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I've trawled the net and to be honest the amount of negatives for the dakota are putting me off, it just seems to be the right package for me, paperless caching and some decent maps. I'm not sure what the maps are like in the us, I have the garmin topo maps which show roads and a few paths but no where near all of them in fact probably not as much info as the open source maps but there are so many blank areas on the open source maps it makes it hard to navigate from them. Here are a some examples of an area I will be visiting this weekend. ordnance survey map open source map

Sorry should have said I'm in the UK

I'm not too familiar with the Dakota (which is a level down from the top-of-the-line Oregon, I think) but whatever you decide, don't get rid of the GPSMAP 60CSx. I recently purchased the new GPSMAP 62s but I keep going back to my rock solid and very accurate 60CSx. I think it's one of the best handhelds out there. Are you using the best maps you can get? To be honest financially it would have to be a switch, I couldn't keep both. As far as I know the topo maps and talkytoaster maps are all that is available for the 60csx but stand to be corrected, if I could get os maps on it I wouldn't change.

I'm currently using a GMAP60CSx for geocaching with the kids, it's great at getting us to the cache but the maps don't give enough detail (have used both topo and talkytoaster)to keep us on the straight and narrow. A lot of the stuff we do is impulse so we don't have the local maps and find it hard to choose the best routes without straying from public rights of way. I've been offered a Dakota 20 with the full 1:50k maps of the GB on, 1:50k although not perfect do give a good idea of suitable routes, they never failed me in the scouts! Is this a good upgrade, is the gps as accurate? can you upload any more info to this unit about individual caches (paperless caching. Any info on good or bad points gratefully received....

Based on the above I best get it bought then. Thanks for your help.

Thanks for the tips / links, I nearly always buy a map for the area if I'm away on holiday for a week or so anyway (nosey) and I suppose if I'm at home I can print sections of as you suggest. It's more the impulsive caching on route etc where having maps would help. Having said that I'd need access to the internet to get the locations so perhaps I'm trying to find a solution for a problem that won't happen?

Thanks for that, I've done quite a bit of searching and came to the conclusion that even if the maps weren't as good as I would like they were better than nothing. The price seems good so if something better comes along I would hopefully get my money back. I'll have a look for some oregon / colorado's first though.

Sorry guys I appreciate the answers probably in amongst another thread but I've done some searches and not really come up with it. We are just 1 walk and 4 caches into this business (3 found) We used my sons nokia phone with a bluetooth gps unit which is about 8 years old and although it got us in the area I wasn't impressed by the accuracy. In fact if it hadn't been for local knowledge, studying the location on the p.c. and the clues I'm pretty sure we wouldn't have found anything. So I'm looking at maybe investing in a handheld gps unit. Trouble is it's a minefield out there having never even held one before. I started looking at one which would do the basics; compass, direction and distance to cache but looking around it appears I would need to be paying over £50 second hand for something like this. I then thought to myself if I'm searching in an area I don't know I'm going to have to buy or download a map for the local to enable me to find rights of way etc.So maybe something with maps on is the way forward (even bigger minefield) I have been offered a Garmin Gmap 60csx for £120 which I believe ticks all the boxes and comes with topo maps of UK 2009 version. Are these easy to use? Will it do everything I need? Are these maps any good? I've seen a few screen dumps and whilst I didn't necessarily expect them to show all the features of an OS map I was a bit disappointed by the lack of information. All my life I've used 1:50k os maps for my outdoor pursuits, scouting, walking, watching rallies etc and it's easy to find your way round with these so perhaps I've been spoilt. I've seen some gps's with OS maps on, can you upload OS maps to the garmin 60csx? Are there any other maps available with more detail on? Should I really be looking at something else? Sorry for all the questions but I really don't know what I'm jumping into and I'm jumping with both feet!

Well we had a good walk and the kids seem quite impressed by the whole thing so thats good. I stored the location of 4 caches in my sons phone, stuck the bluetooth receiver under my hat and off we went. We reached the first location and I realised i'd left the info / clues at home , the first one was described as micro in size and we couldn't find it. Oh crumbs I thought looking at the disappointment on the kids faces this isn't going to turn out well. Off we went to the next one and after a bit of searching of both the ground and my memory for clue info we found it. smiles alround. I think the kids are hooked which is great, hopefully we'll get them out more now. I need to find a better solution for the gps though. (i'll start another topic for that)

Got it sorted, silly me, had an E instead of a W Off in the morning fingers crossed we find something and the kids enjoy it.

cheers guys, I don't want to jailbreak the touch's so looking at the phone at the mo, I've managed to connect it to the gps and can get nokia location to recognise it. there is a navigator built-in but the coords seem to be in a different format to those given on here. I need to enter in the following format. 0(degrees)00'00.00"N, 0(degrees)00'00.00"E (Can't get the degree symbol on here.) I've tried entering some but the navigater tells me I'm 275km away from something I know is only 150m away. I'll try it again in the morning. I'm not after anything fancy at the mo, a basic direction / distance would do, we are only investigating the local area at the moment so I know the paths well.

Hi newby to all this and just wondering if any of the eqipment we already own would do or if we will need to get a hand held gps. We have a TomTom One, this will obviously get us close on the road but as the maps are only roads I doubt we will get close enough of the beaten track. I have a TomTom bluetooth Gps Reciever which I used with my old ipaq, the ipaq is defunk but the receiver still works. My son has a Nokia 5530 I believe it may be possible to connect this to the above receiver, does anyone use this, can I download an app for the nokia? Both my sons have 4th generagtion ipod touch's, is there a way to connect the receiver to these and a suitable app? Any advice gratefully received