How do I record my current location?

[ottawastones]

I'm using the geocaching app on an iphone.  I want to mark my location (parking lot, trail head, etc) so that at any point I can be guided back to that point, if I'm lost.  Can that be done on the app, or maybe in Google maps?

Thanks for your help

[+Max and 99]

24 minutes ago, ottawastones said:

I'm using the geocaching app on an iphone.  I want to mark my location (parking lot, trail head, etc) so that at any point I can be guided back to that point, if I'm lost.  Can that be done on the app, or maybe in Google maps?

Thanks for your help

I'll tell you the way I do it. Go to any geocache and click the compass. It will show you your current coordinates and your destination coordinates. 

You can also scroll down on the cache page to waypoints and click add a new one. If I remember correctly it automatically shows the current coordinates, but you should confirm that yourself. 

[+kunarion]

2 minutes ago, Max and 99 said:

I'll tell you the way I do it. Go to any geocache and click the compass. It will show you your current coordinates and your destination coordinates. 

You can also scroll down on the cache page to waypoints and click add a new one. If I remember correctly it automatically shows the current coordinates, but you should confirm that yourself. 

 

I just checked and yes, the current location is shown onscreen when you add a waypoint.

[Darwin473]

Optionally, if you skip over to Google Maps, zoom right in to where you are and touch the screen for a moment it'll come up with a "dropped pin" menu. (Zooming in isn't a requirement, it just makes it faster to be accurate because your fingertip is covering 30 feet instead of half a mile on the map)

 

From there you save it and give it a name, go back to your preferred caching app and happily hunt knowing you have the location of the carpark / trailhead etc marked. Note that Google Maps isn't the best at giving directions along terrain (it'll try and guide you to a road or known footpath), but at least you'll know which is the right direction if you get turned around. A hiking app with downloaded topographical maps may be a better option if you do a lot of back-woods caching where there may be little to no data signal. I believe some apps can log as you walk, so you can backtrack along a known path you've already covered. This may be a good thing or a bad thing - I know I tend to go in "the hard way" and then find the wide, thorn-free path after I've found GZ!

 

As a side tip, when I do this I have a naming system so I know which saved pins are important and which ones are naff. Something simple like having temporary ones start with a "z" so they are at the end of the list and you can batch delete them later. Or AAA so they are first on the list so you can easily find them when your battery is getting low.

[+Shawna426]

On 11/6/2021 at 6:14 PM, kunarion said:

 

I just checked and yes, the current location is shown onscreen when you add a waypoint.

Not only that, but you can just tap on it (even though it doesn't look like a button or a link) and it will fill in.  So if I want to mark my car as a waypoint so I can find my way back to it, I decide which cache I want it to be attached to (first or last in the loop I'm doing, usually, if more than one), go into that cache, go into Waypoints, click to create a new one, i personally prefer to rename it "Car" rather than WP1, then tap the current location to fill in the coords, save and close and navigate as usual through the cache(s) until ready to find the car.  Then pull up the cache that had that WP, and navigate to it.  Easier than it seems writing it all out like this.  :-)  (And you don't have to type in the coords at any point).  If you want to have backup, you can also drop a pin in google maps.  Not sure if you can have it navigate you like the geocaching app does, but you can at least walk until you get closer and closer.

[+kunarion]

1 hour ago, Shawna426 said:

Not only that, but you can just tap on it (even though it doesn't look like a button or a link) and it will fill in.  So if I want to mark my car as a waypoint so I can find my way back to it, I decide which cache I want it to be attached to (first or last in the loop I'm doing, usually, if more than one), go into that cache, go into Waypoints, click to create a new one, i personally prefer to rename it "Car" rather than WP1, then tap the current location to fill in the coords, save and close and navigate as usual through the cache(s) until ready to find the car.  Then pull up the cache that had that WP, and navigate to it.  Easier than it seems writing it all out like this.  :-)  (And you don't have to type in the coords at any point).  If you want to have backup, you can also drop a pin in google maps.  Not sure if you can have it navigate you like the geocaching app does, but you can at least walk until you get closer and closer.

Cool, I tried it (tap to fill the coords) and that works! 😀

 

I don’t often use The App for the walking portion of cache navigation, I make new waypoints on my Garmin GPS, and I enter corrected waypoints at home on the web site.  But this may be handy once in a while.

 

But for my car (especially when I’m without my handheld GPS), I’ve used an app called “Anchor Pointer” lately, so it’s completely independent of any finicky apps or devices.  I’m therefore much more likely to be able to find my car.  There are many other such GPS waypoint Apps, but Anchor Pointer was free one day.  Another one that’s great is Commander Compass, which I also got for free, by also watching the sites that show today’s Apps gone free.

 

Edited November 8, 2021 by kunarion

[+Max and 99]

1 hour ago, Shawna426 said:

Not only that, but you can just tap on it (even though it doesn't look like a button or a link) and it will fill in.

Well that's handy!

[ottawastones]

Thanks for the help.  Tried it, worked perfectly.  Feel much more confident now.  My sesnse of direction sucks.

[+Shawna426]

Yeah, I've started caching "at night" (you know, at 5:15 pm), and while I have a decent sense of direction most of the time (aka in daylight), I have ZERO after dark.  It's imperative that I put my car in as a waypoint (and remember which cache I used!), or I'll never find it.  Even in daylight, though, it can be possible to get turned around, and even if I'm generally accurate about the direction to head, being able to zero in on it just like a cache is nice, so you don't pop out onto the road you parked on a few hundred yards from the actual car...

[+captnemo]

I use the waypoint in the App method and it works well.  The only time It doesn't is when I am seeking a cache where there isn't any cell service and I haven't already started the search in the app.  This happened recently where I was using the app and lost all service.  I was able to continue to the cache I was seeking but could not log into the next cache which had the waypoint for the car. Fortunately I had entered the waypoint into my old GPS.