Geocaching - Getting Started Has Never Been Easier!

Years ago, I used to go 'Letterboxing' on walks in Devon with my family.  This may sound like a strange activity, but it added hours of fun to walks in the moors.  Letterboxing consisted of checking each prominent feature along the walk for a small box or canister.  Inside the box (if you were lucky enough to find one) was a stamp and a log book.  You would stamp your log book with the stamp in the box and stamp the log book in the box with the stamp you would take around with you - or just write in the book that you had found it.

This was a little hit and miss as we didn't know the location of these sites - you just hoped with scouring of each wall or boulder; sometimes there was something, sometimes not.  You soon tuned in to which were the most likely places for something to be hidden.  It could add hours to a walk but was very exciting for us.  I think the longest time we were out on one walk was 9 hours.  We found quite a few to keep us going that day.  Pretty exhausted when we got back though!

'Letterboxing' has been given a technological make-over in the form of Geocaching.  No less exciting, but much more hit and much less miss as you follow a GPS coordinate to the site of a box or canister (known as a cache).  When you reach your destination, you still have the challenge of finding the cache, and the excitement of finding out what is inside.  Etiquette is to leave something if you take something from the box by way of an exchange.  You still sign the log book in the cache and can keep your own log book in paper version, on your GPS or online.

www.opencaching.com is a free website that is set up with a great introduction on how to get you started. You can download GPS coordinates for all of the listed caches on the website - all of which you can look up using an area search.  You can then use this website to log when you found the caches. You can even set up your own geocaches and register them at the opencaching website.

If this sounds like something you and your kids (or even just you!) would like to get into, www.opencaching.com is a great place to start.

Garmin have also produced a great geocaching GPS bundle with everything you need to get started.  The bundle includes an eTrex 10 GPS with basemap, a guide to geocaching and the elements you would need to set up your own cache.

For more information, visit www.opencaching.com or take a closer look at the eTrex 10 bundle from Garmin.