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How Did You Get Started Geocaching?


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I was a Geography student at SWT and was in a Field Methods course when another student in class mentioned she had heard of some sort of GPS stash game. I was instantly curious and started randomly searching the internet. I finally found the term geocaching and did a keyword search. That's when I found the website. I lerked around reading posts and new caches until February when I finally signed up, but I still didn't have a GPS and checking one out of the department as an undergrad was nearly impossible. I managed to persuade my boyfriend (later husband)that a GPS was a necessity for school. In April 2001, the eTrex Vista was released and I was the first buyer on the list! The first week of May and I took a Finals study break to find the CenTex Prime cache just outside of San Marcos. From that point on I was hooked! The next semester I was telling everyone about Geocaching and even stuck a couple notes on the Department Bulletin Board with the website.

 

Today, I'm the primary geocacher in the family and I usually grab my dog, Tasha, bring her along on my weekday hunts.

 

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Back in the mid-Seventies (my hippy days) my friends and I, all former Boy Scouts, met each year in the woods for a campout and intoxicant binge.

 

Each year a different friend, using a paper map, would pick a place in the woods of Virginia or West Virginia and mail the others the Lat & Long of the spot. It was up to each to make their way there at a certain date and time.

 

We got pretty good at finding our way in unknown woods. It was a natural progression to our using GPSRs to help us find the spot.

 

When it was time to replace a broken GPSR, I did an internet search on "GPS" and found Geocaching.Com. The rest is, as we say, history.

 

We still do the annual meet in the woods, though now it is more like a multi-cache and we use 4X4's, GPSRs, and a really, really big cooler!

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I have been a competitive orienteer for almost 10 years. I was surfing the Web looking for orienteering sites, and stumbled on geocaching.com. Since I didn't have a GPSr, I just bookmarked the site for future reference. Several months later, I went back to the site, and noticed that the Crosstimbers New World Adventure cache was in a park I was very familiar with. I looked at the Topozone map of the cache site, and figured I could find it without a GPSr, so I did. I did my first 33 caches before I ever got my little yellow eTrex, and I've now found over 100 caches GPS-less.

I've done about 40% of my caches by myself. The other 60% of the time, I've brought my daughter Miss Pumpkin (98 caches), son Curly Tiger (84 caches) and/or my wife Nutri-Mom (44 caches).

 

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My girlfriend's cousin (Globetrotter) was in town for Christmas last year, and he brought his GPS with him, loaded with waypoints for the area. On a warm December day, we all headed out caching, and I was quickly hooked. Brass Affair, now Stone Garden, was our first stop, and I was the person in our group to find it after 45 minutes of searching (coins in cemeteries can be hard to find. icon_smile.gif)

Within a week, I had my own GPS unit, an eTrex Legend, and was out wandering the woods and parks searching for tupperware. I usually cache with my girlfriend, meadowmuffin, and my dad sometimes comes along.

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My girlfriend's cousin (Globetrotter) was in town for Christmas last year, and he brought his GPS with him, loaded with waypoints for the area. On a warm December day, we all headed out caching, and I was quickly hooked. Brass Affair, now Stone Garden, was our first stop, and I was the person in our group to find it after 45 minutes of searching (coins in cemeteries can be hard to find. icon_smile.gif)

Within a week, I had my own GPS unit, an eTrex Legend, and was out wandering the woods and parks searching for tupperware. I usually cache with my girlfriend, meadowmuffin, and my dad sometimes comes along.

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My husband and I did our first highpoint ten years ago, took a long hiatus, and then got back into it last year. I read the Highpoint Forums regularly but rarely post. Someone mentioned a geocache being at one of the highpoints. I'd never heard the term so had to ask, "what's a geocache?". I was pointed to this website and after a brief online discussion on the Highpoint forum as to the suitability of an E-trex, I had one on it's way to me. My first outing included not only my family, but my sister's and cousin's as well. My sister has been with us since and is looking at buying her own GPS.

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I saw Web-ling on a local news program. I already had my little yellow e-trex and thought this is cool. I procrastinated several weeks and tried to find the story again to find the website they had discussed but could not find it. I guess I just lucked out and found this site by accident. The broadcast was last Feb. and I found the site in March. I've been hooked since. icon_cool.gif

 

inceptor

the only difference between men and boys is the price of their toys

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I saw Web-ling on a local news program. I already had my little yellow e-trex and thought this is cool. I procrastinated several weeks and tried to find the story again to find the website they had discussed but could not find it. I guess I just lucked out and found this site by accident. The broadcast was last Feb. and I found the site in March. I've been hooked since. icon_cool.gif

 

inceptor

the only difference between men and boys is the price of their toys

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I read a small article in Outside magazine in December of 2000. I checked out the website and registered, but didn't get really active until a couple of months ago. My fiancée and I were pondering on something interesting to do to get out of the house and enjoy a rare mild Minnesota winter, and I suggested Geocaching. I'll admit, it was just a passing interest to me until we went out and sought our first cache. Now we're both hooked, and I just bagged my 50th find today (not that my find count is important, really, I can quit any time I want to, I just don't want to. It's not addictive, I swear!!!) Happy cachin'!!! 15T

 

www.1800goguard.com

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This past December, the famous Triffid came to speak to my Scout group (Venturing Crew 1776, http://www.blackwatercreek.org/crew1776 [it'll be back up in a few days]) about Trail Building and the International Mountain Bike Association. He threw in a plug for geocaching at the end...I was intrigued!

 

Now, 4 months and 37 cache finds later, I'm doing my best to spread the word to others!

 

Scott

 

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Lynchburg, Virginia

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Read a little blurp in Backpacker magazine about Geocaching ... since I'd owned a GPSr for several years and loved to hike ... I checked it out ... found my first ... actually a first find as well ... the next month and had a cache in NC and Bolivia by the 18th of January! Seriously hooked. Not looking for a cure.

 

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I must have read the same issue of Backpacker Magazine that Hawk-eye did. It was on my list of ''web sites to check out someday'' for quite awhile before I got my round tuit. Got hooked right away when I finally saw what it is. Now, if I could just get hubby to be a little more interested. icon_rolleyes.gif

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I must have read the same issue of Backpacker Magazine that Hawk-eye did. It was on my list of ''web sites to check out someday'' for quite awhile before I got my round tuit. Got hooked right away when I finally saw what it is. Now, if I could just get hubby to be a little more interested. icon_rolleyes.gif

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I owned a GPSR for hiking, camping, trekking, etc long before I knew about geocaching. Last summer while on vacation, my girlfriend was reading a magazine and came accross an article about geocaching. It was just a quick write up, but piqued my interest, the idea of using my GPS to find something was kinda neat. When we got back home, I programmed in the coordinates for a nearby cache...spent a few hours in a copper mine...and have been hooked ever since!

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I was browsing Slashdot one day and came across a post where someone had a set of coordinates as their signature. I was curious, so I clicked the link and it took me to their cache page.

 

I had never heard of this before (although now that I think about it, I do remember some discussions about things to do with a GPSr) so I started reading the Geocaching FAQ.

 

It was the coolest thing I had ever heard of. I hadn't even gone out yet and I was already hooked!

 

I picked a Garmin Legend for my GPSr and headed off that weekend for my first hunt. Last weekend I brought out my wife and daughter for the first time and they enjoyed it as well.

 

This weekend I'm planning on scouting a place to hide my first cache. Wish me luck!

 

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I first heard about geacaching while watching the travel channel. They had geocachers who were wealthy, who were going around the world finding caches. I went into work the next day and did a search on "geocaching" and it took me to geocaching.com. I did a search thinking Albuquerque,NM would not have any caches and was amazed that nearly 100+ were within 20 miles of my house - many within 5. Next day I headed down to REI and picked up my yellow etrex. The rest is history!

 

One good note is that after the initial investment of the GPS - no more money is required.

 

With man, it is impossible, but with God, all things are possible!

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April 2002.

 

I was reading one of my websites of choice... The Straight Dope and something caught my eye... a tiny link about halfway down the page linking to Geocaching.com, and a short introduction to the sport.

 

At the time I didn't have a GPS, so I phoned the one person whom I thought might conceivably have one. He did, but after several hours of searching, couldn't find it. So I went round and helped him look. After a few more hours, I agreed with him that he could not find it, and furthermore, neither could I.

 

We made a trip to a local camping store, and he bought a new GPS - a Vista, and we both went on our first caching hunt.

 

When we got back to his house, we found his GPS, which was marginally annoying, but benefical to me as I ended up buying it. I've still got it, andput it through its paces a little (it has got a few cracks in the screen where I've used it as a throwing tool in misguided attempts to stop the ground from hitting my feet).

 

------

An it harm none, do what ye will

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Our first attempt at geocaching was to escape reality...I guess I should explain that. My husband and I had a couple of difficult years (such as the death of my mother in law, among other things) and felt we needed to find something to get us out of the house. Coincidently a newspaper article came out blasting geocaching and after discounting the idiot who wrote it, it appealed to the wild side of our natures. Tuesday we bought a GPS, Wednesday our home was hit by a microburst, Thursday we had a bad traffic accident (not our fault), Saturday our first cache. Geocaching has become a way for us to escape our troubles (God willing, they are all behind us now). We get exercise, bond, have fun...what more can one ask of life?

 

Till a voice, as bad as Conscience, rang interminable changes

On one everlasting Whisper day and night repeated -- so:

"Something hidden. Go and find it. Go and look behind the Ranges --

"Something lost behind the Ranges. Lost and waiting for you. Go!"

 

Rudyard Kipling , The Explorer 1898

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I was attending a star party and one of the amatuer astronomers there mentioned that she hit a few geocaches on the way to the event. We got to talking about geocaching and I filed it away as a story idea (I write for a rural electric co-op statewide magazine). A couple of months later I found a few geocachers in Missouri and did the story. In the process I got hooked.

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Cool! I noticed a bunch of people that actually seen stuff on tv or in magazines about caching. I actually have a friend that has been doing it since the summer of 2001 and I went along with him a couple times and really had fun. Then last year I decided to buy my own GPSr after listening to a few of my friends bragging about their finds at a party and going on a few more with them. I went out and bought mine last August and have been hooked ever since. I have notebooks with all of the caches listed in them by counties and keep it updated all the time. Now that the weather is breaking and I have the listings for a 100 mile radius, we're planning on having a long pleasant summer searching high and low throughout the region for finds and placing a few ourselves along the way. Look for some of our original wooden caches over the next few months, which are being constructed now.

The Buzzard's: ZiggyStardust

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Markwell...

 

1. How did you find out/start geocaching?

My old boss, Bitbrain, while planing for a canoeing trip found a link to the website while researching the river we were conoeing on.

 

2. Who/what got you started geocaching?

My old boss - Bitbrain

 

3. How often you do it?

Whenever I have free time, but usually on the weekends.

 

4. How long have you been doing it?

Since July 2002

 

5. Spending amounts:

a. Price of GPS

I first bought a Meridigreen off of E-bay for $140. Then sold it and bought a Meridicolor for $400.

 

b. Placing a cache

I always use an ammo containor. ($4)

Trinkets (around $10-$20)

Laminated cache sheets ($5)

 

c. other equipment and prices (lights, ropes, etc)

Trading items ($1-$5)

New Caching bag ($40)

Forever flashlight ($35)

Mt. bike to go caching with ($400)

Personal specialty items ($150 for 1000)

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Several other threads on this, but I'll bite again:

I too found it through slashdot when it first was mentioned back in Sept. 2000. Wish I had registered on gc.com back then!icon_biggrin.gif I already had a GPS for navigation, but not a handheld one. I already enjoyed hiking and backpacking, so it sounded like fun, and a good excuse to buy a new GPS. I looked on the website back then, and the nearest cache to me was hundreds of miles away!icon_frown.gif Sorta filed it away in the back of my mind until late summer of 2001, when I decided to see if "that GPS game website" was still around. WOW! There were a few hundred within 100 miles of my house (now there are 1600!), so I spent about a month reading the forums here and researching what GPS was best for me before actually registering on the site. Been hooked ever since!

 

Tae-Kwon-Leap is not a path to a door, but a road leading forever towards the horizon.

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My wife got me a Legend for this past Christmas knowing my affinity for gadgets being an engineering geek. I did the usual stuff with it at first before I learned of geocaching. Established our property corners, calc'd the area, did a few tracks and routes, collected waypoints of favorite places, etc. I was surfing the web hoping to learn more about antenna types and feeling guilty that the unit was starting to reside in my desk drawer more and more. Ran across several references to geocaching and now I'm hooked. I figure I've been searching for property corners, section corners, and various benchmarks for work related reasons over the years, now might as well pick up a few McToys.

 

It's turned into a great family thing for my boys and me

 

Veni, Vidi, Cachi ...

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I heard about geocaching in a mail list support group for parents of children with attention defecit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). Another mother mentioned it on the list and I immediately went to the site to check it out. It just so happened that my boyfriend was a month late with getting me a birthday present because I just couldn't tell him what I wanted... now I knew and 24 hours later I had a gps in my hands. Two days later on the weekend I dragged the neighborhood kids out on our first caching day. 2 finds/ 1 dnf, I was hooked big time right off the bat.

 

I'd always loved hiking but seldom found incentive to drag myself out there anymore. It seemed like the perfect way to get outdoors again and to create good times for me and my son. I've always described my son as a modern day Daniel Boone, he just does not succeed indoors, let alone in a classroom. This gave him something to succeed at while spending quality time together. He always enjoyed it more if a friend came with us so I'd scout for willing kids everywhere to keep his interest going. We enjoyed about 15 months of caching together when the nasty head of puberty entered our lives and now it's tougher to find friends of his willing to go so he in turn usually does not come along anymore and my boyfriend hates it..just not his bag.

 

It's been a great stress reliever for me though. I've come to love getting out in the woods by myself and get back to nature. It's also a great way to meet new friends with similar interests, have made some great fun friends, though local has taken on a whole new meaning. Just today my mother said "Thank God for geocaching! If you've got to obsess about something, which you do, at least it's something as good for you as this is." and yesterday a long time high school friend said to me "It's so good that you get out there hiking, even on your own." I geuss I'd become pretty much a bore, living my life through my son's failures. It's gotta be better for him too even if he doesn't come with me all the time at least I'm more relaxed and feel better about myself. 22 months and I'm going stronger with it everyday! Yes I am a geocacher and lovin every minute of it!

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I go on nature hikes in the Cleveland Metroparks. A park naturalist takes you on a 2 or 3 hour hike (sometimes longer or shorter) and explains what is going on in nature and what you are looking at. On one of the hikes the naturalist told us that she had found one of the caches while looking for salamanders with a group of children. A short time later the Metroparks decided to get involved in geocaching by placing some of their own caches and having written clues to find them (for those that don't own a GPS.) While the program was in it's planning stage the naturalist (who had been put in charge of it) was keeping me informed of it's progress. The more I found out about it, the more I wanted to try this. Then, about a month after the caches were placed, my sister got me a GPS for my birthday.

That was a year ago. I have found 148 caches, and 8 letterboxes, placed 1 cache (so far), been in the local paper and on tv, and become a volunteer with the Cleveland Metroparks Geocaching program. And I've enjoyed every bit of it.

 

RichardMoore

 

www.geocities.com/richardsrunaway

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HUmm I read something on I think /. and I went to the site. The closest cache to me was at a semi public boat launch at Quantico. The hider had give GPS instructions and some basics using a compass. I went and found teh 5gal bucket using an old military style compass.

 

The site I had gotten the info from was very very basic and to be hoest I cant even recall when that was. I never logged that find on that as I didnt really think about it.

 

More recently I was looking at getting one to play with in my car hooked to a Laptop of a pc that did live tracking and routing ( my Boss has a set up in his SUV that quite trick ) I got it and started cleaning up my book marks and I found the site again. Went out that night and found my "first" cache 6/23/02. Been at it ever since.

 

-Robert

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We were camping up at the lake, sitting around the campfire one morning. A friend of mine had gotten a hold of a newspaper and spotted an article in it about GeoCaching. He passed it to me and it sounded just too cool not to try icon_cool.gif. This was March of 2002 and weve been hooked ever since!!!

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My husband and I have been using a local website for almost 2 years to find good local hikes. One day I was looking for a nearby day hike, and the guy who updates the website had added a link to geocaching.com. I ignored the link that day because we wanted to get out and do some hiking, but it remained in the back of my mind. After we got back from the hike, curiosity got the better of me, and I went back to the website and clicked on the link. 5 days later we owned an eTrex Legend and today, (54 days later) we are at 55 finds and counting... icon_biggrin.gif To my surprise, there are lots of geocachers in my area, and they are so cool! We are now currently working on our first hide!

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I was watching the Travel Channel. Some program about Treasure Hunting (ten best or some such) One of the last ones was about Geocaching. Well my husband saw the gleam in my eyes and for our 3rd anniversary bought me a GPS. I've been hooked ever since.

 

...Running over the same old ground, what have we found?...

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My wife heard about a story on our local news about a 'high tech treasure hunt'. I watched the story and ran into my office to grab my measily Magellan Pioneer (I've come a LONG way with GPSr's since then), found the website and located a cache near me. From then I was hooked.

 

It's been such a great sport, and I appreciate it more and more everyday, as I've been introduced to so many things I may have never taken the time to learn about.

 

Brian

Team A.I.

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I was performing an update for my Gramin eTrex Legend and saw that a new icon for a waypoint called "geocache" accompanied by a "geocache found" icon was added to my current compliment of icons.

I entered this strange word, geocache, into Google and came up with several links, including Garmin's contribution.

After registering, I called my brother and sister and asked what they were doing that weekend... icon_smile.gif

 

"Now, where did I park my car...?"

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After my weekly Friday bank visit, I divvied up the cash as always and gave hubby his weekly portion. I never pay attention to the money but he always looks everything over to see if there are any rare coins or funny notations on the bills. One of the 5s was a "Where's George."

 

We popped on their web site and logged the bill. Neat. Afterwards we explored the site a little and noticed a special section for geocaching. I was thinking geo=George and caching=cashing and that it was maybe a special coin they minted or something. A web search brought up this web site. As I read the FAQ, my eyes nearly popped out of my head. After finding out that there were caches near our house, I started jumping up and down like a maniac. Had a GPSr and our first cache found two days later.

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I was checking out the profile of a fellow Where's George member whose bill I had just hit. It mentioned this thing called 'Geocaching', so I checked it out. I registered here right away and began reading the forums, but didn't actually get my GPSr until a month or two later.

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Started working at my present job in 1999. My boss and his wife are cachers (CacheCows) and I first heard about it from them. I finally got around to trying it Memorial Day weekend of 2002. My first attempt was with my OLD Garmin 45. It seemed so great when I bought it over 10 years ago, but it didn't impress me at all on that first hunt. We got to the park where I knew the cache had to be, turned on the GPS in the parking lot, walked up into the woods to get closer, and lost reception. It was completely useless under ANY trees. Then came the mosquitos, then the rain. First attempt: dismal failure. Got home from the weekend, hit the boards here, saw great reviews of the Garmin 76, hit eBay and had one in hand in less than 2 weeks. Tried it on caches a month later and I was hooked! Have since also purchased a Garmin Rino 120 and now use that. Kept the '76' as a backup. Have since gotten my dad (Tuck-A-Way) into the sport/hobby also. I'm completely hooked!

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