maw, paw + the piglets

We tried to pre-empt the possibility of folk keeping our trackables by drilling each one with a hole close to the rim and putting in a clear plastic keyring complete with its objective and THIS IS NOT A SWAP inside. The metal bit of the keyring was then soldered closed so it couldn't be used as a keyring. It didn't work as loads of ours have disappeared. Having said that, one has reappeared 2 YEARS after it was picked up. We have a small cloth bag which Maw made out of hi-vis fabric and trackables we pick up are put therein to ensure they are never lost in the caching bag. We have one coin which went out to celebrate the life of a friend who died aged just 18. It had details of why it was sent out and its mission. It has gone too despite even contacting, in their own language, the person who last had it. It really gets upsetting at times.

Well done and what a happy looking young lad. Hope this is the start of a long and happy involvement in geocaching.

IKEA!! Good for acquisition of pencils and you don't even have to assemble them! Plus as PP have stated, they don't freeze, leak or refuse to write on wet paper and can be sharpened on stones.

It is very annoying when these things happen, but don't give up hope. We had one trackable go missing and re-appear 18 months later. We have, however, had several disappear and never come back despite polite reminders to the cachers concerned ( do wish the one sent out in memory of a young lad would reappear, but cacher hasn't responded despite contacting them in their own language). Good luck and don't be discouraged!

We drill a hole in the geocoin to deter collectors. We then put a keyring through the hole and, within the plastic keyfob, put the coins purpose. The keyring is then soldered closed so that no-one would keep the coin as a keyring. However this does not stop them disappearing from muggled caches, nor does it prevent cachers from taking them on travels which are totally unrelated to the coins requested journey. Hey ho, at least they are travelling!

We always put in a piglet keyring which has been made by Piglet 2. They are the same design (more or less) as our signature piccie. Never thought to put our name on the back though. Will get her to do that on the next batch....6 blocks of Fimo just been delivered!

Before we go on holiday we change our swaps bag contents so that we will have 'useful' holiday things ( 3 in 1 tin openers/bottle opener/spoon, ponchos, torches, reflective belts etc) plus we take mini packs of cards, puzzles and things to keep kids ( and adults) amused on rainy days. All of them are obtained from Asda/ Pound shops or from outdoor shops that have 3 for 2 type deals. Actually found Maplins and Halfords to be quite good. Piglet 1 is no longer interested in contents for swapping, but piglet 2 still likes to find something decent. We try to restock if a cache is running low just so the next cacher gets the benefit.

http://www.arranbanner.co.uk/news/fullstor...ourse!.html Blackwaterfoot is a small village on Arran, reached by twisty roads. A normal sized Lidl store would probably make up about a third of the village.

Friend who goes on a lot of field trips in the US and UK etc recommends long sleeved shirts and also long trousers tucked into boots. Clothing should be light coloured to make ticks more visible and another good idea ( she uses it) is to wrap duct tape, sticky side out, to tape top of socks to trouser legs , almost gaiter like. She says it can be useful to put a loop or 2 of it at wrist of shirt too. Also says the things you find when you take the tape off can be worrying! Lidl and Aldi sell anti mozzie bands which you wear to keep biting things at bay. You wear one on the wrist and one on the ankle ( diagonal opposites) and it appears to work for ticks too. on a camping trip in the Highlands Piglet1 wore one on each limb (overkill) and never had any bites from mozzies or ticks whilst her companions were howking the things off and swatting like mad.

"Drifting off topic somewhat Hotpod stoves are made from scrap gas cylinders " Now you see, you got Maw's attention with this but then she saw the price at the end. SCARY but it is SO desirable.

We always put in a piglet keyring ( made by piglet2) and usually some toys or puzzles to satisfy any junior cacher. We also put in a useful item for any adult wishing a swap, maybe a torch, a mini radio, glasses repair kit, screwdriver or a bottle opener. We also have whistles which we bought thinking about the safety aspect of caching but then realised the distress we might have caused by having a whistle blowing child in the car for a day! SORRY!!!! On Arran we tend to put in packs of cards or games which can be used should you be stuck in on a rainy day whilst on holiday. We always put in some stuff from the Parkinsons Disease Society too but most swag is bought from the party bag aisle or from the likes of Halfords and Maplins ( both do stuff for £1 at the tills).

I love this forum! It's amazing the info you can gather. All this AND geocaching Next time a pub quiz pops out a question involving silica gel, I'm in there

We bought two but will only release one of them. We'll try to remember to notify you when and where we release it so you can follow its meanderings.

We have always carried bin bags with us in our backpack so that we can CITO. The piglets have always been told to take their rubbish home and I am proud to say, have learned well. However I feel that maybe I have been a bit too heavy on the emphasis as I am now known as 'the bag lady' ( accompanied by much rolling of eyes) when I insist on clearing up other folks' rubbish. Perhaps someone can explain to me why some folk , having carried their heavy picnic up to the top of a mountain, then feel obliged to jettison the empty juice cans/beer cans etc when they are now lighter than before? I suppose they might drip on the inside of the plastic bag which transported them up there, but please folks if you can carry it up there, you can carry it back.

The ones I can't understand are the dog walkers who very carefully pick up after their pooch and then they stick the wee plastic bag of cr*p into a hedge or a gap in a wall. Whilst I don't like stepping in the stuff surely it would disintegrate quicker being rained on etc rather than linger for dear knows how long in a plastic bag in a hedge ( not only an eyesore, but also a health hazard). Worst of the lot was at our last cache 'Above Kenmore' there was a wee plastic bag of poop placed inside the cairn!

We carry a bag full of asssorted goodies to cover every eventuality. We have keyrings, torches, screwdriver sets, phone danglies, toys, playing cards, mini soccer balls and charity items. Be prepared that some of the caches you visit may not have anything decent in them for the kids, even though it is a kid friendly cache. When that happens we just let the kids choose something from our stash instead. If we are in a holiday area we tend to leave games, playing cards and colouring pencils so that when the weather turns foul the finder at least has some entertainment for the kids when indoors.

I love seeing all these wonderful pictures. How do I go about adding some of my own? Simple steps please, as I'm not the most computer literate.

GCJAFA South African Representative Cache ( Scotland) on Arran regularly has a few of the blighters around...see the entry for 13th July 2007. Lots of bracken around so long pokey stick and lots of noise needed. I have always wanted to do this cache but Paw seems a bit reluctant, I wonder why? Last year on our annual hloiday on Arran, I spotted a fairly large adder sunning itself on a rock. I pointed it out to Paw whose immediate response was "Don't pick it up!" What???? Do I look like some snake wrangler? Having said that, the year before some guy had to be air-lifted off the island due to going into anaphylactic shock after having been bitten about 5 times by adders. The idiot saw mummy adder and baby adders and decided to try and have a photo opportunity. They didn't like being picked up and let him know good style. What with ticks and adders, I am a firm believer in long trousers tucked into socks for geocaching in very rural areas.

Well, having disappeared in October 2006, our travel bug Bear Behind has reappeared. It would appear that a cache owner was doing a bit of maintenance (not sure as the log is in German and I'm very rusty in that language), found our lost TB (it wasn't logged as being there; we'd put it down as missing in action), grabbed it and is trying to make sure it follows its quest of visiting islands by taking it to Tenerife soon! Brilliant! The TB did have a laminated note of its quest attached to it by chain but in future I intend to do as I do with our geocoins and drill it, attach a keyring, solder the ring closed so that it is useless as a keyring, and then put the quest into the plastic tag of the keyring then superglue it closed. Might not stop them being filtched, but it won't be for lack of trying. Thank you stachelzauberer for finding our TB

Well, having disappeared in October 2006, our travel bug Bear Behind has reappeared. It would appear that the cache owner was doing a bit of maintenance (not sure as the log is in German and I'm very rusty in that language), grabbed the TB (it wasn't logged as being there; we'd put it down as missing in action) and is trying to make sure it follows its quest of visiting islands by taking it to Tenerife soon! Brilliant! The TB did have a laminated note of its quest attached to it by chain but in future I intend to do as I do with our geocoins and drill it, attach a keyring, solder the ring closed so that it is useless as a keyring, and then put the quest into the plastic tag of the keyring then superglue it closed. Might not stop them being filtched, but it won't be for lack of trying. Thank you stachelzauberer for finding our TB

The Library in Brodick is your best bet and at this time of the year I shouldn't think it will be too busy so you shouldn't have to book or wait ( famous last words!). Failing that, some of the hotels ( Kinloch, Blackwaterfoot hotel(lodge?) ) do have internet access but possibly only for residents although I'm sure if you reside in the bar long enough they'll let you log on. Auchrannie certainly has wi-fi access at the leisure complex and you can relax in the sanarium and steam room after logging those hard earned caches. Have a great time...we're jealous.

We have had a travel bug ( Bear Behind) go missing which had all the tags etc attached in such a way as to require disfigurement of the bear if removed. A geocoin went missing in England but then turned up in the USA where it has been travelling freely. It has a clear keyring attached and 'THIS IS NOT A SWAP ITEM' therein. The keyring has been soldered closed so it cannot be removed unless by sawing off. All our Geocoins have since been drilled with soldered keyring attached and a mission statement herein along with the 'THIS IS NOT A SWAP ITEM'. It hasn't stopped our daughter's Timberwolf coin going walkabout in only its 2nd cache,which is a real shame as we wanted to map its travels on Google for her. We were thinking about releasing a coin on behalf of the local Unit for autistic children. The intention was to introduce them to geocaching as a 'day out' walk with a purpose and then let them monitor the progress of the coin as a geography interest. However, given that coins go missing, even with mission statements attached, we may have to think again about it as they would be most distressed if we had to report it had been stolen. Or do you think people would think twice about nicking it if we stated it was for a special school's project? Any ideas?

Read this on another forum which was discussing the sanity of some folk who use Sat Nav. "Our neighbour went to the crematorium to attend the funeral of a friend, Joyce being ever careful decided to take her sat nav out of the car in case it got pinched and just as they took their seats all that could be heard from Joyce's handbag was "You have arrived at your final destination" True but a tad embarrassing. "

Maw and Paw are , hopefully, self explanatory and the Piglets are our two daughters. One of them protests , albeit feebly, about going out geocaching ( but enjoys every minute once she's out there) and the other is dead keen. Sibling rivalry re finding caches , Maw does the loading of co-ordinates and operating of GPS whilst Paw does the logging and the maintenance of our home record of finds. A great family activity.

We have 2 geocoins and a TB out at present. One geocoin went off to the continent and travelled around between Germany and the Netherlands. It was picked up in Feb and noted it would be quickly moved on. Come mid-April I sent a wee e-mail asking politely if the holder still had it as I was checking it hadn't gone AWOL. Lo, it appeared in a cache very soon afterwards. I sent a thank you e-mail , I was so pleased! Coin 2 went down to England. it was picked up in Nov '06 and despite an e-mail asking if they still had it, it didn't move. In April I again e-mailed the holder ( I saw he'd been on the geocaching site in March) and still had no reply so I was prepared to write it off as a loss. Well, next thing I know it appears in a CITO event in Montana! I think someone picked it up in a cache where it wasn't noted as being present and then shifted it to Montana. Unfortunately our TB seems to have disappeared in Germany. It was maybe a bit cute and someone has taken a liking to it, but given it had a whacking great sign attached and a TB dogtag, you have to wonder at folk allowing their wean to appropriate it! The owner of the cache tried to find out where it had gone and notified us of its absence ( which was above and beyond, we thought, given we didn't know it was AWOL) but all attempts have failed. Never mind, we'll just have to hope that someone rediscovers it and moves it on. It is particularly galling when it's a coin your kids have sent out, as I know our tribe enjoy following the travels on a map and it is a grand way of encouraging an interest in geography. We enjoy finding coins in caches and move them on within weeks. if we can't move them on then we admire them and leave them for someone else. If anything untoward occurs we contact the holder and let them know of any delay in moving the coin. We buy coins because Maw likes sparkly things but we tend to buy in 2s so that we can keep one and release the other ( having said that we haven't released any this year). Now we are in a quandry as we like seeing undrilled coins but think that drilling and attaching a keyring with a "This is not a swap" makes it more likely that the coin will keep moving. What do others think; drilled or intact?