How did you first hear about geocaching?

[+stevo185]

I lost my car on Canock Chase - not quite a circular walk and I was in the wrong little car park. GPS units were just becoming available and the idea was that I could mark the car and then navigate back to it. Internet search for a unit had a link to 'treasure hunting with a GPS'. I thought that sounded better than pointless walking and off I went. Wasn't really hooked until about a year later when I had a week in London and found 86 caches. Doesn't sound many in a week now, but then it was most of them!

After being an addict for over 6 years I'm on the road to recovery now!

Steve.

[+moor to sea]

About 5 1/2 year ago I brought an Etrex to take to the Lake Dist and make moorland walking a bit easier.

Eventually searched for some software and came across Easy Gps and i think it had a link on it somewhere to Groundspeak and thought what's all this green lid box rubbish.

Then a while later clicked it again and had a read.

Went for a walk to check one out. That was fun

Cached for about 4-5 months before becoming a member.

[+flookbird]

Well, a year ago this week I was busy telling my sister I thought Geocaching was possibly the saddest thing I'd ever heard of!

 

Her and her hubby dragged me along, still protesting, and I went home 2 finds later still telling her it was the saddest thing I'd ever heard of! Little did she know I looked for 2 on my way home from Filey to Bradford (DNFs of course!) and spent the next few days (months?!) thinking of little else! Almost a thousand caches later, I've managed to convert another - who himself has been mocking me for the past 9 months (took me a while to admit my 'habit' to my friends!), but as soon as he found one has become hooked!

 

Seems some people have to suck it and see!

[+tonyhudspith]

My brother and a few of the lads who are spread over the Uk meet up every now and then to go up a few molehills in the Lakes.

On one occassion we were on top of Haystacks and I saw my brother and Jez pointing and whispering. I asked them what they were doing and within a 5 minute rummage around I had found my first cache (Which I still haven't logged to this day lol) I was fasinated with the Geocoin all the way from Long Island USA.

From that day I have introduced others to the joys of caching and let it take over thier lives too

Loving it still as if it was my first find

[goosegogger]

Well, a year ago this week I was busy telling my sister I thought Geocaching was possibly the saddest thing I'd ever heard of!

 

Her and her hubby dragged me along, still protesting, and I went home 2 finds later still telling her it was the saddest thing I'd ever heard of! Little did she know I looked for 2 on my way home from Filey to Bradford (DNFs of course!) and spent the next few days (months?!) thinking of little else! Almost a thousand caches later, I've managed to convert another - who himself has been mocking me for the past 9 months (took me a while to admit my 'habit' to my friends!), but as soon as he found one has become hooked!

 

Seems some people have to suck it and see!

 

ooerr missus

[+pendragon9321]

Great thread

 

The pup was the reason for me finding out about caching. While excitedly waiting for him to be old enough to pick up I was reading anything and everything and found a dog forum with a dog walk section On that someone was saying they had found geocaching as a great way to find new dog walks in their area so I went to investigate

 

Well and truly hooked now and while pup still needs to be taught to sniff out tupperware (he does have a few finds tho they may be accidental!) he's enjoyed every walk to find the cache

[+drsolly]

We were doing walks for exercise. We got fed up going up the road and back, so I got a book of roundwalks. That led to getting an OS map, and a compass, because if you take three bearings, you can work out where you are. The problem with that is, in the English countryside, you can't usually see even one thing to take a bearing from.

 

Then I lost the compass.

 

So I thought, what I need is a GPS. While researching about which GPS to buy, I discovered geocaching. I told ladysolly about it, and she agreed, that was for us.

 

So we went out and tried to find a multi with a difficult micro. And failed.

 

We could have given up on it then ... but didn't.

[+Simply Paul]

Always nice to hear my Countryfile Video Diary (a 47.1Mb .Mpg of it 'shot off the telly' here) shown way back in February 2005 inspired some people to get involved in caching. I've always wanted minions. "Fly my pretties!"

 

My own genesis story is a simple one. Doing online research for the - now defunct - Chiltern Sculpture Trail for the website I was developing for the Trust in early 2003, I came across Dan & Pid's cache, The Christmas Countdown in Dan's old (gone) BucksCaching site. Through it and GC.com I discovered another cache was in walking distance of my house so trotted off across the fields and found it with the aid of the description and clue. That was in May 2003. I bought Dan's old eTrex yellow - which I still use - at a cache meet that July for £40 after finding my first 5 caches without GPS and used it shortly afterwards to set my first cache... 200+ hides and 4700+ finds later (it took me almost a year for find my first 100) and I'm still using the game to take me to interesting and 'off the map' places. I've made some great friends through it and seen some sights the guidebooks would never dare share, lol! I've certainly been on some caching adventures; deserted islands, mountain tops, mine shafts and trying to keep up with a millionaire on a monkey bike through the woods at night... I will have to write a book about my caching travels and experiences some day. Provisional title: Going to Extremes.

 

Here's an old thread on the same topic which may be of interest.

[+jen0607]

I was watching Countryfile in August of this year and they mentioned their website "thrillseekers". I looked on the website as it was the summer holidays and I had a very bored 7 year old on my hands! Looked at the local area to find things to do, and they kept mentioning BBC geocaches. I googled geocaching and like many others, the rest is history!

 

My son was actually on holiday when I discovered it, and was going to wait until he came home before I started caching. I couldn't...and had logged 4 visits by the time he returned!

[+GAZ]

For me it was a article in Computer Active Magazine in mid 2002, on GPS navigation. Which featured a sub article on Geocaching and this strange bloke called Moss trooper

 

Deci

 

Same for me......only the first article was in Aug 2001

 

And when I started (Sep 2001) there was only 37 hidden in the whole of the UK!

 

Going slightly off topic, my GC.com id no. is 21987, The Blorenges is 6348, Moss Troopers is 5267. All newest cachers are into 7 figures, with a 2 at the start..........just shows how it's progressed!

[+ratcliffe]

I genuinely don't know, it has always been in the back of my mind, but it just took until earlier on this year to actually get off my fat backside and get involved.

I am guessing that I saw a reference in a forum or something as thats where I spend a lot of my online time, but I really don't know for sure.

[+Lime Candy]

In August 2008 I organised a family holiday in France, and invited my sister and brother-in-law. They brought along their GPSr, and the rest of us (me, husband & 2 teenage sons) listened to them explaining about geocaching and rolled our eyes a bit. Towards the end of the holiday they invited us to join them looking for a multi-cache, we grudgingly agreed, but once we'd started finding clues and following the arrow WE LOVED IT!!!!!!!!!!

 

And we were FTF on that cache, the first one we ever found!

 

We did another 3 caches in France, and when we were back home my sister bought us a GPSr as a 'thank-you' for the holiday. 1900+ caches later.... and the irony is, my sister has still only found 80-odd!

[+maccath]

My friend had just got a new smartphone and was playing around with various things including the GPS. He mentioned that there were Geocaches around and I assumed he was just talking about caching (the computing term - storing data, we are both computer science geeks) GPS data on his phone. Then he said something about hints and I wondered what on earth hints would have to do with caching GPS data and Googled Geocaching quickly and realised my initial evaluation of the term was way out.

 

I was hooked and got involved quicker than he could, with a smartphone I'd purchased a few months previously. Yes I am a heathen with no real GPS device, but it's served me well thus far - and I don't write short logs either.

Edited October 31, 2010 by maccath

[+Merlin1978]

I was sat listening to a BBC podcast eating a bacon butty when they did a story on Geocaching, hmm sounds like fun I thought but I can't afford a GPS thingy me bob right now.

 

Few days later while browsing the app store I saw the Geocaching App on my iPhone and immediately downloaded it. Haven't looked back since, had some amazing adventures out there and intent to find caches wherever I go for the rest of my travels

[+oso96_2000]

Thanks to reddit: http://www.reddit.com/r/WTF/comments/8ygz8...went_on_a_date/

 

I read that about two or three months ago but didn't take my attention. Then, a few days later, i read it again and i got curious about what is that "geocaching" thing, and well.. here i am 40 finds later. I just ordered my first GPs device (being doing with my cellphone).

[+Merlin1978]

I was watching Countryfile in August of this year and they mentioned their website "thrillseekers". I looked on the website as it was the summer holidays and I had a very bored 7 year old on my hands! Looked at the local area to find things to do, and they kept mentioning BBC geocaches. I googled geocaching and like many others, the rest is history!

 

My son was actually on holiday when I discovered it, and was going to wait until he came home before I started caching. I couldn't...and had logged 4 visits by the time he returned!

 

I don't think I could have waited either

[jimdiesel]

a friend on facebook posted a status about his 1st cache i googled it and done 2 today

[+The Blorenges]

a friend on facebook posted a status about his 1st cache i googled it and done 2 today

 

Welcome - well done!

 

MrsB

[+PeakFault]

I was on a camping forum and there was a thread called 'Anyone tried geocaching?'

 

I spent two weeks ignoring the post as it kept rising to the top. Opened it and then got instantly interested in it!

 

A few days later I was out caching with my daughter and then the wife joined in after that!

[Watchkeeper]

I'm a fan of the quiz show "Only Connect", and in September one of the teams was "The Geocachers". Never having heard of this before, I did the research (Google is my friend), found the Website, saw there was a cache easily accessible and not far from me, found it (at the 3rd attempt) and that was it ... hooked!

 

Now I'm spreading the word.