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Things sure have changed!


Max and 99

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I was doing some fall cleaning and came across some Geocaching flyers from quite some time ago. 

A couple things that stood out to me:

* Write about your find in the cache logbook (I don't see that much these days).

* Print cache information (don't forget the hints).

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What are some big changes you've seen from your first days of geocaching.

I was very late to the smart phone era, and apps were not a thing in my cheap phone. I never imagined I'd be using an app to find geocaches, but now it's the primary way I play the game. 

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Really big changes in GPSr's - my first one (2001) had a monochrome screen without maps, just points for cities.  It's read-out was in decimal miles so the best it could show was .01 miles (about 53 feet) - so walking down the trail I'd put a mark when it showed 0.0, then continue until it read .01 again, mark there and start at the half way point between them.  It could hold 500 waypoints - just name, GC number and co-ords.  It had two multiplex channels that would switch between the 12 sat's it could read, so accuracy was, let's say, interesting (you could be walking towards GC following the arrow and it would suddenly snap around and point backwards, and then snap back as it's calculations put you 'behind' the last spot it calculated).

 

I can recall the discussions here about the difficulty level of a film can - could it be less than a 3* hide?  Also, if the new (back then) mapping units were cheating, it made is so much easier to find the way to the cache (it's so much safer now, no reading paper maps while driving and guessing which road to follow while zeroing on GC - of course we always cussed out the CO that hid near the edge of the map in the Thomas Guide Book Maps...).

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10 hours ago, Max and 99 said:

What are some big changes you've seen from your first days of geocaching.

I was very late to the smart phone era, and apps were not a thing in my cheap phone. I never imagined I'd be using an app to find geocaches, but now it's the primary way I play the game. 

 

The change to caches placed in areas that aren't interesting at all was the first. 

 - Parking lots, dumpsters and even porta potties not an destination we'd travel to visit.

Cache log fun is another.  Barefootjeff's little jots in a notepad examples not even close to what we've seen earlier.

 - Now you're lucky to get anything in the online log as well.  How many are still seeing trades and trackables even mentioned today ? 

The change from what many earlier recognized as a hobby,  to a game is too, with 3rd party sites devoted to stats.

 

The other 2/3rds used a blackberry in '05 to find caches (Trimble app), but IIRC, it only helped find caches, not the bells/whistles of today.

When the first "official" app came out, she picked up an iphone, but still waited most times to get home to log on a PC.

Between both of us, we've used every OS to cache.  She only used the phone for quick things while shopping or at the doctors.

I finally gave up sorta-smart phones altogether last year.

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Common cache descriptions in 2019:

 

"Part of the ABC series along XYZ Road.  Just another one for the numbers.  Easy P&G."

 

Common cache descriptions in 2002 contained:

 

- A summary of the area I'd be visiting, and why it was cool

- Directions on how best to approach the cache

- Detailed listing of the cache contents (often themed)

- Warnings about any expected hazards (ticks, mud, stream crossings, snakes, etc.)

 

On Labor Day weekend I took a group of geocachers visiting from out of town to several of my caches, including two that I hadn't visited in years.  They were ammo boxes in great shape with the original logbooks from 15 years ago.  But I was most surprised to re-read my own cache descriptions - they were long, engaging stories.

 

Few geocachers read them anymore, I'd bet. One of the caches had been visited four times this year, mainly because a series of 30 caches grew up around it.  The other cache had only been found once this year; it's all by itself in a wooded valley.

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I am returning to the world of geocaching, but find that using a cell phone to do this is so different from my caching past.

is there anyone that would like to mentor me in the ways of using the new technology?

Particularly, does any one have info on using my US android when out of the US? I would like to do my downloads and such when on WiFi and not have to pay the verizon extortion fees. 

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23 minutes ago, Haicoole said:

I am returning to the world of geocaching, but find that using a cell phone to do this is so different from my caching past.

is there anyone that would like to mentor me in the ways of using the new technology?

Particularly, does any one have info on using my US android when out of the US? I would like to do my downloads and such when on WiFi and not have to pay the verizon extortion fees. 

It's wonderful to see you back in the game.  Most forum participants will not know of your contribution to geocaching history - the Northern California DeLorme Challenge.  The growth of challenge caches is definitely something that's changed over the years!

 

You can most certainly cache outside the USA without eating up smartphone data.  Download cache data and maps to your phone over wifi and save the info for offline use.  Put your phone into airplane mode, fire up your geocaching app, and venture out.  The GPS works, and you've saved the info you need!  I've done this for trips to four foreign countries.

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8 hours ago, The Leprechauns said:

Common cache descriptions in 2002 contained:

 

- A summary of the area I'd be visiting, and why it was cool

- Directions on how best to approach the cache

- Detailed listing of the cache contents (often themed)

- Warnings about any expected hazards (ticks, mud, stream crossings, snakes, etc.)

 

There are a fair few cache descriptions from back in the day that were one liners or almost.  Given the overall number of caches was so much less back then, I wonder if the *proportion* of short vs long descriptions was similar...

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