Frustrated

[potrzebowski]

Took the kids out yesterday and today to find too (what I thought were) simple caches in a nearby parkway.

GPS started leading us along the way just fine, with distance getting smaller and smaller with every step. We hit about 50ft and the GPS started pointing us off the trail... ok.... went off the trail walked a few steps and looked back at the GPS and it was pointing us back right from where we came... and we were getting further away now.

 

Up and back every which direction with no luck of ever whittling it down to less than 40ft or so but even that 40ft was more than questionable.

 

2nd cache had the exct same experience.

 

Am I doing something wrong? Does my GPS stink? To I stink? Any suggestions?

[Mag Magician]

Took the kids out yesterday and today to find too (what I thought were) simple caches in a nearby parkway.

GPS started leading us along the way just fine, with distance getting smaller and smaller with every step. We hit about 50ft and the GPS started pointing us off the trail... ok.... went off the trail walked a few steps and looked back at the GPS and it was pointing us back right from where we came... and we were getting further away now.

 

Up and back every which direction with no luck of ever whittling it down to less than 40ft or so but even that 40ft was more than questionable.

 

2nd cache had the exct same experience.

 

Am I doing something wrong? Does my GPS stink? To I stink? Any suggestions?

 

At 40 feet, it's time to put down the GPSr and start a visual search. No, you don't stink, you are just new.

 

Perhaps you could find a nearby easier cache to get the feel of using the GPSr?

 

Post your location (sorta, closely, not your address) and I'm sure some more experienced on here could point out an easy find?

[+balinda]

Took the kids out yesterday and today to find too (what I thought were) simple caches in a nearby parkway.

GPS started leading us along the way just fine, with distance getting smaller and smaller with every step. We hit about 50ft and the GPS started pointing us off the trail... ok.... went off the trail walked a few steps and looked back at the GPS and it was pointing us back right from where we came... and we were getting further away now.

 

Up and back every which direction with no luck of ever whittling it down to less than 40ft or so but even that 40ft was more than questionable.

 

2nd cache had the exct same experience.

 

Am I doing something wrong? Does my GPS stink? To I stink? Any suggestions?

 

At 40 feet, it's time to put down the GPSr and start a visual search. No, you don't stink, you are just new.

 

Perhaps you could find a nearby easier cache to get the feel of using the GPSr?

 

Post your location (sorta, closely, not your address) and I'm sure some more experienced on here could point out an easy find?

 

What I do is stand on the trail and look in the direction the GPS is telling me to go. I judge the distance and say " near that tree over there" Then I stay on the trail and move a little farther down the trail about 10 feet and look where the GPS is sending me. If it looks like the same place I head to that place without looking at the GPS.

 

When I get there I take another look at my GPS. Sometimes I have to stand in the same spot for a little while for the GPS to catch up to me. Then move again so it knows which direction I am headed. If I'm not right on top of the cache then I repeat the look and move technique.

 

For most caches you stay on the trail until right near the end.

 

Make sure someone has found the caches you are looking for recently at least then you are sure that they were there on that day.

[+El Diablo]

Give your GPS time to settle down. That means taking a seat and a break for a few minutes and let it adjust. A mistake that a lot make is to over walk the GPS. When you are a 100 feet out look where the arrow is pointing and take a mental note. After that it's time to rely on hunting skills rather than the GPS.

 

Another suggestion is to start with 1/1 full size caches before you attempt the smaller ones which can be very cleverly hidden. When I say cleverly, I mean in plain sight and you still can't see them.

 

El Diablo

[TermiteHunter]

What are you doing wrong? Nothing. just don't rely on the GPS to pinpoint the location. Most are not that accurate depending on many variable factors. (reception, location of sats in the sky, your gps accuracy, the hiders gps accuracy the day they hid it) DO like the previous poster said and head in the general direction for the app. distance. If you stand at what is ground zero long enough it will soon become 45' off so start looking around as you approach the expected site.

 

After a good search of the area, I have sometimes left the area I expected it to be at and tried the approach again often ending up in a different area all together.

[Neos2]

Sometimes after waiting a few seconds for the gps to settle, I ignore the direction the arrow is pointing and just try to make the "distance to the cache" number decrease.

 

You don't say what kind of gps you have--some are less precise in the woods. Let us know which model you have and we may have additional hints.

 

WAIT...no, I remember you now....You have the Legend, right? We told you the Legend would not get good reception in the woods! So here is what we would do when we were hunting caches in the woods:

 

1) Try to find the nearest spot that has relatively clear overhead view and sight the cache from there.

 

2) If there are no clearing--Triangulate:

Let the unit point out the cache and mentally mark the spot (three feet from the stump) then go about the same distance away from another direction and repeat the process, then go to a third spot and do the same.

 

3) Walk in circles around the area, trying to get the distance to the cache numbers as low as possible, then set the gps down and let one of the kids watch the gps still while you start looking around that area with the others in the group in gradually widening circles. If you don't find the cache in a few minutes, check where the gps is pointing now (it wil almost always be different!) and start the process over again.

 

Make sure you don't have the unit in battery saver mode (especially in the woods). It gets good battery time.

 

Don't turn the unit off between caches--the longer it stays on the more accurate it reads.

(I would leave mine on all day--I'd get a good 20 hours out of a set of Duracell batteries even when using the backlight at night).

 

Do have the WAAS enabled.

 

If you are using the compass page, try the map page instead or vice versa. Sometimes one works better than the other. When Chris and I both had Legends, he'd set to one and I'd use the other.

 

Ignore the compass when it starts swinging in wild circles--You are probably very near the cache. Just watch the numbers on the unit to make sure they keep going down.

Edited May 25, 2008 by Neos2

[blanderson]

You sound like me. I just started geocaching two days ago. I gave up on my first cache and on my second one, I almost gave up, but go kinda lucky. I ran into some other geocachers and they told me where the first one was located. It appears that the coordinates on the first cache were off about 15 feet. You are at the mercy of the cache owner for the exact coordinates.

 

I am using a Garmin etrex Venture HC GPS and as I'm learning to use it, I notice it draws a trace of where I have been. After the first two geocache attempts, I started paying attention to this trace so that when I'm looking for a geocache and am having problems finding it, I will try to create a circle around it by walking around the proximity of where the GPS is showing the geocache. This helped me a lot on my most recent (8th) cache. Using the trace can really help you out. My GPS unit tends to get withing 5-10 feet of accuracy. Again, this assumes that the cache owner captured accurate coordinates.

 

Take care,

blanderson

[+J10fly]

It's tough at first. Once you get the hang of it you will start to be able to read your GPS better. Like now when mine gets down to 5 or 6 feet I start looking around in circles going out a little further each time. Keep in mind your GPS most likely says 30 feet accuracy or so. It's a learning curve but once you get that down and start finding more and more caches you will get an idea of where to look from a distance sometimes. Happy Caching and welcome to the fun!

[+WestTxCondor]

I had a heck of a time finding my first few caches. I was pretty much relying too much on my GPS to get me right at the spot. I wasn't really looking at my surroundings for clues. I had the good fortune a couple of weeks back of meeting a more experienced cacher and we hunted down a couple together. He spotted them right off the bat, but let me actually "find" them. He's gotten many caches under his belt so he know exactly what to look for and now I am starting to do the same. He calls it his "geosense" and thanks to his patience and advice, I'm becoming more aware of my surroundings and getting a feel for what to look for as I get within 10-20 feet of a cache site. Just be patient and have fun.

[+Team GeoBlast]

Took the kids out yesterday and today to find too (what I thought were) simple caches in a nearby parkway.

GPS started leading us along the way just fine, with distance getting smaller and smaller with every step. We hit about 50ft and the GPS started pointing us off the trail... ok.... went off the trail walked a few steps and looked back at the GPS and it was pointing us back right from where we came... and we were getting further away now.

 

Up and back every which direction with no luck of ever whittling it down to less than 40ft or so but even that 40ft was more than questionable.

 

2nd cache had the exct same experience.

 

Am I doing something wrong? Does my GPS stink? To I stink? Any suggestions?

 

I've got a few things you might try.

 

1. Use all the information available to you and read the cache pages very well before you go. Note when the last time it was found was, how hard they said they had to look and so on. Use this information in your search.

2. Try another screen on your GPS. Try to use the map screen. Zoom all the way in and be the arrow. This a lot less confusing than the standard search screen sometimes.

3. Make sure when you are hitting "go to" you are saying "off road." I think your unit has an option of either "follow road" or "off road." If you follow the road, it is not going to lead you to the cache, it is going to keep looking for the closest road.

 

Hang in there, I'm sure you can feel that most everyone has been where you are at now. It is so cool when you get a handle on it.

[Neos2]

[3. Make sure when you are hitting "go to" you are saying "off road." I think your unit has an option of either "follow road" or "off road." If you follow the road, it is not going to lead you to the cache, it is going to keep looking for the closest road.

The Legend does not have autorouting, so it doesn't have the off-road/on-road options.

 

I'd also advise trying both the map page and the compass page. Some people have better luck with one than the other. The compass on the Legend isn't active unless you are walking at a decent pace, though, so don't go toward the cache too slowly.

[+TeamAtlas]

I'm still fairly new to caching, but one valuable lesson I learned from reading the book 'A Complete Idiot's Guide to Geocaching' (yup, that's me, a complete idiot!) was that you cannot rely on the arrow on the GPSr to tell you which way to go when you are going slow or standing still. This is called 'loose bearings' and according to what I read, you have to be moving at least 4mph for that arrow to be accurate. So when you're getting close, forget that arrow and instead focus on the distance. Walk until it gets smaller... if it starts growing, turn and start walking another direction. Soon you'll be able to narrow the search area down. That tiny bit of info has helped me tremendously!

 

Good luck and don't give up!

[gitarmac]

It's kind of a reflex or something to stand still or slow and look at the arrow. I have to keep reminding my friend to walk. She expected the gps to just point to a coordinate and stay that way and thought the gps unit was not working properly. Also, every now and then I get the random needle thing going on, where it will reverse direction, or something, only a moment. it's kind of hard to tell where it's really pointing when it does that. It only happens every now and then, I think it's a satillite phenomenoa.

 

I walk and watch the distance and arrow. It will point to the same spot, more or less, until you get close then the needle floats all over. Are you using the map screen or the navigation screen? I have found that the map screen isn't very useful when you get close. I have a venture which does not have mapping, a mapping unit may be differant.

 

I have noticed that many caches will not have exact coordinates. I don't know if it's because of the inherant error caused by differant units used on differant days or if it's purposeful.

 

At any rate, once you get kind of close you must revert to "geosense" and look around for something out of place.

 

Don't get too discouraged. I can barely find even the easy ones. Apparetly easy is a relative term. I try not to use the hints but I usually wind up using them anyway.

 

As long as I find one every now and then I'm happy. It's like I go thorugh spells where I can't find anything.

[+Save The Murlocs]

We did the same thing with our first few ones. Too reliant on the gps. Don't get discouraged, you'll get the hang of it.

[JodiW]

We just got back from our first geocaching outing and are 0 for 4. I have a couple of discouraged kids, but I know it's a learning curve. We'll go try again someday soon and see if we have any better luck. If only they would have 'first-timers' caches that are at least the size of a shoe box and painted bright orange or something so we could have some success to start with. I know, not practical, but I was sure wishing the ones I was hunting for today weren't hidden *quite* so well. I guess that's just part of the challenge/fun, right?

 

Thanks for the tips others have shared. I'll keep those in mind when we go look again. I think we'll choose a more 'urban' location for the next search - I couldn't see the cache for the trees today!