Geocaching - where to start

[Pleiades45]

I've been looking at Geocaching as a new interest for the family, in particular as something we can do when camping. We live in North Wales so there seem to be lots of caches around (in fact there appears to be one on the other side of the street across from our house) and we do have a Garmin GPS which we probably need to update to help with this.

I haven't registered yet, and have been trying to figure out if all geocaching is registered on the one global site (looks like an American site) or whether there are other sites?

What else do I need to know or have? I believe that some caches have smalls gifts. What items would be suitable as a stash of gifts to keep in a bag to carry along?

Does anyone keep their own record of sites they have visited or is this information easily accessible from the global site? I was thinking the children could do diaries with photos. If so, any hints on what might be useful to record?

You can log it all on geocaching.com

Log your find and it shows on the map which ones you have done. We usually take a photo too

geocaching.com is the site. choose a family name and get registered its free ( dont bother with the premier membership for now) when you log in you have your own page, for each cach you find you leave a "found it" log for each cache, the caches have their own page with pictures and all the log entries. Your kids would probably love to send put their own trackables too. For these you have to buy a trackable tag (info on web site) you attach this to your item that you want to send off on its travels. The tags have unique codes and when you register it you set up its web page. My dd has wooden reindeer, its mission is to visit chocolate shops and factories, its currently in canada, we also have a wee figure whos mission is to take over the world. Other grocachers pick them up and drop thrm off in caches. Other option is to keep hold of ypur own trackable and "dip" it in each cache you find. This would give you an online record of all your caches together on one page, kids could have one each and add their own log entries and pictures. Have fun.

oh yes and of course stash to leave in caches, my kids are teens but dd still likes to find badges. We tend to leave pirate coins, diamonds and other party bag items, crap items to leave are anytgings kids wouldnt be excited to find, like bus tickets and rubbish like that.

Can someone explain to me (thick person) how it works. I don't understand.

there are caches all over the world hidden by other cachers. each cache has a web page with its coordinates, description and clues, plus a log of who has found it or not found it. You download or entet the coordinates into your gps device or use the apps if you phone has gps. then you follow the arrow to find the cache or like me if phone is rubbish use the maps and aeirl pics plus clues. each cache contains at least a paper log to sign and bigger oned have swaps. they range from nanos which are about the size of a valve cap to varoius sizes of tupperware tubs and some really huge crates etc.

Playingwithbuses, thanks for such a detailed reply. I've created an account so now we need to find a cache and log it. I'll look into the trackables and get a stash of things to leave at caches.

If I buy a trackable or 2 for the boys, do we need to create our own cache for them to be located for the first time, or does etiquette allow that you put them in a cache you find?

You can drop your trackables into any cache you like. When you log a find on a cache, there is also an option to drop trackables in there.

We now have 3 trackable tags. I have activated one and was asked if this was a collectible. I've not seen any reference to this before, what does this mean?

'Collectible' is an extremely confusing term in the geocaching world!

If you want to set the TB travelling and don't want anyone else to put it into their collection (which is what I would expect) then set it to 'Not Collectible'. Other cachers can then 'retrieve' and 'drop' the TB, but can't move it to their own collection.

If you are keeping the TB for yourself, set it to 'Collectible'. Other cachers can only 'discover' the TB, they can't do anything else.

only just got a chance to look at this again. Thanks for the reply about the collectible bit. We're off tomorrow. Found our first cache last weekend and the excitement with the boys was awesome!