Geocaching : chatty thread

[bumpybecky]

hello geocachers :)

there were lots of outdoorsy shite threads, but now we have our new great outdoors forum, I thought I'd start a new thread for us :)

I am (one of) Dave's Piglings and an in Bedfordshire. We've currently got about 140 finds and 9 caches placed :)

[Mmmcoffee]

140 finds! We've found... ...one. And completely failed to find another five, despite having (apparently) very good 'directions'. We sort of gave up after that.

[MegBusset]

Hello :) Have found many caches over the years but never bothered keeping count. I have currently got two travel bugs in my possession waiting until I go a bit further afield.

[PinkyCheesy]

Hi! Been hoping for a geocaching place on MN for a while. We have been doing this since Sept and have found over 400. I'll admit I have become a bit obsessed . Been brilliant for weight loss though, as I take myself off for 5mile walks while kids are at school.

Any questions, I will do my best to answer. I have read loads on the website and tried to involve myself in the local caching community. (Herts/Cambs border)

[EndoplasmicReticulum]

Hello! We only have 60 finds, I'm aiming for 100 by the end of the year. We set our first cache up a couple of weeks ago, and today we nabbed a geocoin, we're going to take it somewhere tomorrow and send it on its way.

400 since September? Wow. I think I'd have to travel miles to find that many! We go with the boys so 5 miles is about the limit before they start whinging.

[LadyUmamiDeMort]

We're going off to do this cache and the rest in the same series tomorrow. Vair excited, as the cache owners always make a fantastic job of their hides.

We've just broken 250 finds. DH insists we must get one of these now!

[EssieW]

Am in Herts. Nearly at 100 - about 4 to go I think. I mostly cache by myself on bike rides so have limited time. Haven't set any up yet but hoping to release a couple of travel bugs soon.

[PinkyCheesy]

Hi Essie! If by any chance you're in North Herts, are you going to be attending this event next Wednesday? And have you had a go at the fabulous 'Back to Basics' series near Hitchin?

[EndoplasmicReticulum]

A question for you - is it worth getting a premium membership to the geocaching site? Round here, there are very few "premium-only" caches, so I am unconvinced of the benefits.

[PinkyCheesy]

I think it is for me as I travel about quite a lot and come across lots of premium caches. City centre ones quite often are premium to avoid being trashed by newcomers to the game who are only interested in spoiling it for the rest of us (amazingly and sadly this happens more than you would think).

Also, premium members can set up alerts so that they find out about new caches in their area. If you're a competitive type you might want to rush out to get a first-to-find.

There's a few other perks too but it very much depends on how involved you want to get. We started casually but got hooked after a few weeks when we went to an event with 18 new caches laid and a huge group went off rambling round the countryside to find them . Have made lots of interesting new friends too.

[EndoplasmicReticulum]

Ah, that explains why someone found our cache after 20 minutes!

We found 12 today, the most we've got in one day. What I really enjoy is how it takes us to places we'd not otherwise visit.

[PinkyCheesy]

Totally!! I 'found' a 14C manor house the other day owned by a massively famous artist/sculptor, just cos I went for a cache nearby. The cache description just said "nice old house and interesting statues in the garden on your way to the cache"!

[Strawbezza]

Hello fellow geocachers!

I've been caching for almost 4 years and have found 4800+ caches, and hidden 45.

I think premium membership is well worth the money, you get Pocket Queries (PQ's) as well as the details of premium caches.

[LadyUmamiDeMort]

4800

[bumpybecky]

I am very of 4800 in 4 years - I am thwarted by work and children! today was a beautiful day for caching, but too many boring things to do instead. I shall carry on plotting our finds for Easter holidays! :)

as for membership - deffo worth getting the premium thing. Being able to download 1000 caches at once into the gps, searching for caches on a route and alerts for new caches all fantastic :)

[bronze]

I have about ....... Ten. And about 4 we havent found and all but one have been pulled soon after. Not going to get many more for a while as have done all the ones walk able from home

[Strawbezza]

I have some spare time for caching (not enough though!) - and I take the opportunity to cache wherever I go. On Monday my car had its MOT, instead of waiting I walked four miles around the suburbs and bagged four caches.

It's not about the numbers!

[MyleeneCrass]

Has anyone tried finding caches in other countries?

[geogteach]

We have found some in Germany and Iceland.

[bumpybecky]

nope - I've not left the country since 1997! we did manage Wales 4 years ago, but that was before we started caching :)

[Strawbezza]

I've cached in France, Ireland and Hungary. Nowhere has as good maps or footpaths as UK though.

[bumpybecky]

Off to Devon tomorrow :) lots of caches planned for the journey and when we get there. Hopefully we'll have lots of nice easy finds!

[LadyUmamiDeMort]

We've done a few in the US. There seemed to be lots of urban 'in a carpark' type ones, which I don't really like; lurking suspiciously where there are lots of muggles makes me nervous

[Strawbezza]

My least favourites are suburban - e.g. on the back of a road sign whose name happens to fit a theme. Too many curtain-twitchers. And when you write the log, you can't really say "thanks for bringing me to this lovely place...". I hate supermarket carpark ones too, have only done a couple of those literally when I was about 50' away anyway.

[lilyfire]

Experienced cachers please help! We started trying on Saturday and were flushed with success when we found our first cache quite easily. We tackled one with four separate clues on Monday, and we could find the clues - which gave us the co-ordinates for the cache, but I couldn't work out how to put the co-ordinates into my i-phone app. to get to the cache. I was using the i-phone geocache (£6.99) app. I put in co-ordinates (worked out from the clues) after pressing the little flag bit at the top (is that right?) but then the app just wiped them and wouldn't search for them. I thought maybe the app was pointing us to the cache, but in retrospect I think it just kept directing us to the first clue. Does this make any sense? How do you put co-ordinates in on the app? Am I doing it totally wrong? It all looks really exciting, but I feel a bit pathetic.

[bumpybecky]

I have absolutely no idea about the iphone app, sorry!

However, if you've still got the co-ordinates, I'd try putting them into this site which has google maps (can switch to satellite view too) which might help :)