[kc9gbo]

Ed’s Mainstreet in Argonne, great place to eat and freshen up after doing Eagle Source! Food was great and decently priced, we were all impressed.

[kc9gbo]

HP2, I’d believe Challenges are free to place as it doesn’t require you to seek permission from the land administrator. GeoAware was on a podcast I listen to a couple weeks ago and was discussing earthcaching and it was their idea not Gc’s to have every new earthcache have land owner approval to make sure earthcaches did not impact sensitive land areas.
I’m kind of on the fence with this, I can see where they would like to be aware of an earthcache that could lead to a trail across to where the location is and the learning experience, but to charge that much for “paperwork” is ridiculous also. I wonder if there is a Staff Naturalist on site that would work with you to develop the earthcache?

[kc9gbo]

Event is tomorrow! Looks like nice traveling weather!!

[kc9gbo]

LIKE! and hopefully that helps improve the situation in some areas where caches have been placed but no check up done on them recently by the owner.

[kc9gbo]

Got it to export in a .kml file for Google Earth and from there we can convert the file to a standard .gpx file or whatever we need now!! I assume that Nordic stands for cross country sking? and that is the trails which we would use for hiking also, looking at it in Google Earth I can see where the trails kind of go and I see that I missed a few in the test conversion as they must be on a different layer.

[kc9gbo]

From here, it is a free software: http://www.qgis.org/

[kc9gbo]

I took a quick look this morning and it loaded the files into Quantam just fine, now I need to remember how to export them so I can convert them into something usable.

[kc9gbo]

Yeah, the hardest part is the figuring out the process and it would be great to just juggle everything once, but then the map making companies would go out of business.
Like CodeJunkie I’ve played with it enough that I can do it, but not gracefully.

[kc9gbo]

As a side note, I use QuantamGIS for doing some low level changing of what I can into files that the gps will read. It takes a bit and isn’t just a drop it in and go type file change.

[kc9gbo]

Here is a spot to start and maybe they will convert it for us to download: http://www.gpsfiledepot.com/

Only downside with this site is people that don’t have Garmins will have to do some more converting to get the files to be able to use on their gps. I’ve seen a few names I think on that site from here as almost powerusers. I did what you want to do for Pike Lake State Park when I was out there for the Cache Bash and used the trail map I made to guide myself right to the oldest cache without getting lost on another trail.

[kc9gbo]

They sent you the files used in a GIS program, there are several programs that will be able to open them and let you view them. This is where I run into trouble because the ones I’ve found to use don’t seem to export well into a .gpx file which we use in our gps’es.
One program I found is ArcGis if I recall correctly (at work and don’t have my laptop to look it up) that will allow you to view them. I’m fairly certain there are other map people on here that will be able to help both of us out.

[kc9gbo]

Yeah, isn’t that one little thing great? I’ve tried downloading tiger shapefiles for Wis. but haven’t had much luck.
Wish Wis. DNR would catch up to Mn.’s in so many aspects, particularly in the state park sticker.

[kc9gbo]

I have a feeling that she is trying to match up with her finds with where a state forest or state land area is for a challenge I know King Boreas has several for various Mn. DNR lands.
If you can’t get it, give me a call and we can meet up and try and figure out what you need to do as I’m putting something together for a Challenge cache I’m making and may be able to help you out.

I wish the Wis. DNR would get smart like the Mn. and give you a website where you can download the .kml file or trails and parks.

[kc9gbo]

No, Vt I haven’t and yes I see it all over the state also and this could fall into the category of things that will kill the sport. And yes, I will freely admit I do search for them eventually and probably will when I need to find a cache for my day challenge, but to keep going back to places that I was at just a few weeks ago because the hider felt it best to redo it when the cache was perfectly fine rubs me the wrong way.
After spending a fair amount of time this year caching elsewhere while trying to maintain my caches I found it refreshing to get out and find new and interesting locations with caches that are older than a year or two and that were well maintained. As an example I cite King Boreas who has some challenging ones that I’ve found and yet has older caches that he’s kept alive even after them being muggled, yet he also finds new spots to bring people and that to me is the way it should be.

[kc9gbo]

There is that also, that is still in the guidelines.

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