redwoodkestrel

We had a full presidents series nearby here in the Bay Area - one for every president, including Obama. Most are still around though I think few have been archived. We also have a presidents streets series in SF, but it's not all of them - just those we have streets named after.

I did one that was an otter box attached by carabiner to a rope tied around a rock and placed on the bottom of a lake. It had a little foam handle that acted as a float too, and that combined with the air inside of the otter box made the cache float up from the rock about a foot. It was still ridiculously hard to find though, with very low visibility in the lake (probably 5-6 feet total) and the algae that started covering the cache (which was already a black box) and the float. Once found, you detached the carabiner so you could bring the container to the surface. Even harder though was finding the rock with the rope again after you were done signing the log - I was worried I wasn't going to be able to re-attach the cache, since you drift a bit while treading water and signing the log. Luckily I spotted it eventually!

It should only wiggle when you stop. If you're kayaking, just turn it off when you stop. As long as you're moving, you'll get a pretty accurate estimation of the distance you covered.

That's pretty normal for a GPS unit. It's drawing a track of your path as you search. There is probably an option somewhere to turn off tracks. Even when you're standing still the configuration of satellites is changing so your GPS unit is constantly re-calculating your coordinates. That is 100% normal. That variation should be pretty slight though - probably all those squiggles are within 10 feet of each other. Your GPS unit probably also doesn't know what direction you're facing unless you're moving. That's also normal. So if you have it configured to always keep your direction facing "up" on your screen, once you stop moving it will very likely keep turning the screen. If that bothers you, you can probably change it so north is always "up" on your screen. The rule of thumb is that once you're within 20 feet or so of where your GPSr says GZ is, it's time to put down the GPS unit and just start searching with your eyes. If you want to keep refining exactly where your GPSr thinks GZ is, you'll need to keep walking away from GZ, and then approaching from a new angle - that should help narrow down your search area. But realize that your unit does not have 100% precision/accuracy, nor did the cache owner's GPS unit - so the variation of the two means you'll very rarely ever find the cache exactly at what your unit says is "0."

No, your trackable count does not go up if you discover or move the same TB twice. I've moved the same trackable at two different times and checked to see. Your trackable count is by individual trackable, not by number of instances of discovery or retrieval or grabbing. On the other hand, if you find the same cache twice, then yes, your find count does go up.

Wow, there you go - learned something new about my GPS unit!

I don't believe you can filter by any cache attributes (D/T, size, type, etc.) once they're in your eTrex. If you really only want large caches to show up in your GPSr, then you could run your pocket queries for only large caches.

You can also download (for free) an app called "GPS Status" which speeds up the response of your phone's GPS. Often that's the issue with perceived GPS inaccuracies on your phone - you're actually moving faster than your GPS is updating, which causes you to overshoot GZ. With most phone GPS as well, you need to be moving for it to accurately point you in the right direction. Once you stop, the compass will start swiveling.

Project-GC.com has a "Map compare" feature, where you can take two cachers and either look for caches you've both found or caches neither of you have found, based on geographic area.

Some of my favorites: Rabbits From Mars: one of the first truly tough, test-your-mettle-as-a-cacher Multis I had ever done. The hides at each and every stage are exquisite in their use of the landscape and natural camouflage. It often takes cachers multiple trips to find all four stages. Tidal Forces-Hole in the Wall: a nice Earthcache with a great hike to it - it's about 2 miles from the parking lot to the cache site, all along a pebble-y beach. Plus I like that the cache not only gets you to notice the geology, but also the intertidal life in the area - since the two are very much linked. Lunker's Lair: a fun 5/5 Traditional that involves diving in a lake with a pretty murky bottom! But such a great feeling to finally find it! Dazed & Confused: a difficult to solve puzzle. But once you start unraveling it you realize how truly clever it is.

I love finding caches that require some sort of water craft. And I don't even own any kind of boat! I'd love to buy a kayak at some point, but until I do, I just rent the equipment I need to find the caches I want to find. Which also means there are some boating-only caches that I'd love to go find but still haven't had the chance to yet. And that's okay. Around here in the summer there's usually an on-the-water event at a nearby lake. Though I believe the organizers usually start on land with a picnic/BBQ so that folks without a boat can attend as well, but then it moves onto the lake to paddle around and go after some of the caches on the islands. But I also think it would be totally acceptable to have an on-the-water-only event.

I decided to go caching in the Palisades yesterday morning. Of course, it was the first day we were expecting rain in months, but it supposedly wasn't coming until the afternoon. Drove an hour and a half to get to the trailhead, including the last 3 miles on an unpaved road (the last half mile of which was really sketchy - wasn't sure the truck was going to make it!). And, of course, it started raining pretty much right as we got to the trailhead. And it was cold! (Yes, the California version of cold, but I wasn't dressed for it, or the rain. ) I knew my initial plan of a 2-3 hour hike wasn't going to happen, but after coming all that way I wasn't willing to just turn around, so I decided to hike up the trail a ways. My boyfriend thought I was crazy and decided to stay in the car. I figured I'd hike up to the next geocache, grab it, and turn around. Well, as the crow flies it looked pretty close... definitely a bit farther by trail. And then a scramble up the rock and a bushwhack to get it... both more difficult thanks to the rain. And much more slippery and muddy... if only you could see what my pants looked like in this photo. This is me near GZ... though the cache is still through those bushes and up the rock a bit. As it really started raining I booked it back to the trailhead since I knew the road was only going to get tougher to get back out of the longer it rained!

All the folks who live in all the Springfields in the US (I've heard there's one in every state? But I haven't fact-checked that bit of information...) should put together one massive exchange cache.

hunter259 is exactly correct - you need to change the coordinate format. They are NOT interchangeable, and will lead to very different places with the same numbers! You're currently in decimal degrees and need to change to degrees and minutes. You'll also have the option of degrees, minutes, seconds (DEG MM SS.SSS), but make sure to just select degrees and minutes (DEG MM.MMM). From there you should find the next stage of your multi will be much closer to the first stage!

Wow! Very cool. As a marine biologist I'd love to not only to find the cache, but to see the hydrothermal vents up-close. Alas, my research focuses on the rocky intertidal so I've yet to have a reason (or a means!) to go down in a submersible.

Ah, you figured it out while I was typing my answer! Have fun watching your TBs!

Assuming your brother has a geocaching account, he can "grab it" from you. Once he does that, it will be out of your inventory and into his.

For NYE a group of friends and I backpacked up to the Hikers Hut in the Santa Cruz Mountains to spend the night and celebrate the new year. Yep, there's a cache right at the hut and a few others nearby, as well as along the hike up... so I made sure to grab a few. Anyone who thinks they might be in the area at some point - I highly recommend staying a night or two up there! Gorgeous views, a nice hike, a good number of caches around, and very inexpensive! The hut: Last sunset of 2013, from the hut: Hiking out on New Years day:

No, it's not - read Moun10Bike's explanation to my initial post. Set your PQ radius small enough that it returns just under 1000 caches and you can easily sort the PQ, keeping all the original caches that are returned. Once I went back and tried it, it worked great! The only thing you may need to do is to keep tweaking the radius until you get just under 1000 caches - so don't schedule it to run (i.e., don't pick a day of the week) until you've got the radius figured out.

2013: 43 DNFs, 532 finds, so 43/(43+532) = 7.5% Overall: 127 DNFs, 1314 finds, so 127/(127+1314) = 8.8% Though not starting 2014 off so well... 2 DNFs, 10 finds, so 2/12 = 16.7%! Hopefully it's not setting the tone for the rest of the year!

When you visit a cache page, you should see two maps - one on the right near the top of the cache page, zoomed out pretty far. The second one is down below the cache description and is more zoomed in. Above that map is a link that says "View Larger Map." If you click that you can see all the other caches around that cache. Is that what you're looking for?

I started out initially looking for caches placed on certain dates. Since you can't filter and return a PQ for date without year, I figured I'd just sort by date placed and check those few specific dates I'm still looking for through the years. So while the sort would list the caches placed by date and year, I could just search through the pages and find those few dates each year that I'm interested in. Great! Thanks for the help Moun10Bike - that's why I wasn't sure if it was really a bug or something I just didn't quite understand about the PQ preview. Glad to hear it's just me! I'll try running a new PQ now!

I've noticed today that when I preview a pocket query I've made via the map (so a radius around a point) in list mode, the first list that comes up is, in fact, my pocket query, displaying all 1000 caches that were within the correct radius on the map, sorted (I assume) by distance from the original center point - whatever the default listing order is when you preview a PQ. However, as soon as I try to sort that list, I still have 1000 caches, but they're from much farther out than my initial radius - so it's not the original 1000 caches, but 1000 caches pulled from a much larger area. So, for example, I'm interested in finding caches in my home area that are of a few D/T combinations. So I run a PQ centered on my home coordinates, returning 1000 caches. I preview that list - all looks good, they're all within that initial radius from my home coordinates - about 10 miles. Then I click the "D" in the "D / T" header to sort by difficulty, so I can look specifically for caches nearby that have the D/T combinations I'd like. All of a sudden I have caches in my list that are from way beyond my home area (100+ miles) that were not in my initial PQ. It still only displays 1000 caches, but it's not the original 1000 in my PQ. The same thing happens if I sort by "Placed" or "Last Found" or any other sortable header. I assume this is a bug? Or are pocket queries really only able to be previewed in the default list that comes up, not sortable?

You can search the attributes of caches - any one that has the "requires scuba gear" attribute would almost definitely be underwater. You can also look for the "may require swimming" attribute but that won't necessarily mean it's underwater - it may be on an island in the middle of a lake, for example. Though I'm not sure if there's an easy way to search the attributes of caches without doing a pocket query - but if one of your friends is a premium member, then they can run the PQ to search for those attributes.

I love all the great places I never would have discovered if not for geocaching - including places that tell the story of the history of the area. GC3WG0B An old train tunnel just north of San Francisco - closed off though, so you can't go inside. GC29ERV Wemple Cabin, in the Plumas National Forest GCBFAD An old mercury processing plant GC17J9M Abandoned house on the Mendocino coast