mork

Wicked. great to have another Sask cacher. And thanks for pointing out that Sand Castles cache - it is definitley on my to-do list - those pictures are amazing!

I've seen a couple that use tobacco containers and they seem to have held up quite well. If you know someone who rolls their own smokes, you could ask them to give you their spare containers.

Yup. We haven't done many caches, but were out on a long walk and returned to our vehicle to find a young couple getting busy in their truck. They weren't bashful and were in sight of anyone in the area. Walked right by them to our car and then drove by as we left.. they didn't mind us.

part of why I looked to Geocaching was to get a little more excersice (any amount is more than I was doing). I'm 6'0" and 215lbs. Hoping my belly starts working its way back the other way this summer if I can get enough caching/hiking in.

Since having posted the above, we have not only purchased a GPSr, we've found 6 caches so far. Realizing that if we kept up that pace we'd be out of local caches in no time we've already placed our first one. I've got a really good location in mind for another cache and will hopefully get a chance to put it out there this weekend. Keep the Saskatoon cache's coming! We need more!

$30 at a surplus shop in Calgary? That IS expensive. Local surplus in Saskatoon sells them in excellent condition for $9. I bought a couple at Princess Auto (Calgary should have a Princess Auto, right?) for $6.88 a couple of days ago. The Princess Auto here has two prices - $12.99 and $6.88 - the $6.88 pile is usually the junky rusted ones, but if you dig through them you can find suitable ones. The $13 ones aren't in great shape either, but are generally better. Another thread mentioned Princess Auto puts them on sale every couple of months for $6.88 as well.

I'd also be sure to note what these 'crazy adults' really are like. Generally Geocachers are going to be respectful of their surroundings and their enviroment. You can also flatter the land-owner by suggesting the spot is so unique and that Geocaching is all about sharing great places you might not otherwise see. If your placing it outside of a museum or something, comment on how well you think the grounds are kept and want others to appreciate ithe area as well. If your able to tie the cache in to the museums theme somehow, they would probably appreciate it as it may increase interest in the museum to cachers who seek your cache.

On second thought, I'll probably leave this value alone and tinker more with the time to switch to the internal compass. Perhaps the problem was that it was still interpolating my orientation from position measurements when I was slowly walking and it would be preferable to use the internal compass when slowly walking. (?) It is odd however that the compass did seem to be responsive and 'correct' but with a shift of 180 degrees. Why always in the exact opposite direction?

as I noted earlier, I had this same problem in my first outing with the eTrex vista. It seemd that the compass was acting up, but the distance measurements were updated with every step I took. also had good reception. Being me, I hadn't read the manual. After flipping through it (and still having not read it) I have realized a few things which may be the culprit. This is all specific to the eTrex Vista, but I'm sure it shares things in common with the other eTrex models. 1) Compass must be callibrated!! I didn't realize this was needed with every battery changeout as the manual states. As a result, I have no reason to believe my internal compass was accurate. 2) When moving, the eTrex will use the change of your co-oridinates to determine the direction you are moving in. How fast does one need to go to be in this seemingly more reliable mode? It's optional and can be set under Setup -> Heading there is a "Auto-compass switch speed", mine is set at 16km/h by default. I think I will reduce this quite a bit. I don't expect I walk trails at more than 5km/h. 3) In the same option dialog there is the time it takes to switch to 'compass heading' when your speed falls under the above speed setting. Mine is at 90 seconds by default. I plan to lower this a lot. This means when I stop moving, it will wait 90 seconds before switching to the internal compass. This weekend when I go out with the eTrex vista again I will do the obvious fix to #1 and tinker a bit with #2 and #3 and see if the problem persists. Does anyone have any suggestions for these values?

Fresh eTrex Vista here with the same problem. We went for our first cache find tonight and boy were we ever confused .. didn't take too long before I had to stop blindly walkng in the direction the arrow pointed. As mentioned, our solution was to keep an eye on the distance and head in the opposite diretion. As has been described here, it essentially pointed eactly opposite frequently. I just cheked and it is using bearing pointer and not the course pointer. Is there a solution to this? I've only had the unit for a day and everything about it has impressed me, but this is a real show-stopper!

Great idea guys! Have we settled on a system? Or perhaps someone can start a new thread that is not for discussion, but just a regularly updated listing of all caches on the trans canada (listed in some sort of order).

Greetings. I wish to win.

I'm a little dissapointed with GPSCity - I placed my first order with them last week and I am positive everything I ordered (have double checked) said In Stock! Ships same day! on the products page. When I check my order status, it has not been shipped because an item is on back-order. In reality, if I had known it was not in stock I would have likely ordered elswhere or excluded the item from my order. I hope it ships soon, but I guess I'll just have to wait (no idea how long).

I'll be joining you all soon (from Saskatoon) - just gotta pick-up a GPS reciever first I've been talking to a number of friends about this and a few sound quite interested in starting themselves. My girlfriend and I thought it'd be a great way to ge out a little more this summer. Looking forward to our first cache when the snow finally melts.