GreyingJay

Ooh thanks. I'll try that. Edit: that does work, though it takes quite a bit of time to do the extra requests. I hope I can eventually solve this 1.0.1 GPX issue.

Hi all, I appreciate the clarifications but I am still experiencing problems. My preferences are definitely set to 1.0.1. I have set them back to 1.0, saved, and then back again to 1.0.1, saved again, multiple times. Here's a screenshot. Yet, when I download a Pocket Query (both a My Finds, which I expect to stay at 1.0 based on what I've just read, and a regular PQ), this is what I get. <gpx xmlns:xsd="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema" xmlns:xsi="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema-instance" version="1.0" creator="Groundspeak Pocket Query" xsi:schemaLocation="http://www.topografix.com/GPX/1/0 http://www.topografix.com/GPX/1/0/gpx.xsd http://www.Groundspeak.com/cache/1/0 http://www.Groundspeak.com/cache/1/0/cache.xsd" xmlns="http://www.topografix.com/GPX/1/0"> My account seems to be "stuck" at 1.0. Not sure what to do next. I can't do anything in GSAK that works with attributes. Is this worth submitting a bug report?

It definitely shows 1.0.1 on my profile. I've checked it multiple times.

I wondered this too. Whenever I open a PQ in GSAK it warns me that the file isn't in 1.0.1 format, even though my preferences are set to use 1.0.1.

Honestly I think just going with a friend (or two or five) helps more than anything. The other day I went with a friend to find a micro in a tree that was in a park adjacent to a schoolyard (two of them actually). As we approached GZ there were kids everywhere, sledding down the hill. Did I mention the tree in question is on the top of said hill? There were parents there watching their kids, and as we got closer my friend and I resolved that we should probably be super open about why we were there, if anyone so much as looked at us, we would inform the parents that we were geocaching, etc. Well - nobody paid us any attention. A few friendly kids waved and said hi to us, we waved back, and just continued looking up and down the trees, making casual conversation as we searched. Not 10 feet away from us were two parents talking to each other. Nobody even batted an eye at the two weirdos with no kids of their own standing on top of a sledding hill poking around in the trees. We eventually DNF'd it and walked back to the cars. Once again, families passed by, waved, said hello, etc. but nobody questioned it.

With the 66 (and most modern Garmin GPS units, from what I can tell) you just set up all the Pocket Queries you want, and download them to your computer as ZIP files. You then plug in the GPS to your PC via the USB cable and it mounts like an external disk. You then unzip all of the pocket query files and copy them to the GPS. (There are other ways to do it - including connecting the 66 to your home WiFi and having it download the files directly from Geocaching.com servers - but this method is slow and clunky, and I think I'll stick to copying the files) As you surmised, downloading the PQ's to your GPS only capture the state of the caches as of the date you ran the query. Over time caches disappear, other caches are added. Best bet is to re-run the queries periodically (every week?) and just copy the GPX files to your GPS again, overwriting the previous ones. At least with modern units you can download as many as you want onto the GPS. My 60csx had a hard limit of 1000 so I was constantly wiping it and replacing the waypoints stored on it.

Thanks! I was so confused a few weeks ago when I tried to find a Wherigo app for iPhone and it wasn't in the app store at all, despite everyone telling me that's where they got theirs from. I was unfortunate to have been caught in that window when it was gone.

I've found the GPSrChive website to be most helpful. I assume you run it? Thank you for putting together such a great resource. As for PQ's, you're right, perhaps I need to rethink how I do things. My PQ's date back quite a few years and include searches for things like "1000 traditional/multi/virtual caches near me". The thinking dates back to pre-iPhone days. The idea was that I never knew when or where I might desire to cache, so I'd keep as many as possible loaded up (1000 was the limit of the 60csx) "just in case" and refresh every week or so to keep it up to date. Now that data is so ubiquitous (and now that I can do live searches from the unit itself) this approach probably makes a lot less sense. I do have a bookmark of "solved puzzles - go get 'em!" that currently consists of about 230 caches with corrected coordinates. (Including a set of 150 geo-art caches that were put together for Canada's 150th birthday in 2017) I'm obviously not going to go get them all in one day, but up until now there had been no reason to keep the list small. I hope to connect the 66s to WiFi and sync the list live - and just keep it synced as the bookmark list evolves as I remove the ones I've found and add new ones I'd solved. However, it appears that when I try to sync, it takes the GPS quite a few minutes to do its thing. Maybe I just need to go find those 150 caches - then my bookmark will be a lot smaller and more realistic to keep synced going forward.

I suspect this is the journey I will be taking too... Anyway, I hope my feedback is of help to @NetraLee. The 66s is a good unit with a bigger and more hi-res screen than the other GPSMAP series. Same screen and interface as the Oregon 7x0 series. You just have to decide if you prefer a touchscreen or clicky buttons. Each have their pros and cons.

I went out again this morning to further shakedown my 66s experience. I think it is growing on me, though I still don't like the multitude of button presses to note a cache as found. I will look into your suggestions, mikeD. Maybe with some unit customizations I will learn to love it. I know on the forum I see many people who say they love the 66s over the 60/62/64. Maybe a future software update will bring back my beloved "found" button I am still experiencing issues with live syncing of pocket queries and lists (it is SLOWWW!! and I must have aborted the process mid-transfer because some of the trads I hoped to find today weren't on the unit -- yikes!) so I agree I think I'll just load PQ's from my PC like I used to do. Edit 1: mikeD - I just tried your suggestion to put the GC dashboard on the compass page. Doesn't that mean you end up with two compass dials on the same page? Edit 2: I just set up my main menu ribbon to be simpler, like mikeD suggested, and turned the scroll animation/preview off. I like this better already.

I'm actually quite torn. I used to cache with a 60csx. Loved that thing to death. Literally. I had a bit of a lull in geocaching from 2015-2020. I still did it casually. Mostly with an iPhone. Currently have an iPhone XR, and I've found hundreds of caches with it. It's great for casual caching - you've always got it with you, the data plan lets you pop open a map and see what's around, you can log and post photos from it, etc etc. Phones are great for casual geocaching. However, if you plan to do more than a few, you'll kill the battery pretty quick. The reception and accuracy isn't quite as good as a real handheld GPSr. The "compass" is laughably bad. If you lose cell reception in the woods, suddenly you feel very nervous. And in the bitter winter cold, all of that is exacerbated. Touch screens are not great with gloves on. And better make sure you don't ever drop it, or you're totally out of luck. I've started to pick up the hobby again and starting to do more substantial hikes into the woods instead of just park and grabs and short walks. I learned the hard way last week that when you're bushwhacked into the woods a few hundred meters from the trail, relying on the phone to get you back out was iffy. So I bought a GPSMAP 66s. And, well, I kinda hate it. Compared to my previous experience with my 60csx and spoiled by the responsiveness and giant screen of the iPhone. I find the geocaching function on the 66s to be slow and clunky. Takes forever to download a pocket query. Something as simple as the "Found" button on the compass view of my 60csx, is not available on the 66. If I want to mark that I've found the cache, I have to push something like 6 buttons (menu - arrow down to Log Attempt - Found). And the map view with a dashboard is really small. I see that the 64 and 65 do have the Found button on the compass. I'd almost switch just for that. But then I give up the nicer screen of the 66, and other nice features. I'm really torn about whether to just keep the 66 and learn to live with its quirks, "downgrade" to a 64 or 65, or just return it and go back to just my phone (and carry a large power bank in my backpack).

Worst container I've ever found: A jumbo Kinder Surprise container. Spray paint flaking off. HANGING OFF A TREE in very plain sight (what, were muggles supposed to think this was some kind of fruit?) Just beside the street. Behind the Beer Store. In downtown Ottawa. Well, as one logger put it, it's amazing how people don't pay attention to their surroundings. Months later, it's still there! Check out the logs for GC1CCT8, they're quite entertaining. Worst cache I've never found: I was with a group of people including kids, and we walked into the back corner of an absolute dump. Ahead of us, 20 meters away, was the cache, but we were standing on the edge of a swamp with head-high grass, trees, and thick brush. We were standing ON private property. Behind us was a wall of parked school buses, in front of us was a flat bed PILED high with rusty car parts. We dared not continue. We wondered if there was maybe another approach we missed, one that was more public and had a trail -- nope, this was the intended approach. Through a garbage dump on private property. No thanks.

Heh. Well, the point stands. If you really want to place an urban skirt-lifter, OK, fine. But get permission to do so (if they'll let you!) so it's kosher. I think that would solve a lot of problems -- fewer issues with police and "suspicious activity" and fewer lame caches, as you'd have to find ways of justifying them to the property owner. No more nano containers hidden beside trash dumpsters. And, honestly, I would be much more open-minded about searching around said trash dumpster for a cache if I knew that the proprietor OK'd its placement. So even "lame" hides become somewhat less lame. Everybody wins!

I actually like that there are smaller, but more frequent events now in Ottawa. GAG events are always very welcoming to newcomers. I am fortunate that GAG5 occurred about two weeks after I started geocaching in 2004. I walked into the restaurant completely nervous and knowing nobody, but was welcomed with open arms. Today, walking into a GAG event brings you to a noisy room of 250 people. It is fun, but it is also crazy mayhem, a lot of work to plan and possibly intimidating to someone who is new to all of this. While I always felt welcomed at all the GAGs, I still cached largely alone and only knew the other Ottawa cachers as familiar faces -- you may see them, but you still don't really know them. In the last couple of years, thanks to the monthly and weekly events, I'm now proud to call many of these people friends (I think you pass from being "geocaching acquaintance" to "friend" when we call each other by real names instead of geo-names ). I see some of them every week as we cache together in the "geomob", and at least twice, if not three times a month, by going to the CCC monthly, "Geocacher's Anonymous", the AGO breakfast, and any other events that happen to come up. I think I could safely say that even if regular GAG events never happened again in Ottawa, I would probably not miss them as I see my caching friends so frequently as it is. But that said, I'm definitely looking forward to GAG12!

Ottawa is having an Adopt-A-Highway CITO event this Saturday, April 19th. We'll be cleaning up a section of highway 416 near Kemptville.

Well, the article is right. These things are supposed to be placed with permission from the property owner. Any lamp skirt micro or tube-in-the-woods-behind-a-big-box is 99% likely to be in violation of these terms. The cache reviewers really should start clamping down on this before the police get totally fed up with us. You can guess how I feel about these urban, no-hike, "nothing but a log book" caches designed to test the limits of how "stealthy" you can be.

On the other hand, this scale is perfect for urban caches, where I can see almost exactly the street corner closest to the park so I have a rough idea of how to drive there and possibly even where to park. At least I can actually see "oh, this cache is in the ___ subdivision, near ___ major road" rather than "It's somewhere in Ottawa" which was virtually useless. Perhaps some intelligence is required on the part of the mapping software to auto-adjust the map scale according to the urban density of the area (not sure if there is currently enough meta-data to make this possible). So for your desert cache, the scale would increase until at least a highway or two were visible.

New format shows a cache title and then: "a event cache by hidnseek" Should be "an event", of course, and I think a/an should be capitalized. e.g. CCC Meet & Eat An event cache by hidnseek Not actually a big fan of the new boxes, sorry. And I really liked the images-display-on-hover. The "greyed links only display for premium members" text has a red X which I can close to make go away, but I have to do this for every cache? Can there be an option to acknowledge that message "forever"? Or is this a ploy to get me to renew my PM? I do really like the new maps on the cache pages, they actually mean something to me now where before all it really told me was that it was somewhere in my city. Well, I already knew that..

I think I'm the unlucky one who just missed it. GreyingJay

I tend to be pretty verbose in my logs if there is some kind of a story to be told. I try to be funny and play up the experience I had finding the cache, whether it was because I got lost trying to navigate there, dropped a flashlight and had to feel around in a field of thistles, etc. Even if the cache was "meh" I try to find something to talk about. You might even find a log or two from me where the cache itself was so hum-drum that I barely even mentioned it, but instead spent 95% of my log talking about the great weather or whatever. "Oh, yeah, and I found the cache... TNLN." I am guilty of being a tad snarky though when there's something about the cache that I don't like. Sometimes it's based on the habits of the hider ("Found yet another Joe Microspew cache. In fact, I think all 6 caches I found today were yours, and I didn't even have to drive farther than 5 minutes on any one of them!") Sometimes the cache owner and I have different opinions of what constitutes a good hiding spot, like the cache tagged "Scenic View" that brought me underneath a freeway bridge whose pylons were covered in graffiti: "Not quite what I would call a scenic view, but it sure was a unique one." A log on a rusted Altoids tin container in which the owner was clearly ignoring the "Needs Maintenance" attributes, as every single log in the past 6 months has mentioned how badly the container is holding up: "I only found it on my way back to the car after I thought I had failed in my search. It was on the ground, a rusted-out lump of metal, looking just like the other trash in the area (bottles, beer cans...) The magnet has nothing to hold onto anymore (glue doesn't stick to rust flakes) so the container was sitting plainly on the ground. I opened it up and sure enough it was a cache, so I signed the log." On a DNF where the cache had been a cardboard box (!): "Yeah, I didn't see it either. I did see the crap in the grass, lots of it, as well as trash, bottles, and junk everywhere. I wasn't too impressed with this one, and I don't think it can still be there given the size of the container I see in the photos and the area to search. I did find pretty easy parking, though."

So many of the caches I've found have been damp and smelly, so I'm not sure how a pack of matches would even hold up, regardless of whether it was kosher or not.

The poster is in Canada, where we no longer have "Radio Shack" per se (they were bought by Circuit City and now operate as The Source). However, for all intents and purposes it is still Radio Shack and they may have the appropriate flashing LED. A self-contained blinking LED would be ideal because they are self-contained (even the current-limiting resistor is built in). With a couple of long-life alkaline batteries, they should last for months. Do you happen to have the Pink Floyd album "Pulse"?

Gallant is an active member of the Geocaching forums. Goofus drags up 3-year-old threads

I did a search for my username and Google keeps asking if I meant "GreyGay", which is some kind of porn site

Hey, I have mutual funds with them!