Team ChipsNDip

That made me laugh out loud. As ridiculous as that is, it almost makes sense in a geeky way. Reminds me of Sheldon from Big Bang Theory... some people just live in a different world than the "normals".

I'm always having to filter what my kids want to put in a cache. I've got 6&8 yr old boys, and they think that bottle caps and rocks they found on the trail on the way to the cache are the coolest things they've ever seen. So the bottle caps may be explained that way... You have to remember that the wet/rusted stuff wasn't that way when it was put in - it's just the nature of outdoor activities. Plenty of junk in caches, especially those that have been in existence more than a year. We try to keep a good stash of treasures to beef up depleted caches when we come across them - finding the treasure is my boys favorite thing in the world!

And the good news is that you have that choice! Isn't life good? Congrats on the record, ventura_kids! Sounds like an incredible day. Keep on cachin'!

Starting Dec 5th -- "The challenge is to be the first to submit the locations of 10 moored, 8-foot, red, weather balloons at 10 fixed locations in the continental United States. The balloons will be in readily accessible locations and visible from nearby roads." The coordinates must be within 1 mile of the anchor point for the balloon, and must be sent in degree-minute-second (DD-MM-SS) format. It's a DARPA challenge testing the effectiveness of groups communicating and coordinating over networks. If we're serious about it, we should set up a central contact who we can send our information to - if that's a mobile number we can text information to, etc.

Does this mean that if I select the "Western US", and the "without time limit" database, then the next time I click "One Click Update" the software will know I have that database loaded and update it? If so, that's really cool - I thought the one-click would just download the latest factory-default database.

I saw that the update kit is showing as backordered at REI.com - hoping that this is only because it's not fully active in the system yet! I see that there's an option in the update page to select east/west US to include all caches up to a terrain/difficulty of 4... Any chance of providing more customization for end-users to filter caches to a more custom specification? I love my geomate -- can't wait to get my update kit and play with it in more detail...

This weekend we visited Austin TX and stopped by REI to pick up a Geomate... tried it out that day and it worked like a charm. I can't wait to get the upgrade kit -- it will definitely be the key to keeping the device up to date. It was really great, though, to pull out my little GPS anywhere I was and be within a mile or two of a cache! Even my 5 yr old was excited about it, and it's definitely easy enough to be kid friendly. Can't wait to get it out again and find some more caches!!

I'd love one of these - what a great idea!

Of course this solution would not be advised for any off-trail type geocaching as it would lack any of the ruggedness built into typical GPS receivers. My PDA stays in a padded foam pocket unless I am standing still to read the cache description. The GPSr is in my hand all the time so I can see where I need to go. You'd be suprised how rugged those palms can be... Voice of experience here. If you are going to be doing any serious bushwacking, you'd probably be well-advised to get a case that has a bit of padding or rubberized shock absorption, as that's the thing *I* most encounter when out in the wild. The only other thing would be waterproofing, but I just carry some plastic sandwich bags that can serve as emergency "umbrellas" or waterproof bags if conditions get that bad. Throw on a screen protector to prevent any scratches, and you're off in the woods without any paper!

quote from the AP : "Peter Berdovsky, 27, a freelance video artist from Arlington, Massachusetts, and Sean Stevens, 28, were facing charges of placing a hoax device in a way that results in panic, as well as one count of disorderly conduct, said Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley. The hoax charge is a felony, she said. Both men were arrested Wednesday evening." A FELONY! That charge is incredibly vague - placing a hoax device in a way that results in panic... how many ammo cans could be targeted with that charge... I think the city of Boston is doing some PR spin to appease all the people THEY put into a panic yesterday.

I think this is it exactly. Act like you belong there, and there's no reason for anyone to even question it - and no one will. Act sheepish and apologetic, and you invite questions. I've noticed that when I go caching in my "work clothes" - dockers and a polo shirt - I get much less notice, even when wandering in a park, or in the woods... I think it makes me look "official", even though it's the completely wrong outfit for the location. Someone recommended to me once to carry a clipboard with a few "official" looking papers on it... everyone who looks will just assume you're doing some sort of business. A prop like this may give you the confidence to not feel insecure. My biggest fear is more with police officers. I've several times had police watching me as I search for a cache. I've never been stopped and questioned yet... once I was alone in a park looking for a cache, and once I was finished I noticed a police car sitting in the nearest parking lot. Since I was alone in the park, he was obviously watching me. I walked back to my vehicle, right by the police car - made eye contact with the officer, and kept walking. Then he drove away... If I had tried to avoid him I think I would've gotten stopped, and had to practice my "what is geocaching" speech.

Unless you thought you were, and you weren't... see : this find. Oops. As to why FTF are a big deal... just human nature, I guess... why are 100, 200, 500 finds "landmark" events for cachers? We don't see any pins for 691 finds...

I can't say where the term is concretely defined, but I've never heard of the FTF as being the first to log their find online. Whoever signs that logbook first is the FTF... Now, there may be grey area to be hashed out about pre-finders, or other issues... But logging is NOT finding.

Hmm. More detail is probably needed. Describe what happens as you approach a cache... what screen are you using? How can you tell your reading is innacurate? What is different after you reset it?

I'd like to add my vote to the request for this feature. I know there's some debate in the community over the whole geocoin hunting, but those that don't care don't have to use it. There are lots of possible ways to do this, but I'd be happy just with a field that could differentiate between regular TB/ geocoin / custom geocoin.

Here's my opinion on this topic that is as old as geocaching itself : Why not have the numbers? Why turn OFF functionality that already exists? If numbers don't matter to you, why does it matter if other people care about them? Roll your eyes at such people and move on. Note - I like the numbers. I'm not in this to be competetive - I've been caching since 2000, and am pushing my way towards 200 finds. I'm not out doing this every day, I'm not in a race to build my numbers - but I'm thrilled to track my progress. Passing 100 was a big milestone to me. Passing 200 will be as well... I don't look down on others who have less, but I am amazed and impressed with people who have thousands. I just dont' see what the big deal is.

I found a cache once that had no listing on geocaching.com - we were at a state park, in a parking area, and a trailhead at a super-scenic location with two huge pine trees on either side of the path. I was waiting for the rest of my group to finish their photography, and was looking at the area thinking - "If I were going to place a cache here, I'd put it right about there". And when I looked at my chosen spot, there was a painted camo rubbermaid container. I was extremely excited - it had a logbook, trinkets, etc - but there wasn't a cache listed at those co-ords or anywhere close to them when I got back to computer access. I don't know if it had been archived, or if it was just unlisted originally. But it was still a blast to find a cache that way.

Oh yeah... forgot about that. I may order one as an emergency backup... Here's the thread that talks about it, with description and a photo : link, and the product for sale on TigerGPS : link. I think I'm going to collect all FAQ and important troubleshooting tips threads about the Explorists...

It's for the Motorola T720, but it's the standard battery, not the extended life one. Hang on, I'll find the link to the thread here about it... Here's the thread about the Motorola battery. Apparently the 1100mAh fits the best. "The Google search on battery + SNN5582B results in the 750mAh battery you need to do a search on battery + SNN5595B to get the 1100mAh battery."

It's for the Motorola T720, but it's the standard battery, not the extended life one. Hang on, I'll find the link to the thread here about it...

You can hook the Garmin up to the PC, have it provide NMEA data, and use any number of auto-routing softwares. If you don't want to haul the laptop around, I'd recommend buying a cheap palm OS or Pocket PC device and getting Mapopolis - there are a few different mapping softwares around, but I'm a fan of this one. For ~$100 you get the software - if you get a bluetooth enabled device you can get a Bluetooth GPS for ~$70 (there are ways to get the garmin to be bluetooth as well, and cables to hook up the garmin to the pocket pc / palm - i prefer cordless solutions). Buy a used device on ebay for ~$100, and for the price of a cheap auto-routing GPS car unit you get a voice-navigating (with street names read) routing software with the addition of the features of a handheld organizer.

check out that comparison page of accuracy readings. That's what made my mind up - i switched from a garmin etrex to a magellan explorist. I prefer the Garmin interface - I think it's easier to use. But I went caching with a Magellan owner, and liked the way the "averaging" held him closer to the cache. Perhaps it's just that it's style of reporting matches my hunting style more. Basically, the new SIRF chips in the Garmins is hyper-sensitive - it gathers in more info, and reports down to a lower dB. The bad news is that by reporting the lower dB signals, you may get more "bad" data in the process. Look at the wander in that scatter plot... The Explorist stays tight. How does it do that? Because it doesn't show you the wander - it averages together the last so many samples. For geocaching and me, that is good. But there may be times when you want to know exactly what your current readings are, and the Magellan doesn't do that. I'm currently doing routing with the V1 maps for Magellan, and while they work they don't really pick the "best" route. I haven't done any autorouting with Garmin for comparison, and haven't done auto-routing with the newer v2 or v3 versions of the magellan software. I also got the 600 explorist - I don't really care about the barometric altimeter, but I really dig the electronic compass. The Explorist has a 3-axis compass (doesn't have to be level horizontally to get you an accurate reading). I don't know WHY Garmin hasn't switched to a 3-axis over a 2-axis. I like both companies, like both options - but I picked the one that matched my needs.

Yes - you can do this. You can hold as many .gs files as your memory will allow. The trick is that only the "active" one will show icons on the map... You can still search for "geocaching points of interest" in all of the files, but if you want them to show up on the map you'll need to have that geocache file active.

I had the same reaction when I first started caching. Be assured you're not doing anything wrong, and the GPS is behaving like it should. In general, once you get to "ground zero" the best thing to do is to put away the GPS and start looking for hiding spots in a 20ft radius. Now, I don't always follow that advice, and I do go back and revisit my GPS if I feel I've gotten too far off of where I should be - but in general it's a good rule of thumb.

I got the swivel mount mentioned by embra, and it's a lifesaver. I don't have to screw in the cable anymore, which should prolong the life of the unit quite a bit. Check and make sure all of your prongs and contacts are clean - if you see any discoloring, you can clean them with rubbing alcohol. I'd double check the "spring tabs" on your unit as well, making sure they are all sticking up the same amount. You definitely need to screw in the cable, but shouldn't have to bear down on it for it to make contact.