Geocaching is like treasure hunting for grownups.
It's also a great fun for the whole family.
Something that I am still having a hard time wrapping my mind around is
that there are treasures stashed all around our little town!
Say what?
Treasures ya'll.
Hidden.
For me to find.
This is the stuff of my childhood AND grownup dreams.
I mean sometimes those treasures are dirty SpongeBob magnets or rusty buttons,
but every now and then, you score.
Like that time we found the cache with glittery blue fingernail polish.
Yes, you read that right. GLITTERY.
But I tell ya, while the treasures are hit and miss, the fun is really in the finding.
The only downside is trying to figure out this GPS.
If a major component of any family activity involves a parental figure
staring into a electronic device for lengthy periods,
kids tend to loose interest real fast.
But I think I'm getting the hang of it.
(Chuck...not so much.)
Since my handheld GPS will only show me how to get somewhere as the dang crow flies,
I plan to use the car GPS to get to each location.
Then once we are out of the car, I'll use the handheld.
The Technical Stuff
Somebody who knows Geocaching feel free to offer up suggestions or tricks of the trade.
I've got a Garmin nuvi 1200 and a handheld Garmin etrex Venture HC.
I'm a premium member of geocaching.com and use easygps.com
to download the waypoints to both devices.
#1 Problem: I am having trouble filtering out the extra small caches. I have used the pocket query feature on geocaching.com to filter these out but they still come in my query.
Kids don't really go for the "log only" types of caches.
#2 Problem: My GPS doesn't indicate what the size caches are, so we don't know what we are looking for. To a kid, it's disappointing to work real hard for a cache and then discover a "log only" situation.
#2 Problem The clues aren't showing up on my GPS.
The clues are what gets the my little girl into it. Otherwise she's just following me around.
This was Charley's first find.
How fun!
If you a take a treasure out, you just put a treasure back in.
Also, sign the logbook.
We're Team Piankatank.
I chose it because:
#1 I couldn't think of anything else in the whole world.
#2 It's another term for the area in which we live.
#3 I think the word is funny. It makes me want to sing Badonkadonk, Badonkadonk. And that makes me laugh, because it is an unbelievably ridiculous song.
(Spoiler alert)
(Another Spoiler Alert)
This is crazy.
Treasures planted all around my town and in most every town I want to travel to?
I must be dreaming.