Wooden Cyclist

Why would someone use a sock puppet account to ask this question?

I am 50. At an event to day I would guess that I was at about the median age. But among those of us who actually went caching afterwords, I was above the mean age.

An ElDiablo stick made an appearance at an event I attended today. Very nice. The owner of the stick considers it to be one of his prized possessions. It's a staff...not a stick. I've always regreted naming my web site geo-hiking sticks. It should have been geo-hiking staffs. Stick, just sounds so impersonal. Every staff I've ever created was customized to the owner. El Diablo Sorry for the using "stick". I should have known better. By the way, the Boy Scouts call them staves. I don't know why. Thanks for the poplar recommendation. I love to work with poplar in my woodshop. I'll have to keep my eye open for a good looking piece in the woods. Will a branch work or should I look for a sapling?

There was a thread in this forum that asked the question "How do you carry?' in reference to how geocachers carried their side arms while caching. LOTS of responses by gun owning cachers and some pretty good pics of some pretty impressive iron.

He probably got the new listing emailed to his phone.

Sometimes you have to look closely to see the beauty. We went on an ice walk today to find a cache on an island that is about 1/2 mile from shore. It was a beautiful day with plenty of opportunities to see beautiful scenery. But not all of the scenery involves looking into the distance. This crack in the ice as about 3/4" wide and is unimpressive at first glance. But if you look more closely you can see the crystals that have formed on the edges of the crack.

An ElDiablo stick made an appearance at an event I attended today. Very nice. The owner of the stick considers it to be one of his prized possessions.

This one might be a good choice for you;

I just looked in the corner of our garage. There is a stack of hiking staffs there. My son picks a new one up in the woods every time we go to Cub Scout Camp. There are a variety of woods and lengths represented and all have proven to be strong and functional.

Isn't Oak a relatively heavy wood? I wonder how purple heart would hold up? I've always liked purple heart. Both purple heart and ebony are heavier than either red or white oak are.

After searching the net for an answer to your question, I came up with this: The staff should come up to your chin or shoulder, be 6-9 inches higher than your elbow, should be 6 feet long, should be 5 feet long, varies between 46 and 48 inches long, 1.75 meters long, "right for you". As you can see, there is no standard. Mine is 6 feet long because I like to hold the staff slightly below my shoulder level and still have me hand at least 12 inches below the top of the staff.

He posted a description of his staff making process HERE.

There have been many good recommendations in this thread. I took a different approach when I made my staff. After searching the web for awhile I came across THIS. The staff described in the article looks like this. The author started out with a mop handle that has a threaded metal tip that gives the tip added durability. The cord that is tied around the staff not only provides a good grip and good looks it also serves as survival cord if you get into trouble on the trail. If you think about it, mops get used by professional custodians for heavy work on a daily bases, so the strength of the mop handle should not be a concern. My staff looks similar to this one except that I chose more colorful cordage. All that is left is to add one of these Groundpeak Geocaching Staff Medallions.

Edited out the duplicate.

Sometimes you get a pleasant surprise. I contacted a land manager about placing caches and he very enthusiastically invited me to palace caches in 10 of the preserves he manages. The public is encouraged use those 10, but he feels that they are underused. He gave me a set of easy to follow guidelines and asked me if I was interested in doing a series that would draw people to all 10 of the properties. Another cacher and I are going to place a Letterbox Hybrid in each of the preserves. When a cacher has collected all 10 unique stamps they take them to the office of the manager and he will give them a small gift. This same organization manages 25 other properties that are considered fragile and any use by geocachers or anyone else is prohibited.

My Lee Valley order came in today. I actually needed some specialized connectors for some office furniture I am building, but browsed through the Gifts section and camp across the bison tubes. They call them Mini Containers. Not cheap at $1.50 each, but now that I have them I can tell you that they are of a higher quality than the ones I usually find as cache containers. I also saw these brass containers at the low cost of $3.70 per 6. Orders some of them too. They don't have a seal so it will be necessary to add an o ring.

I was having trouble getting decent coords for my caches. It wasn't unusual for mine to be 45' or more off. After reading a recommendation on these forums about walking to the cache from different directions, taking coords from each approach then averaging them, I decided to give it a try. Result? 110' off.

Pruning shears? First time I have heard of those being used for geocaching.

A good portion of my finds were made in the rain. I can't say that I prefer the rain, but it does keep the muggles inside. As for other weather. My preference is late winter/late fall. No blood sucking insects and I don't drip with sweat while I am signing the logs.

Almost all of my 880 finds have been made with my BlackBerry. It serves me will for seeking caches, but I have difficulty getting consistent coords when I place caches. A friend of mine offered to sell me his old Garmin GPS 60. It is a very useful addition to my geobag. I will still seek most caches with my phone, but the Garmin will come in handy when I lose phone signal or when I am hiding caches. Check around for used GPS's There are some good bargains out there.

http://www.itsnotaboutthenumbers.com/

A smartphone can be a very effective geocaching tool. I have been using a BlackBerry Curve 8330 with Cachberry installed for 11 months and had found almonst 900 caches. Battery life can be concern if you are going to cache for more than a few hours. Accuracy has not been a concern for me except when I am far into the sticks.

Thanks, that worked for me too.

Please excuse me for posting in this forum using English. Are any geocaches located in Volhynia? I would like to send a travel bug to that area, but I have been unable to identify any caches there?

Where are you located? I just happen to have a white jeep in my possession right now.