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Geocaching is part game, part sport, and part excuse to play with cool high-tech gadgets. The idea was born in May 2000, within a week of the Clinton administration's decision to stop scrambling the signal coordinates beamed to global positioning system (GPS) receivers from an orbiting network of satellites. Suddenly, GPS users could pinpoint their exact location on the planet to within 25 feet, versus the 330 feet that had previously been possible. The increased accuracy spawned geocaching -- a global goodwill game of hide and seek that uses technology originally developed to track troop movements.
Today, between 30,000 and 50,000 geocachers all over the world are hiding, seeking, and finding each other's caches (generally a plastic bucket or box filled with interesting or fun gee-gaws) by downloading coordinates from the Internet and plugging them into handheld GPS units. Here's how you, too, can get coordinated:
Your first stop should be the official Geocaching web site, www.geocaching.com, which is maintained by Jeremy Irish. Here you can look for the coordinates of caches that might be hidden near you, as well as learn more about the history and conventions of the game.
You don't need an expensive GPS unit to be a successful geocacher -- units as inexpensive as $100 will get you to within 20 feet of your goal. It's even possible, thanks to the mapping capabilities of the Internet, to find a cache without a GPS unit -- especially if you're already familiar with the area. At the Geocaching web site, players often provide hints, or even photos, which you can choose to ignore if you want to keep things challenging.
Virtually all caches are hidden outdoors for the simple reason that GPS devices don't work indoors. Local parks and recreation areas are popular cache sites -- so searching for a cache can be a good excuse for a hike or a walk. You could find yourself strolling less than a mile from your house in the city, or hiking over miles of rugged terrain in a wilderness area to find a cache, so check the difficulty rating of a cache before you set out. Finding relatively easy caches are a great way to get kids excited about hiking outdoors, too.
Most caches will contain a notebook and pen so you can write a comment and document your success. They may also contain small prizes such as toys or souvenirs. It's OK to take something from a cache -- as long as you replace it with something else. One thing that should never be added to a cache is food, as it might attract the unwelcome interest of animals.
Should you decide to try hiding your own cache, choose a site
that is enough off the beaten path that it won't be uncovered
(and plundered) by passersby. Also, respect the rights of private
property owners (in other words, get permission), and check
with any managing agency for public lands.
Hiding and searching for a geocache shouldn't mean forgetting
common-sense rules for treating the environment with respect.
Don't place a cache in a location that will force people to
bushwack a new trail or disturb sensitive flora and fauna (grizzly
dens, for example, make poor caches).
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