Search the Community

This ^. This talk about containers is fine but it comes down to monitoring and maintaining what we've put out in the wild.

And not that it makes the slightest difference but just for the sake of flirting with the facts, I have found the cache in question and it's not the only one with this sort of CO abuse. I fail to see how this particular comment by the CO is abusive, overly rude, or threatening to anyone or anything but the comments that might lead to archival. Abuse is a big stretch, at least to me. Rudeness? Perhaps, but nothing overly offensive and nothing that really pushes it over the bounds of civility. Threats? To archive the series, yes, but so what? It's not directed at you but at the cache series and the continued wet log comments that might lead up to possible archival. So what if this cacher opts to archive all the caches if the comments continue? Let them. If I find a wet or damp log, you can bet I'm going to make a comment about it in my log. If it's bad enough, I'll even file a NM log. That was the experience I had with that particular cache, so I'm going to relate it, regardless of what the CO might do. Embarrassing? Perhaps. Personally, I rarely talk about the caches that aren't very good with those who don't cache. I make sure to point out the neat ones to highlight the reasons why I still cache - Barney Smith's Toilet Seat Museum, the EC and virtual at the Cologne cathedral, a multi in rural Indiana, a 5 mile roundtrip hike for a single cache in an area that was devastated by a tornado but is thriving again, the Lego giraffe in Berlin, a multi along the limestone cliffs of the Ohio river, a letterbox hybrid that takes you on an underground trip through downtown Chicago, the rather routine cache that gave me a story I'll remember the rest of my life, the puzzle that looks unsolvable but you get that "AHA" moment and realize you can solve it. Why would I mention the caches that are boring or mundane, or downright disgusting because they're a wet, pulpy mess? That does NOT mean that those types of caches aren't out there; I just choose to mention that yes, not all things are pristine and there are some caches that many will find unappealing. You have to be willing to suffer some of the not so good caches in the hope that one of those you didn't have high hopes for turns out to be a nice experience, for whatever reason that might be. You and Lone.R seem to focus mostly on all things negative about caching and only occasionally comment or post about those that are positive with regard to this activity. I don't know either of you, don't know your situations, and don't know what your home area is like with regard to caching in general. It just seems like there's nothing positive going on in your caching community and it's all bad and causing both of you to be so negative about things that it makes me wonder why both of you are still active cachers (or at least still active on this forum). I realize that the forums are a place to discuss all aspects of geocaching and that not everything is in great shape with this activity that we have chosen to participate in. I just choose to make my life less stressful and focus more on the good things than the bad things we encounter while geocaching. If I ever get to the point where I'm the curmudgeonly old man complaining about everything bad, then it will be time for me to find a new activity to participate in. I don't completely disagree with the premise of your post. It's just a little rude (but I would take no offense if it was in response to my log) and the threat is to archive the caches. Perhaps this CO should archive the series if they're that bothered by the comments about the experience a cacher had with one of their caches. As a CO, you have to take the good with the bad, when it comes to cachers relating the experience they had with one of your caches.

Throw in a link, done. I wouldn't use this site if it was all about videos. I can read way faster than you can talk, and I find videos excruciatingly slow. But that's just one opinion.

That sounds good just seeing the DNF and the NM would be a big help. I also take care of Geoart I planned it and my local club set out the caches at the set locations. That's an additional 69 caches I watch. The club is about gone but we do the twice a year CITO for the area. I have to try to rad on the GSAK I have had people talk about the program before. Thank you for the suggestion.

I felt like I needed to follow up on this comment because I don't want anyone to get the impression that GS is some sort of greedy corporate entity. Paid memberships are important in keeping geocaching viable. Without them it wouldn't be the game we've come to know and love. I get the impression that, although necessary, the money side of the business is the least important aspect of geocaching to GS. They've always offered a free membership and over the years that hasn't changed. GS has always been an active participant in the growth and direction of the game but it seems more so lately. Why? Could geocaching have reached a point of size and scope that requires something more than community reporting to manage it? Maybe it has something to do with the declining numbers we've seen in the recent past. Has the perception of the game taken a downward turn? I have no idea but I do know that owner maintenance has become a focus point and in my opinion that's a good thing. What we fail to understand is that if Joe Scmo fails to maintain their cache it's not they who get the black eye. It's GS and geocaching that take the hit. I laugh when I hear people talk about Groundspeak as only a listing site, as if they are a silent partner who has no skin in the game. Yet it's Groundspeak who's vilified when things start to go sideways. The onus is put on them to fix the problem in a way that will satisfy everyone. That's a tough spot to be in especially when your only suppose to be a listing site.

a few of you got the point . lovely :-) I could use many other systems, my phone, a little paper notebook in my pocket.. The thing is, the geocaching web page DID actually work, perfectly, until "they" removed the option for CO to write NM logs on own caches. When a cache got the NM flag, it is SUPER easy and fast for a CO to figure out where to go on his next planned fix and check route, this way we polute the air less, and we waste less time on the road, so it is even safer.. I you only got 5 caches, and they are only found 5 times pr year, then you do not have the "problem" as many of us got, as explained here. Please can someone with a bit influence talk some sense into the Groundspeak software department ?? Thanks in advance.

The people I'd be inclined to talk to are the local reviewers. I suspect they'd give you a better understanding of what's going on and why. I don't think there's anything you'll be able to do about this new reviewer's actions since it sounds like it just one more aspect of a general change in attitude of GS towards cache maintenance, but I think you're local reviewers will be able to help you adjust to the changes if you can. I won't defend this reviewer's actions, but I do want to ask you to consider why those caches were archived and whether it's really that big of a deal that they were. Even if you wish they weren't archived, can you still see a reasonable justification for the decision? If so, maybe you should just move on and plant replacement caches instead of archiving caches yourself and leaving the game. I have a hard time seeing the logic in archiving good caches to protest this reviewer archiving caches which must have been in some sense dubious. If you are willing to archive caches so easily, why didn't you archive those caches before that reviewer ever came into the picture?

As a slight sidebar to Mineral2 so he can continue to provide awesome help to others, I'll share my recollection of that era in the hope that it helps anyone. 200x-era Garmin USB trivial pursuit can be a tricky category. In the 1990's, Garmin had a line of products with overlapping prices and features that were all serial ports. In 2004 They had the new 60 and 76 models (with and without Color and Sensors) that added a USB port. In that era, map transfer and track transfer were the only thing that *typically* took over a minute to transfer so that's all that went over the USB wire. After shipping for a few quarters they added the ability to read and write the SD cards as removable storage devices over the internal memoru, albeit at USB full speed and not high speed. That was the point where Garmin USB got viable for moving GPS points and racks because you could just copy files to them as you would a thumb drive. By 2004/5, devices on the market that were using the CSR owned SiRFStar receivers which performed their home brews in a matter of ways. In Jan of 2006, Garmin released the "X" variations of the 60c/76c. The SirfStar supplier was under constant attack for alleged patent violations and Garmin, as their biggest user, was hit hard by both supply and concern if the suit continued on, so they double-sourced and went to the very similar MediaTek products. Garmin didn't like the uncertainty, but muddled on with their two flagship handhelds. By spring of 2007, the -other- entries in the handheld line (eTrex, Summit, Legend, + Nuvi) were looking pretty ragged. Serial port adapters and proprietary cables were costing a substantial percentage of the product. The typical user no longer even knows what a serial port is, let alone how to make one. So they ran back over those 1900-era models and re-cut Vista HC Legend HC, Summit HC, and eTrex HC Oh, and Nuvi but it's the odd duck here so we'll ignore it. There "HC" models retain all kinds of bizarre 1990s tech (six character upper case only names? Ugh) with their namesake models; they "just" got the better Highsensitivity Chip and integrated USB. They kept the cases and holsters and bike mounts and everything as possible as they could. Code-wise, though, these models acted more like stripped down 60's than their namesakes. You really can imagine (OK, _I_ can...) the engineering decision that this was a copy/paste exercise to put the (potentially depopulated, underrated) hardware into as close to the same case as you get - close enough to hopefully not need a new mold but just a new die flash cut (think cookie cutter) as they cooled. It would have been a very reasonable task for a small team of interns to knock down during the summer: take the schematics, source code, getber files, FCC guidance, etc, and "just" swap radios and turn off some features from the 60 to make it fit into a smaller flash EEPROM. Don't try to make Legend try lower case letters - just swap the chip and do as little to the code as possible. There are a few other glitches in that time frame, but remembering that the 60C/76C were the first of the second gen platform (to me). They didn't look/act like anything before them in Garmin-land and almost everything after them looked the same. Nuvi and Colorado hatched others named like states where bigger numbers == more awesome within the line, but they're totally different on the wire and in UX that in my mind they're the third gen. (Fitness, aviation, marine, etc. could more planes to this diagram, but let's not.) So, back to the sentence " you have the last model of the old family) supports GPX files and mass storage mode. You can just download a Pocket Query and drop it into the device's onboard storage (or a microSD card expansion) and be done with it." that's not quite true. The Legend hcx, for example, was shipped after the 60Cx, but it acts more like the 60 and original Legend than it does a Nuvi 350, 500, or Oregon 300. which shipped AFTER the 60 with noticeable improvements, like a geocaching mode that was more awesome than animating an icon lid closing on the container. To make matters worse, the new Nuvis (err, "Drive" models) will still take your GPX files, but it doesn't mount on your computer like a file drive. You have to treat it like a 15 year old flash player or camera and transfer files to it via PTP or MTP. On the up side, your GPS won't go into charging mode and "dead" when you plug into charge and you don't have to reboot to get your points visible on a map. But you don't have those models, so let's not stay with MSTO itself being an outdated standard itself at this point in time. Garmin isn't alone in this line of confusing product lines. The Meridian was clearly SD card hooked to code dealing with serial ports. Explorist x00. The successor to it, Triton was something totally new (and disastrous). Seeing those tank, Magellan, under the new leadership of Mitac - rolled out a less hacky Explorist and goes back to the former name, but the numbers confuse people because an X10 is newer than an X00. A 310 has more in common with a 210 than a 300. The newest Explorists (and they're going on 10 y/o at this point) have more in common with the turn of the century Magellans than either of the entire product lines that should have replaced them.| NOW going back to the original question. The 60CSx was a lovely unit. Search and Rescue teams, in particular, love many traits about them and aren't switching. You have to remember it's a 2007 remake of a 2004 product. It's probable that most of the geocaches between 2006 and 2010-11. It's not like site changes for, say, Giga cache are likely to impact it much as it doesn't know about geocache types; there's only found and not found. The device should work. However, as you've found, some of the software infrastructure that will cut maps and deliver geocaches in a "dumbed down" way needed by those has suffered from dry-rot. You didn't say what OS you were on, but Windows users will need https://www8.garmin.com/support/download_details.jsp?id=1245 That driver doesn'say much about Windows 10. If you're on Linux or MacOS, GPSBabel *should* be able to talk straight to the unit, but you may be the only one that's tried it in 10 years. Buzz me if that's the case. Garmin did their users no favors by not upgrading their browser plugins to relevant browser security stands...

I don't see the issue here as being "nitpicking", but rather a lack of trust. Rather than accept the word of those who have used these devices for years and have even gone to the lengths of doing additional testing to confirm, you seem to be insisting on some kind of incontrovertible proof directly from authoritative sources. If that's the only thing that will convince you, then you've come to the wrong place. You'll need to talk to Garmin, but you shouldn't be surprised if you find you get far less useful information from them than you have here.

Thank you, Mountain Woods, for making the trip from Missouri, and Thank you, Vulture1957, for making the trip from Oklahoma. Thank you, Benchmark Blasterz, for NOT taking that trip to Colorado. We enjoyed your company, and listening to your talk. Yes, the Event at J & J Pizza, ended up being a training session for Geocachers. Many of them came to learn more about Waymarking and we couldn't disappoint them. Next year, the Texas Challenge will be at Seguin, TX. It is located about 25 miles east of San Antonio on I-10. I am in charge of the Committee that will be planning that Mega Event. I will be very busy for the next year. I will be too busy all weekend to host a Waymarkers Gathering Event. If someone else would like to take charge of setting something up, I will do what I can to get it in the schedule. I still have Waymark Stickers available at $1.00 each. I'll pay the postage for delivery within the US. You can contact me at 8nuts1@gmail.com Edit to add the last line.

Thank you. He hasn't tried to talk me out of much, but if he had I'd listen. Some days are good; some days you come out of treatment and sleep 10-12 hours to recuperate.

My experience today tells me this is all fine. Most people don't bother with NM's and NA's or even mention the state of the cache in their logs and anyone who cares enough to post NM or NA has to trail out to the cache first to see what state it's in no matter how much evidence there is to support that it's a piece of unmaintained junk. Ergo all this talk of the CHS and all the effort of integrating it into the system seems, to me at least, to have been a complete waste of everyon'e time as the net result will ultimately be that nothing will improve whatsoever. If this is the party line I'm going to surrender to the party line and just log my find and move on, regardless of what's at GZ. The race to the bottom is complete.

I think this sums up my problem. COs are what makes the game happen. As much as we owe the reviewers that have to put up with COs, we owe the COs more. So if they whine, we should listen. But you talk as if you're thinking, "How dare they whine. They should be grateful we're finding their miserably little caches." The longer this goes on, the more I think that this big push for "quality caches" is a big reason why there are fewer quality caches. The better a CO is, the more likely being called "whiny" will make them lose interest.

Brutalfly, I helped a local teacher who wanted a grant for GPS units and to teach geocaching to her students. The caches would just be for those students, so there was no need to publish them on the GC site. We walked around the school, chose different cache types for different hiding spots. She did a great job planning this activity for her students. On the flip side: I was asked to talk about geocaching (specifically latitude/longitude) to my son's 3rd grade class. I informed the Principal and secretaries in advance what was planned, so they wouldn't panic if a kid reported a suspicious container. Everything went great until it was time to go outside and find the cache, only to learn that the kids who were just outside during recess found it first and were so excited to show everyone else. "Put it back, put it back, quick quick!" Haha.

I just want to reassure you guys that I talk with my principal all the time and we have nothing but the safety and security of the student we teach in mind. We briefly chatted about this and would never make things public so other can come onto the school property. What we normally do is form a committee and discuss these types of ideas to the fullest extent we eliminate anything that could put children in danger especially with all the school things going on. I do have 3 children of my own and would never do anything to put them as well as my students in harms way. If we did do something like this it would be kinda like an Easter egg hunt but just for our school and our students only. There would be no tracker for anybody to come onto the property. Just wanted to clarify all that. We do fully exhaust all good and bad things that could happen before we decide to do anything.

Umm...yeah. Neither of those discussions would happen. Are these hypothetical families also going to talk about the "Friend League", the parents humbly admitting that most of the people listed as "friends" are people they never actually met? "But Daddy, it says they're your friends! My whole existence is a lie!"

I really need someone that has a Garmin 700 to try to talk me through some steps on setting mine up for Geocaching. I have googled all the help and watched the youtube videos but I am still no where close to getting the gps to where I can use it. If anyone could and would help me I really would appreciate it. Thank you. I am replacing an Oregon 450

I have just bought a Garmin 700 and I am having all kinds of problems trying to get it set up. Can someone direct me to someone that might can talk me through setting it up. Google is really not much help to me.

It sounds to me that you didn't understand what was going on. Without seeing the exchange, I don't know what's going on, either, but if the reviewer had to ask what was wrong after you posted your NA, then you should start with discussing privately with the reviewer how your NA could have been more complete. Well, I'm betting you were using the new user interface, so your actual NA was just the modern canned NA, and the reviewer was having trouble figuring out what the problem was based on the Found or DNF log, but all the more reason to talk it over with him.

Garmin Forerunner 305 GPS Receiver With Heart Rate Monitor Sleek, stylish, lightweight design that "wraps" the GPS antenna around part of the wrist for a better view of the sky, improving reception during training  High-sensitivity GPS receiver provides faster acquisition times and improves tracking under trees and near tall buildings  Robust ANT wireless heart rate monitor with softer, more comfortable chest strap and superior battery life eliminates cross-talk with other devices to reliably measure and send heart rate data, and helps you train in your zone  Customizable screens let you view up to 12 data fields on 3 data screens for immediate feedback on the information you need most when training  Multi-sport capability lets you seamlessly transition between sports without resetting the unit, so you can use it for running, biking, and more Easy to use no calibration required Excellent condition. Comes with GPS unit, heart rate monitor, charging base, software and Garmin carrying case. $110 or best offer.

I'm planning a trip and would like todo a pocket querrie. Or what ever it is called. I can't do it. Geocahing does not respond to any of my Messages. Can anyone help me with it. I'm new to using a phone. I'm back to caching after some years. I got the premium membership yet wondering why I wasted the time .. Is there a class on this. Is there a place where I can talk to a person? Is there someone who can talk to me like a three year old without a phone.. I don't understand the lingo..of the phone.. pinch, blahhhh.. Isthere anyone near who can help me/ I'm going to quit due to no events...no where to learn no emails answered .. I'm aggravated as hell. I'mplanning a month in advance and I can't get anyone to show me the ropes.. I probalby won't even be able to find this page again. Been asking for a week and now have three weeks until schedule departure. Does anyone have the time , energy to help me.. I never knew I have to be an expert on the laptop and phone to play a game that is outdorors.. smh. I'll have to find something else.. I'm so tired of it.

And previous threads will prove you know my name isn't Bert. So let's talk about insults a bit longer...

Then if that's the case, after three pages just in this thread alone, you must just like to hear yourself talk. If you communicate clearly and effectively, a single post is all that's needed.

Thank you all for responding to my post. From reading these forums, I thought naively, like a Field of Dreams, that if I put great caches in amazing places, they would come. My friend (actually, she's my daughter) and I often work together on caches and we have several collaborations that I am proud of. I used the Nature Preserve as an example because I follow both caches and the difference is stark. I think I just needed to know that it is normal and dedicated COs care lovingly for caches that others rarely visit, and thats ok. So thanks for the pep talk. I'll keep hiding caches that I would like to find in amazing places I would like to share. And go search for that ammo box in the woods you've been thinking about. It will remind you of why you started this hobby while you make some COs day.

i would contact the cache reviewer for your area. each reviewer has quirks they allow and dont. they should be able to help you with the rules. the one major rule i see is no caches on school property. the other would be the amount of gps's needed to accomodate that many people and to have to explain to that many people how to program coords into an infinite variety of gps's that would be there. we helped with one a few years ago and these are just a few ideas. sounds like it would be fun though. have you been to any geocache events/meetings? maybe talk to a few local cachers and get there 2 cents. they might want to help thats how we got into ours. cache on