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There are no hard rules regarding trading. You can even take something without leaving something. You won't get "disqualified," although you'll be a jerk. The rule of thumb (a suggestion, not a rule of the game!) is to "trade up", if you feel like trading at all. Take something, but leave something a little nicer. How you want to divvy up the taking/leaving among your party is completely up to your discretion. I personally hate the "trading stuff" part of geocaching.

JaeCee, those are some great suggestions and critiques. I second all of them, and have appended some notes/ideas/thoughts on the following items: Try creating a free email account with a site that offers POP3, then have your PQs emailed to that email address. Try it a few times together with GeoJournal to see how it works for you. I'm finding that I'm just deleting my PQs from my main email account because I'm using GJ's GUI to import them from my "Geocaching" email account. The Preferences options determine the general behavior of those things. But sometimes you just need to look at a map real quick, or make all pictures bold just for a minute. That's why the options also appear on the sidebar, for easy access. They toggle against the behavior that you've set in Preferences. But you're right - maybe just some easy to remember keyboard shortcuts can do the trick. Now that you mention it, I completely agree. Do you have caches on both sides of the Atlantic? That may cause this. But I too have experienced some issues exporting to Google Earth (Which can be done at any time, incidentally, via the File>Export Selected To menu). Intriguing - please expand! I don't know that I quite understand what you mean, but it kind of sounds cool.

This is copied and pasted from the GeoJournal documentation regarding the creating itineraries:

I just want to add my little endorsement for GeoJournal. I LOVE this app, not only because its a geocache file utility, but because its the complete geocaching package - recording memories, planning outings, everything. Plus, Rich is very responsive.

I personally dislike the geocaching mode on my eXplorist 500. Sure, it holds the difficulty/terrain, but it only holds like 30 characters of the hint and you cannot edit the coordinates on your unit. I use the POI system instead, and take my Palm Treo 650 along for notes.

Sometimes, unactivated TBs are left by generous geocachers.

I've created a website specifically for MUGs (Mac-using geocachers). Take a look (even if you don't have an eXplorist as I do). http://chimbisimo.googlepages.com Don't worry about being left out due to owning a Mac - you won't be left out at all.

This is how I do it on my Mac: http://chimbisimo.googlepages.com

Take a look at this, and it's free. Let us know if you can geocache with it. http://www.navizon.com/

I created a website just for MUGs (Mac-using geocachers), especially those using eXplorists. I have some tutorials on how to make things work well. http://chimbisimo.googlepages.com

Wait til Leopard, which comes out in October. It will be $129. Hopefully the Garmin software will work with 10.5.

On my Treo 650 I can have mp3's, videos, cache info (via Cachemate), street maps (via Google Maps), and a GPS (via a plug-in GPS unit; I don't use one, but they're available). This is your best (and perhaps only) bet.

Remember that your PQs are emailed to you. Those should come in the GPX format. To turn LOC files into GPX files, use GPSBabel.

Schweet. I'll try that next time (hah!).

I use my Magellan eXplorist fine with my PowerMac G5. I've created a website about Mac-using geocaching (http://chimbisimo.googlepages.com). So far, the only time I've needed to use a PC was to update the firmware.

That sounds funny especially when you know that "chimbisimo" means "really lame." If you see the mounted volume icon on your desktop, then your iMac can see it. Try marking a new POI on your XL, then mounting your GPS to your iMac, then searching the GPS via spotlight for that POI name. Upper right-hand corner of the finder window is where you can find the search field. Once you locate the POI you've created, then you'll know where to have GPSBabel save your .upt file to. (the .upt that you've created out of your .loc file with GPSBabel)

I haven't had the need to load maps onto my unit yet, but for strictly geocaching and hiking in familiar territory, my eXplorist plays fine with my Mac. I created a web page for Mac-using geocachers: http://chimbisimo.googlepages.com . I did have to resort to a PC when updating my firmware, but that's because I'm on a PowerMac G5 without Boot Camp/Parallels and Windows.

Permethrin is where it's at. If you add a tiny bit to your laundry, it will maintain its potency for weeks.

Great tip, thanks.

It's all in the forums already. http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?showtopic=165491

delete

Try GPSBabel instead.

If your unit is on while plugged in to your computer it will recharge slower than it would if it was plugged into your computer and was turned off.

You lucky dog...

I understand that I can keep multiple .gs and .upt files on my unit; this is why my question asked about file type characteristics. I also understand that while I can have 999 caches in a particular file, only the specified number of caches will be displayed, which is why I asked how many will be displayed on the map (as opposed to how many caches will a file hold). What you have made clear is that the comments seems to be the limiting factor; if a .upt file holds waypoints with comments, the limit is lowered to 200. My experimenting confirms this. Thanks!