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Hello everyone,

I have been researching this "game" of hide and seek for a while now and decided to give it a shot. The problem, however, is that I am a truck driver and it is very hard to get my truck into tight spots in order to seek caches. My question is, are there any other truckers out there with some pointers as to how they partake in this activity?

 

Well, a few more questions, sorry. Would a Samsung Galaxy S be sufficient with the neongeo app? I noticed that many of you use the top of the line GPSr's in your hunts, however, I cannot yet afford one.

 

Also, rest areas, truck stops, places with truck parking, are there caches that exist in these areas? I mean, I am sure there are, but are there enough to keep the average trucker involved? If not, could I hide some once I get familiar with the policies and recruit local cachers to keep them up, as I cannot get thru there as often as I would like(in most areas)

 

What I hope to do from this, is recruit more truckers to join this Team of Hard Rollers to get involved in this activity, because it may be some of the only exercise we get outside of our trucks, and we would have fun doing it. Sure would beat walking around truck stop parking lots with the smell of baked urine on the ground.

 

Anyway, I would appreciate your opinions :)

 

Roy

Destin, FL

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Hello everyone,

I have been researching this "game" of hide and seek for a while now and decided to give it a shot. The problem, however, is that I am a truck driver and it is very hard to get my truck into tight spots in order to seek caches. My question is, are there any other truckers out there with some pointers as to how they partake in this activity?

 

Well, a few more questions, sorry. Would a Samsung Galaxy S be sufficient with the neongeo app? I noticed that many of you use the top of the line GPSr's in your hunts, however, I cannot yet afford one.

 

Also, rest areas, truck stops, places with truck parking, are there caches that exist in these areas? I mean, I am sure there are, but are there enough to keep the average trucker involved? If not, could I hide some once I get familiar with the policies and recruit local cachers to keep them up, as I cannot get thru there as often as I would like(in most areas)

 

What I hope to do from this, is recruit more truckers to join this Team of Hard Rollers to get involved in this activity, because it may be some of the only exercise we get outside of our trucks, and we would have fun doing it. Sure would beat walking around truck stop parking lots with the smell of baked urine on the ground.

 

Anyway, I would appreciate your opinions :)

 

Roy

Destin, FL

 

Hi there and welcome to the zaniness.

 

Indeed there are caches which are big rig friendly. Turn-outs and rest stops ... Because Truck Plazas are private property permission issues need to be addressed.

 

And yes there are many truckers involved in this activity. There are some along I-5 in N.W. Calif at truck repair facilities ... the Cache Owner is a trucker and it seems as though his rig was giving him problems. The general theme of the caches was " Fix This !@#$% Truck "

 

have fun and enjoy yourself ... be safe out there.

 

Hi there

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Hi Roy,

Welcome to the game. Your Samsung will be fine to start off with, I started with my car's GPS which is a TomTom XL. Not perfect but it did get me started. I have moved on to a LG P500 smartphone which is better but at some point in the near future I'm looking to get a dedicated GPS unit. My advice is to start with what you have until you are so addicted that you will save every penny to get a good GPS :)

The best way to find caches that are along your routes and on or around the truck stops would be to do a Pocket Query. A PQ is custom geocache search that you can have emailed to you on a daily or weekly basis. Pocket Queries give you the ability to filter your searches so you only receive information on the caches you want to search for. But you will need to be a Premium member to use it.

I hope this helps and good luck recruting other trucker I think its a great idea.

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You folks are the greatest. Thank you for your quick replies. I am headed to check that site out now :) As for the private property issue, I did not even think of that. Thanks for pointing that out as well. As you all can see, I have much to learn, but with the info here and you guy's/gal's vast knowledge, I think I am in the right place! It is good to know that this can be done by anyone in any profession :)

 

I have a Garmin DEZL, but I dont want it to break.. lol. I was checking out the GPSmap60?? For the future maybe. Right now though, I just want to get my feet wet in the game.

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BTW. It is not necessary to get a top of the line model.

 

Many folks use phones and report O.K. results ... not very good to use for hiding, although many folks do.

 

They will all get you to GZ. soooooo ~$100.00 will get you in the game. ( depends how many bells and whistles you want )

 

You mentioned a 60 CSX ... that unit, although now discontinued enjoys an outstanding reputation and has a very loyal user group.

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<snip>

And yes there are many truckers involved in this activity. There are some along I-5 in N.W. Calif at truck repair facilities

Actually just about the full length of I-5 there are caches in the rest stops, some times two. Many of the other interstate rest stops also have caches.

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BTW. It is not necessary to get a top of the line model.

 

Many folks use phones and report O.K. results ... not very good to use for hiding, although many folks do.

 

They will all get you to GZ. soooooo ~$100.00 will get you in the game. ( depends how many bells and whistles you want )

 

You mentioned a 60 CSX ... that unit, although now discontinued enjoys an outstanding reputation and has a very loyal user group.

 

Maybe that is why I found it pretty cheap at the pawn shop, being discontinued and all, but trust me, I wont be looking for the best. I just will come to dislike having to be extremely careful with the phone, though I could put it in an otter box. Plus, I hear the accuracy on a real GPSr is much greater. I shall stick with the phone for a bit and see how it goes. Besides, I wouldn't mind it being off a bit when searching, making the search a tad more difficult. But, if I do ever start hiding, which is in the far future, after I learn the ins and outs, I would like to have a really good unit, so I can give better coords. That is a long way away though. It is great to hear that people are doing okay with phones.

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<snip>

And yes there are many truckers involved in this activity. There are some along I-5 in N.W. Calif at truck repair facilities

Actually just about the full length of I-5 there are caches in the rest stops, some times two. Many of the other interstate rest stops also have caches.

 

I rarely, and I mean rarely get to I5, on purpose!!! I love California and all, just not the 55mph speed limit and their eagerness to conduct inspections. But, next time I do, I will be prepared to go on a hunt :)

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May I ask what kind of GPS you use in your truck to get you down the road????

 

Garmin DEZL, it does have a pedestrian mode, so maybe that could be an option as well I guess.

 

Certainly worth investigating. Recently spent some time in Nevada with a gentleman who had a Garmin Nuvi which consistently placed us within feet of the goods. At times it was necessary to break out the heavy guns to do the deed.

 

Lots of folks using car units, however, ruggedness and battery issues need to be considered.

 

Worthy of note; within 15 - 20 feet time turn the electronics off and the eyes on.

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May I ask what kind of GPS you use in your truck to get you down the road????

 

Garmin DEZL, it does have a pedestrian mode, so maybe that could be an option as well I guess.

 

Certainly worth investigating. Recently spent some time in Nevada with a gentleman who had a Garmin Nuvi which consistently placed us within feet of the goods. At times it was necessary to break out the heavy guns to do the deed.

 

Lots of folks using car units, however, ruggedness and battery issues need to be considered.

 

Worthy of note; within 15 - 20 feet time turn the electronics off and the eyes on.

 

Thank you for the advice. I will definitely keep it in mind. I think I want to use the phone over the dezl though as it, the phone, has the protection pland and the DEZL, if it breaks, I will have issues that adversely affect my ability to make money (routing issues, IFTA logging, etc.) I'll keep checking out the pawn shops though. Seeing as how I pass many very often driving across this great country, I am bound to find a great deal.

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Welcome to the game--let me say you can cache with just about any GPS you can get your hands on. I use an ancient TomTom One 1gb that I've converted to use a program called ttmaps for satellite imagery but you don't have to go that far. All you really need are the Lat/Long measurements which just about any GPS can show you with or without route info, that and knowing what direction the numbers move based on which direction you're walking in (i.e.: Lat numbers go up if you're walking north, Long numbers go up as your walking west, etc) can find you plenty of caches. When my little TomTom runs out of maps (because it only has 1gb) I just rough it and go numbers only until I find what I'm looking for. Rest areas/Truck Pullouts in Idaho generally all have one or two caches within a few hundred yards of the freeway making finding them with a big-rig doable. Use your DEZL to get you to the rest area, then use the numbers on your phone or whatever other inexpensive GPS you've got to walk to the cache!

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Well, a few more questions, sorry. Would a Samsung Galaxy S be sufficient with the neongeo app? I noticed that many of you use the top of the line GPSr's in your hunts, however, I cannot yet afford one.

I began with my phone, and it certainly did the job. The problem was that it only lasts a few hours before the battery is dead. The GPS accuracy was okay, not the best. One time I dropped it, and the corner chipped off. It's nice having an app that connects to the internet and shows the location on a Google map. In places like parking lots, the satellite map view is all you need -- just look at the lines on the pavement and go towards the dot on the map.

 

This year I upgraded to a bottom of the line unit, the garmin etrex venture HC. It is $100 at amazon right now. Battery lasts for days, and the accuracy is great. It's made to be dropped and survive. Downsides are that it has limited memory so it will not show the whole cache description or the hint (limited to about 50 letters). It has a very poor included map, and limited memory to add more maps.

 

So both things have their uses.

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Under "Hide and Seek a Cache", do a search for caches using the Google map feature...should be fairly easy to just scroll along your planned route and see what caches are there. I've found quite a few at truck stops and rest areas along the interstate while travelling, and although they tend to not be the most spectacular caches, there are plenty out there.

 

As far as hiding caches goes, it's highly recommended that you go out and find a whole bunch of caches first....50 would be a good number, I think. For a couple of reasons...first, to make sure that you know you're going to stick with the game for awhile. Too many new cachers out there who run out and hide caches the first weekend they sign up, then two weeks later lose interest and leave the game forever, leaving their poorly planned junk caches unmaintained. So make sure you're going to be in the game for awhile before you take on the responsibility of cache ownership.

 

Second, you'll likely hide better caches once you've found a few and develop a sense of what makes a good cache. Some poor quality hides are the result of newbies who go out and hide what they have seen before in their very limited experience. They simply don't realize yet what makes a great cache because they haven't seen many great ones yet.

 

Finally, you should only hide caches if you know you can properly maintain them. You shouldn't hide caches in faraway locations unless you know you can make it back there in a reasonable amount of time to address maintenance issues, or have a SPECIFIC agreement with a local cacher to do maintenance for you.

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Hello everyone,

I have been researching this "game" of hide and seek for a while now and decided to give it a shot. The problem, however, is that I am a truck driver and it is very hard to get my truck into tight spots in order to seek caches. My question is, are there any other truckers out there with some pointers as to how they partake in this activity?

 

Well, a few more questions, sorry. Would a Samsung Galaxy S be sufficient with the neongeo app? I noticed that many of you use the top of the line GPSr's in your hunts, however, I cannot yet afford one.

 

Also, rest areas, truck stops, places with truck parking, are there caches that exist in these areas? I mean, I am sure there are, but are there enough to keep the average trucker involved? If not, could I hide some once I get familiar with the policies and recruit local cachers to keep them up, as I cannot get thru there as often as I would like(in most areas)

 

What I hope to do from this, is recruit more truckers to join this Team of Hard Rollers to get involved in this activity, because it may be some of the only exercise we get outside of our trucks, and we would have fun doing it. Sure would beat walking around truck stop parking lots with the smell of baked urine on the ground.

 

Anyway, I would appreciate your opinions :)

 

Roy

Destin, FL

 

 

Hi Roy and welcome.

 

I do use an Android and I do use Neongeo. I have found it works great for my present needs as a good quality app. One thing I like most about it is the relationship between the app users and its developer. He constantly works with us to make use of our recommendations and to improve this program continually. I also find it easy to follow the maps and the overall functionality.

 

as others have said have fun and ditto...be safe.

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I do not plan on hiding any for a long, LONG time. As I mentioned, I really want to learn the ins and outs of the game before I even attempt to begin hiding. I am back on the road tomorrow, after some long overdue hometime, so with my premium here and the couple of downloads on the mobile, I will be giving it a shot! I did not download the Groundspeak ap, as neongeo seems to offer just as many features. Thanks again for everyone's response and tips. They are greatly appreciated!

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BTW. It is not necessary to get a top of the line model.

 

Many folks use phones and report O.K. results ... not very good to use for hiding, although many folks do.

 

They will all get you to GZ. soooooo ~$100.00 will get you in the game. ( depends how many bells and whistles you want )

 

You mentioned a 60 CSX ... that unit, although now discontinued enjoys an outstanding reputation and has a very loyal user group.

 

Maybe that is why I found it pretty cheap at the pawn shop, being discontinued and all, but trust me, I wont be looking for the best. I just will come to dislike having to be extremely careful with the phone, though I could put it in an otter box. Plus, I hear the accuracy on a real GPSr is much greater. I shall stick with the phone for a bit and see how it goes. Besides, I wouldn't mind it being off a bit when searching, making the search a tad more difficult. But, if I do ever start hiding, which is in the far future, after I learn the ins and outs, I would like to have a really good unit, so I can give better coords. That is a long way away though. It is great to hear that people are doing okay with phones.

 

You mentioned a GPS Map60, not a Map60CSX. They are not the same unit and not even close as far as performance. Do not buy a Map 60 unless you are getting it very, very cheap (like under $25). It's a unit that uses obsolete technology and doesn't have the best reception. You can find something newer like an eTrex 10 that is inexpensive (around the $100 mark) and will perform far, far better than a GPS Map60.

Edited by briansnat
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My husband uses his Samsung to cache when abroad (in USA) and it's fine for accuracy. Phones might be slower than a GPS and of course the big difference is lack of service/reception cutting off your access to the app.

 

I often use my android (also excellent for accuracy) and I must admit to liking the satellite maps on the geocaching app - in fact I like that app all round and recently uninstalled other geocaching apps as it's all I need on my phone. If you get used to using a phone for geocaching it can take some time to then get used to using a GPS without maps, or with only basic maps, so if you are likely to buy a GPS down the line, it's also worth thinking of going to some events and (after getting to know a few people) seeing what GPS units are like when in use in the field.

Link to comment

BTW. It is not necessary to get a top of the line model.

 

Many folks use phones and report O.K. results ... not very good to use for hiding, although many folks do.

 

They will all get you to GZ. soooooo ~$100.00 will get you in the game. ( depends how many bells and whistles you want )

 

You mentioned a 60 CSX ... that unit, although now discontinued enjoys an outstanding reputation and has a very loyal user group.

 

Maybe that is why I found it pretty cheap at the pawn shop, being discontinued and all, but trust me, I wont be looking for the best. I just will come to dislike having to be extremely careful with the phone, though I could put it in an otter box. Plus, I hear the accuracy on a real GPSr is much greater. I shall stick with the phone for a bit and see how it goes. Besides, I wouldn't mind it being off a bit when searching, making the search a tad more difficult. But, if I do ever start hiding, which is in the far future, after I learn the ins and outs, I would like to have a really good unit, so I can give better coords. That is a long way away though. It is great to hear that people are doing okay with phones.

 

I am one of those in the very loyal user group for the 60CSx. It is lacking some of the bells & whistles of the newer units, but for pin-point accuracy, it can't be beat. In MY opinion, the 60 IS the best. I can afford to move to a newer model, but I won't until I absolutely am forced to.

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May I ask what kind of GPS you use in your truck to get you down the road????

 

Garmin DEZL, it does have a pedestrian mode, so maybe that could be an option as well I guess.

It looks, on the surface at least, that the DEZL is essentially a Nuvi. By using GSAK (a 3rd party program for the Windows platform), the cache page and logs can be loaded in. I use my 60CSx for looking for the cache, and my Nuvi if I need to take a look at the cache page info, as well as for driving to the area of the cache. Its a great combo.

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You mentioned a GPS Map60, not a Map60CSX. They are not the same unit and not even close as far as performance. Do not buy a Map 60 unless you are getting it very, very cheap (like under $25). It's a unit that uses obsolete technology and doesn't have the best reception. You can find something newer like an eTrex 10 that is inexpensive (around the $100 mark) and will perform far, far better than a GPS Map60.

 

Ahhh... good catch!!

Link to comment

BTW. It is not necessary to get a top of the line model.

 

Many folks use phones and report O.K. results ... not very good to use for hiding, although many folks do.

 

They will all get you to GZ. soooooo ~$100.00 will get you in the game. ( depends how many bells and whistles you want )

 

You mentioned a 60 CSX ... that unit, although now discontinued enjoys an outstanding reputation and has a very loyal user group.

 

Maybe that is why I found it pretty cheap at the pawn shop, being discontinued and all, but trust me, I wont be looking for the best. I just will come to dislike having to be extremely careful with the phone, though I could put it in an otter box. Plus, I hear the accuracy on a real GPSr is much greater. I shall stick with the phone for a bit and see how it goes. Besides, I wouldn't mind it being off a bit when searching, making the search a tad more difficult. But, if I do ever start hiding, which is in the far future, after I learn the ins and outs, I would like to have a really good unit, so I can give better coords. That is a long way away though. It is great to hear that people are doing okay with phones.

 

I am one of those in the very loyal user group for the 60CSx. It is lacking some of the bells & whistles of the newer units, but for pin-point accuracy, it can't be beat. In MY opinion, the 60 IS the best. I can afford to move to a newer model, but I won't until I absolutely am forced to.

 

Ditto. I own two of them. I also have an Android and the accuracy stinks.

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You mentioned a GPS Map60, not a Map60CSX. They are not the same unit and not even close as far as performance. Do not buy a Map 60 unless you are getting it very, very cheap (like under $25). It's a unit that uses obsolete technology and doesn't have the best reception. You can find something newer like an eTrex 10 that is inexpensive (around the $100 mark) and will perform far, far better than a GPS Map60.

 

Ahhh... good catch!!

 

It's a very important distniction. I've met more than one person who bought a Map 60 thinking that it was the acclaimed 60CSX and they were very disappointed. The Map 60 was a moderately priced unit and didn't have the high sensitivity receiver or many other features that the high end 60CSX did.

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