Tacos for dinner, hard and soft, plenty of meat and salad. Still not satisfied. "Do you wanna...?" There was that look in his eye. He knew we shouldn't do it. So many other things we should be doing .... but I could tell at once what he had in mind. And I wanted it tooo....
Yep - a quick dash out for a cache - Ted's Toybox.
Ahhhhhh, that's better. Time for bed.
Saturday, February 23, 2008
Tuesday, February 19, 2008
Our Brisbane caching experience
Earlier this month we flew to Brisbane for a conference, and of course we managed to fit in some caching while we were there. It didn't take us long, with Queen's Place being found within a couple of hours of arriving.
The next two days were taken up with the conference, but then we got to our free day on Sunday. We had a list of 12 caches on our bookmark list, and the rain wasn't going to stop us trying to find them all. We managed to visit 11 of them, and log eight finds. Most of them made Mr S a bit uncomfortable, being urban caches, but it was a productive visit.
Our two favourite caches were On the Horns of a Dilemna and Lover's Expo. Trying to put The Ringleader back in place posed a challenge for Mr S, and he was starting to panic that it wouldn't go back.
We've put the photos on our Flickr page, so you can see what we got up to.
The next two days were taken up with the conference, but then we got to our free day on Sunday. We had a list of 12 caches on our bookmark list, and the rain wasn't going to stop us trying to find them all. We managed to visit 11 of them, and log eight finds. Most of them made Mr S a bit uncomfortable, being urban caches, but it was a productive visit.
Our two favourite caches were On the Horns of a Dilemna and Lover's Expo. Trying to put The Ringleader back in place posed a challenge for Mr S, and he was starting to panic that it wouldn't go back.
We've put the photos on our Flickr page, so you can see what we got up to.
Friday, February 8, 2008
What a day!
We prepared for our geocache-a-thon by compiling a list of 14 caches to find on the day. They were:
Our second stop was the multi-cache Pemulwuy. We well and truly blew our time limit on this one, taking about 90 minutes. We were making progress for all of this time and didn't feel like we were wasting our time. The first waypoint was hidden very cleverly and we had to try approaching it from a couple of different angles before we got it. Once we found GZ we spent a lot of time on the wrong side of the rock, but it was a quick find once we changed sides. After this success we rewarded ourselves with breakfast.
The next cache we visited, Dead Wood, had one of the craftiest containers we've come across yet. With a muggle in a nearby backyard cleaning his pool, Mr S was a little reluctant to keep searching. Once the muggle went inside, Mr S was happy to continue searching and was finally successful.
It was hidden in a false branch at the base of the tree stump - very clever!
Cache number four was Plugs Leads & Thingymejigs. We didn't log this one, as we used up our 30 minutes trying to find the best way to walk in to the cache. Our TomTom in-car GPS put us close, but in a spot with no walking track. We drove to a spot on the other side of the creek, but again, no trackto be found. Seeing as though we didn't get to GZ we felt justified in not calling it a DNF.
Road Less Trodden was fairly straightforward, with a nice walk in and a quick scramble up the hill to the hiding spot. Previous finders had mentioned the amount of damage that was being done to the vegetation surrounding the cache location, but it didn't look too bad to us.
We were all set to do AO#2 - Ubatuba before lunch, but the track leading to the cache has been closed for 12 weeks while maintenance is being done.
The next cache we visited was Point in the Park, which was pretty easy. The nearby plaques of historic sites gave us an idea for a series of caches we could place.
Hidden Oasis tested our balance skills. Mr S was a bit unsure about this one due to the fence that had to be walked around. The green slimy patch on the weir had Ms S worried, but she conquered her fears and was brave enough to replace the cache.
Ms S did a quick grab of Newline, then we moved on to Wirrabara Waste. This was a special cache for us, as it was the first cache that our travel bug Danny & Delinda visited after we set them free.
We came across another brilliant hide at Thirteen Sixteenth's. Ms S did a good job grabbing this one. The cache was hidden behind one of the round red reflectors that was attached to one of the logs.
Sally's Way and The Park were found in quick time, then it was on to our last cache for the day.
Granny's Scramble was another example of the TomTom putting us close, but in a spot where we couldn't get to the cache. We consulted the old-fashioned street directory, and where ab;e to find a more appropriate place to park. Like most of the previous finders, we missed the easy track in and spent a lot of time trying to find a track that took us in the right direction. Ms S had to overcome her fear of green slippery rocks twice, but got through in the end. We saw two dragonflies near the cache, so we named them Danny and Delinda, after our travel bug. The walk back to the car was much easier, as we found the easy track back. We could see how easy it was to not find it on the way in (unless you were a local with a knowledge of the park).
So that was our first cache-a-thon. We broke our previous record of five finds in one day by finding 11 today. We're on our way to our goal of making 200 finds by the end of the year.
Now that we've found a few caches in the local area, we might need to look further afield for our next cache-a-thon. There are more photos from today and our other geocaching adventures on our Flickr page.
- El Guarda (GCVQZ4)
- Pemulwuy (GCVA58)
- Dead Wood (GC16MDX)
- Plugs Leads & Thingymejigs (GC148PM)
- Road Less Trodden (GC12AR1)
- AO#2 - Ubatuba (GCMMN6)
- Point in the Park (GCTPE7)
- Hidden Oasis (GCTPE2)
- Newline (GC18DA6)
- Wirrabara Waste (GC10XA0)
- Thirteen Sixteenth's (GCWC87)
- Sally's Way (GCMNQX)
- The Park (GCN3X3)
- Granny's Scramble (GCM9XM)
Our second stop was the multi-cache Pemulwuy. We well and truly blew our time limit on this one, taking about 90 minutes. We were making progress for all of this time and didn't feel like we were wasting our time. The first waypoint was hidden very cleverly and we had to try approaching it from a couple of different angles before we got it. Once we found GZ we spent a lot of time on the wrong side of the rock, but it was a quick find once we changed sides. After this success we rewarded ourselves with breakfast.
The next cache we visited, Dead Wood, had one of the craftiest containers we've come across yet. With a muggle in a nearby backyard cleaning his pool, Mr S was a little reluctant to keep searching. Once the muggle went inside, Mr S was happy to continue searching and was finally successful.
It was hidden in a false branch at the base of the tree stump - very clever!
Cache number four was Plugs Leads & Thingymejigs. We didn't log this one, as we used up our 30 minutes trying to find the best way to walk in to the cache. Our TomTom in-car GPS put us close, but in a spot with no walking track. We drove to a spot on the other side of the creek, but again, no trackto be found. Seeing as though we didn't get to GZ we felt justified in not calling it a DNF.
Road Less Trodden was fairly straightforward, with a nice walk in and a quick scramble up the hill to the hiding spot. Previous finders had mentioned the amount of damage that was being done to the vegetation surrounding the cache location, but it didn't look too bad to us.
We were all set to do AO#2 - Ubatuba before lunch, but the track leading to the cache has been closed for 12 weeks while maintenance is being done.
The next cache we visited was Point in the Park, which was pretty easy. The nearby plaques of historic sites gave us an idea for a series of caches we could place.
Hidden Oasis tested our balance skills. Mr S was a bit unsure about this one due to the fence that had to be walked around. The green slimy patch on the weir had Ms S worried, but she conquered her fears and was brave enough to replace the cache.
Ms S did a quick grab of Newline, then we moved on to Wirrabara Waste. This was a special cache for us, as it was the first cache that our travel bug Danny & Delinda visited after we set them free.
We came across another brilliant hide at Thirteen Sixteenth's. Ms S did a good job grabbing this one. The cache was hidden behind one of the round red reflectors that was attached to one of the logs.
Sally's Way and The Park were found in quick time, then it was on to our last cache for the day.
Granny's Scramble was another example of the TomTom putting us close, but in a spot where we couldn't get to the cache. We consulted the old-fashioned street directory, and where ab;e to find a more appropriate place to park. Like most of the previous finders, we missed the easy track in and spent a lot of time trying to find a track that took us in the right direction. Ms S had to overcome her fear of green slippery rocks twice, but got through in the end. We saw two dragonflies near the cache, so we named them Danny and Delinda, after our travel bug. The walk back to the car was much easier, as we found the easy track back. We could see how easy it was to not find it on the way in (unless you were a local with a knowledge of the park).
So that was our first cache-a-thon. We broke our previous record of five finds in one day by finding 11 today. We're on our way to our goal of making 200 finds by the end of the year.
Now that we've found a few caches in the local area, we might need to look further afield for our next cache-a-thon. There are more photos from today and our other geocaching adventures on our Flickr page.
Monday, January 28, 2008
Our cache-a-thon!
Today we did our first "cache-a-thon". We prepared a list of 14 caches that we wanted to find, and set out before 7am to start the hunt. A quick summary of how things went (who said geocaching isn't about the numbers?):
- Number of caches found - 11
- Number of travel bugs/geocoins moved - 6
- Number of dorks who got sunburnt - 2
- Number of spider webs avoided - 72
- Number of spider webs not avoided - 3
- Number of green slimy patches safely negotiated - 2
- Number of sausage sandwiches consumed - 2
- Number of times Ms S told Mr S to"Be Careful!!!" - 27
- Number of things we'd rather have done today - 0
Saturday, January 12, 2008
geocaching 2.0
Geotales - believe it or not
I love this - what a fab idea for a puzzle cache!!
See the youtube video
See the cache page (premium members only)
Gabrielle the Gadget Queen REALLY speaks to me
... so does Marta Skewer and Sharulia
I love this - what a fab idea for a puzzle cache!!
See the youtube video
See the cache page (premium members only)
Gabrielle the Gadget Queen REALLY speaks to me
... so does Marta Skewer and Sharulia
Handheld GPS devices - CHOICE article
When we went shopping for a GPSr last year, I went to CHOICE looking for info to inform a confident shopping trip ... but at that stage could only find tests on car GPS units. However, the current issue of CHOICE (Dec 07/Jan 08 ) has just published an article roadtesting 1o units between AUD299-729 - "Where the hell am I? A handheld GPS uses satellites to guide you through the bush - but don't rely on them alone!" (pp.52-55, Dec 07/Jan 08). Geocaching was not mentioned at all.
The one we bought (Garmin 60) was not in the test - it does not have the map facility ... just vague knowledge of suburbs, but not street level detail. All the models tested came with a basic world map, and included LOWRANCE, GARMIN , and MAGELLAN units. The overall score was made up of "ease of use" (50%), "battery life" (15%), "accuracy" (15%), "acquisition" (10%), and "waterproofing: (10%). Funny that accuracy only attracted 15% ... I guess it's the geocachers more so than the hikers that are more interested in that!!
Garmin eTrex Vista Cx score best overall (83%, $599), closely followed by Garmin eTrex Legend Cx (81%, $499) and Magellan eXplorist 500LE (78%, $650).
The test article is here (subscribers only get the full article, but you can pay per view). Otherwise, trot down to your local library and read the full article for free.
The one we bought (Garmin 60) was not in the test - it does not have the map facility ... just vague knowledge of suburbs, but not street level detail. All the models tested came with a basic world map, and included LOWRANCE, GARMIN , and MAGELLAN units. The overall score was made up of "ease of use" (50%), "battery life" (15%), "accuracy" (15%), "acquisition" (10%), and "waterproofing: (10%). Funny that accuracy only attracted 15% ... I guess it's the geocachers more so than the hikers that are more interested in that!!
Garmin eTrex Vista Cx score best overall (83%, $599), closely followed by Garmin eTrex Legend Cx (81%, $499) and Magellan eXplorist 500LE (78%, $650).
The test article is here (subscribers only get the full article, but you can pay per view). Otherwise, trot down to your local library and read the full article for free.
Friday, January 11, 2008
A 50/50 day
Well, our most recent geocaching trip last weekend wasn't as successful as we hoped it would be. As the title of this post suggests, we found half of the caches that we were looking for. It was a trip to some of our local caches which we hadn't yet visited. We managed to cross Bella Vista (GC101TP) off our to-do list (Serenity Now (GC170DZ) has also been taken care of, having been found the day before), as well as find Run Rabbit Run (GCHK41) (which wasn't actually on our list). Our unsuccessful attempts were on the multi-caches Daniel's Decoy Duck (GC16ZKE) and Stumped...(GC130KD), both hidden by sspack.
The day started off well with a quick find at Run Rabbit Run, thanks to Ms S spotting a likely hiding place which turned out to be spot on. 11am on a sunny Sydney summer day was not prime rabbit-spotting time.
Our next stop was Daniel's Decoy Duck. We had read the clue for this one, so we found a likely spot where the first waypoint would be and started searching. Now, Mr S isn't too fond of urban caches which require loitering and poking around in places that make you look a bit suspicious. He hasn't yet mastered the sneaky search. The location we were looking in didn't have many muggles around, but it was an area that was overlooked by offices and restaurants. Needless to say, Mr S was not comfortable. Our ploy of buying coffees so we at least had an excuse to be hanging around failed when the cafe we went to didn't do take-away coffee. We weren't really in the right frame of mind to be tackling this one, so we moved on.
The next cache we went to was Bella Vista, and it felt good to finally cross this one of our to-do list. The location of this micro had been changed, and we had looked in the original location twice (once after it had moved and we hadn't read the updated logs) with no success. It took us longer to find that it probably should have. Despite the clue changing to reflect its new location, we were perhaps subconsciously influenced by the original location, and assumed that it would be hidden in a similar way. But just as we were about to give up, Mr S did what the clue said and found it. The GPSr was also a bit all over the place, despite the tree cover at GZ being minimal and also being on the top of a hill.
Our final stop for the day was the multi-cache Stumped..., and we certainly were. Mr S was a bit put off by the council worker who was spraying weeds nearby, so waited for him to go before joining the search. Despite having a clue, which we weren't sure was for the first waypoint or the cache itself, and finding an area which matched the clue we weren't able to come up with the goods. Our search was also shortened by the fact that Mr S was getting hungry and wasn't too keen to do any more searching once a muggle family set up their picnic right near where we were looking. Another one to keep on our to-do list.
We're hoping to go for a walk tomorrow morning and cross High Adventure and Lip Lapper off the to-do list.
The day started off well with a quick find at Run Rabbit Run, thanks to Ms S spotting a likely hiding place which turned out to be spot on. 11am on a sunny Sydney summer day was not prime rabbit-spotting time.
Our next stop was Daniel's Decoy Duck. We had read the clue for this one, so we found a likely spot where the first waypoint would be and started searching. Now, Mr S isn't too fond of urban caches which require loitering and poking around in places that make you look a bit suspicious. He hasn't yet mastered the sneaky search. The location we were looking in didn't have many muggles around, but it was an area that was overlooked by offices and restaurants. Needless to say, Mr S was not comfortable. Our ploy of buying coffees so we at least had an excuse to be hanging around failed when the cafe we went to didn't do take-away coffee. We weren't really in the right frame of mind to be tackling this one, so we moved on.
The next cache we went to was Bella Vista, and it felt good to finally cross this one of our to-do list. The location of this micro had been changed, and we had looked in the original location twice (once after it had moved and we hadn't read the updated logs) with no success. It took us longer to find that it probably should have. Despite the clue changing to reflect its new location, we were perhaps subconsciously influenced by the original location, and assumed that it would be hidden in a similar way. But just as we were about to give up, Mr S did what the clue said and found it. The GPSr was also a bit all over the place, despite the tree cover at GZ being minimal and also being on the top of a hill.
Our final stop for the day was the multi-cache Stumped..., and we certainly were. Mr S was a bit put off by the council worker who was spraying weeds nearby, so waited for him to go before joining the search. Despite having a clue, which we weren't sure was for the first waypoint or the cache itself, and finding an area which matched the clue we weren't able to come up with the goods. Our search was also shortened by the fact that Mr S was getting hungry and wasn't too keen to do any more searching once a muggle family set up their picnic right near where we were looking. Another one to keep on our to-do list.
We're hoping to go for a walk tomorrow morning and cross High Adventure and Lip Lapper off the to-do list.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
Posts
