QuiltinNana

I'm going to add my THANK YOU right here also. First, Thank you! for starting this thread. We are closing in on #1000 since starting June 2010, should get there this weekend. My husband and I always go together and since I work days and he works 3 - 11; weekends, vacations, and holidays are our only caching days. My daughter and granddaughter started with us 3 years ago, but they don't always get to go with us anymore. But it's always more fun with them along. Second, I also thank everyone who has hidden caches that we've found (or will find), found our caches, had events we've participated in, and given advice over the past 3 years. We got started with a couple of friends who have since moved to OK from PA. Little did they know (or did they?) how obsessed we would get. They are coming back for a visit in late Aug and they have asked me to get a list of caches ready. Woo Hoo, it will be fun caching together again. Third, can't forget all the people who have released trackables or moved one of ours, I love finding them and moving them along. We are introducing a new geocacher to the game this weekend. I'm hoping he enjoys it as much as I do.

We like to collect the wooden nickel sig items, also any neat pins that we can attach to our backpack. If the granddaughter is along, she likes to look through the swag. But if it's a wet cache, she won't even look. We leave a rubber duck with our team name on the bottom and also a beaded keychain with a duck charm on the bottom. These are put in the tiny bags from a craft store with our team member names on a card enclosed with each. I've heard that there is at least 1 person collecting all our ducks as she finds them.

That is a really cool idea!!! I agree and this is exactly what I would like to do also. If for some reason, I can't do this, I at least want my headstone to be used for a puzzle cache. My 7 year old granddaughter loves cemetery caches. In fact they are her very favorite kind. So I know she will be able to carry out my wishes at some (hopefully very far) distant future time. I still have lots to find before I leave.

Just broke my upper arm/shoulder 2 weeks ago. we were on a bike path through an abandoned railroad tunnel. This tunnel is approx 1 mile long and has a bend in the middle. We almost made it to the middle part, just shy of the bend, when my bike decided to take a detour off the paved part of the trail. Once I hit the sloped ballast and cinders, I was just thrown into the wall shoulder first. Knocked all the wind out of me, I thought I had at first broken a rib. Once I caught my breath and managed to stand, I knew I needed to get xrayed. So we walked back out of the tunnel with my poor husband having to walk both bikes. Broke the shoulder bone in 2 places. I have my arm in a sling as it's too high to cast. And to make it all worse we hadn't even gotten to the cache part of the trail yet!! But the next weekend, we made up for it by taking a road trip from PA through New York into Canada.

For our first year all we had to use was a Garmin Nuvi 1450. We found about 250 using the Nuvi, we used it in automobile mode til we got to where we needed to park and then switched the settings to Pedestrian. The only thing we found that it did not do is tell us how far GZ was in the Pedestrian mode. I had a "blue ball" that I followed, when it was right on top of the "treasure chest", I knew we were pretty close. Now we use the Nuvi to get to the parking area, and then use a Gtrex Venture HC to get the rest of the way. Sometimes, I still take the Nuvi along since my better half won't let me have the Gtrex. And sometimes I find it before he does!!!

We won't mind trying to figure things out as we go along. Even with our Nuvi, we sometimes have to figure out where we are really supposed to go since it tries to takes us down private drives, shows road where there are none, and sometimes takes us miles and miles out of the way just to go a few miles down the road. But that just adds to the fun.

Thanks for the reply. We are going to have a rental car for the week so hopefully we can get around to quite a few.

We are going to Aruba for a week in a few weeks. I of course want to try and find some caches while we are there. We usually use our car NUVI 1450T to take us to the general location and then use a Garmin ETREX Venture to finish off the search. The maps loaded in the NUVI are only for North America. Will the ETREX work for us? By reading some of the cache descriptions, I think we can find the general location without too much trouble, but without the ETREX, I'm not sure we can pinpoint the actual location. This is our first trip out of the US, so I want to understand what we can expect when we want to go cache hunting. Thanks Shirley

I bought one late last year for my granddaughter's birthday in March, she turned 6. Once the company was sold, we were not able to update the maps, but as of late July, the map updating feature is now working again. She used it yesterday for the first time and had a ball with it. It was as accurate as the Etrex units we had with us. And she felt like she was in on the hunt like everyone else with it. It was also good in that we had a newer member of our group with us and our previous finds were not in the Etrex units, but they were in the Geomate Jr so he was able to pick up a couple of hides that we had already found. The only issue I have with it, is that I can't figure out how to load pocket queries to it. It dumps my database, but does not load the pocket query correctly.

My granddaughter loves to find coins in caches. In alot of the caches we find, there isn't much of interest in them, rocks, business cards or maybe even some toys that don't interest her, so if she can find a penny or nickel, she's happy. We leave custom made signature items (beaded keychains and usually rubber ducks) if the cache is big enough. We leave the keychains even when we don't take anything. Someone found one of our keychains and made a TB out of it. Sadly it's gone missing now.

Thanks for the update about the Eastern US now being available. I was able to give it a try over the weekend and I now have lots of caches reloaded in the database.

I haven't tried the update for a couple weeks, thanks for the heads up. I will have to give it a try this weekend. My granddaughter has been so disappointed that she hasn't been able to use the unit since she got it for her bithday in March.

I can load mid-US and western US on my granddaughters Geomate JR but I cannot load the Eastern US. Which is where we need I've tried loading PQ's but can't seem to get it right. After I do this, all I see on the screen is NO Database. It's getting frustrating, but I think I'll hold on to it awhile to see if they get the Eastern US load working again.

I use the GSAK database to load into my Nuvi 1450 and to my husband's Etrex Venture HC. My Nuvi unit only shows the GC code and his unit shows the actual name of the cache.

CNCGTG Clarion County North Country Trail - when you complete all 20 caches, you can send for a trackable coin. I hope I linked it right.

We use Squirrley on our Nuvi 1450 and he's a lot of fun. We still answer back to most of his questions He doesn't say street names, but he can entertain you between stops. We've tried Dr. Frankenstein, but didn't like his voice sounding like it came out of a tin can.

My granddaughter's Daisy group just placed a cache last weekend. It is located in NW Pennsylvania. GC3J0DT - Girl Scout 100th Birthday.

That is awesome. It's really cool to see the wear and tear he suffered during all those miles.

We picked up one at Geowoodstock last summer of Mrs. Chip. She wanted to travel to Disney World. As it happened, we were planning a trip in November, so I emailed the owner and asked if they wanted me to hold onto Mrs Chip and take her with me or was that too long of a wait. They replied they would be so happy for me to hold her and take her to Disney. I released her in a cache near Disney after taking her to the Disney production of Beauty and the Beast. Personally we have one of the cartoon character Rita Malone, from the movie Flushed Away, her goal is to travel to England. She is currently in Michigan I believe.

I just had one of mine reappear. I placed it in a cache last July and it went missing immediately. No log, nothing. Then just a week or so ago, I got a log notice that someone had found a "bag" of trackables that someone had lost or left behind. The people that found the bag, sent out log notices that they had them and would be putting them out in the near future. I also have a coin that went missing in Michigan after a couple hops, again no log. It resurfaced in Florida just after Christmas when someone posted a log that they had grabbed all the coins that their sister had been hoarding and were going to be putting them back out in circulation. But alas, they have not released my coin yet. They have been actively caching all winter and going to caches large enough to put it in. I'll just be patient and hope that they do release it soon.

I've tried using the link to download a PQ, but I'm not sure it's working correctly. I downloaded my PQ file, then opened up the link, select the GPX file. Under Handy info it tells me that the Geomatejr is detected, gives me firmware geomatejr V1004 RE X2, then beside database: geomatejrdb: caches within 250 miles (my pocket query name). There is a long box below this, it looks like the kind of box that shows progress, but nothing happens in it. My question is - Should there be something in this box?

My first coin, Rainbow Bridge went missing after 2 stops. Then over 1 year later, it showed back up as being grabbed from the cache it had disappeared from. The grabber sent me an email that their sister had an inventory of coins that she had picked up to keep I guess and they took them from her and were going to be getting them all moving again. This was the end of December, and they still have my coin in their possession. I emailed them asking if they still had the coin, but they haven't replied, but I have seen that they have been actively caching most of the winter since they live in Floria. I had given the coin up and when they revived it, my hopes were raised that it would be moving again. My first TB, went missing from the very first cache I dropped it in. Guess, I don't have the best of luck placing TBs and coins. Maybe I should just stick to moving others along.

I'm having the darndest time getting signed into the update area. I had this problem earlier then all of a sudden, I got in. Now again, I have carefully entered my email and password and nothing happens. It just stays on the sign on screen. Is there a limit on how often you can access? I have the file unzipped, but can't go any further at this time because I can't get signed in. This is very frustrating for something that is supposed to be so easy.

I bought the GeomateJr for my granddaughter for her birthday. I wanted to update the system since I had no idea what timeframe the caches were in that were included from the factory. I was able to run the update to a factory default of 4/6/2012. I tried to upload a PQ into the Geomatejr, but although it says, 500 caches converted, it fails to upload any database into the unit. I would like to upload PQ because the default list says it only includes caches over 6 months old. Has anyone else tried to do this? I would appreciate any help or tips.

I like it. We also make keychains. Someone found one of our keychains and made it into a TB. We package our in a small plastic ziplock from Joanns with a card with our individual names on the back. http://img.geocaching.com/track/large/1b19b841-73fd-4fb9-b52d-25ad33f943d9.jpg