7.00 and used the palm software to install it on the zire.
I use GSAK to create a cachemate .pdb file which is automagically synch'd with the palm the next time I perform a hotsynch. When I next run cachemate on the palm, I have to merge the synched data with cachemate's data, which takes about 10 seconds. Be sure to install the palm software before you install GSAK.
I have defined two additional cachemate categories as 'found' and 'not found', and when I search for a cache I change it's category accordingly. After a day of geocaching, even a long day, all I need to is change the cachemate category filter to 'found' and I can see what I've done that day. After logging, I delete the records from cachemate.
My setup is just a little more complicated that that - I have seperate GSAK databases and seperate cachemate categories for certain geographical regions that I might cache in, but you get the idea.
One additional thing I use is Mapsource. I also use GSAK to create a mapsource waypoint file and load it in for viewing. Before caching in a particular area I'll printe out 1/3 of a mile scale maps of the cache areas. It feels very different to have a street map with the cache plotted on it, compared with just driving around semi-lost.
The zire 71 has a nice bright screen and plenty of memory for cache pages. I know a few other very active geocachers who have the same model. The camera is handy in a pinch too. Gopher It!
-- edited to add, if you buy one, make sure you're getting evenything that came with it. The palm, the cradle, the power adaptor, and the palm software CD. Next, go out and get a hardshell case for it. Do not delay. I regularly sit on my palm, on rocks and curbs, and the case protects it perfectly. Should you not have one of these, your palm will last about a week, imo.
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Not necessary.
My first rule of night geocaching is not to park in a parking lot near the cache site. Eg, if you're going after a cache in a regional park, don't drive in and park in the lot. Look for legal anonymous on-street parking somewhere more or less nearby. Accept that you're going to have to walk a little further to find the cache.
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The only thing that deters me from looking is any possibility that the coordinates are not correct. Thus, I have to be pretty sure a puzzle solution is correct, and if it's one of those multis where I have to gather the numbers, it had better be pretty unambiguous. I don't appreciate wild goose chases. I went on one recently, and it really peed me off.
Other than that, nothing. Playground caches are easy at night with a flashlight. If a cache has DNFs on it and the hider is unfamiliar (or infamous), I'll probably shorten my search time, but I'll still look.
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Difficulty should be higher than a 1 because of the "... lack of equipment" needed ...
Maybe for you...
perhaps those caches need a variable difficulty?
Jeremy - Founder, Groundspeak
in General geocaching topics
Posted · Edited by WalruZ
Having Jeremy go look for your GeoCache is sort of neat too!