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A couple of inexpesive items that I think are fairly popular since they seem to disappear quickly from our caches:
Break your own geodes ($6/dozen) We write “geode: smash me” on them so people know what they are
and
playing cards ($8/dozen) Not high quality, but people can always use a spare deck of cards.(edit: one more time – try to fix the URL)
[This message has been edited by abcdmCachers (edited 02-28-2006).]
Even though I usually have my PocketPC along, I still like to change the icons in my GPSr to give an indication of what I’m looking for those times I don’t have it or leave it in the car. It’s easy to customize the icons using GSAK. Since the GPSr icons don’t exactly match the geocaching.com icons, you’ll have to experiment to see which ones are most meaninful to you. Here’s the mapping I use for my Garmin 60c:
Traditional = Geocache
Multi = Stadium (kind of looks like 3 flags)
Event = Bar
Virtual = Bell (kind of looks like the geocaching.com virtual)
Web Cam = Live Theater (smile and sad face)
Mystery = Information (as in need more info)
Earth = Airport
Micro Cache = Medical Facility (they can be painful after all)Of course the downside to doing this is that the next nearest cache feature that Garmin provides doesn’t work because it only looks for nearest waypoints that use the geocache icon. This doesn’t really bother me since I rarely use that feature anyway.
As long as I’m at it, here’s what I use for the generated waypoint description:
(%Dif/%Ter)%bug=* %Name by %ByFor example this generates: (2/1)* Geocache Name by abcdmCachers
* indicates there is a travel bug present in the cache. Of course Garmin will cut off the end if the name is too long (why in this day and age of cheap memory Garmin has description length and waypoint limits is beyond me).
(Acme heart maker: http://www.acme.com/heartmaker)
[This message has been edited by abcdmCachers (edited 02-14-2006).]
I agree – cool idea for a cache. But now that there are programs like GSAK and the one that I wrote that automatically extract embedded coordinates, seems like it would mighty easy to see the picture in your mapping software without walking the walk. (More than easy with the software I use because extra coordinates automatically show). But a combination of coordinates and landmarks would do the trick (e.g. “now walk to the right field fuol pole”).
Yeah, some of the maps are very low resolution (unusable), some are crystal clear – depends on where you are looking. Note that you can turn on the map overlay, so that it shows road names as well as the satellite picture.
djwini, did you get it working yet? If not, here’s some extra info for you or anyone else who may want instructions. When you download the kml file, if you choose the option to save it to your disk, you will then need to do a file/open in Google Earth and select the kml file from the folder that you saved it in. When you exit Google Earth, it will ask if you want to save the Geocaching Info in “MyPlaces”. Select yes so that next time it will be loaded automatically. You can also choose to open the file instead of saving it when you download. In this case it starts Google Earth automatically, with the cache info already loaded. Not sure about this, but I’d be a little leary of doing it this way since I’m guessing the kml file will live in the temporary internet files folder and may eventually go away, but maybe Google Earth is smart enough to copy it. Also note that you need to zoom in a ways before any geocaches show up.
If people haven’t tried this yet, I’d recommend it. When I read the description on geocaching.com, it sounded like since “the link has been set up to work just for you”, that I’d only see caches in my area. But you actually get the caches for wherever you zoom to. I was looking at geocaches in New Orleans and surprised to see quite a few that have been found since Katrina went through.
I don’t have a strong opinion either way, but I will say that one of our favorite trading items that we have picked up in a cache was a button that said something like “I use multi-billion dollar military satellites to find tupperware in the woods. What do YOU do?”. Probably an old joke by now, but we all thought it was hilarious and in fact both kids took turns to wear it to school.
Hi, you may already have purchased by now, but I’ll just mention a couple of things. We have both the Garmin GPS 60 and the GPSMap 60c. Besides the lack of a color display and the lack of maps, the 60 seems identical to the 60c. Maps are nice, but you can definitely geocache without them, so I would give the 60 a thumb’s up. I would make sure that you get one that has a computer connection, which some of the lower end models don’t have. If you get hooked to geocaching (which most people do after their 1st cache), you won’t want to enter all the waypoints by hand.
One final comment, if you want to see and compare units as opposed to purchase online, Casanova’s on Capitol Dr. at 137th has almost every Garmin model in stock (no Magellans) and they will match prices that you find online (within reason, taking shipping into account, etc.) http://www.casanovasadventures.com
Good luck and welcome!
I’ll pretty much echo hogrod’s answer. I use a Pocket PC and have never used a Palm. A couple of benefits of Pocket PC’s not mentioned so far – color displays are standard, and they have pocket versions of Excel and Word which may or may not interest you. I have a Toshiba with wifi and 2 expansion slots (SD and CF) – great features, but I would recommend the hp over this one.
Another thing to consider is that I use the CF slot for a GPS device from Teletype (works great for the car) and the SD card holds detailed street maps and geocaches for many states. If this is something that interests you see my website for more info: http://www.logicweave.com/waypointgen.html
Everyone in our group had shorts and socks. A, B and D managed to stay PI free, but C has a couple of small patches on the ankle and shin of one leg. On the way home we stopped at Walgreens and picked up some PI cleansing soap. Not sure if it did any good 6 hours after the fact, but at one point we had wandered into the middle of a PI field, so I’m guessing it did. I think it could have been much worse considering how much we saw.
Good discussion so far. But it’s too bad we have to have it again and again. Why doesn’t GC.com just add a new log entry for event caches (“found temporary”) and track temporaries separate from events just as they have separate categories for other cache types like multi’s, virtuals and letterboxes. I would think this would end the controversy once and for all. I assume people have asked GC.com management about doing this. What has their response been?
I argued in the past that temporaries are their own beast (see my comments near the end of this topic on 12/8/04: http://wi-geocaching.com/forums/Forum8/HTML/000639.html). I would support a 1 log per event decision, but would prefer a gc.com solution.
I hear you DCExplorer. I’ve never really liked them much either. Just adds too much clutter in caches that are often overflowing. But maybe I’ll start collecting them – that will change my perspective. For the longest time, I didn’t know taking signature items was OK. Are you supposed to trade them, or can you just take them? (We don’t currently have a signature item).
Any chance that these will be permanent caches, or will they be temporaries? I think it would be great if they were permanent, for a little while at least. Would be another fun series, like the 50 SOM’s. (Also avoids all that controversy over logging temporaries!)
Doug
quote:
Originally posted by EnergySaver:
it should be APROXIMATELY N43 44.865 W88 06.193
Here’s a link to the google map for those coordinates: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=N43+44.865+W88+06.193&spn=0.652776,1.035461&hl=en
quote:
Originally posted by EnergySaver:
it should be APROXIMATELY N43 44.865 W88 06.193
Here’s a link to the google map for those coordinates: http://maps.google.com/maps?q=N43+44.865+W88+06.193&spn=0.652776,1.035461&hl=en
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