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why would we? you seem to have it covered. It seems that a lot has changed on that page since I last used it... could not find a place for the password anymore... it may be there or not... the rest seems valid... I was basing on the old page. Anyway it should work... the re register part appears valid. Doug

Poking at dead stuff is also something I would NOT do !! Better that than LIVE stuff... that often fights back! Doug

Assuming you got the avatar in the avatar section not the profile pic... It usually takes logging right out of everything and then logging back on... Can you see the pic's in the profile listing as your avatar and or profile pic. IF not... perhaps you didn't complete the update... I believe you have to give your password to do that up at the top of the edit page... sometimes it doesn't take... you should see the pics if it does... I'm sure someone else will chime in on this as well. Doug

Me too... the took / left record ( a very brief one ) is a necessary item for tracking missing and otherwise misplaced items... I've solved a few rather involved misplacings in my short career... ha. No record no solution, or not as neat anyway... It doesn't have to be very big either... just clear what it entailed... I use intials of the name and whether it is TB or GC.. or the reference number... A visit to place something or collect one after one has found is part of the cache log... and should remain... This does not apply to "oops, I forgot to drop this" type entries... but does to visit notes... Doug

Yep... more than close enough... your chance to confuse... hope you have a good question ready... I'll not mention the typo glitches in my scoring.. I was hoping for a mention of the fact that online declination calculators such as the one at NRCanada http://geomag.nrcan.gc.ca/apps/mdcal-eng.php only give magnetic declination not grid declination... being aware of your convergence angle (and +-) from the map can save a lot of calculations... which are likely not valid anyway... The convergence angle does not change... it is a physical construct based on the grid as mentioned by you.. declinations change frequently and even the rate of change is not constant. Did you know this?... you sound a bit like a navigator of some sort. I've done marine, air and ground navigation at one point or another... Another for you... does your GPS accept declination correction... some of the newer ones seem to do it 'built-in' thru software... my old one I can correct the Magnetic ... that is declination. Congrats... Doug

Not quite... British Grid is a coordinate system like UTM or even lat / long... it uses OSGB 36 datum... Geocaching.com uses DD MM.mmm (lat/long) in WGS 84 Datum as has been said... To the OP... to plot things on a map use the BG and OSGB 36.. or whatever datum the map uses... to convert back away from the map to caching mode... just set to our set.. Like Starbrand says, the conversion is then automatic.. it's all the same to the GPS... the map is the different situation... since the measurements of where things are changed... you can see this on the Wikipedia site.. and others... Doug

Thats it - your up! Oh OH!... one tends to forget the need to have a question... hmmmm... Having not read all the quiz yet... I hope this isn't a repeat... Forgetting Optical and Dental (maybe others) definitions... What is convergence angle? AND Why is it a good thing to know and how it applys to NTS maps? That should take care of navigation and Canada requirements... I'm to busy to come up with anyting else for this time... sorry... BTW I knew the 603 thing but didn't have time to enter... ha ha. from another old document in fact... NGS back in the old days... an article on making the trip... Doug

An old brochure from the Columbia Icefields says it supplys water to three oceans... Pacific, Atlantic and Arctic... and is the only place in North America that does... Didn't see anything that disallows reading tourist stuff... apologies if that is wrong... no Googling involved... PS I climbed up there in 69... nice view. Doug

Exactly. Sometimes you'll see a Found it log with great details of an adventure and then you'll see a follow-up Note that'll say 'Oops, forgot to Drop bug.' That Note doesn't have to remain on the cache page for the bug to track correctly. Everything on the bug page still shows all the Drops and Retrieves. I'm a little less foggy today... I know the difference... I guess it makes a difference IF the note was an oops and the drop was mentioned in the Find log but not executed in reality... I do like the Took and Left notes to be there... whether swag or trackables. Thanks for the answer and putting up with a fuzzy question. Doug

Nice... I've been thinking about the project... but haven't had a lot of free time to doodle... Things ranginf from the fish mosaic to word and initial stuff like yours... also one other variant once I figure out a new to me software... (hate changing graphics programs)... Becky will certainly have some choosing to do... I've been trying to find out just what her wants were... although the only major problem has been that I so far don't have any useful way to display stuff like this... so far... I had to do it by email... Like that change to Iphone... Not sure what he wanted either... I was going to put a bullet hole thru it as a joke!... he did say take a shot... Come to think, I have to get ertyu back online... he is still mulling final changes to his... that's more my style than 'flat' images... been very busy though. Nice to chat... sorry I'm long winded. Doug If you haven't emailed her I'll mention this post...I think they're about to travel a bit. not sure when.

As you have been 'tutoring' some of us who like to occasionally track missing bugs for whatever reasons... IF drop notes are deleted, does that not remove the online record of placement for tracing purposes??? I suppose one could depend on the next pickup, but it makes it a bit harder to backtrack doesn't it? I can see that your pickup/ drop would be in the cache log (hopefully). I am probably not thinking very clear tonite... been digging out of another dump of snow... hopefully the last one of the winter.. ha ha. Anyway, both cache and TB logs should have a brief record of the took / left transaction... IMHO. Doug

Excellent... now go get it, hopefully FTF you never know... I can't go... work... and 1200 km away. Doug Edit: Sorry! Go find another puzzle after this one... February 21 by celestron8 (75 found) yeah hooo . FTF Actually my 11 yr old found it but I drove him there. TFTC Marvin Waiting for your entry... working on a few local puzzles myself for spring...

Dang the double... sorry Doug

Relax, it's just some scientist using hamsters to work out the details of harnessing the energy of two and three year old children... Doug

Care to pick me up on the way? Not to far from the border... At first I was STYmied... after about thirty seconds I saw the light... Just kidding about the trip... I'm to busy right now... It's tax time... now that is rough... Doug

Hi BC... from one in BC... What do you bet it's the usual way for LEO's... call the bomb squad! Fastest time to blow it up... from muggle report to bang! To bad about my life of leisure... It looks like that is open to Fire as well... I could probably beg status but could not afford the trip! sigh! Doug

Right now there are a limited number of really local caches here... and I've done 4 of them... a few more to go to clean out the valley at this end... (lots of potential hides, of course, but then I can't find them...) This became clear to me the moment I did my first search for caches around my location... Lots close by, but unaccessable without long drives to the other side of the mountain/ next valley... Those are still fair game for hunting of course, but not really local even though closer than the ones IN the valley. I decided that one approach was to limit the number of caches I hunted in the area, as well as along the routes I normally travel frequently to the 'big city'... Once I get there it is a different story. Although I havent' found that many yet, I will always save some for the drives... I like one cache about every 30 minutes of driving to give my back a rest... that gets me away and back without cleaning out the route... Eventually, I'll have to go farther and get further out into the boonies... but I go there anyway and anywhere but here there are lots of caches about... I don't care about finding them all... just having something to do and to see new places... Of course I don't worry about running out, since there are some really prolific cache hiders around me... and like I said, I have yet to get hiding myself... There is also the fact that some of these hides can take a while to locate... my longest was 4 tries til found, and I really enjoyed booting my own butt for that one ONCE I located it... Bigger thrill was watching the number of higher count cachers that HAVE YET to find the thing... at least the ones who admit to DNFs... Doug

Testing something! Still confusing... but I think I'm getting around to the problem...

Main things to watch... When you go to a map... Geocache coordinates are given in Degrees minutes to decimal places and in WGS84 datum ( DD MM.mmm WGS84) You should enter the coordinates in that format... THEN, switch the format and datum to match your map and desired output... Sounds like British Grid and whatever datum they used to make the map (that information is printed on the map)... You could use the lat / long format instead, but on those maps, Use DMS format... Catch is that older maps use an older DATUM... when the newer WGS84 came in the world squirmed a bit under the grids... that is the features on your map are not where you think, unless you convert... The GPS does all the work of conversion of the display... DO NOT leave your GPS set like that to hunt the GC.com coordinates... the difference is fairly substantial in northern areas... it's proportional to your distance from the equator. Doug

I was occupied a lot this week... There is a good explanation here... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Universal_Tra...ordinate_system Don't seem to get the link thing to work, but cut and paste that into your goto box... Anyone know how to get the insert link to work.... It just says I have to enter one and stops.. I guess it's of to the FAQ for some reading... Edited: It just looks and sounds like it doesn't work... but it does anyhow... funny. might as well remove the buttons... just type the tags... once you know what they are. Doug

Nostalgia Time... I won't play this time since I've been in BC since 95... I remember the 12 lanes near Avenue Rd. cause that is where I lived... I can guess that there is some latitude in the defn. of THRU... since all lanes go thru to somewhere... even the off ramps... I suspect it would be somewhere else since there really wasn't anywhere left to put lanes there... Of course there is lots more of 401 than in Toronto. Good news is that there isn't ANY 401 in this part of BC... yaay!. Going the other direction, I remember when 401 by Avenue Rd. was a dirt track leading over to the construction site for the unbuilt bridge over the Don... That was less than one lane... Then two lanes, four, six , eight and then twelve... too many. Too many hours sitting in traffic jams and too many radio chats with people who were commuting from opposite ends every day... I remember many going from Miss or Brampton to Oshawa and from Pickering to the West end... Never did figure out why some of them didn't MOVE... they could have simply swapped appartments with one another... go figure. I got smart and commuted for a while to Hamilton... only 45 minutes since I was always going opposite to the traffic at that time... 90 minimum to Don Mills at times. Doug

Hi... when reading UTM format... the number is the ZONE NUMBER... I am in 11 U... the U is the block identifier... they are subdivisions of the zone from south to north... the larger numbers are representing the grid lines... the North South lines are eastings, the east west lines are northings... they are read eastings first then northings... they number from west to east, and south to north respectively... that part is similar to British usage... the anchor points may be different... A zone is 6 degrees wide. There could be more, but I'm running out of thoughts... long day... I forgot all you wanted was the Letter part... anyhow there are loads of good sites explaining the usage... it all looks like ZZ BB Easting Northing on a GPS... In this area 11 U 123456 123456 or similar... you don't need all of the numbers all the time either... note, my count is off for digits... but I don't have access to my GPS... sorry. Doug

Nice.... but actually he said he DIDN'T cross it! Even better... that makes him a winner. Doug

And if HE were doing that, some of our LEO members would probably be seeking HIM for a FTF... Keep up the SAFE caching... like the geek approach... me I'm old school, like things the HARD way. to a point... Doug

Nothing wrong with 'older' gpsr to start with... they just require a little patience, in many ways they are better to start, because they force you to 'DIY'. You learn care in entry, skill in using the data they provide. I've looked at newer ones... (have to research yours yet)... not really interested right now... I use a 45 xl Garmin... nothing fancy, but fairly accurate for 95 vintage. Has lots to appeal to me, I bought it new in 96 and use it a lot even before caching. I'm still learning to use things I never saw in it's capabilities... Anyway... One thing about your question... That sounds like a display format thing... Geocache uses Degree and minutes to decimal places, yours sounds like it is set to Degrees to decimal places. I see you found the UTM, and that works well too. Check the same setting and see if you find DD MM.mm as a setting option. I think you were set for DD.dd . Also check the datum is set to WGS 84. One thing to look for is the display mode that will give you GOTO information (regardless of what it's called) that is the display that will give you the bearing and distance to the waypoint you enter for the cache... Most early models and new ones have that... sometimes different names... Garmin uses GOTO, mine has a button on the front... push and follow the bearing... (no compass on simple machines, use a good hand unit.) you hunt by following the bearing and watch the distance reduce to its lowest point... you are there... not the cache, but the area... You can look up triangulation to... older units are less efficient in trees, buildings etc... I find clear areas, and look along the compass bearing to see a line of position to the cache... two or three good ones and you can 'triangulate' the likely location better despite poor GPS results in the woods... takes practice, but helps... Other wise look for more than one 'closest' reading... and search in between them as well... Older GPSr are prone to 'slide', that is the GZ readings (lowest) move around a bit. You have to look at all the area covered... Those are the days to consider triangulation... saves time. If anything, I think that older rigs with the right 'basic' readouts, in the hands of someone who has learned the right methods work fine... just not as fast a lot of the time... I haven't been doing this that long, but I have a few finds that are lost to a lot higher find numbers... remember... YOU are the search engine. Doug