AZcachemeister

In some areas, the Google products are very accurate. In some areas, they are very inaccurate. Nobody knows what the accuracy really is at any particular location. (Well, maybe somebody knows, but they're not telling! ) In an urban environment with tall buildings blocking satellite signals and reflective surfaces bouncing them around, GPS accuracy can (and usually does) suffer. The difference is that a good quality GPS receiver will tell you when it thinks it has poor accuracy. It would be nice if you could right-click on a spot on Google Earth and get some sort of estimate of the accuracy, and maybe someday this will be possible. For now it is NOT safe to assume the co-ordinates provided on Google Earth are 100% correct.

Yes, it would be nice to log the cartridge, but isn't required before logging the cache.

The OP was looking for a way to write the log while the memory was fresh, yet have the log post a few days later for whatever possible security value that might provide.

I hope it works for you. I've never actually tried to use a Bluetooth GPS with my phone, but that one works great with a laptop.

YOU WILL COMPLY! RESISTANCE IS FUTILE! YOU WILL BE ASSIMILATED.

While it doesn't automate the process for you, I have a solution that might be helpful. Post your complete log in the 'Personal cache notes' section on the caches you find, and put the caches in a bookmark list with the found day's date as the title...actually, you could put your log in the 'comments' section of the bookmark for each cache just as well and skip the 'personal note' part altogether. Now that it is 04/08/2013, and you wanted to delay your logs for (let's say) one week, it is time to post the logs you wrote on 28/07/2013 by copy/paste from the comment on the bookmark (or the 'Personal note') into an actual log. Depending on how many caches you found, this may make it difficult to log the caches in the correct sequence (if that is important to you), but out-of-sequence logs might be a good thing in this case. Field notes are a good option too, but (as far as I can tell) they would require writing the log using a handheld device...which becomes not-very-fun really fast. Yet another possibility would be using GSAK in a way that parallels the bookmark idea above.

I guess the only option is to write and use your own 'blah, blah blah, etc, etc, etc' reviewer note. I suppose the reviewer has got permission to use this, but only if no specific group (like the n00bs who really need to see it) are singled out.

I do like the idea of the clickable grid squares bringing up a list of the caches with those ratings.

A .gpx file is simply a specialized text file, you can open it with Notepad, Wordpad or a myriad of other text processing programs. You won't get very far with it though, since it isn't meant to be used that way. Still, it can be interesting to take a peek and see what is in there.

Yep. Welcome to the real world. Have you ever seen a sign at your local park's parking lot that says something like: "WARNING: Thieves frequent the area. Please lock any valuables in your trunk." This warning appears even though stealing is illegal. And I guess it's okay for thieves at your local park to steal valuables that are locked in the backseat of a vehicle? Hmm, forcibly breaking into someone's vehicle vs. describing a bit of detail about a cache find in the log? Those two acts seem light-years apart to me. I guess we should all log 'TFTC' to avoid any accidental slip-ups in our exuberance to post a nice entertaining log for the CO to read? I reiterate, the CO has the power to delete anything they think is too much of a spoiler from their cache pages, and in fact they have been given the responsibility to do so. So the 'Don't post spoilers' bit in the TOU does not apply there...or at least it is unenforceable unless TPTB are going to hire a bunch of people to read every log that gets posted to every cache. If they do, though, those people can also delete all the duplicate finds, and the 'couldn't sign the log but claiming a smilie anyway' logs.

Personally, I like the DeLorme Bluetooth 'BT-20', but it looks like they aren't selling Bluetooth models anymore. I just checked, and you can get one off EBay for $20. But there seems to be only one right now. I especially like it because it is both Bluetooth and USB...options are good!

I've seen this at least twice. Both were hiking events, so there may be a correlation. In the first case, the 'event' was 'Meet at the parking lot for a few minutes of idle chatter before hiking the Ballantine trail. No need to actually go on the hike.' Somebody arrived late...long after the other hikers had headed up the trail. He logged 'Attended' (even though there were no other geocachers in the parking area), and headed off up the road to another part of the state. In the second case, the event was 'Meet at the top of Camelback Mountain at (some certain time).'...I think it was 0900 or 1000 Hrs. Someone decided to go up earlier, not wait for anyone else to arrive, yet still log 'Attended'. Pathetic. Good candidates for the 'Didn't find it = Found it' thread, though.

Plenty of stumbles, scuffs, scrapes, encounters with cacti, torn pants and/or shirts, poked by low-hanging branches, flesh ripped by cat-claw bushes, heat exhaustion, nothing too exciting. But there was the time I was dashing back across the road after finding a benchmark. It wasn't a well-traveled road, but a pick-up truck was coming. I didn't properly 'look both ways', but I heard it coming as I stepped into the traffic lane. My momentum was carrying me forward. The driver swerved a bit. I somehow contorted my body so that the corner of his rear bumper only grazed the brim of my Boonie hat instead of slamming into the back of my skull. I executed a nice PLF (Parachute Landing Fall), and ended up on my feet with nary a scratch. My camera fell out of it's belt-pouch and took a few scrapes, though...but it still works today.

I'm certain the cache owners would appreciate knowing their caches need maintenance. If I were them, I'd rather you posted a note describing the issue(s) rather than a 'Needs Maintenance' log (assuming it's a minor issue and not 'the container has been run over by a lawn mower').

Is there any way to provide a link to this "long-running thread"? I'd like to read this better solution. Here ya go. Way down on page four in this forum...I wonder why?

1. Covered in the guidelines you claim to have read before placing your cache. Redundant. 2. If the cache isn't in the cemetery, it must be on private property. So, I only need permission of the owner of the property where the cache is located. Only applies to Rhode Island anyway, not a national issue. 2b. Hiding/hunting a cache in a cemetery on a reservation in Arizona will likely get your vehicle and all real property confiscated, as well as a hefty trespassing citation with jail time. 3. OK, that is helpful and non-intuitive. 4. Once again, covered in the guidelines you claim to have read. Redundant.

And now, a moment of silence, please.

Yet hundreds of caches are published every day despite those "overly restrictive" guidelines Skirtlifters, guardrails and powertrails, OH MY! Our whole society is being dumbed-down by this Politically Correct baloney that nobody should feel bad because they couldn't do what needed to be done to get the award. What ever happened to the concept that if you couldn't do it, you did more training, honed your skills and gave it more effort? It's happening in our schools nationwide, and now in Geocaching too (not really surprising I suppose).

That was my favorite guideline! It went away when Groundspeak realized that power trails = $$$ Actually, I think it went away when the reviewers asked for a more concrete reason why a cache couldn't be placed 600 feet from another one. Probably there are plenty of WOW! caches that are only 600 feet apart, and also some cases where the lame guardrail cache preceded what could be a WOW! cache only 600 feet away. In either of these cases the reviewer is left evaluating the WOW! factor to decide if a cache can be squoze in at that location. So now, 528' is the rule, and the rule is 528'. Perhaps more, but not less. Five hundred and twenty-eight feet shall be the number of the counting, and thou shalt not stop until 528' (being the number that thou shalt count) be reached. AMEN.

Unless one of the logs is from someone who found it before or perhaps the owner (who should have disabled the cache but didn't), don't let DNF logs stop you from looking if you have the time. There are few better feelings than what you get when you find a cache that the last several cachers overlooked.

I don't know enough anything about the file structure on your GPS, so I can't comment there. I can say that keeping your already found caches on the unit will eventually cause problems...like taking up too much memory space and clogging up the maps so that you can't see the caches you have yet to find.

You can't. But, there are many free apps that will show your current co-ordinates. That being said, please use a dedicated GPSr to collect co-ordinates for your cache.

Well, then it should say: and there should be a link to the TOU. On one hand they are warning us that we might see spoilers, and on the other hand 'we agree' not to post them? Failure to use the provided tools to keep spoilers out of your cache's logs is like complaining about the weeds in your garden that you never tend.

Because Groundspeak is warning you that some people ignore (or are unaware of) their Terms of Use Agreement: Grammatically, it would be better if they changed their warning from "Spoilers may be included..." to "Spoilers might be included..." An interesting paradox, eh? Since the owner has control of what is in the logs on their page, it would seem that anything stated in the logs not deleted by the owner should be OK, wouldn't you think?

There is another (HUGE) thread about this, with some comprehensive details about how it could be implemented. A Groundspeak official has stated it IS a good idea and that Groundspeak was 'working on it' (or some equally optimistic phrase). Still, two years later and nothing has been done aside from several rounds of cosmetic changes to the website appearance. Groundspeak apparently actually believe it is the TB owner, and the Cache Owner who are responsible for maintaining the accuracy of TB whereabouts...or more accurately not-there-abouts, and they are not really going to do anything to solve or even help with the issue.