blue163

I don't know about you, but I think this message adds character to the forums

I have seen a couple of methods: 1) Epoxy a large magnet to the side of the container, and if the target is also not magnetic, epoxy a magnet to it. 2) Use a container with a thin lid, or very strong magnets, and put the magnet inside the container and let the magnet do its magic

I have an iPhone 3G and an entry-level Garmin GPS unit. I have the full paid app on my iPhone. We went caching last weekend and hit up 4 caches, and on every one of them I compared the GZ as read by my iPhone to the GZ as located by the GPS unit. All of the caches were within Calgary, AB (not a small city), and in most cases the iPhone led me to an area approximately 20-30 feet from where the GPS led me. Now, when you are hunting in an open park and there is only one bunch of trees nearby that must be hiding the cache this isn't so bad, but when there is a huge bunch of bushes and trees it really helps to reduce the accuracy by those 20-30 feet. The most extreme result of using my iPhone as a GPS was one cache where it insisted I was still nearly 200m away from the cache when I was holding it in my hand...

I have a dedicated GPSr and an iPhone, and I find that within the city here (Calgary, AB) my iPhone usually gets me within 10m of the cache, but I also find it very reliably places me about 5m from where my GPSr places me. Sometimes it is closer but 2/3 of the time or better my GPSr is closer. If you are looking for smalls/regulars or bigger with good hints then you can probably get by with the iPhone for a while, but once you start looking for micros or nanos and the hints get less useful, you will find a dedicated GPSr pays off.

How about, uh, that other thing that Canadians are supposed to be good at in a canoe? Surely you mean paddling

We are now the 63rd state

Hit the checkbox in the header (or the "check all" button) then hit "Download waypoints" This will give you much more than 1 at a time. Nowhere near as good as pocket queries, but I have done this to download ~500 geocaches near my house. From there I used GSAK to load them on my GPSr and away I go. Of course, this doesn't give you the log information or cache information, but I use the iPhone app for that anyways.

Search only for 1/1 or 1.5/1.5 caches that have been found in the last couple days. Preferably ones that have been found many times in the last month because when you get on site you will usually find foot trails leading around and directly to the cache. This will give you an idea of how other people search for caches as well as give you some guidance when you get on-site for where the cache is. Start with regular/small sized caches, and always read the hints and ALL of the cache logs, lots of times hints are strewn in there. People will usually post if the cache is not very close to the given co-ordinates as well. Once you have found 5 or 10 of them you will start feeling a whole lot better. When I started we picked a random geocache, walked up and found it within 30 seconds. It was at the base of a pine tree poorly disguised. We then went on to 5 more cache sites, and at every one I searched all around the base of a pine tree and found nothing... I hated this sport and was ready to quit. A lunch break and a fresh mind and we were back in it, finding all 5 we had previously been unable to find. If it helps they were things such as: Camo taped round ball cache with a hook on the top hanging from a zip tie in a pine tree Camo taped small LnL container buried under a patch of grass in the middle of a field of 2-foot long grass (this one was VERY frustrating, in the end we got a broom handle and used it to poke in the thick patches until we found the container) Camo taped small LnL container stuck sideways in a split inside of a lilac bush about 5 feet off the ground. This was a particularly dense bush but once you peeled back the outer layer of leaves you could see inside pretty well Small film canister under a lamp post skirt Make sure you are using a proper GPSr, never a phone, and if possible turn on the accuracy display. On mine I find sometimes the accuracy can vary from as little as 3m to as much as 15m. If the accuracy is currently 15m I will try to get a better signal before proceeding towards GZ because in my opinion, a 15m diameter circle is a pretty big area to search.

"What are you doing?" "Looking for something." "You lost something in the bushes?...." "Oh, I didn't say I LOST anything." "okay...... *walks away*" Worked so far Generally I avoid the high muggle ones, such as micros hidden on a bridge in the middle of a park. I leave those for weekday mornings/evenings so that the park isn't full of 500 people walking their dogs and playing with their kids. I don't think there is any way to avoid drawing attention to yourself in such a situation.