weekend caching

We spent the weekend in Weymouth a place that seems to have a cache every 528ft

After solving all the Olympic rings we decided to hit Weymouth to get them. While we had plenty of dnf s on caches we focused out time on the Olympic series as that was what we were aiming for, getting all the clues for the bonus's.

While we solved them all we hit a brick wall with red bonus 5 and the bonus bonus. The red bonus involves a 5 mile hike or you can drive to a carpark less than 528ft from the cache and pay a huge parking fee for the priviledge which we refused which then meant we couldn't get the bonus bonus either which was a shame.

The series took us to some great locations around Weymouth that most tourists know nothing about and took us on some nice walks. There were a couple of caches I would question as being placed within guidelines, but there was some excellent ideas too.

All in all we enjoyed the whole series and the weather after a windy first night with a power cut to the whole of Weymouth turned out to be a great weekend both weather wise and caching plus time to do other things.

I need a new gps

My poor Oregon 300 which replaced my two etrex s is in a sorry state so I've started the task of looking for a new one, an Oregon 550 as I'm not keen on the new Montana devices. I managed to find one for £260 but still pricey then I thought, if all my unique viewers to my blog donated £1 each I could afford a new gps immediately. But will that happen? Watch this space ....

another 5/5

I qualified for the mario Mctavish 365 day challenge a month ago, so yesterday on a trip to hayling island we picked it up with some drive bys and some caches on hayling itself. Whilst we picked up the last two of the day I popped behind a tree to relieve myself as nature was calling and to my suprise in front of me in the tree was a munzee. So out with my phone to capture it. Whilst I'm not really into munzees if i do come across any now I do capture it with the phone app.

Today I been sorting out some puzzles in Weymouth to do, fed up at staring at the oc screen I turned it off but with a smug grin that there is a good days worth of caching ahead next week :)

Later this week we are going to the camping event up Nottingham way so anyone going feel free to say hi.

depression

Well today I thought I talk about something that affects me, depression.

It's when the brain doesn't get enough serotonin which is the happy stuff naturally found in cocoa. Because my body doesn't make enough of it I have to take tablets to increase it. However exercise also helps, I find geocaching a great way to boost it and today went out with frodo to get some caches that friends had kindly sent me co ords for.

With walking being a prime example recommended by doctors, my doctor always encourages me to get out and go geocaching as not only am I getting exercise to try and boost my serotonin levels but the buzz and feel good factor also from finding a cache brings you up too.

Today we did around Wiltshire, not feeling up for one of stans excellent events we decided to get a few drive bys and do a nice series near littlecote involving traditionals, puzzle, wherigo and a letterbox cache of which frodo enjoyed to especially trying to sniff out sticks at gz and eventually taking one from the stickoflague.

There was a clever safe cache where you had to pick up the co ords and safe combination which we enjoyed, the combination was rather stiff but eventually we got there and the safe opened :)


In the distance we could hear the rolling thunder but stayed dry only seeing rain when we returned to Wantage which had suffered some flash flooding.

What a nice afternoon out, just dread next week all the logging.

an apology

I would like to apologise for any hurt or upset that I have caused anyone recently with my posts. It's been due to frustration and my mental health and I have ashamedly taken it out on my friends and reviewers who I do class as friends too. I must remember this is only a game that we all enjoy, again I'm sorry.

pq s and garmins

Had an interesting chat today so thought I do a blog on getting pq s onto your garmins.

Firstly log onto geocaching.com and click down right side on build pocket queries.

Next create a new query

Name the pq, for this ill call it today, tick day you want then how often you want it to run. Where it says show me 500 caches of change to 1000

Types=any
Containers=any

Then tick: I haven't found, I don't own, are not on my ignore list, is enabled

Tick difficulty and terrain

Leave within and go to from origin and select what you want, here I'm choosing home.

Within a radius leave at whatever

Place during=none selected

I'm not choosing attributes but they are there if you are looking for say a night cache or a scuba cache.

Then click submit information.

Next click on pocket queries at top then go down to tab pocket queries ready for download and click on tab.

Click on the name of picket query you have just created and choose to save.

Open up the zip folder and highlight the two files ending in .gpx one is caches the other is waypoints

Turn on gps and choose delete all routes reset all trip info under settings and then plug into the computer. Open up the garmin folder on the computer open garmin and you will see some files and folders geocache_visits.txt is here for upload if you have done caches (upload field notes on gc site) if you have already done that then delete this file.

Click on gpx folder delete archive and current folders and anything else in here and paste the two .gpx files here renaming the long number as 1.gpx and the other with -wpts.gpx to 1-wpts.gpx and your all done.

However I save mine to memory card which is memory card, garmin, gpx again delete everything in this folder before pasting the two gpx files and renaming them as mentioned in last paragraph, this I find helps them load up quicker

Go to bottom and choose remove hardware and remove all when told to do so unplug and turn on your gps, it will take a moment to load up and if correct when you open geocaching you be able to find caches. If not (and the reason I recommend sd memory cards) is you can turn it off take out the card, turn it back on and load up, reset waypoints and then turn off, reinstall sd card and turn back on, this time they should load up with no problems. If you are unfortunate for them to go down in the field at least with memory card you get the option to remove it and retry.

Hope this blog helps you out if not feel free to comment.

my weekend

Spent much of it rechecking caches wading through water and crawling up tunnels, one I tried when I was 10 but gave up. This became a place for another cache and even found a quick way back in if I need to perform maintenance. This place even led to my old back garden which was cool.

Then looked at a few places to place the very last one which will involve keys, locks and stuff used so far, plus a few new bits. Problem is all the work needed to get this in place so probably be another weekend.

Already have several favourites on my first in the series as well as an attempt on number two. All have to be done in order to do the next stage and so forth.

placing new caches

In the past week I have placed another cache in the all about the numbers series. Problem is trying to find the ideal locations. I looked at the river at steventon where it runs under the road by the cherry tree pub. The problem here is not getting under the tunnel it's the fact you have to trespass a foot to get to it so I had to abandon the idea. Just before I abandoned the idea I thought of using a kyak, however the water wasn't deep enough and too much reeds in water too .

Then back to Wantage, Wantage has about 300 caches in about 5 mile radius, which is great for caching but not for placing caches. On looking at several great locations to place a good cache idea I was stumped, why? A film pot cache that's why. Wherever I look and find the ideal spot for a huge cache it's scarpered by a film pot within 524ft.

Now don't get me wrong I'm guilty as the next for putting a film pot out for the sake of it. But when you trying to put a good size cache out, surely a bigger cache should win priority? I've even been out maintaining and removing caches I feel are just there for the sake of it or too small freeing up space for bigger and better caches.

Just this week I went to the army surplus store to get two big ammo cans for eight quid a can, some where Manky, but after a look at them all I got two good ones, might go back for more.

If people went out and did some of the oldest caches like Coombs hill or the queens oak and saw what size these caches were in the early days, what is in them and how big the logbooks are, then perhaps they would go out to their small caches and archive them and place some bigger caches or find locations which you would want to show someone. After all what would you like to see? An underground tunnel or a bush with disused needles?
Yes there is the chance of it being muggled, but a well placed cache with a lot of thought that's gone into it shouldn't get muggled.

So while I look at places for its all about the numbers 3 and 4 have a think about your own caches or a friends, maybe being honest to yourself and them and think you know what? Our caches are pretty crap along that stretch how about we archive them and place a bigger cache up that tree or in that hollow?

what's geocaching

This is what I was asked today. So how do I explain it?

Geocaching is basically a high tech treasure hunt where you get the co ords off geocaching.com put them onto your gps device and head off in search of the box aka cache.

Once you get down to a few feet you hunt around for the container, this can be small dog tag micro or up to a huge box. They can be devilish as in a cache hidden inside a hollow log to a magnetic sign with a logbook inside it.

As more and more phones come with gps you can download an app to your phone to start with before moving onto a proper gps.

out puztok caching

Out today with frodo, parked at a parking spit off Walton steer near to fiddlers island and did about ten caches including metal bijou s excellent cache at the old swimming baths and four puztox caches, the ones that the reviewers allowed. This brought us to some parts of Oxford that we didn't no existed including a little alley way. We got caught in the rain and the thunderstorm and also filled another d/t thank you simply Paul for the puzzles and placing them :)