Mickey100

Your confession has been accepted, my son; you have my absolution. For your penance, you must do 10 geocaches in one day.

The pocket Garmin Map60Cx that I use for geocaching does a great job, but doesn't speak to me, so she hasn't got a name. My wonderful Garmin 255W that I use for highway navigation, when I am on a trip somewhere, and not geocaching, I call Emily. She talks to me, is very knowledgeable, and polite, and never yells or nags. I even talk to her at times. If only she would start the conversations with, "Hi Mickey, how are you today?", I'd be in heaven. I guess if I had a daughter, I would call her Emily, too.

I think that Maddy is probably right, in that PAT means "premiere a trouve", or FTF in English. Then, ... "grateau" must be a bad misspelling of "cadeau", or gift.

At one time, 65 years ago, French was my only language. My,... have times changed. There are very many new words in the language, ...both languages. Re this listing: In both languages, descriptions are often cryptic, and logs sometimes facetious. Computerized translations can't understand such stuff, only real people can. This cache is a very easy cache to find. Everyone who looked for it found it. "Easily found, impossible to miss." "A windy location; the wind howls across the fields. Pull down your toque over our ears in the winter." "The farmer must wonder why so many people are interested in his tree." "Co-ords are right on." "A drive-up cache." From what I can read of the logs, there are cattle in the nearby field, and an electric fence nearby, so don't touch the wire. Bring a pencil. "Un grateux pour le PAT", I believe refers to the need for sand or chains on certain winter days when the road is like a skating rink', or "une patinoire". One of the French speaking campers at the nearby camp-ground wasn't too happy with his stay there, but others had no compaints. I sometimes use Google-Translate myself, both ways, but I always have to make my own corrections afterwards, so it makes proper sense. Hope this helps. Remember, a smile is the best aid to any transation. There will always be someone around in the area who can help out. Enjoy your trip.

If this cache is 250 meters SW of Woodpath Rd. SW, then you are possibly expressing the N and S co-ords as numbers and decimal of that number, - like this maybe N 50.92583 W 114.13179 ? Degrees and decimals of degrees is not the standard that is used in this hobby. If this is what you did, you must change the way your GPS unit expresses the co-ords, so it matches the standard used in this hobby, which would be Degrees, Minutes and decimals of minutes. Minutes can never be greater than 59.999 Your unit will do this automatically if you have selected the proper way, as the default for your unit. Maybe someone in your part of the world can have a coffee with you, and show you how to do this. It should be someone with a similar GPSr if possible. Since the first cache you found is in southern Calgary, I am afraid that I won't be able to have a coffee with you, as I am in Ontario. N 50.92583 W 114.13179 becomes N 50° 55.550 W 114° 07.907 in the form that is used in geocaching. The little circles that mean degrees, are not entered when submitting your co-ords. I made the conversion on the laptop here, by looking at any cache listing, clicking on 'Other Conversions' just to the right of the listed co-ords, changing the view to Dec. Deg., entering your figures , and clicking the 'Change Waypoint' button. But that is the hard way to do it. Letting your GPSr do it automatically is the easy way. You don't have to go back to the cache location to do this, just change your settings, and the numbers change themselves. By the way, I used 'Google Earth' to see where this cache might possibly be. Have fun.

Here is some interesting reading: http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php...;camo+tape'

Only in Canada, eh. OK. Then I'd try an outdoors store, for hunters. Let us know how you make out.

After being unable to find it at CTC, I asked a male clerk. He couldn't see it either. A female clerk overheard us and walked over and pointed it out to us, - sitting right next to the gray duct-tape. Seriously. This actually happened to me at the Belleville CTC. It is camoed after all. I think it was in the paint department. It is a bit pricey, but fills-the-bill.

To change dd mm ss co-ords to dd mm.mmm Go to any geocaching cache listing, and next to the posted co-ords, click on "other conversions". Click on the 'Deg and Min' down-arrow and click on 'deg, min, sec,' wait a second, then enter the above co-ords, and click the 'Change Waypoint' button. It sounds complicated, but after you have done it once it is easy, - and handy whenever you have to convert co-ords. You then get dd mm.mmm and a Yahoo map showing you where the co-ords are. The other way is to change the co-ord format in your GPSr before entering dd mm ss and then changing it back again to dd mm.mmm I prefer the 1st method. It is easier after you have done it a couple of times.

Thanks for the info, tangerineman. I appreciate the help.

Welcome to the hobby, Nunaki. Seeing children bounce around with delight, when they find a hidden treasure in the forest is a sight I'll never forget.

You can actually go down to 0.01 m by pressing on the right arrow to move the highlight to km, clicking Enter to get the pop-up menu, then click m.

1) Pick caches that have not been muggled in the past (they would be terrible choices), as well, 2) Pick caches that do not have posted warnings on the web-page about possible mugglers. 3) Read all the logs for all the prospective caches that you have in mind. I personally would read all the logs for at least 20 caches, if I was not familiar with the area. At the bottom of each web-page, click the " View them all on one page " link, to get access to all the logs for the cache. This will allow you to pick out some safe caches. Hopefully, your own is one of them. When I am out geocaching with a travelling item in my pocket I will not drop it off unless I think that it is a safe cache. I often will do 5 caches and come home with the TB still in my pocket because I wasn't satisfied that any of the caches was safe enough. If I can easily see a window from where I am standing at a cache, then, someone can see me. It is not safe to hide a TB there. There is not rush. You don't have to send them all on there way in one day, or even one week. Don't put them all in one cache. Only put one in each cache that you decide on. Don't mention in your log entry that you have dropped off a travelling item. Instead, just add it to the "Inventory" on the right side of the web-page. I suppose that the vise-versa is probably almost as good. What I am getting at here, is that the less references to the item the better. I am sure that some people just scour the cache listings looking for easy steals, -steals from easy caches, caches that only require a few steps from where one parks their car. Travelling items are always safer in tougher caches. Although if they are too tough, e.g. not winter friendly, the item may spend the whole winter there before being moved on. Anyway, - good luck and have fun.

The other thing is, - you should always check out the latest changes for the caches that you are planning to do that day, by checking each web-page listing just before leaving home. That way you will be aware if a particular cache has been 'disabled', or if its co-ords have changed. So that is really the best time to 'send' the co-ords to your GPSr, and either print-out or download the info into a hand held computer (paperless).

1) You probably should set your Magellan to display co-ordinates as degrees, minutes and decimals, -at least while you are geocaching. 2) Also, make sure that the Magellan's datum is set to WGS84. It probably is that by default already. 3) Always be very careful, and double check any manually entered co-ords. We have all learned the hard way after being directed far off into private property, our mistake. They are especially easy to get wrong when in the field, entering re-directs. 4) To change any co-ords format to any other: click on any convenient cache listing, then click just to the right of the listed co-ords: Other Conversions. Then, besides being able to view the listed co-ords in all the other formats, you can use this page to convert any other co-ords that you are interested in (e.g., co-ords that have nothing to do with geocaching). Click just under the bold co-ords at the top, to change the format to whatever you want, enter any co-ords you want, and click the Change Waypoint button just below. 4) If you ever click the MyTopo Maps link that is on all cache-listing pages, the default there is deg. and decimals. Click, and click again if necessary, the word 'format' at the bottom of this topo map. The pointer must be moved back to the map to view locations in either of 2 other formats. 5) Ibycus, by the way, has an excellent topo map. I don't know if it is downloadable for Magellans. I haven't tried it yet for my 'Garmin map 60Cx', because I really don't know enough about computers. Hope this helps.

8 compasses spinning 7 stealthy cachers 6 muggles laying 5 Ammo cans 4 Shiny coins 3 log books 2 Garmin Oregons And a film canister in a tree?

I find that any duct tape colour still reflects the sunlight when the angle is right, even the camo duct-tape that I use, from CTC. I have seen fabric camo-cloth lately on some containers. It seems to be a peel and stick fabric. It doesn't seem to reflect the sun. I don't know where to get it though. I have seen containers that had the spray camo-coloured paints. After a while, like a year, it starts to get ratty, and peels off of plastic containers. Until it starts to peel, I really like it. It has just occurred to me that a container should have its surface scratched with fine sandpaper to improve adhesion, before painting.

-An old chunk of carpet soaked in slaughterhouse blood next to a popular hiking trail, to attract bears, so as to discourage hikers from the area. What a stink. -A homeless person's backpack, with all their worldly possessions, which I left. -Old boards from childrens' forts, with the 3-inch nails pointing up, which I always move away and flip over, so they won't pose a vicious hazard when there is 4 inches of snow on the ground. Who would have thought that safety boots are required for this hobby. If you haven't seen any yet, you are quite new to the hobby. I had to move my letterbox to a completely different part of town, after the place became a boys' fort area. -The writings and thoughts of a despondent person who was wondering if life was still worth living, - found on the nearby seat of a gazebo. (This was a tough re-direct to find; I was there more than once.) Then one day, the young pregnant woman herself was there. I think it was the same person, and I chatted with her. I spoke as kindly to her as I could, gave her my best advice, and said a prayer for her when I left, but no - I don't know the outcome, I was caching in another town. Tragic. She was young enough to be my granddaughter.

One tadpole helping another, sorta like the blind helping the blind, eh. You entered the co-ords for Billy Goat's Gruff Chapter 5, as well as Bowring 811 Cache, which is 6 km away, - and then you went to Bowring 811 Cache. When at the site you probably moved the pointer on the map page to the other cache. The co-ords at the pointer showed up at the top of your page. The satellite page will tell you exactly where you are standing, within a few metres anyway. GPSrs are complicated. The more you play around with it the better you will be able to sort out all the things that it can do.

I was helped immensely by the replies to this topic. Having bought a new printer, I thought that it was faulty, or that I was doing something wrong, e.g. internet settings, etc., but I realized that others could not print the 1st cache page properly. I do like reading the logs. The problem seems to have been corrected. Also for a few days I was unable to download the co-ords into my Garmin Map 60Cx. That is working now as well. Thanks to all who wrote in.

Go to any Canadian Tire Store. It is in the paint department next to the gray duct-tape. It is actually hard to spot. It is camoed, eh.

I'm not being facetious here, - I have never seen an ariel photo of my neighbourhood before.

Wow! thanks for the info. I can see the snow in the valley of my roof and my van in the laneway.