Jeep-O-Caching
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Posts posted by Jeep-O-Caching
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Thanks, Keystone. I don't know how to get in touch with the local reviewer you mentioned. Is there a link someplace that I am missing?
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I am the owner of GCWD06 Pal-Mac 1 multicache near Rochester, NY. I have no idea who to contact for help, so I am posting here.
The Erie Canal suffered a washout over the Winter and the Thruway Authority has closed the viaduct on which WP 1 was hidden since it is adjacent to the washed out overflow. I don't expect them to reopen it anytime soon, since repairs are moving at the pace you might expect. I managed to retrieve the WP container and rehide it on another structure in the immediate area, but it is something like 215 meters East of the old location. When I try to edit the starting waypoint using a log entry I can't move it this far because it is over 161m. What should I do?
Thanks in advance for any help anyone can offer,
Jeep-O-Caching.
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My understanding is ...
Thanks for the info. - at least now I know what I need to come up with - it might be good to do if the TB is unique enough - how about this?: http://www.geocaching.com/track/details.aspx?id=186100
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Can anyone tell me where the custom icons come from and how I can make a TB with a custom icon? I'd like to have a custom icon that shows up when you search for a cache or one a cacher's stat page. How did Jeep get them and how can I? Thanks --- Brad.
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I'll get new icons for my stats the hard way, thanks - but can anyone tell me where the custom icons come from and how I can make a TB with a custom icon? Thanks --- Brad.
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In my opinion, if you change the cache enough to where you're willing to let people log it again, because it would be a different experience for them, then you should have archived the old one and started a new one.
This makes sense to me.
I subscribe to the "one GC number/one credit" philosophy as well. It was a surprise to me that the website even counts a second find into your total.
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I am sure this has already been discussed to death, but I just noticed a user who logged "found it" into the same cache twice in a row. I checked their cache count against their list displayed under "show all finds". I found that they got credit for finding the cache twice, since one fewer cache was shown under "show all finds" than their count reflected. What's up?
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I contacted the New York Admin as advised in the previous post. They posted a notice to the owner on the cache page and disabled the cache. They told me by e-mail about this and that the cache would be archived if the owner hadn't responded in three week's time. This would open up the area for a new cache. They appear to not be in favor of adopting and keeping up an abandoned cache, but rather they appear to be in favor of throwing out the baby with the bathwater. I can understand that there may be good reasons for this (the one given was that the cache owner may reappear and be upset with how things were handled) and am going to wait out the three weeks, but so much for trying to help save an established cache.
I can do better anyway. The cache was muggled because it was not well hidden enough in my opinion. I, of course, appreciate the efforts of the Admin in this case. -
You're a kind person...one willing to adopt a pee-muggled cache.
Yes, you can adopt a cache. If it's near you and you are willing, go recover it and clean it up. To adopt a cache, you can send a note to your local administrator requesting an adoption.
Good luck with this.
GSMx2
Local administrator? Is there such a person? How do I locate them? I'm assuming it is not under Groundspeak in the Yellow Pages.
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Went to GCGZBC today and was treated to a nasty surprise. The cache had a crushed beer can in it and had been urinated in. I posted a note to the cache page warning folks not to visit until it had been repaired and sent a note to the owner through the site with the details of the damage. That e-mail message bounced. Most of the contents are of course a loss, but the log book can be saved with reasonably quick action (it is in a plastic bag that may be watertight enough to have preserved it and there may be a travel bug in there as well that needs attention. Is there another way to contact the owner? Is there a way to adopt the cache if it is orphaned? Help me save this cache!
Thanks in advance for any help you can offer.
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Thanks for the help, everyone!
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Okay, so I'm a bit new to this and it hasn't happened to me yet, but it easily could as I know right now where there is a cache I want to do that currently has a TB in it that I've already logged once.
So, my question is what happens if you log a TB a second time - does it add to your count of TB's or just generate a log that shows you are not paying attention to whether or not the TB you just picked up has been logged previously by you?
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Okay, so I'm going to get called to task for the foolishness of this question, but are there any folks who buy these tags for travel bugs that the finder is supposed to keep? I can see that most of you are passionate about the "Don't keep me" text, but are all travel bugs that way? Okay, now you can tell me that this kinda the point of the travel bugs... I just wondered though.
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I like the adoption center idea since since it dovetails with cache rescue missions.
Setting an arbitarary time limit on a cache lifespan is problimatic. 18 months sounds reasonable. But given the nature of having so many caches to choose from now some will be 'neglected' by Joe Cacher out of blind random chance even if he is interested in that very cache and the long hike in.
There is a local one called "The Vent" It's on my list. I doubt it's been found in over a year. It's not that it's not there, or that I don't want to do it (and a few other locals want to do it) it's finding time, and doing it when the weather cooperates as it's a good hike in a lava flow. Some of the hottest and most brutal hiking you can do.
I chose the 18 month deadline on the assumtion that it is reasonable for a cache owner to visit their cache on average once per year. This mechanism could take some load off of site management. This might also serve to discourage people from placing more caches than they can reasonably maintain.
I can imagine many circumstances that would be a major enough change in someone's life that geocaching would be put aside, possibly for good, and we could minimize the negative effect this inevitable kind of change would have on the sport with this sort of method.
I understand that some caches are visited only infrequently for whatever reason, but is it unreasonable for the cache owner to be *expected* to visit their baby at least once per year to make sure that it hasn't been carried away by flood waters, buried under a lava flow, or simply removed by a well-meaning park ranger?
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Here's another tip: The owner automatically receives an email when a log is posted to his or her cache, which means that you received this email from Jeep-O-Caching when his/her log was posted:June 11 by Jeep-O-Caching (61 found)
Came over from Rochester to try this one today. Paddled the 1.8 kilometers up from the boat launch (see photo) and a search out to about 30 meters from the GPS coordinates yielded nothing. A few good cache hidey-holes were there, but nothing in them.
Reading the previous logs leads me to believe this needs to be maintained or sent to the archives ...[Emphasis added]You can't fault Jeep-O-Caching for not informing you about the problem with your cache. What's more, your disable note:
isn't clear whether you plan to check to see if the container is still there.June 14 by teamcny (9 found)Disabled cache. With more than one no-find, I suspect high waters floated this one away. I wonder if anyone ever found it downstream?!
We hope you do plan to check on it, sometime soon, so that it doesn't become "geolitter" if it is still there!
I was aware that an e-mail would be generated when I added the log entry that is referred to above. That is why I take the time to log DNF's and include comments on what the situation was at the time.
I also observe that no progress has been logged regarding checking on that cache at this time. I am not pointing this out to shame the cache owner. At least this cache is now on hold so folks know not to attempt it right now. I am hoping that the Geocaching.com folks see this and it encourages them to look for ways to improve their handling of inactivity in caches. I understand that some caches are not accessed very often, but how about a one year plus time-out timer where if a cache gets no "found it" entries or notes from the owner saying that maintaince was performed in say 18 months then it is placed on hold and the owner is e-mailed. A non-response would mean it gets archived, or better yet put up for adoption. Hey, what about that, an adoption center for orphaned caches. Hey, just thinking out loud here ...
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I did a cache yesterday that was last successfully found in 2002 (GC9361). The previous no-find, along with mine, makes it clear to me that noone is paying attention to this cache entry.
First of all, how do I report this kind of problem without going to the forums?
Second of all, and what I'd like to see discussed is this: In my opinion a cache such as this that hasn't been found in years, and has no notes from the owner saying he did something like an annual check on it, should never have been still listed. Someone should have queried the owner when there was no activity on the cache, notes or otherwise, for say over a year. I know this is another drain on resources that are probably already overused for other things, but is there something that could/should be done about these? I can already point to another cache that probably ought to be queried/archived as well ...
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CONS
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WAAS consumes battery about 25% faster
I'm sure if you don't like the battery consumtion of the WAAS in the Legend you know you can simply turn it off. I don't consider WAAS a 'con', BTW, I wouldn't want a GPS without it. The Legend is the lowest cost Garmin with WAAS.
Many folks have recommended the Garmin etrex Vista, but I'd say it is overkill for the money. I have a Legend (available used on eBay for a touch over $100) and the only differences between that and the Vista are that the Vista has the electronic compass, the barometer, and 3x the memory for maps. You have to decide if those extras are worth the price. (To those who are screaming out "but the Legend has half the waypoints of the Vista!" you need to upgrade your software.)
Those who have recommended carrying a compass are right on the mark with that. Even if you chose a unit with an electronic compass you'd do well to have the 'low-tech' compass in hand when the messsage "Lost Sattelite Reception" appears.
I use my compass and GPSr, one in each hand, when I'm trying to find a precise spot. It works very well for me. -
Okay, so I was a bit frustrated when I wrote that last post. I'd gotten a little tired of being told over and over that I could already do that with workarounds/multiple queries when that wasn't the point of the topic.
Anyway, you'll be glad to know that I worked up a solution to this using 4 PQ's and GSAK. Of course I'm now running 4x the number of PQ's and pulling twice the number of waypoints that I would be if I were allowed simply to select up to 999 instead of 500. That's okay, though, the html output from GSAK is much better than ebooks!
Thanks again to those that actually posted/sent constructive solutions/suggestions!
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I'm starting to think we should just have a general "Cemetery Angst" topic pinned at the top of these forums.
I've seen plenty of tastefully and respectfully hidden caches that take you to some very neat spots. It would be a shame to think of such beautiful and serene places could only be used by those too dead to truly enjoy them.
As for me...I'm going to ask that my ashes be placed in an ammo can in the woods.
Thanks for summing this up nicely! Tasteful will alway be a matter of opinion, and opinions vary widely. Common sense dictates that caches shouldn't be near the leading edge of an active cemetary, but some of the best caches I have done so far have been in/near cemetaries. If you live near me, try these as examples of this:
GCJMHE
GCGD0E
GCJZ34
The first is right above a grave marker in a historic cemetary! I can't say anymore w/o spoiling it, except that it is probably my favorite cache to date!
It can be done.
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Can anyone suggest a good file format for use for the cache descriptions and previous logs I can output from GSAK or another similar program for use with my Motorola MPX200. This runs a stripped version of WinCE that is call Smartphone.
I have tried html and that seems to work really well, except the Smartphone has some limitations here. It can't take all the data as one file, the 3M file of data doesn't pose any kind of storage problem but IE crashes after loading a portion of the file. It doesn't like any more than about 1400 files in a directory, so the output from GSAK at 1500+ files poses a problem there. It is not again a storage problem at about 4M, but the file manager complains about there being too many files in the directory. I can work around this by pressing the scroll down button for a moment after the error message and it lets me access the files anyway. I'd prefer a way to talk GSAK into using a few fewer files or better yet talking the Smartphone into being okay with the large number of directory entries.
BTW, the html output from GSAK is a revelation! Wow.
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Jeep-O-Caching
Several here are trying to help you get what you need within the current 500 limit and using available tools. Continuing to insist you need 1000 and need all terrian/difficulties and all types in a strictly defined area isn't really helping much.
Jeremy (who ultimely decides these things) has stated that you can get 1000 with availble tools. I take that to mean there is no hope of getting 1000 as a limit despite your pleadings.
I too am not familar with that particular phone but I will do some reseach and see what programs might work for you on it. I highly recommend getting GSAK and learning to use it. It works wonders with the PQs! There must be some alternate reader we can find for you.
I suggest dropping any terrian 5's as they require special equipment and planning ahead. Drop Puzzle caches as most require the time to sit down and figure something out before you are in the field. Drop difficulty ratings of 4 and 5 as they generally require multiple hours to locate or multiple trips. If you are caching on a whim, my guess is you won't have time for these. Drop anything that has multiple DNF's as the last few logs (GSAK) so you don't waste your time.
Adjust your starting coords if you don't tend to travel in some particular direction from home. (shift north 10 miles if you mostly drive north and rarely south).
Just some ideas.......
Not reading what I've carefully and time-consumingly written isn't helping. Are there *any* 5 difficulty or 5 terrains around here? I doubt there's any or many, and I don't think I'll waste the time looking. I already don't query on puzzle caches, as stated above. I would have thought that Jeremy's role would be to respond to intelligent, thoughtful suggestions, with similar dialog. So far we have a one-liner saying you should be able to do that with the tools available to you already. Well, I've now spent all morning working with PQ Toolbox, Watcher, GPSBabel, and EasyGPS and I might now be able to actually go out with waypoints that aren't two weeks old. One individual thoughtfully and time-consumingly typed a set of queries and suggestions that I have been attempting use to work-around this issue. I had to write a batch file this morning to get GPSBabel working in an acceptable fashion, since it won't take options through the GUI! Files output from Watcher are not directly readable with EasyGPS without exercising your 'find-and-replace' skills. Does this seem like what you want folks to have to do to get some enjoyment out of an activity I'd hope you'd want to promote to as many as possible with as wide a level of skill sets as possible? What would happen if someone in say the National Park Service got ahold of the wrong end of the stick about geocaching and decided it was merely a bunch of geeks who deface Federal property? Go offline once in a while and think about the bigger picture. As to the folks who responded by saying that some of the most successful cachers print their information out on paper before they go out into the field. That's fine, if that is how you want to do it. I don't wish to have to take a filing cabinet into the woods with me, but that's just me I guess. I can throw a few electronic trinkets on my belt and I'm free to cache at will.
In the meantime, I have successfully used the queries posted for my by the one helpful individual in your 'never exposed to outside air' community to collect, coallate, sort, and upload an html version of the data to my phone so that I can now go out and cache. Thanks to that individual, and give me my 1000 waypoints so I never have to go through this again!
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Which does bring up one other point. Instead of always trying to max everything out, it's really not that big a deal to get a new PQ for when you want to venture a little further. Personally, I have 2 PQs set up to get me all my unfounds in CT, but I skip NY. Long Island is only 20 miles away as the crow flies, but it's a $100 ferry ride or a 2hr drive to get there. Other parts of NY are almost as close, but since I rarely cache in that area, I just exclude it. If I'm planning a trip across the state line, I'll grab a quick PQ for the area I'm gonna be in. Rare that it takes more then 5-10 minutes from the time I start setting the PQ up til the time it's loaded in my GPS and PDA.
Substitute NY for CT in the above and you have a whole different problem - my problem.
Also, on the idea of generating a new query before going out. My point is it is often when I am already out that I have the opportunity to be in relatively further from home location and grab a quick couple of caches. Tech + Nature = Geocaching. Nature seems to be working just fine, but I find it hard to believe folks who would go into the woods with a GPS looking for treasure wouldn't understand the clear benefits of paperless and easy to use data.
I've been working on those PQ's you suggested and they are okay as far as they go, but did you know that data output from Watcher is not compatible with EasyGPS without more tweaking? I could be out caching right now, but instead I'm home trying to convert data from one format to another. 1000 waypoints still sound like a bad idea?
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Changing the limit to 1000 actually wouldn't help you. If you hit the max number of waypoints (be it 100, 500, or 950) and there are more caches then that number that fit your criteria, it seems that the excess caches are dropped by date, not by distance. So you would still need to periodically readjust the queries or you may possibly miss getting a new cache a mile down the road while still getting the old caches 100 miles away.
This is probably true if you are running date range PQ's, but the caches are dropped by range when you are doing a coordinate based search. This is perfect, since it gets exactly the current maximum number of caches every time.
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Jeep-O-Caching - clue us in on a couple of things here so that we can come up with some help for you.
1. What type of PDA are you using?
2. Do you have a PC or MAC? ver of operating system?
3. Generally where do you live?
4. What types of caches do you perfer? (Size, terrian, difficulty)
5. Do you have mapping software available on your PC?
Answer these and some of us will come up with very specific information to help you sort these out with multiple queries to get you to 1000 so you can fill your GPSr easily.
I want caches at all difficulty levels and all terrain levels. I want to have as many as will fit in my poor little 1000 waypoint memory, within 50 or so from absolutely full or as close to that as can be reasonably accomplished. I want them updated about once a week on Friday or Sunday at my option with data that is no more than one day old when I put it there. (PQ's on Thursday or Friday, and on Sunday). I want the nearest waypoints to my home coordinates that I have not yet found and that are active. I want caches of types traditional, virtual, earth, multi, and l/b hybrid (only because I assume that that is like a traditional but also works in the l/b community). I only want coordinates within NYS for now, since ranges over a certain distance start bringing in Canada from across the lake. I want the waypoints and the ebook file to match, since my phone won't do the find function in Mobipocket (their software's problem, not my phone's). This means that I have to look through the contents of the ebook file and the only way I have do find anything is by comparing the distance from home in my GPSr with the distances listed in the ebook file's contents list. Usually I guess the distance and look within a range in the ebook's contents list. I want the ranges on the different types of caches to be the same, so I don't unwittingly get out beyond a certain radius and find that I am hunting only virtuals and earth caches or somesuch. I don't want to have to set up the PQ's over and over again, because you miss one radio button and the whole thing is garbage. I don't want to have to periodically readjust the queries after realizing that I'm missing some data or things aren't cooinciding properly.
Now, I could accomplish this quite simply with one query set to 950 waypoints max, specifying the fives aforementioned cache types, specifying the haven't found/is active/within NYS/from origin criteria, and I'd be all set. Okay, that was sarcastic; but it is also exactly why I asked the question in the first place.
Before you start pointing out that I could do this with a single 500 waypoint query and have lots of waypoints available for whimsical waypoint related games in the field, that would only get me out to 46.9 km (29.1 miles) including the 5 caches I found today.
Equipment:
Garmin etrex Legend, currently with the default maps - certainly not top of the line, so I don't know what everyone is so excited about with the 1000 waypoints thing, heck the Vista has an altimeter and a compass in it! Who could need that, and for what?! Sounds suspicious to me ...
Anyway, it was the least expensive thing that Garmin makes with WAAS in it. They're only going for a hair over a 100 bucks used on eBay!PC at home running Windows XP - no, I don't bring my laptop into the field, nor usually in the car either, nor can I access the Internet from any location more than 50 feet from my home.
Motorola MPX220 (Smartphone O/S, sort of a stripped Win CE) - and no, I don't have the Internet turned on on the thing. That's a bit over the top for me.
German made compass - the kind with the little needle that usually points North.
I don't have expensive mapping software or any specialized geocaching software either. Geocaching has recently caused me to put a copy of Mobipocket on my MPX220 and on my XP PC - say that five times fast! I'm using EasyGPS to move waypoints from the PC to the GPSr and back and MobiPocket to move the ebooks to the MPX220. I use the nice little camera on the MPX220 to take acceptable photos while out caching and that is about all I bring, except of course for the trade goods and the bug spray!
Well, what do you recommend?
I can do better anyway. The cache was muggled because it was not well hidden enough in my opinion. I, of course, appreciate the efforts of the Admin in this case.
Reading the previous logs leads me to believe this needs to be maintained or sent to the archives ...[Emphasis added]
I use my compass and GPSr, one in each hand, when I'm trying to find a precise spot. It works very well for me.
Anyway, it was the least expensive thing that Garmin makes with WAAS in it. They're only going for a hair over a 100 bucks used on eBay!
Please help me get GCWD06 back up after Erie Canal washout
in Northeast
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Thanks to both Keystone and simon_cornelus for the helpful information. I can certainly get in touch with that account now that I have the name and your advice on how to look them up. I should have known I could've done this once Keystone gave me the name. I still don't know how I would have found the name in the first place, but it looks like I have what I need to proceed.
Thanks to you both, and to Geocaching for providing this forum!
Jeep-O-Caching