Cyclometh

Other compasses with the tritium vials made by this company did have the warnings in 1960. This one, near as I can tell, never had the tritium in it. Even if it did, it's long since stopped glowing (it only lasts about 10 years). As long as I don't break it, I'm not going to worry about it too much. I'm more pleased with the fact that it seems to be not only cool, but fairly unique.

So, a question and an invitation to post about your cool and/or odd geocaching or related equipment. I have a lensatic compass I inherited from my father. I'm told by my mother that they found it on a beach in California, probably left by some soldiers on training or something. Anyway, it's been my dad's compass for as long as I can remember- I'm sure he had it before I was born (1969). It's an amazing instrument and I have never used a better compass- it's rugged, reliable and although I don't think it's very waterproof (and have no intention of finding out), I love the thing, probably not least because it reminds me of my dad every time I crack it open to take a bearing. I've done a bit of research, and it seems to be a fairly common version of the military lensatic compass referred to as the M1950. They were made from 1949 until modern times by various manufacturers and many used vials of tritium to illuminate the disc. Mine doesn't, or doesn't have any radiation warnings. Certainly, any tritium would have long since ceased to glow; they stopped glowing after a few years. The thing I'm curious about is that my compass does not have the radiation warnings for the tritium-based ones, and was made by a company that only made the M1950 for the military in 1960. Their series were 3-60 and 5-60 (March and May), and were supposedly all made with the radioactive warning label because of the tritium in them (nasty stuff, I gather). Mine says 1-60, and has no radioactive warning label. The compass says "U.S." and under that "1-60" and beneath that "Manufactured by Waltham Prec. Inst. Co. Waltham Mass." I'm curious if anyone has any more information about the history of this compass and its manufacturer- I find it odd that although there's very little data about this series online, what little there is omits the particular one I have. A couple of pics: So, what interesting and/or really cool equipment do you take on your caching runs?

Interesting thread. I was introduced to GPS technology when I was in the Army, and that's what led me to geocaching/benchmarking these days. I spent 4.5 years in the 82d Airborne Division as an artilleryman (13E, fire direction specialist). Did Basic/AIT at Ft Sill, jump school at Ft Benning. I'm a veteran of Desert Shield (I was with the first 100 soldiers to go) and Desert Storm, as well as the Hurricane Andrew relief effort. GPS technology is obviously important to the military, and even more so to the artillery, so when GPS became widely available to the public, I was all over it.

Near the Olympia Airport, OLY AIR AI2208: My son wanted to take this shot of me with SY0859:

I'll vote for that! And look at the Gallery. 50% or more of the time you can't read the GPS screen in those photos anyway! Guilty on one I found yesterday- but only because the image was scaled down so far that you couldn't read it. I posted a closer "benchmark-only" version of it as well. If I include the GPSr in the future I'll make sure you can read it.

Yup, I found one yesterday like that.

Of course not. I leave things with the hope that someone will enjoy it. I'm sure that the items I leave behind in caches are found by someone who likes them. But I don't base my enjoyment of what I do on that, nor do I follow the logs to see who bothered to log that they took some trinket I left behind. And here I thought I was the cynical one. I like to read the physical logs of the caches I visit when I visit them. It's fun to see the patterns of visits by the other cachers in my area. I've been trying to come up with a signature item, once I saw some of the really inexpensive but totally cool trinkets some of the other folks around here leave behind. When I leave something behind at a cache, I've had my fun. The fun of it is leaving something that someone- I have no idea who- will enjoy or take home. But I'm not going to parse the logs every five minutes trying to see who took some widget I left behind. *bow* Thanks. Travel bugs and geocoins are, by their very nature, only "useful" when logged online. Unlike a cache, which is a logbook in a container, with the online log being (in my mind) superfluous, travel bugs, geocoins and other trackables have to be logged online in order for their part in the game to work. I have one TB, which I hope gets logged by people online. I also make sure I log every coin or trackable item; if I'm going to take them from a cache, I've implicitly agreed to the owners' wishes and the process of handling TB/trackables. I also act as a TB ferry from Olympia to Seattle and vice/versa. Since I live 75 miles from where I work, I can carry TBs and trackables every day a long way, which I enjoy doing. I like helping TB owners out, that part of the game is fun. But the "rules" of that involve online logging implicitly- it's not an extracurricular activity to log a TB online, it's the core of the process.

If you define the excitement of geocaching by logging online or reading online logs, you're not exactly getting the point of the sport. If you're going to put out caches with strings attached for the finders, please consider not putting them out at all. If you hide caches with such expectations, you're being rude to people who find your cache. Cache= (box+logbook.) Cache != (box + online log)

Hah. I type 120 wpm, so it didn't take that long. I cruise the forums when I'm waiting for my latest code revisions to build.

Wow, that was some post. Suffice it to say that I don't make it a habit to tell people how to play the game. Read a few threads and you'll see that this is true. Except, of course that you just did. I have no need or desire to justify anything to you. This is exactly why I don't log finds most of the time- aside from just not wanting to be bothered doing something again (I already signed the physical logbook), I just don't see the need. And then I end up having to deal with people like yourself who place themselves in a position to pass judgement on my behavior, as though you had that right- which you don't. It's also why I don't go to events. Maybe I'm just an iconoclast, but people who perceive rudeness in others because they don't follow their way of doing things really get my hackles up. If the cache owner is concerned about the state of their cache, they should hump out to it and check on it. If they want to see who's visited it, they should change out the log book and go home to read the old one with a glass of singlemalt. I reject categorically the notion that not logging online is rude. Online logs are a numbers game and cache owners can delete them at will- they're absolutely meaningless. I stand by the way I do things. I seek carefully, I CITO, I don't damage the environment or the cache, I trade up (sometimes I trade WAY up, because I love to leave stuff that people enjoy finding), and I play the game in all respects as it should be played. A cache is a container and a logbook at a minimum, and I don't have to do anything other than visit the container and sign the logbook in order to satisfy the "rules" of the "game". The online logs are a useful tool, but it gets my back up when people start attaching some sort of expected behavior based on their own patterns of play and thought and then have the audacity- the outright arrogance- to claim other people are being rude for not following said "rules". Tell you what. Just to be consistent, from now on, I won't log anything online at all. If I think a cache is gone, muggled, damaged or destroyed, I'll email the cache owner. And no, I don't need to explain my reasoning in such matters to you or anyone else. To those who think I'm overreacting or just being rude, you have to understand something about me. I'm a FIERCELY independent person. I don't react well to being told what to do. I react even more poorly to condescending pronouncements based on nothing more than some sort of groupthink. One way to get me hacked off really quickly is to imply that I'm somehow lacking in some way because I don't share your precepts. As far as I'm concerned, if you hide a cache, I'll try to find it. But you have no right to expect that I'll do anything more than that. It's not impolite to follow the rules of the game and seek the cache, take something, leave something and sign the logbook. It's also not impolite to seek the cache, fail to find it and move on to another one. Simple courtesy means that I'll let you know if it looks like the cache is really gone or something. But that's it. The implied contract doesn't go any further than that. If I ever hide a cache that got zero finds online, but a hundred in the physical log, I'd consider that a successful and popular cache. But the very last thing I'd do was hide a cache just to see blobs of text on a web site- frankly, that's just silly and my opinion is that if you're hiding a cache to get the online logs, you're hiding it for the wrong reason. You're entitled to your opinion on the matter, but I'm entitled to mine as well.

Generally, I'll try several times to find it. If I can't find it after several attempts, or the area's been disturbed, etc. I'll check the logs and see how long ago it was found or not found. And maybe I can jump in about the rudness factor of expecting other people to play the game your way. A cache is a box and a logbook. I sign the book for the cache itself. The sport's in the hunt, not in the log. If people are really in need of that much validation for what they've done in placing a cache, they can go get the logbook from the cache and read it. It's arrogant pronouncements like this one that make me even *less* likely to log online. Just exactly who do you think you are to imply that I'm rude? I trade up, I play the game as it's meant to be played and I play nice with other people's caches. I even do maintenance on caches for people who don't have the time. I don't have to justify anything to you or anyone else. You're not the arbiter of the proper conduct of the sport.

I don't log most of my finds online unless there's something vaguely interesting about it. I only log DNFs when I think there's a chance the cache may be gone instead of me just not being able to find it. As noted above, to some this is a numbers game and I find that somewhat distasteful. My son and I enjoy caching and benchmark hunting together, and by the time we get back from a long day of cache hunting, I'm generally not in the mood to spend a bunch of time logging every cache we went to. I log the highlights and move on.

The Watershed Park one (GCRDRC)is a great one- I recently went and did maintenance on it for ohjoy!, who was leaving town about the time the cache was noted as needing some TLC. Someone even found the bath salts I left as updated swag.

This isn't something that'll be resolved here, and only opens the door to a flamefest and eventual thread lock. People have different opinions about things and that's pretty much the end of it. I don't support the BSA myself, but I don't really begrudge anyone who wants to have their kids in it. Heck, I was a Cub Scout and made it to Webelos before I got disillusioned with the whole thing.

Thanks for all the positive vibes, my benchmarking peeps. I'm doing a bit better; I can walk now, which is a huge improvement. The drugs they've got me on are quite entertaining. Hopefully I don't have to stay on them long, I've got an appointment Thursday with my GP. Got to get out there and get some more marks soon!

Well, last night my hobby sent me to the ER- back spasms and severe lumbar strain. It was so bad I couldn't even walk and collapsed a few times. No replacements or anything, but I've never had pain so severe they had to give me IV painkillers. THAT was a remarkable experience, I can tell you.

Some people prefer not to log finds online. Since you don't generally have any way of knowing why a given log entry isn't online but is in the cache log, you should respect that. I don't log all of my finds online, and I'd be pretty hacked if someone did that. The online log is a tool. The cache log is the canonical source. Whether someone chooses to log online or not is their decision, not yours.

Nah, I'm not in the contest- I hunt benchmarks for fun, and a competetion just takes the fun out of it for me. I'm sure it'll be a great time for everyone who takes part, but such things just aren't my cup of tea. Thanks for the good wishes.

I went seeking SY1875, JIM CROW POINT, with my son yesterday. About a mile into the pack up the hill, my back started giving me trouble. But we were a mile from the car and had to hike back, then I had to drive 120 miles home. By the time I got to the ER, I couldn't walk because of the pain and spasms. They gave me some IV drugs and I'm able to sit up and use the computer. I have to see my regular doc in a few days. I'm going to go back there and get that sucker, though. It's a heck of a challenge; the point's a LOT higher and more rugged than the description would lead you to believe.

I live in Washington. Caching, like motorcyle riding, is subject to the weather. As I tell people, if you don't go caching in the rain, you're not going caching.

Two words: Pocket queries. See the geocaching.com FAQ page for info on how those work. You get a ZIP file with your query results in GPX format, and you can simply slurp that into GSAK and send it to your GPS.

I'm planning to use this as the first leg of a multi/puzzle cache sometime this summer:

Imaginary numbers are for the weak! The true Klingon cacher uses complex numbers! /I have no idea what I'm on about.

Thought I'd responded here already, but apparently not. Here's my caching ride, unless it's to someplace I can't ride on this:

Any cache placed on private property without the owner's permission would not be listed or would be immediately archived if it was discovered after publication. Not many cachers that I know of ask private individual property owners for permission to place caches. It's best to avoid that. You'll find a few, but the vast majority are on public land of one form or another. Some are managed lands that are accessible to the public, but not owned by indivdiuals. If anyone tells you about a bad experience with a private property owner, if the story doesn't start with "I asked permission to place a cache..." or "I found out a cache I placed was on private property after I placed it..." you can be sure the cacher is in the wrong.