Wintertime

Some friends and I are going to the Mojave Desert next week to do some "geo-art" caches near Edwards AFB. I've been staring at topo maps on my computer (using MacGPS Pro and the free maps from the California Geo-Spatial Atlas), because we're going off-road and I want to understand the terrain as well as possible before we get there. (Yeah, yeah, I'm hoping to find a few benchmarks, too!) I'm probably going to swing by USGS and get a printout of the relevants quad(s), but I also just downloaded what appears to be a very nifty app for my iPod touch. Of course it also works on iPhones, and there's a separate version available for iPods. It's called simply Topo Maps. Here's its website: Topo Maps app It's $7.99 but already looks to be worth every penny. I installed the app, selected and installed two USGS quads, and sent a GPX file from my computer to the app all within about five minutes. (For waypoints, it accepts GPX, KML/KMZ, and CSV files. It also supports multiple coordinate formats.) I'm not surprised that nearly half the 649 people who've reviewed it on the iTunes Store have given it five stars. Given that benchmark hunters often need topo maps, I thought I'd let other folks here know about this app. I'll post again if I run across any particularly nifty features!

Yeah, I don't think there's any way of displaying benchmark datasheets on the GC app. If you had an actual GPS receiver, you could convert the NGS datasheets to .gpx files and display them on that unit. That's what I do on my eTrex 20. The instructions for doing that are probably in one of the pinned threads on this forum.

The benchmarks that have been turned into waymarks on Waymarking.com are intentionally ones that are not listed on Geocaching.com. That's precisely why those various Waymarking categories (U.S. benchmarks, UK trigpoints, Disney benchmarks, etc.) were created: to give people a place to log marks that aren't on Gc.com. The two sites are owned by the same company, but your Waymarking "points" have nothing to do with your geocaching "points."

Oh, that is helpful. Thank you for the clarification!

Thanks, Lumbricus! If a group manager cancels the submission, then the original submitter would have to do the editing and resubmission, right? So if I wanted to edit it myself, I would have to accept it and then edit it?

Hi, Max. Of course I'll email the person who submitted the waymark. But I don't want to make the offer until I'm sure that the Waymarking.com software allows me to do it.

I head a category that just received a number of submissions from someone who made a bunch of typos. I thought I might offer to fix the typos for him, but when I click on "Edit" next to a submitted waymark's name, all the fields on the details page are grayed out. Do we have to accept the waymark before a group manager can edit it? Or can only the submitter edit a waymark? (From other discussions in this forum, I think the latter isn't the problem.)

I might try this next time I'm in Menlo Park, which should be next week. USGS has a survey mark in their flagpole circle, and they hand out printed sheets giving its coordinates. Here's some info I posted about it some years ago, in case anyone reading this thread is in the vicinity and wants to calibrate their GPS receivers with that mark: Info on WMC 1994 And here are some photos I took of it and the surrounding area: WMC 1994

The Groundspeak folks are aware that professional surveyors sometimes look at benchmark logs on Gc.com. And they're in touch with NGS (Dave Doyle, right?). So although it's frustrating that they've never updated their copy of the NGS database, I'm not worried about them suddenly removing it.

I agree with Kayakbird's comments. Filing a recovery with the NGS is a serious proposition. I'm sure that even those of us who've done it a lot sit there and read every field multiple times before we click Submit, because we know that we have a responsibility to provide accurate information. And if we're including notes, we want to make sure they have the exact wording and formatting expected by the professionals who use the NGS database. Sometimes we'll even run our comments past the other folks on this forum for editing suggestions before sending them to the NGS. Submitting recoveries to NGS is not a good idea for beginners, and I fear that a simple "log" button on what sounds like a very nice and easy-to-use iPhone app (I only have an iPod touch so can't use apps in the field) would inadvertently encourage people who are unfamiliar with NGS's way of doing things to file recoveries. I think it's great, though, that you make it easy to log survey marks on Gc.com.

Thanks, guys, it looks like the eTrex just didn't like the format of that XML file. I pasted the coordinates from it into my proven LOC file and they're showing up on the GPSr just fine. I'll mention it to my friend, but if other people's GPS receivers are using his file okay, I doubt he'll want to spend any energy figuring out why mine didn't.

He generated the GPX file himself using GSAK; the additional waypoints for the multi do not exist on Geocaching.com. (He knows that's an option, but has considered the pros and cons and decided not to do it.) I can download the main geocache file from Geocaching.com to get the descriptions of all the stages in one GPX file. What he was trying to send me were just the waypoints. Those are the things that are showing up fine in BaseCamp, but when I send them to the eTrex, only the first one shows up. It's a mystery!

Moun10Bike, what do you mean by creating a GPX file "locally," and which line(s) of the XML file are you referring to as the "cache ID"? My friend's GPX file has separate "<wpt>" tags for each stage of the multi. For example: <wpt lat="33.809083333" lon="-117.9239166"> <wpt lat="33.812816667" lon="-117.9260166"> <wpt lat="33.809433333" lon="-117.9272500"> Each "wpt" has a unique "<name>" and "<desc>" tag, too. I would expect Garmin's GPSr software to respond the same way to a multi-waypoint GPX file as Garmin's computer software does. So I don't understand why BaseCamp sees the separate waypoints but the eTrex doesn't. I don't have GSAK myself but am certainly willing to hand-edit the XML file as needed to make the waypoints show up properly.

I just found out the hard way that, unlike GPX files, you can't just drag and drop LOC files on the latest eTrexes. At least, it didn't work with my Disneyland benchmarks LOC file. I had to bring the file into BaseCamp and send it to the eTrex from that program. Otherwise, no matter whether I put it in the GPX or POI folder, my eTrex could never see it. Now, a question about GPX files. A friend sent me one that has all the waypoints for his multistage virtual geocache at Downtown Disney Anaheim. Dropping it into the GPX folder on my SD card didn't work; I only got the first waypoint. When I import the file into BaseCamp, all the waypoints display on the map. But when I send the file to the eTrex, I'm back to square one: only one waypoint shows up. My friend generated the GPX file from GSAK. If I understand correctly, there are multiple formats possible for GPX files. So am I stuck because my eTrex is expecting a Groundspeak-formatted GPX file and it's getting a GSAK-formatted GPX file? Any ideas on how I can get the eTrex to recognize all the waypoints in the file? Thanks, Patty

Hi, Jaz. As others have mentioned, GPS File Depot and Open Street Maps are good places to find free maps for your eTrex. I would suggest either the planimetric (not topographic) maps from GFD or the street maps from OSM for starters. As GeoTrekker mentioned, you won't need topos if you're mostly doing urban caching. But first, we need to figure out why you're only seeing part of the East Coast of the U.S. on your eTrex. The built-in basemap, although it's so basic as to be almost useless, does cover the entire world. What happens when you zoom out? Also, where is this arrow appearing? At the top of the screen, or on it? If the latter, that's showing the direction you're currently heading, and will change as you move! Patty

Reiger, I just got an iPod touch myself. When I'm somewhere with some spare time, it would be fun to find a Wi-Fi connection and download a few caches to look for. I realize that I will be limited to using descriptions and rough map locations to find them, but that's fine. I have some friends who have the Geocaching app for their iPhones; I might ask them to turn off the phone connection and see what we can do with the maps offline. I also might try the free version of Geocaching app on my iPod touch and hope that gives me a good idea of how the full app would work. I wonder whether there's also a way to disable her GPS receiver; maybe in Location Services?

That site has a lot of good features, one being that, unlike the Geocaching.com site, it's up to date with the NGS database.

After I did that a couple of times I got smart and made .loc files with the locations of all BMs marked on the USGS topo maps for Yosemite.

Last week I found a clip of the last couple minutes of the movie on YouTube and went looking on Google Maps for the coordinates. I don't think I wrote them down, but someone over on IMDb just said that the latitude was 34 08.227. I thought the ones in the movie were DDMMSS, though, not DDMM.MMM. Anyway, I recall that the first few digits of the longitude were hidden, but I played around with some possibilities, and my favorite result put the location pretty near the Hollywood sign in Los Angeles. Perhaps they are the coordinates for the original Batcave from the TV series; that would be very fun! I just saw the movie for the second time this weekend and have no plans to go back again in the immediate future, so if anyone sees it and can write down the visible coordinates, please let us know what they are! [edit] Okay, I found the clip. It's 34° 8' 22.77N; the only part visible of the longitude is 9' 18.1W. I don't see anything of potential interest at that latitude anywhere in the U.S. other than the Los Angeles area, so I'm still guessing that it's a (random?) location in the Hollywood Hills between Warner Bros. and the Hollywood Sign at 34° 8' 22.77N, 118° 19' 18.1W.

As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago in someone else's Disney benchmarks thread (which seems to have died out), the creation of Cars Land has provided surveyors with the opportunity to install more survey marks at the Disneyland Resort. My friend Lloyd found a slew of new benchmarks in Cars Land, plus one at Tower of Terror and a couple at Disneyland. For more information, go to: Patty's Disneymarks page You can even download .loc files for DL and WDW for use in your GPS receiver. And most of the marks on my Disneymarks site have also been turned into waymarks, if you'd like to log them on Waymarking.com. If you go to Disneyland (or any other Disney property) and find any marks that aren't already on my website, please let me know! Patty

Here's the page on Garmin's website where you can find all the models that offer paperless geocaching: https://buy.garmin.com/shop/shop.do?cID=143 Perhaps Magellan's website has something similar. With that capability, you can use Pocket Queries or Send to GPS to download full cache descriptions, hints, and logs. And you can upload notes made in the field.

Hi, John. So you're thinking that the tracklog is more accurate?

Rich, it looks like my track log is being updated about every 30 seconds. Even when I'm on the bike rather than on foot, that seems plenty often enough for me. I don't bike very fast. :-) MH, yeah, it isn't a huge difference, but do you have any idea which one is likely to be more accurate? Patty

I went out biking and geocaching today, and I'm confused about why the trip computer on my eTrex 20 says I traveled 6.53 miles but the track log recorded only 6.2 miles. I have my GPSr set in walking mode rather than driving, so the trip computer shouldn't be rounding off to the nearest street. Any ideas? Patty

I haven't used the photo viewer on my eTrex 20 very much, but I've loaded some benchmark photos to help me find those. If the photos are geotagged, they'll even show up on your map screen to let you know that there's a photo of something in that area.