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martinp13, Ok, given that you are not an orienteer, I have to ask: What is your definition of orienteering? There are two typical answers to this question. For a lot of folks who got their training through the scouts or military, orienteering involves taking compass bearings and counting off your paces to measure distance, ie, go 200 yards at a bearing of 123, 100 yards at a bearing of 78 degrees, etc. Sort of a surveying thing. I did this as a kid and never saw it as being of any value. Then there is sport orienteering. This is much more an exercise in map reading than surveying skills. Matching the map to the terrain is more important than blindly following the compass. Using a detailed map, the sport orienteer must make route decisions on the best way to get from one point (a control) to another. Straight line bearings are usually not the best choice. (Remember that Colombus thought that the best way to get from Spain to China was to go straight west and he never got there.) The sport orienteer is always making route choices based on map reading; trails or bushwacking, over the hill or around it, ford the stream or seek out a bridge. Which way is the fastest/easiest/most enjoyable? Having decided on a route, the orienteer finds landmarks on his map and then moves out, clicking the landmarks off in his mind as he goes. Only on long stretches with few distinctive landmarks will he resort to following a compass bearing. Coming from a sport orienteering background, my thoughts on a geocache with a tinge of orienteering would be a multi-stage cache that can not be done by straight line bushwacking. There would be uncrossable obstacles like cliffs, marshes and deep streams on each stage. Of course there would have to be a reasonably detailed map available to the seeker so that he could determine the intermediate waypoints that would circumvent the obstacles. Just my $.02 [This message has been edited by CaptHawke (edited 06 June 2001).]

Well, so far . . . The Katy Trail 174 has been head and shoulders above all of the other caches I've found. We drove more than 100 miles to get close. Then we rented bikes at a small historic town. Then we cycled five miles along the bike trail by the Missouri River and had to find the cache somewhere in the face of a 200 foot limestone cliff! It was a hanging-by-my-fingertips find. Really worth the effort. It's near the town of Columbia in Missouri, which now has a half dozen caches, so it might be worthy of a visit to make a day of it. Paul Lamble

quote:Originally posted by jeremy: I don't follow. So you're assuming that everyone will want to allow people to take their cache information and do whatever they want with it? If so, you're missing the point. Ed Hall's maps were good. I have not read a single criticism of them. I assume most people agree. "Everyone" is another matter. This probably deserves a completely separate thread, but I am concerned about what the database will look like in, say, 5 years. What happens when there are, not 2000 caches in the database, but 20,000 or 200,000? What happens when tens of thousands of them have not been visited in years. Maybe it won't be a problem to wade through and ignore the leftover litter, so to speak. Or maybe today's geocachers don't care about the future, so long as it's fun today. Like I said, maybe such strategic thinking deserves its own thread. The reason I bring it up at all is because I was thinking along those lines when I realized that any historic caches that owners go back and mark as being open to Ed Hall to map, are probably caches that are still being taken care of by their owners. That's good. It doesn't prove anything about the caches not so marked. But, personally, if I had a choice of which to search out, I would pick the ones that I have some evidence are being taken care of. There, does that long-winded explanation make you sorry you asked?

quote:Thanks for the lnk, I'll have a look. I thought that WGS84 was an American datum and did not correlate to our maps here? I use topo maps and find the NZ '49 datum works spot on whereas the WGS84 is quite a bit out. WGS84 was defined by the American Department of Defense and the National Imaging and Mapping Agency, but it is a global standard. There are important distinctions between local geodetic datums and global gedetic datums. For something like geocaching, with its global focus - WGS84 makes a lot of sense. As the GPS system uses a global geodetic datum, which I believe is WGS84, it makes sense to use the GPS units in that configuration most of the time. Our only problem occurs when the WGS84 datum doesn't match with the NZGD49 - I believe there are differences of around 200-300m. Most geodetic datums are tuned to local specifics of the earths crust - that is they are tweaked to a local best fit. However these systems don't scale to provide a good coordinate system for the whole world, which is essential for mapping things like GPS satelitte coordinates, and aircraft navigation. There are a couple of good descriptions here: - The European Air Traffic Control Harmonisation and Integration Programme http://www.wgs84.com/wgs84/wgs84.htm US National Geodetic Survey FAQ http://www.ngs.noaa.gov/faq.shtml#WGS84 NZGD49 does provide the best mapping to the topo maps, but I believe that NZGD2000 will be more closely aligned to the WGS84 datum when it becomes widely used. I believe that one of the main reasons for the development of the NZGD2000 is so that NZ's reference frame is more closely aligned to that of the WGS84. I use the 260 series topo maps, and WGS84 is a pain for them. My solution has been to enter all the co-ords in WGS84, and then switch to NZGD49 datum and NZMG coords, record the NZMG coords, switch the GPS unit back to WGS84 and d mm.mmm. The GPS transform functions seems pretty accurate and I haven't had a problem yet with this transfer. I do it this way as most of the coords I use are wgs84, and the only time I need NZGD49/NZMG are for the topo maps. Hope that sheds a little insight into the various datums we have to deal with! Cheers Gavin

Anyone interested in a very slightly used Etrex Legend. I got one a week and a half ago and find that I would be better served by something different. I've used it for biking once, two attempts @ geocaching, and a couple of times just playing around with it. Still looks brand new, everything works fine, all original equipment, manuals, box included. I'd like to get $200 for it.

Garmin eTrex Venture here. nice little sub-$200 unit and tough as a rock

Does anyone know....if the Magellan GPS 320 will do distance resolution down to the foot level? As in '200 feet from waypoint'. I am in the process of recommending a GPS to a new geocaching addict and I initially recommended the Magellan GPS 315 which is what I have but remembered that the one feature I would like to have on mine is resolution down to the foot. If the Magellan GPS 320 doesn't do this, does anyone know if any of the Magellan's have this capability. Thanks in advance!

I'm confussed about a couple of things. Now, I understand that there are different formats for locations (UTM, WSG, etc.) so maybe I'm just confussing them. This is what I've been able to figure out on my own, someone correct me if I'm wrong. If you visualize the globe as flat, then Greenwich is the orgin, meaning its at x=0 and y=0, so anything to the left of it on the horizontal axis is negative (W Latitudes), and anything bellow it on the vertical axis (S Longitudes) is negative and vice versa...pretty obvious. My question is, what are the ranges in degrees of lon. and lat. I'm assuming that they range from W or E 0 to 180 degrees and N or S 0 to 90 degrees, is that correct? My confussion comes when I see something like this -2.393.91. The way I see it, its E002.393.... its pretty obvious that you can't have a 200 degree eastern latitude because its greater than 180 degrees. But, my problem is that I don't know if 91 seconds as in ...091 or if it is 910 as in ...910, because it seems that GPS leave out zeros in their readings. Can someone clear this up for me? Thanks

Has there ever been a hotter thread in the history of this website - I doubt it! This is awesome! I bought a DeLorme gadget - I can't even remember the name of it now (it's a bad memory) -because I have a Palm 3c and thought it would be cool to use it as a GPS. Hated it. Cords going everywhere, guzzled batteries four at a time, no car adapter, maps were EXCRUCIATINGLY slow, took forever to acquire sats...you get the picture. I had it for a weekend and couldn't get it back to the store fast enough. Was out looking for a way to spend the $200 my dad had given me as a graduation gift - nearly bought a new cell phone (close call) I was talking to a guy at work about my experience with my GPS, he asked me if I'd ever done any "GeoCaching" - "Geo-What?" I said. He told me what little he knew, (he'd never been either, a friend of his in Wisconsin is a 'cacher) and I went back to the store that night and got my Magellan MAP330. Called my brother that night and told him about it, and the next day we found our first cache. That was April 26th. I have since found 26 caches, placed two, rescued one, and I have six more in the back of my Subaru begging for a home.

Is Geocaching becoming popular enough for domain name speculators? Has anyone here registered www.geocaching.co.za (South Africa)? The details from co.za's whois are: 0a. Last Update: Sat Feb 3 07:39:28 SAST 2001 0b. Sender: hostmaster@key.co.za 0c. Posted: Sat, 03 Feb 2001 07:39:12 +0200 0d. Subject: Domain registration [geocaching.co.za] 0e. Paper: 03-Feb-2001 0f. Payment: 04-Apr-2001 13:25:41 0g. Hist Cnt: 1 0h. Inv Number: 139283 0i. Contract: NEW 0j. Coza Version: $Revision: 1.39 $ $Date: 2001/01/05 13:10:59 $ 1a. Domain: geocaching.co.za 1b. Action: N 2a. Domain Owner: Andre Bruton 2b. Owner Postal: PO Box 4203, Randburg, 2125, South Africa 2c. Owner StAddr: 44 Goldman Street, Florida, 1709, South Africa 2d. Payment: 200 2e. Ac/Inv/Chqe: I 2f. Bill/Acct: Key Web Hosting 2g. Mail Bill to: admin@key.co.za 2h. NoDelayWord: **set** 2i. Invoice Addr: P O Box 4203, Randburg, 2125, South Africa 2j. Owner Phone: +27-11-475-6137 2k. Owner Fax: +27-11-475-3279 2l. Owner E-Mail: andre@bruton.co.za 3a. Opp Date: 2001/02/03 07:39:16 3b. CNAME Base: 3c. CNAME sub1: 3d. CNAME sub2: 4a. Adm Contact: Bruton, Andre 4b. Adm Title: Mr 4c. Adm Company: Key Web Hosting 4d. Adm Postal: P O Box 4203, Randburg, 2125, South Africa 4e. Adm Phone: +27 11 475-6137 4f. Adm Fax: +27 11 475-3279 4g. Adm E-Mail: andre@key.co.za 4h. Adm Nic: AB5331 5a. Tec Contact: Lockhart, Peter 5b. Tec Title: Mr 5c. Tec Company: Key Web Hosting 5d. Tec Postal: P O Box 4203, Randburg, 2125, South Africa 5e. Tec Phone: +27 11 475-6137 5f. Tec Fax: +27 11 475-3279 5g. Tec E-Mail: peterl@key.co.za 5h. Tec Nic: PL5082 6a. Prim NS FQDN: ns1.key.co.za 6b. Prim NS IP: 196.2.147.10 6e. Sec NS1 FQDN: ns2.key.co.za 6f. Sec NS1 IP: 196.2.147.5 ------------------ Peter Scholtz www.biometrics.co.za

Ok...with that said and done I am sure that most people don't place caches in areas that reach 200 degree's, and if they do, there wont be anyone finding them anyways I have placed cameras in my caches and left one out in weather that reached -3 degree's and was buried in over a foot of snow for about 2 months. I then went after the camera when it was an average of 70 degree's outside and the day I took it the temp was 83 degree's. the pictures came out like new and look great! to see them go here http://www.navicache.com/photos.html these are the pictures of my "ghosts domain" cache located in rochester, ny. the camera was a single use kodak non flash 27 exposure unit. By the way, I live in camera and film home town usa to kodak. I have many friends that work at kodak as well as a couple that make the film in the cameras, they insist that for what I use it for that it will more than perform when I get it back and develope it. oh! and for the last poster, I hope I didnt come across snide at the beginning of my post. As a matter of fact it's pretty cool that you got all that kodak information, it does come in pretty handy and I am making note of it as well for future use! thanks! ------------------ Quinn Stone Rochester, NY.14616 www.Navicache.com

Ok...with that said and done I am sure that most people don't place caches in areas that reach 200 degree's, and if they do, there wont be anyone finding them anyways I have placed cameras in my caches and left one out in weather that reached -3 degree's and was buried in over a foot of snow for about 2 months. I then went after the camera when it was an average of 70 degree's outside and the day I took it the temp was 83 degree's. the pictures came out like new and look great! to see them go here http://www.navicache.com/photos.html these are the pictures of my "ghosts domain" cache located in rochester, ny. the camera was a single use kodak non flash 27 exposure unit. By the way, I live in camera and film home town usa to kodak. I have many friends that work at kodak as well as a couple that make the film in the cameras, they insist that for what I use it for that it will more than perform when I get it back and develope it. oh! and for the last poster, I hope I didnt come across snide at the beginning of my post. As a matter of fact it's pretty cool that you got all that kodak information, it does come in pretty handy and I am making note of it as well for future use! thanks! ------------------ Quinn Stone Rochester, NY.14616 www.Navicache.com

Here's a question/answer from the Kodak web site regarding their cameras and extreme temps. Q: I've heard it's a good idea to keep a one-time-use camera in the glove compartment of my car in case of emergencies. Won't the extreme temperatures hurt it? A: The interior of a vehicle can be a very hostile environment for both photographic film and for cameras. Frigid conditions alone will not necessarily cause harm to film. Some of the difficulties that might be encountered when photographing with a one-time use camera which has been kept in a car under sub-zero temperatures include: brittle film tearing, film advance mechanism failing, shutter sticking or failing, and flash performing poorly because of weak energy delivery from frozen batteries. In the summer, temperatures inside a car can easily reach 200° F or more. At these high temperatures there is the strong potential for physical damage (such as film sticking to itself) as well as loss of picture quality (low contrast, color shift, and poor shadow detail).

Congrats! I think that you will like the Vista. The screen is small, but it is only a problem if you are trying to look at details while driving or the like. It has great clarity and legibility when you are holding it, and even when driving you can make out the roads fairly easily. My biggest gripe with it is that is doesn't support an external antenna. Did you order the Garmin MapSource Topo CD for topo maps? I also recommend the Metroguide CDs. It's nice to be 200 miles from home in an unfamiliar area and be able to locate the nearest Italian restaurant! [This message has been edited by Moun10Bike (edited 09 May 2001).]

Congrats! I think that you will like the Vista. The screen is small, but it is only a problem if you are trying to look at details while driving or the like. It has great clarity and legibility when you are holding it, and even when driving you can make out the roads fairly easily. My biggest gripe with it is that is doesn't support an external antenna. Did you order the Garmin MapSource Topo CD for topo maps? I also recommend the Metroguide CDs. It's nice to be 200 miles from home in an unfamiliar area and be able to locate the nearest Italian restaurant! [This message has been edited by Moun10Bike (edited 09 May 2001).]

We could really use some caches in SW Michigan. I really want to get into Geocaching, but the closest cache is about 200 miles away.

"Inherent" works for me. And, yes, if you aren?t using GPS, you aren?t Geocaching. (JIntorcio's Law?) This is a concept that the cache owner has to keep in mind when deciding where to place the cache. If the cache can be found by map and compass alone, it isn't a Geocache.(Hawke's Corollary to JIntorcio's Law?) The cache should be placed far enough away from any landmarks found on a USGS topo map that the seeker will have to break out his/her GPS. For example, if clicking on the link to TopoZone shows that a cache is at the base of a 200' radio tower atop the highest hill in the county, you might as well leave your GPS at home. It might still be worth the trip because of a great view, but since it can easily be found without the GPS, it's not really Geocaching. In this case make the great view the first stage of a multistage cache and then you've got something that's becomes more of a navigational challenge.

Mike, I hate to tell you but john-daly.com is as predictable a "deconstruction" as any other. Invariably, these disbelievers use biased opinions and bad examples. Here's a few from his page: "Satellite data shows a cooling trend". I don't know how many times it has to be repeated, but that is using the RAW DATA. This data is uncorrected for orbit decay. Once it is corrected, this "0.03 degree cooling trend" turns into a warming trend. I love his graphs with the "5-year moving average". Think about that for a sec. Why is that invalid? Natural cycles are on scales of thousands - billions of years. ONE SINGLE YEAR will skew even a 100-year average!!! Regressional analysis of a 5 year curve is as meaningful as saying "it was hot today - global warming is true!" Incidentally, all his little anecdotes about individual snowstorms and colder temperatures around the world are just as useful. We have been recording weather for maybe 200 years. Weather has been happening for hundreds of millions of years. The statistical probability that we have seen the extreme ends of what weather is capable of in any given location is next to zero. His article "Opinion - Models or Mimics?" directly contradicts his conclusion that CO2 rates are linked to temperature and not vice versa. (Incidentally this is true - carbonate system weathering rates increase with temperature, leading to more CO2). You'll notice that his rant does not actually address the problem - we are adding billions of tons of CO2 to the atmosphere. His article addresses nothing! If we were increasing the temperature, then it might be relevant, but that isn't the problem. No one is arguing natural cycles and the CO2 lag - that is common knowledge. But what of the reverse??? Also, throughout the site he rags on the media for only presenting the "warming side" of the debate. Yet his site ONLY puts links to the other side of the debate!!! This site is un-professional, un-scientific and completely biased! Statements like : "I have closely followed the carbon dioxide warming arguments. From what I have learned of how the atmosphere ticks over 40 years of study, I have been unable to convince myself that a doubling of human-induced greenhouse gases can lead to anything but quite small and insignificant amounts of global warming." Are meaningless!!! Who is this guy? Why should we believe him?? What evidence is he studying, what is his background, political or otherwise? Okay, this is getting long so I'll shutup. The point is, people like John Daly use bias and un-scientific methods (not to mention poor data) to prove their points. Increase your depth of study before making a conclusion. I have studied climate for 5 years now - here are some better links: http://www.ec.gc.ca/climate/index.html Tons of info on canadian climate and warming effects, including data so you can do your own analysis. http://climatesolutions.org Good facts but obviously biased. Take it with a grain of salt. http://tigerherbs.com/eclectica/earthcrash/index.html This site, opposite of Daly's, keeps track of news articles that support global warming. http://www.ipcc.ch/ The IPCC homepage. Check out the data & reports yourself before taking someone else's opinion of them. It is real! Okay I'm done. [This message has been edited by Goat Commander (edited 22 April 2001).]

Ok folks, tell me what you suggest. In my cache searches locally I don't need to use topo maps and I only use the mapblast to get me near the cache site. I always use my compass between 200 and 100 feet and then use the etrex to estimate how close I am to the cache site. Maybe I should just experiment with magnetic north and true north and see which routinely is more accurate. Maybe there is no real difference for the narrow distance I am discussing. Bill

Your GPS is giving the correct position. The problem is that Geocaching.com uses the WGS84 datum (the current standard), while Topozone.com uses USGS maps that use the older NAD27 datum. This can lead to a positional difference of up to around 200 meters in some parts of the US. In order to plot the correct point on Topozone, you will have to convert the cache coordinates to the NAD27 datum and then tell Topozone (manually) to plot them. For more info on datums, see http://joe.mehaffey.com/maps.txt and http://www.alltopo.com/gps_accuracy.htm .

e already intense use this small system supports. We have approximately 3.5 million visitors per year, which is more than visit Rocky Mountain National Park, and we have only one-eighth the acreage. We appreciation our local geocachers? respect and concern for the environment, as expressed through dialog on the web site, and would like to add our own to the conversation. Our primary concern is the increased off trail use that this activity generates. Assuming the goal of this sport is to use a GPS unit on a scavenger hunt, it seems unlikely that staying on trail would be the normal or desired mode of travel for geocachers. The park has 140 miles of official trails, and we estimate over 200 miles of social trails. This high volume of social trails indicates that visitors are penetrating core areas specifically intended to remain as undisrupted habitat. The topography, slope, soil types and vegetation on Open Space and Mountain Parks properties cannot sustain off-trail use. Off trail activities are causing extensive soil erosion. Trampled vegetation at trail edges tends to be replaced by weeds rather than native plants. We are concerned about damage to native plants such as Ute ladies?-tresses orchids, a federally listed species, as well as other sensitive plant species and communities. Fragmentation of wildlife habitat for animals, like the endangered Preble?s meadow jumping mice, gray fox and goshawk is likely. Disruptive intrusions into the breeding territory of the forest and grassland nesting birds, including peregrine falcons and golden eagles, is also a potential problem. Preserving core areas of unfragmented habitats is a major management goal. Habitat fragmentation affects animals negatively by eliminating vast tracts of uninterrupted space needed to sustain foraging, nesting, breeding and territory needs. Unofficial paths bisecting these habitats cause animals to spend unnecessary time defending their nests or territory from humans. This detracts from time normally spent feeding and caring for their offspring, which can result in the death of their young. Off trail travel results in a corridor of impact. A single person quietly hiking has much less impact than a pair or group, and significantly less impact than when a dog is present. The weaving nature of a dog?s normal travel dramatically broadens the corridor of impact, made worse if the dog is actively scouting for animals, following scent trails, digging and/or barking. Proposing an alternative use for this navigation/orienteering technique that directs the general public to local special natural history points, such as rare plant species or communities, elicits greater concerns. In an effort to balance the research and protection needs of these communities we use staff and volunteers to monitor them, but within a controlled framework. Explorations by larger numbers of people to these areas would probably prove very detrimental to their health. Management policies aim at protection of the lands while providing for appropriate recreational activities. Consequently, our policy includes discouraging off trail use and any activities that involve taking anything from the park or leaving property in the park. Our wildlife closures specifically prohibit human incursions into protected areas. Activities that damage property or can be perceived of as littering or construction of structures are not allowed. Our preference would be to see the geocaching activities happening on lands that are less vulnerable than the Open Space and Mountain Parks properties. The basic premises of the "Leave No Trace Policy" are critical to the protection of these lands: stay on trails, leave it as you found it, carry out your trash, manage your dog, pick up after your pet, and share the trail with other users. (For more specifics on "Leave No Trace", visit the web site www.ci.boulder.co.us/openspace/lnt/lntonos.htm.) Our regulations can be found at www.ci.boulder.co.us/openspace/rules.htm. Thank you for taking the time to read about our concerns. Feel free to visit our web site at www.ci.boulder.co.us/openspace or contact us at sutherlandd@ci.boulder.co.us or by phone at (303) 441-3440.

Why doesn't this site use UTM coordinates as a standard? UTM coordinates are much more intuitive and is the datum used on USGS maps. Why use degrees, minutes, and seconds when coordinates can be logged in meters? If people are not familiar with the UTM system it would be well worth the short time to learn it. For exanple: If I am standing at 15S 0369238/3923896 and my objective is 15S 0369238/3923696 then I know that my objective is 200 meters south of my current position just by subtracting the coodinates.

I have been swapping e-mails back and forth with Kim from http://www.advancedgps.com/ and she says that 100 vista's are going out tomorrow, and another 200 are expected to be sent out thursaday or friday (this is shipping to customer not shipping to advanced from Garmin.) I have checked many sites for GPS units and pricing and she seems to have one of the best with the offer of no shipping costs. She has also been very helpful and at the time I was e-mailing with her she did not know of "Geocaching" until I mentioned it, she now intends on taking the family out for a go at the sport. If any of you guys are new to this sport and are thinking about buying a GPS unit, be sure to check that site out. I know of many people from this board that have bought theres from here as well as I have too! ------------------ Quinn Stone Rochester, NY.14616 www.Navicache.com [This message has been edited by Quinnow (edited 04-03-2001).]

The ones I was looking at says they can be recharged about 500 times, but what I am wondering is what the heck is NiMH? is that nick cads? also can they be used in the unit I mentioned and at what battery setting? I would like to take a look at the ones you are using, is there a site that shows those? quote:Originally posted by wjoos123:I'm using ACCUCELL's you can get them in all sizes, they have (for AA batteries) 1800mAh !!! and a low discharge current, and better performance in cold conditions. Accucells combine NiMH and Alkaline batteries. They are rechargeable (about 200 time)!!! ------------------ Quinn Stone Rochester, NY.14616 www.Navicache.com

I'm using ACCUCELL's you can get them in all sizes, they have (for AA batteries) 1800mAh !!! and a low discharge current, and better performance in cold conditions. Accucells combine NiMH and Alkaline batteries. They are rechargeable (about 200 time)!!!