Raymond Duck

Thanks for your advice Panda Inc and The A Team. I've requested the tracking code from the bug owner but they haven't bothered to answer. If it's showing up as being at the cache then I'll maybe just write a note on the bug's page explaining the situation. Thanks again.

At the weekend we dropped off a travel bug and I updated it's log to say it had been dropped off. However, it is showing as being at the cache inventory but not there's been no update on the actual bug's trackable page. The bug is called Cheers Ted and it's reference number is TB4X887. It's currently at Old Agecroft Colliery Slag Heap, GC3NQW5. Any help will be greatly appreciated as I'd like to keep it's log up to date. Raymond Duck

Cheers for that MartyBartfast. I'm offshore at the minute so maybe it's a problem with the company's servers. I'll check that and the link when I get home.

Thanks for the reply, Gitchee-Gummee, but I get as far as the screen with the two map options but the Google Maps side is greyed out.

Read on the forums that Google maps can be selected from the map page but when I try the button is greyed out. Am I doing something wrong or is this feature not available in the UK? Any advice will be greatly appreciated. Cheers, Raymond Duck

Ah - you're not supposed to wind them up you know. You should apologise for having the temerity to stand in a layby, and beat a grovelling retreat whilst doffing cap. Then turn yourself in to the local fuzz. You could also ask for your offence of standing on the cracks in the pavement to be considered, along with two counts of assembling a folding bicycle in an unapproved fashion. Abolutely class I like the cut of your jib, Mr Humphrey.

The lady in the cottage doesn't have a grudge against the geocaching community, she has a grudge against people being within a 500ft radius of her house. The only reason this lady was alerted to our presence, was the incessant barking of her dog, who had obviously sensed our presence within the area. Had it not been for the dog barking, she would never had known we were there, as we were no where near her house, not in the direct sight lines of her windows, and making no noise apart from a conversation between ourselves. We are primarily walkers, and on the day concerned, had just set off on a circular walk of the area, picking up any caches we passed along the way. So had we decided not to look for the cache, but had stopped at that stile anyway, whether to grab a cold drink or to check our direction or for whatever reason, I believe the same confrontation would have happened. The lady's aggressive tone, body language and condescending nature, were a factor in the way I responded to her when she questioned how long we would be. Even after we walked past her house to continue on our walk, her ranting continued when she came outside again to have her say. Her main points of argument were that her cars had been vandalised, her husband had nearly knocked over one of 'you people' in his car and that we made her dog bark. I explained that we had neither been anywhere near her cars, nor her dog, and that if it's barking irritates her, then she should take it inside the house. We have previously abandoned caches that we have felt were too close to houses, to prevent causing any concern or objection from residents, and to prevent being muggled. In this case, the cache was well away from their property, and is in fact located on a stile which is part of a public footpath, which I'm sure must be used by hundreds of people throughout the year. I am disappointed to hear that the cache has been moved due to this lady, as it was a perfect location on the circular route. I have no doubt that there will still be further confrontations between her and countless other unsuspecting members of the public, who make the mistake of walking past her house and 'making her dog bark'. Mrs Duck

Below is an extract from our log for section 2 of the Herding Hill Challenge (GC3JFWQ). Found but not without some considerable hassle from the lunatic woman in the nearby cottage. She stood, arms crossed, shouting abuse while we quietly searched for the cache. We tried our best to ignore her rantings but when asked how long we'd be Mrs Duck answered back with as long as it takes and pointed out that as we were nowhere near property it was none of her business. After five minutes she returned to the cottage, possibly to take medication, and left us alone to find the cache. As we walked past the house on our way to Herding Hill number 3, a man came running out, demanding to know what we were looking for. After a brief chat he returned indoors leaving Mrs Loony to claim that previous Geocacher's had vandalised her cars, upset her dog, and more or less annoyed her by daring to stray anywhere near her house. Mrs Duck put her straight on a number of issues and we left. Surely, as the cache was no where near her property we don't have to take such abuse. Obviously the cache owner sought the relevant permissions prior to placing it there so she has no legal complaint to make. I hate to think how intimidating to the situation might of been for a lone female cacher or youths. As I've mentioned above, what right do these people have to hassle cachers who are innocently searching near to, but on, their property? Can Geocaching.com, as an entity, challenge these poeple over their behaviour and accusations?

We searched every nook and cranny without success. GC26F1M

Hi there, I have often wanted to go, but unfortunately they are on a sunday which is no good to us 'out of towners' details here Thanks for that, Perth Pathfinders. Sure that's the day before I'm due back up Aberdeen, so I'll be pushed for time but see what I can do.

Many years ago I was contacted by a local cacher and invited to a monthly get together at a pub in Witton Gilbert, County Durham. Can someone from the North East group let me know whether this still takes place, please, because I wouldn't mind attending one. Cheers, Raymond Duck

Thanks for all your advice. I'll be sure to try your suggestions out over the weekend.

Hello there, Tried out my new Etrex 30 on a local cache last night and didn't like the 'feel' of the unit. Previously owned a Venture, it passed away recently , where you searched for the nearest waypoint, selected one from the list and then used the compass screen to navigate to the cache. With the paperless system on the Etrex 30, clicking 'Go To' directs you to the map screen when I'd rather it showed the compass. Can this option be changed and I was wondering which way people have set up their units to be more Geocaching friendly? Maybe I'm too used to the more simplistic Venture unit but I'm actually beginning to regret my new purchase. Any advice will be greatly appreciated.

Thanks for all your advice. I'll be out today trying the unit for the first time. Thanks again.

Been advised to improve the accuracy of my mobile phone by purchasing a Copilot Bluetooth GPS unit. It's linked with the phone and appears to be working ok. How does one cache when using a Bluetooth GPS unit? Do you carry the unit along side the mobile or is keeping in a pocket, for example, acceptable? I appreciate any advice offered.

Hoping to look for two caches in the Aberdeen area before I go offshore on Thursday, one of which is a magnetic keysafe. As I have never come across such a thing I was wondering if someone could give me some pointers as what to look for. Cheers, RD

Right, I have kind of worked out how to get the caches onto the TomTom using your macro, but it doesn't seem to transfer all of the data from the gsak program. I've set up a PQ, with 500 caches, and opened it in gsak but each time I've attempted to move the locations it seems to only move so many. The same ones keep appearing. I read on a similar post that the parking locations are usually accompanied with a blue P and that hasn't happened either. Wigglesworth has sent me a guide to moving the caches to POI but I'm struggling with that as well. Using Vista and I can't seem to un-zip files, save attachments, etc. Never had any bother when using XP. Gsak is completely new to me but i think I've grasped the fundamentals, enough to transfer the cache info into the program; it's just getting all of the caches into the TT. Thanks for your help.

TomTom One XL - Great Britain and ireland.

Update: I've ran the macro and have now generated four files, two of which are .ov2 files; the remaining two are icons. Is it now simply a case of dragging the files into a TomTom file?

I've searched through the posts and have downloaded gsak and the TT macro, as suggested, but I don't know what to do next. As I'm finding gsak difficult to use I'd appreciate if we could right back to the basics. Thanks in anticipation. RD

I have a holiday caravan which I regularly spend time at. There is no internet access so I manually download PDF of each cache from that area, so I have something to refer to. Is there a way of batch downloading PDFs from a group of caches or will I have to go through each page, downloading individual files . Thanks in anticipation.

One of these could save you from losing your GPSr in low light. At only a pound each, they're cheap as chips. http://www.dealextreme.com/details.dx/sku.12996 I've ordered a couple.

I was once lucky enough to spot a fly tipper throwing building waste into a hedge. When home I reported him to the police, who took his registration details. Really hope he got what he deserves cause people like that boil my blood.

Thanks for the advice Miragee but it would seem that it has been working all along, I just wasn't using it correctly. Sometimes, I'm about as thick as a whale sandwich!

Hello there, Renewed the upgraded membership hoping to use the Bookmark List feature but I can't seem to do anything with it. I already have one list from a couple of years ago that I can't delete and can't seem generate any new ones. Any help on the matter will be appreciated. Cheers Raymond Duck