Ian&Sue - Team Pathfinder

We previously did an international exchange with a team from Spokane in Washington and enjoyed following it. Unfortunately recently the cache has gone missing and we would enjoy being able to set up another. Please contact us is you are still looking for an exchange partner.

What a shame I hadnt been able to read the forums whilst I was down in Perth as we have only just come back past your required location and would have been happy to stop and take a photo or two. Not that there is much to see at your spot. We shall be going back down past your co-ord at Easter (maybe even before) so drop us a line if you still require the photo then and we will grab one for you. Team : Pathfinder Karratha WA

Many thanks for all your detective work and help BaldEd. Hopefully you have recovered from your gruelling cycle! We are looking forward to enjoying our Travel Bugs continuing journeys. Sue - Karratha Western Australia

Hi all, We have two travelbugs in NZ at the moment - somehow they have both stalled in Canterbury. We would dearly love for one or both of them to start moving so that we can continue tracking them. I know thats what everyone wishes but we really hope that someone can help as they are our link to geocaching as we live in a very remote area and cache hunting isnt something we are able to do very often. My brother-in-law will be visiting Aukland in the next few weeks and we are wondering whether some really kind person could grab one or both of these bugs and maybe move them to somewhere where he could retrieve them for us. Many thanks,

I should have added in my previous note that I am talking about the locationless virtual cache. Sorry. We dont have many virtual caches here at the moment - I had forgotten that there are two kinds.

We are disappointed that new virtual caches are being immediately archived. Having moved from an area where Geocaching was just starting to go ahead to a remote region with only a very small population we were enjoying trying to find things in this area that satisfy the virtual caches. It was making up for the lack of caches around here. Before you say that we should start a group going we have been trying to, so far now there are two teams here and another two 350 kilometres further north of us. Most people up here dont want to venture out into 40C plus heat in the desert here. We find that we are disadvantaged in many respects because of our isolated location, please dont make this another thing we cannot enjoy.

Hi We have only been back here for a couple of months and already things are well underway. If you can get word out through your local newspaper or a note on the board at the Service station etc. you will be amazed at the response you get. We were contacted by the local ABC radio to do an interview in the afternoon show they were very keen to hear all about geocaching and even invited me to come on occasionally to let everyone know how we are going. Nothing is impossible, even in a small community. People just need to know that Geocaching is out there. Please do stress that we like to be environmentally aware though - Protect our native flora & fauna and Cache in / Trash out. We dont want to end up like NZ where geocaching is frowned upon so practicing good principles from the start is the way to go. Geocaching is also a great way to promote tourism!! Another marketing tool. (Although I like the quiet!!) PS. These are all my personal opinions and practices - I am not here to preach at you or anyone - Now I will get off of my soapbox, ha ha. Feel free to e-mail us if you need more of a hand on setting up a group down there. Good luck and happy Geocaching.

What a great idea. Unfortunately we dont have a plane at our disposal immediately but have found a couple of good hills etc. Since the concept is so good we thought that we could adapt it a bit to suit. Hope you dont mind!!

I am curious. How far would you travel to find a cache? We have tried to locate a couple of caches which are approximately 2000klms from where we live but that was because we were trying to escape the winter cold!! Mostly we will travel around 250 kilometres in a round trip to locate caches and we do this regularly. How about you guys? When we move to the Pilbara WA in a couple of weeks we will be setting quite a few caches, would you visit them if you where holidaying here? Would it influence where you go on holiday.

Great idea. The geoterriers love a good cache. Actually they often show us the ideal hiding spots, ha ha.

Well we intend setting quite a few - but as for they will come - its not exactly a day trip. ha ha. Let us know ahead and we will put you up for a night!!!!

Question - what to do with the caches we have planted when we move from the region. We have 15 or so caches planted and are soon to move 1700 kilometres away making checking them extremely difficult. We will probably only be back in Perth a couple of times a year. Do we retire them or retire only the ones that are in the more public areas. We dont want to be giving geocachers a bad name.

Well just as we got started (geocaching) we have to go, back to Karratha. We are hoping that there are some others out there in the Pilbara who might like to group up with us and start setting caches. I can think of quite a few great spots. I am going to get in touch with the local ABC radio and also leave some messages on the local ISP home page to see if I can generate interest. Meanwhile, if you regular cachers have contacts up that way that you can spread the word to, please do. Sue - Team:Pathfinder

We would be happy to have it here in Western Australia. There aren't too many "international" bugs here!!

Its on!!!!!!!!! September 22nd

Mark you calenders and stay tuned to the Cache page - details will be posted during this week.

Sounds like there are quite a few here interested. It would be great to get it happening in the not to distant future!!! Stay tuned, I am working on a format for a great day out now!!! Any suggestions, helpful hopefully, greatfully accepted.

Coming from Karratha myself I understand your problem with distance Goldminer. I don't mind a bit of a trip to "meet half-way" but I know that many "Perthites" consider places like Mandurah out bush!!!! No offence meant to the locals!! I am thinking that I will attempt to contact each team individually about a meeting since it seems like there are only the three of us that are using these boards at the moment. Will keep you all informed. Happy Geocaching.

Hi Guys, At the moment in WA there seems to be a couple more Geocachers coming out of the woodwork - so now would probably be a good time to get to know one another. Can some of you who have perhaps already setup meetings give me some idea as to how you did it. I am thinking that perhaps on an arranged day I could give some co-ordinates to a location maybe even some sort of a trail of co-ordinates/caches. I would like to draw on others experience and make the day something (great) to remember!!! Thanks Sue

When the GPS signal degradation called Select Availabilty (SA) was removed by the Clinton Administration May 1st, 2000 (statement), it opened up the possibility of games like this one. On May 3rd, a container of goodies was hidden by a someone outside of Portland, Oregon - in celebration of the removing of Selective Availability. By May 6th the cache was visited twice, and logged in the logbook once. Mike Teague was the first to find the container, and built the first web site to document these containers and their locations that were posted to the sci.geo.satellite-nav newsgroup. In July of 2000, Jeremy Irish found Mike Teague's web site and found his first cache outside of Seattle, Washington. Recognizing the potential of the game (but never expected the growth), Jeremy approached Mike Teague with a new site design, used the name Geocaching, and developed a new web site adding virtual logs, maps, and a way to make it easier to maintain caches as the sport grows. The site was alive for a while, but the official torch was passed to Jeremy on September 6. Since the launch of the web site, the Geocaching sport has grown to caches in all 50 states and over 30 countries. There are now many variations of the game, including virtual caches, offset caches, puzzle caches, multi-stage caches. New ideas and new great games crop up every day. From it's inception, Geocaching.com has been developed and maintained by Jeremy, with the assistance of Geocachers around the world. Many thanks to the Geocaching community for making the game it is today. The official web site for Geocaching is Geocaching.com. Who knows where it'll go next! There is a lot of information on this page - http://www.geocaching.com/faq.asp Sue & Ian Team : Pathfinder - Western Australia

Hi guys, I am interested in finding out how many of us there are in WA and also what you think about organizing a get together.

We are trying to put together some caches to plant. We have been making a bit of a collection of things to place into them but would like to hear what other geocachers use, or perhaps what they might like to find? OK I know what kind of a reply I will get, the winning lotto ticket, etc etc. ha ha. Seriously though, what sort of things are being planted around the place? thanks