BGunner01

As a fortunate finder of many of your hides I'd like to thank you for being such a prolific hider of quality caches. Most all of us can vividly remember finding some of the more special caches on our list of "finds" and some of yours trigger memories for me. In case anyone cares, they were/are: I-80 Paperback Books Library I-80 Commerce Coin Cache and your Oregon Trail series: Facus Springs Jail Rock Nebraska I had lots of fun finding all of them and really appreciate your efforts!

When I first started caching with my "basic yellow" eTrex, I purchased one of the standard Garmin protective cases. After donning my backpack I just clipped my eTrex (in it's case of course) to one of the backpack straps near where it went over my shoulder. I thought it worked pretty well because it was near to my tired old eyes and I could easily read it just by glancing down at it. The strong clip of the Garmin protective case, combined with the weight of the backpack on my shoulder strap, helped keep it firmly in place and it never once fell from that position. As a safety measure I also put the GPSR lanyard around my neck. I don't go on long treks as much as I used to therefore I seldom use my backpack any more. However, I do know from several close calls that it's still a really good idea to keep the lanyard around your neck in case you lose your grip on your GPSR.

WOW - I received my 60Cx from Deals For You on Thursday morning! Delivery was less than 48 hours after PayPal payment (from Manitoba to Nebraska). Ain't free upgrade to 2-day shipping wonderful!? P.S. I LOVE the new unit. I can't believe how tiny that micro SD card is.

I'm in agreement w/ Chuy re: no maps on the right side of EasyGPS. I only know one way of downloading coordinates for several caches into an EasyGPS file at one time. That is done by using the little check boxes on the right hand side of the Search Results page after you've done a search. Check the boxes of each cache you want to look for and then go to the bottom of the page and click on the Download Waypoints button. That will download all those coordinates, but I think it only works on one page of search results at a time, i.e., you can't select caches on three different pages and have them all download at once. Another way I occasionally use is described in my post on this discussion.

DRAT!! I received the dreaded $80 price increase notification today when I called ProVantage to check on my order. I told them I was very disappointed that they falsely advertised their price and asked them how they can stay in business when they let their suppliers dictate the price they must charge while other places are selling them for considerably less. I also told her I wondered how many GPSR customers they lost - for good - by their action. The customer service girl didn't know anything about why or how Garmin can do that and it certainly isn't her fault so I dropped the conversation. I did tartly express my dissatifaction and told her to add my name to the list of customers who won't return to do business with them. Afterward I promptly got on ebay and purchased one from DealsForYou for $399 + $15 for 2nd day UPS shipping = $414. That price is more than I really wanted to pay but it still beat the $449 (or more) plus shipping that US retailers are charging (DealsForYou is in Canada). Received confirmation already tonight that it was shipped today and I should receive it Friday. Yaaaay!

Hey There "Tadpole" - WELCOME!!, You may or may not be interested in this optional EasyGPS (free version) feature.... As I'm reading and sorting through various caches that I want to load into my GPSR I will download & open the coordinates (either .loc or .gpx format) into EasyGPS for them individually while I'm on that cache description page. I will keep doing that until I've read/sorted through all the caches I want to search for that day (let's just say 10). Obviously, I then have 10 open EasyGPS windows and each one contains one set of coordinates. I then select any one of the 10 windows and up on the main toolbar select Window > Tile. That will open all the EasyGPS windows at once and display them in a "tile" array. Then I simply drag & drop each set of coordinates into one of the windows until I have them all in one place and SAVE that single file for that day's hunting. Then you just close/delete each of the other windows. Veteran EasyGPS and GSAK users will probably read this and say "WHAT??!!" I admit that it's a somewhat convoluted method but hey, it's worked for me for quite a while.

Oops - you're right. So would it be a waymark or a virtual cache, or either? Imagine what they could do with a film canister or a bison tube inside a rubber spider...

This looks a little like a couple of geocaches I've found - only smaller and less high tech electronics of course...

This grasshopper is going to try to be patient with Provantage and hope for a $60 to $100 cost savings (as compared to many of the other prices I'm seeing). A 2-3 week wait doesn't bother me (yet) but fortunately I can still keep hunting with my "old" 60C.

Ditto what Badlands said. I also purchased mine from Strong Engineering and they fit great! It's sorta like putting clear vinyl seat covers on your car - they help keep your screen nice so when you sell your used unit to the next guy he/she will have a nice scratch-free screen. I've used them on three GPSRs and highly recommend them. I personally think they restrict vision a tiny (but barely noticeable) bit. After all there is another thin layer of plastic to view through.

Here's the Yahoo! Groups registration link.

Since Benkelman, I've lived in Norfolk, Omaha and now Blair (for the last 25 years). FYI - There is a state-wide, informal caching group called Nebraskache and we have a discussion board on Yahoo! Groups. There are quite a few active cachers and caches not too far north of you - North Platte, Kearney, Hastings areas and some really nice people. You can keep up with current activities by monitoring that board if you're interested. Good place to ask questions too, in addition to this GC.com forum of course.

I didn't look at your profile before but I did this morning. Talk about a small world!! I was born and spent the first 12 years of my life in Benkelman, NE.

Hi Mindy – WELCOME to geocaching! I would certainly first recommend saving up and purchasing one of the various GPSR's mentioned in the above replies if possible. I remember trying to find my first cache with my daughter without a GPSR (global positioning system receiver). We never did find it. After purchasing one of the "basic yellow" Garmin eTrex units we tried a second time and found it within minutes. Granted, now I understand with your four strapping young helpers it should go a lot better for you than it did for me because they probably won't be afraid to venture deep into the weeds or turn over a rock (Eeew – there might be a spider!) like my daughter was. LostOutdoors.com is one of my favorite websites where you can look at satellite photos or alternately at topographic (topo) maps. You can also select different zoom levels and print copies (no, I'm not "paperless"). LostOUtdoors uses a different photo database (USGS?) than Google Maps does so theirs aren't in color. I know that occasionally the map I look at is way outdated and instead of a field there is now a shopping mall – but that happens to some extent with all photo and mapping sites. My technique in case anyone's interested: I use my mouse to highlight and copy the cache (aka waypoint) coordinates all at once directly from Geocaching.com description page and paste them into the "Latitude" window of the Map Maker portion of LostOutdoors.com. Then, in the Latitude window of LostOutdoors.com I highlight all the numbers BEHIND the west ("W") coordinate letter and drag & drop them into the "Longitude" window. Go back to the Latitude window and delete the north ("N") letter (alternately, it's easier if you don't even copy the "N" when you first copy the coordinates on Geocaching.com). Then click on the Create Map button and your image will appear and the coordinates you entered will display as a very accurate dot. You can even type in a title for the dot, such as "Cache". This may sound tedious, but after you've done it a few times and become familiar with it, it will only take about 2 seconds. My slow, old dial-up internet connection can handle LostOutdoors.com images quite a bit faster than Google Maps because there is less data transfer to get their respective image. Also, I would mention that all the various satellite/mapping sites are pretty picky about how you enter the coordinates so you may have to experiment a little to see what works. For example, neither LostOutdoors or Google Maps recognizes the coordinate letters N and W. LostOutdoors will accept several numerical variations. Google Maps requires a format such as: 41° 01.158, -095° 53.196. I've rattled on long enough. Welcome again and Good Luck!

Maybe I'm missing something... Your avatar appears to have a color screen. Is the Legend you are offering the "C" for color model? Thanks.

Using the detailed street maps of one of the MapSource products and the "autorouting" feature of your new 60CSx to lead you from benchmark to benchmark would quickly win you over. Use autorouting a couple of times and you'll probably reach over and turn off that built-in Chrysler GPSR. Seriously though, is it possible to load coordinates for, say 200 benchmarks into the Chrysler unit and have it show you their proximity in relationship to your present location and the best route to get there? I must admit I'm not familiar with how the built-in units in new cars work.

yes it is a great price bu it looks like they do not take returns on this item. If you are going to get it do it now. I spoke w/tiger gps after I ordered mine for 418.00 as the prices went up to 499.00 they said that Garmin does not allow a delars price to go below a certin ammount on items that are preordered. But he said that I would still get my order price. He said that they had to raise the price when Garmin informed them of their pollicy. So get it now before Garmin finds out about the low price. I was balancing on the "buy/no buy" fence for a 60Cx, and your post helped to push me over to the buy side. I liked the price Provantage had so I made the jump just in case they decide to raise their price. Even though they won't take returns I have a short while to cancel my order. Now I just have to figure out how to explain my weakness to "the BOSS".

Is that a "solid" price that they say won't change? I was monitoring MegaGPS.com last week and the price of theirs jumped about $70 in a very short time (a day or two). I guess I'll have to drop Lake Powell an e-mail and ask them. Thanks for the info!! P.S. I also found one on Provantage.com for $363 + $6 shipping. No returns allowed though. I wonder why that is?

Is that a "solid" price that they say won't change? I was monitoring MegaGPS.com last week and the price of theirs jumped about $70 in a very short time (a day or two). I guess I'll have to drop Lake Powell an e-mail and ask them. Thanks for the info!

I'm so-o-o happy!! I tried what CenTexDodger (and Peter) suggested and my GPSR is now back to autorouting like it used to do. For me, it was simply a matter of checking the little box down at the bottom right corner of the the MapSource "Maps" tab and then reloading all the maps. Thinking back, I'll bet the box became unchecked when I recently installed the "upgrade" to City Select Version 7. Honestly, I don't even remember ever noticing that little check box in the two years I've been using CS Version 6 and loading maps into my 60c. Hmm... guess I'll have to start paying attention to the instructions again, eh? Thanks so very much for your help!

I haven't been active in the forums for a while and just today noticed that the SEARCH function is temporarily out of service due to "software problems" (sounds like out IT Dept. at work ) I'd ordinarily search for discussion on this but since the function is inoperable right now I'll just ask... Any idea when the SEARCH function will be returned to service?

Hmmm... Use Google maps to find Lat./Long.? I'm not familiar with that. How is it done?

Ditto for me on my 60C. It just started doing this a couple of weeks ago. I think it was after the latest "beta" firmware upgrade. My unit seems to ignore detailed City Select maps and route only to the base map. The turn-by-turn instructions seem to mimic the diisplayed route, but nowhere near the detail it used to. I noticed after I push the "Enter" button after selecting "Follow Road" that the calculation screen barely shows at all 1% or 2% before it flashes across the field and closes. Seems to indicate an incomplete route calculation to me. It won't autoroute "in town" at all, i.e., it ignores all city streets. Something else that's goofy is that the purple route plots that do display are not directly on the street like they're supposed to be. They plot offset and parallel to the streets. This is particularly noticeable (and irritating) at close zoom levels. I'll be interested in hearing what you find out from Garmin before I try some things and contact Garmin myself. Thanks for sharing your info....

Is Fall Fest IV close to you? Events like this are always fun and the geocaching information exchange is fantastic.

This is probably a dumb question for those familiar with it, but I haven't been able to solve it… After downloading and saving a batch of cache location files (in .LOC or .GPX format) into either EasyGPS or GSAK, is there a way to open the files directly with a Garmin MapSource product such as City Select or MetroGuide? The way I presently have to do it is to save all the files into my GPSR and then use City Select to "receive (open)" the files from my GPSR. Don't know if it's pertinent or not, but I use a Garmin GPSMap 60C. It would seem me that there is a way somewhere out there for City Select to recognize and open the files directly from EasyGPS or GSAK without having to transfer them through my GPS receiver. Would greatly appreciate any advice anyone might offer. Thanks!