BareFeat

Not to mention the exposure for the sport, if an actual caching mag was at the dentists office instead of issues of LIFE from 1983. whoever decides to attempt something of this sort, please contact me, even if just for New England related content. This is exciting stuff.

Wow! How did i miss this topic? To those that say a printed magazine will not flourish i would have to agree. I was a graphic artist in another life, and am now in a completely different line of work because of such down trends. However i would have to say if done correctly, (cost!!!) and if your not shooting for the stars straight out of the shoot, this idea intrigues me greatly. I have very many contacts in the printing field. And could provide good costs on stock/layout/bindery type aspects of such a product. Mailing could be done by a few of us. I propose this idea: Start the website, find your people. Your contributors, your content. Then instead of going for a full color magazine, start off with a simple newsletter. Then if you do a good job, you can start inquiring of your subscribership what would they pay, to have a bit of a nicer "publication". Also many magazines are now published on CD. I think a website with "tools" for the community, and people covering different geographical "areas" is a fine idea that would be welcomed by many. Dont forget Europe! They are mostly english speaking also. Hell just to have a site where you felt your input was heard would be nice.

Im glad to see so many support the idea. What i dont understand is this. I had the badluck to be banned from this forum, it took exactly 5 mins from the post i made till i was banned and my post was removed. It was an ignorant mistake, i was talking about some software that was not obeying the TOS. (which i was not aware of in the slightest) I was a bit dismayed at the situation, since it was better then all the other crap offered here that you have to pay for, but live and learn. However every day i see great topics simply being ignored by the PTB. Why is that? Ive asked for help on moving this idea along, yet i dont see any comment by a moderator or anyone else on how to do that. Are we to be stuck w/ the site as it is forever? Is there no evolving around here? Ive created and been involved with a couple "community sites" in my past/present and anyone whos worth their salt doing such knows, you must evolve to meet the needs of your users. I guess i just dont understand what appears to me as intentional foot-dragging by the PTB (as you forum users call them) I hope in the future, we wont have to use 3rd party html scripts to get the desired effects on our pages. That this site with ALL its volunteers can actually grow and become MORE useful. Instead of just ignoring. I mean the site works great and all, but i could give you around 100 bugs and improvements just off the top of my head. As far as people abusing an attribute: How exactly does one do such a thing? I guess i dont understand that part so much, i mean if it doesnt belong on a cache it doesnt belong but to classify it as abuse, denotes to me that the person gained something by using the attribute. Keeping adding your reply's and keep this topic on the up! Maybe someday well get a response, at least on the proper way for the community to be heard.

Lets just say ive heard some pretty sad stories, of every cache someone has hidden coming up missing, or they are destroyed, or moved just in general people F'ing with their things, because of stuff they dared to respond to on this forum. And as far as the "Cache-ier then thou statement", take it how you want. I've been experiencing it since i began last year. First cache i placed in an air tight container, i dared to put a package of non-smelling dog treats inside. Some a** came along and took everyone of them because "i shouldnt put those in there". Same with people who insist on removing ANYTHING from a container that is NOT THEIR OWN. Strictly to enforce their will on the masses. hence ive coined the "geo-mafia" to describe such trolls. To those people i say: Get Bent. (in the nicest way possible) haha A simple note to the owner should be sufficient. Let them live and learn. Also im quite experienced with forum trolls, another beast i wont dare mention. As far as the topic goes... WELL DUH dont put a cache in a glass jar. But i mean cmon, there were like big clunky rocks and priorty tape all over those jars, if that wasnt a joke i duno what was. Anyone who believed he was going to place that cache, would be the kind of person who cant figure out how to make kool-aid- ....cuz how do you get 2 quarts of water in that little package? flame on!

I too am very into the local history aspect that geocaching presents. Ive been able to show more people some historical spots in my town, then im sure have seen it in 30 years without a cache. Many from the town they are in even, that didnt know the site exsisted. I've also heard what you are describing, called a "power=trail" although the idea isnt the same. It would seem these power trails are simply designed to provide many finds in a short amount of time. Not my cup of tea. We are considering placing numerous caches in a local game preserve here, I love and practice the "no trace" idea myself, but if its in an area that is desginated for walking/hiking, and there are no issues w/ management or owners. I say its a great idea. .

This clearly has to be a joke. And if it ain't, you should also know that using glass jars is generally considered a no-no. Glass has been known to break and I've been known to CITO glass. Clearly your comment must be a joke. Are you implying you destroy someones cache if it doesnt fit to your guidelines? Im so sick of the "greater then thou geocachers". the Geo-mafia is gonna get yea becareful!!

lol... boy that old saying comes to mind. Everyone has an opinion...... I would say to you, to be your own person, and not listen to these "quality over quanity" people. I mean its all subjective isnt it? I enjoy finding any hide. If its hidden well, there is a sense of accomplishment. Sure im personally not going into the city, to find urban caches all day or everytime i cache. But ive done a couple that were great. I like to think we all bring a bit of ourselves to the table with this game, (this is what makes it fun! seeing how others play the game, and maybe taking an idea, and molding it a bit into your own M.O.) I think everyone is entitled to their own opinion and of course to what their "idea" of geocaching should be. But those roadside micros, or urban caches you dont care for, could be right up the alley of the professional, who works entirely too much to get out into the woods and do a 5 mile multi once a week. I myself have placed several "lame roadside caches". However i counter the "haters" by providing as much info as possible. For instance my group of hide a keys are all at local fishing holes. When able ive posted a topographical map of the body of water, described the types of fish, plants and wildlife you can expect to see- and perhaps given a hint on what type of lure would work best for a "quick cast" when they are done finding the cache. To me, these caches are for the fishermen amongst us. Do i care if joe blow doesnt enjoy my cache? Not at all, i care that joe blow the fisherman got turned on to a new spot to take his children on a nice afternoon, or to launch his boat and do some great fishing at. Ive also made sure to vary my hides in difficulty. I have some any cacher can "figure otu" when walking up to the GZ, and now i have a couple that have numerous DNF's due to how well they are hidden. Ive recently gotten into different sorts of camo's also. These things are what make hiding fun for me. Showing you a piece of history is the important part to me, not that the container is big enough for you to put some silver coin from you local supermarket in. I have 18 caches hidden, and am waiting for my 19th to be published today. Find your own niche- as long as you put some thought into them, you will find you will have people who love them. And we will ALWAYS have people whod rather push their opinions on everyone else, or can find the negative in any situation. Happy Hiding!! Free your feet!!! Geocache Barefoot!

I recommend any HTC device. Crackberry has nothing on winmo anymore, especially since more corporate intranets are using exchange. I use both an HTC tilt and HTC FUZE, and you cant get any cheaper. If you have at&t for instance, and you are up for an upgrade the Fuze will run you around 200.00, the tilt (same as all the blackberry devices except the brandy new ones) are mostly free. Just sign a 2 year contract. The pros are obvious, free googlemaps pull you right up to a cache location, log your finds from the field etc. like you might have done w/ the previous phone you had. I recently had to shut off my data plan, but am still able to cache free of charge using cachemate and downloaded gpx files from the site. Also check out terracrosser for a freebie map program. It will download from google/yahoo maps, you set it up for how many zooms you want, and it downloads the (1000 screenshots average 2meg file) and converts them into a .map file. Wah LA! gmaps w/ no data plan. nicole- i use windows mobile which is also a bit buggy, to make sure im ok w/ coordinates when placing a cache i actually will reboot my device twice and take around 7-8 readings each time. Also with a real handheld gpsr you get a +/- footage error display. It could be that due to humidity, trees, or landscape you are missing certain sats to bring your triangulation truely into a 3d lock. For instance, if you are not getting any southern satellites, you may find you are too far north/south. My advice would be to boot your phone with the bare minimum running in the background when caching, and when going from one cache to the next, or if your device has been on and running for days, try a reboot in between caches.

Bump! So how do we put an idea like this into some sort of motion? MOD? anyone?

One thing I ran into while trying this is that I had a tendency to overdo it in the beginning. I think since the body is using different muscles and learning to walk differently, I needed to start slow. My beloved is now starting to do this as well and we're starting him on no more than one mile until that is easy and pleasant and doesn't result in pain the next day. You might want to just back off a bit on the mileage and move up slowly. Carolyn Wow i forgot to check this thread last couple weeks, glad to see my new friend Shiraz helping with questions! Also it makes me smile to think of geocarolyn and hubby ow ow owwing thru the woods for the first time! There is this insane little widget for igoogle, called "how to of the day", it shows one or two topics on my igoogle page. Not long after posting this i actually saw a "how to begin hiking barefoot" listed in the topics. LOL Not a whole lot of brain power involved, although there were a couple great hints for people new to this sort of activity. Mostly mentioned above by Shiraz (start out in the backyard/driveway, and small hikes not 10mile rocky courses) but one thing that they mentioned that i actually took note of was this. You need to "learn" to walk this way, your feet are slaves to your shoes/sneakers and what not. If you think about it as you are first doing it (conciously) you will learn to hike correctly barefooted. One great point they made, Place your feet straight down, don't "scuff" your way thru the woods. Also they suggested that you should use the ball of your foot landing first. As far as balance goes, if you place the ball of your foot down first, and you hit something nasty (gooey or sharp), you can adjust much easier then if you are walking on your heels. Amazed at all the replies to this thread, and glad to see Me and Nudecacher arent the only ones trying to be a bit more intune with nature. As far as the bug-bites, sharp objects etc. go, well my feet always take the brunt of the bug bites, and after living in the desert, the swamps of florida and new england i guess ive learned to take it. But as a few others mentioned im also the person who people are surprised to see WEARING shoes... .so i was a bit more prepared to start caching/hiking barefoot.

Anyone know the process? Do we need a petition or something? And I would have to agree nothing can kill a cache hike like an angry cow.

We enjoy placing and finding historical type caches. Old homesites, rail lines and burial grounds are just a few we've come across in our meager #96 finds. Im sure most cachers will eventually come upon a cache "historical" in nature at some point. As history and caching go for us so far, each new one leads us a little farther from home, maybe not geographically as much as in our heads, imagining the place the cache owner has brought us too in days long past. Having the "Historical" tag designation on the attributes section would make finding caches in places like Boston much easier when planning a trip to do a few. We are blessed in New England, and its great that so many of the caches already out there are little history lessons already. Dont make me mention 10 attributes already there, that it would be MORE useful then. haha j/k Anyone? Anyone? BUELLER?

It seems the NEW designation is not appearing on some caches recently published. A series of caches published today "A final TESTing place". Only 5 of the 8 show up on the site with the NEW designation. If viewed on their respective pages, they have the NEW tag. However if you do a search for Athol, mass and then scroll thru the pages, 3 of them do not have the NEW tag listed in the list. Possibly the owner placed these over a series of days (weeks) and the older ones are not showing? I'm using the latest build of firefox, and windows XP and i dont care to waste my time any further than that. Moderate me some more.

For our large multi we left a brand new 1gig mp3 player *(7.95 on woot.com) stuffed full of phish's reunion shows from march @ hampton va. with a note that said, expand your horizons and check out some new music, or feel free to delete and add your own. I could care less if its a so called FTF hound, we dont put anything special in our regular caches. Believe me they earned it on the multi ( one almost vertical trail involved, some bushwacking, and all the assorted bugs and things you could imagine-- hell bigfoot might live in there) of course some people may find my sons favorite item to leave "special". Whoopie cushion $1.00 @ your local dollar store (~)}]

LOL alrighty then, didnt go exactly as i thought it might. Nudecacher hijacked my thread without trying! lol ... must fight the urge to view profile...... funny stuff thanks for the laughs. And of course i dont go barefoot to everycache, but you better believe if its a decent area, they are coming off!

did my first multi- of the season completely barefoot the other day. OW!! Very rocky old cartroad, and quite a bit of bushwacking involved too. I got into barefoot hiking some years back after jokingly saying i wanted to start a barefoot hikers club, and finding out there was one already in the north quabbin area i was living in. (full of crunchies!!) So anyone else geocache barefoot? And crazy stories about such? Check out this video- Mt. Whitney Summit-- BAREFOOT! double owwey!! No thats not me, just some other crazy hikers intune with nature. (~)}]

Also there is no precedence according to the website rules. Meaning just because someone else did it, (or you yourself did it). Doesnt mean it will be allowed again. I have run into some trouble publishing one near a railroad line, and couldnt understand why this person suddenly had an attitude towards my hides. I had recently done a cache in a major city at a Subway station where you had to walk out onto the platform to find the cache!! Why was my backroad cache having problems?? Was i jumping into the game to quickly? unwritten rules i didnt understand? No. and No. Turns out googlemaps showed the former rail line (the trail it was placed on) as a still working rail line, even though there were'nt even any tracks there anymore. It is a volunteer job, and overall we are very lucky the system is as quick and well oiled as it is, i think.

Hello all- I have a question im sure has been asked a million times, but i dont find the answer anywhere im looking. We have a cache, that someone fairly new went to weeks ago, the person retrieved/dropped a coin. They never actually picked up or dropped the coin here at the site however. Im a firm believer of communication, so i sent the person a friendly note (after waiting two weeks) reminding them that that coin appears on the cache page until logged, (and that some crazy geocachers could potentially drive 100 miles to see a certain coin), only to show up and the coin not be there at all. I know this is a common new player problem, i messed up the first one i did ( i grabbed instead of retrieving- not so bad), so my question is this. Should i not have contacted this person at all? They were very friendly and complimented us on our hides, so i dont feel bad at all. And now its been almost another month, what else is there to do? Do i notify a mod? or ? thanks

Also humidity plays a major part in the offset of a gps signal. With an older model i would imagine it may even run havoc on it. The newer units or "high sensitivity" units are also complemented by newer gps technology. You can actually get gps indoors in some cases now, depending the structure of the building, and the unit your using.

Ive also used the approach on muggles, we drove all the way into NY a few weekends back to do some western caches, and popped over the line to do 1 in NY. When we pulled in there was a nice (much) older couple eating a picnic lunch. We said our hellos, and started up the gps, and realized the cache was within their site, the gentleman was quite observant and inquired what we were "up too". lol I sat down with them, and explained geocaching they were instantly enthralled, i even pulled up the google over lay and showed them their home town, they had a cache within a mile or two of their home at a park they knew well. My son retrieved the cache and we showed them a logbook going back 4 years full of names. I think they sat and read everyone of them. Used the same approach on a pair of grizzled, crunchy fisherman this last weekend. They helped us find the cache, and wrote down the site. When they ever saw the beautiful geocoin we pullled out of it. MORE Fans were made indeed. (geopelli geocoins). You have to be careful doing this of course. But if your a good judge of character, even muggles can be dealt with and turned on to the sport in some instances. My wife says im the traveling evangelist of geocaching. HA! /flame on

lol The areas happen to be VERY scenic, fishing areas mainly. One i did last nite has barely a car on it from 6am=3pm then the "commuters" claim their turf. And the speed limit is 20 or less however, not everyone obeys the rules. Also the idea was that people with small children might want to be fore-warned. Not that an adult would fall into traffic. hahahah funny stuff. Railroad tracks hahah, i placed one within 20 yards and was denied. Yet ive walked into central station in worcester and had to physically walk out on the T platform to find one once. YIKES! feels like a good day for trolling, gonna be 80 here. Course my trolling will be in the water.

Hello all! Some of the caches i've placed recently have very fast moving traffic near them. I could have picked different spots. But there are parking areas, and trails and you like to think everyone will think "safety first". Sorry if there is a section this should have gone in. I couldnt find one. Any one agree that "TRAFFIC" would be a decent attribute to add to the list?

Yup. Looks like a normal goal to me. Theres a hell of alot more to this story. But its not my place to tell it. Theres a good reason he pulled it back. In the situation i would have too.

hrmm dont they say pigs/hogs are cleaner then your dog or cat? I think your being discriminatory towards swine!! hahahha funny TB!

For sure not all phones use triangulation (which isnt worth a whole lot!) I own both an HTC Kaiser and HTC Rapael which have onboard gps radio and an external port for a SMA type connector. Also some pep use bluetooth gps with phones that dont have the built in gps radio like those mentioned. GPS is a known battery hog you did about all you can do, I would suggest while driving to your next cache turning off your gps till you need it may also save you some battery.