Geocaching

“Thanks Mr.Gordon (I mean it) because I need to see the other side of the coin. But if you read carefully, there was no criminal intentions.

On a more synical note..is it safe to assume that you feel there is nothing wrong with a law enforcment official dramatically over-embellishing a situation, condone trumped-up charges and support false accusations? Apparently you do.”

“Buddur, it my experience with law enforcement officials, they "puff" up the case to the same extent that the Defendant "puffs" his innocence. More often than not, the absolute truth lies somewhere in between. I concur that you had no "criminal intent". However, not guilty and innocent are two different terms. IMHO.”

“The NPS opposition to geocaching is well known and has been publicized since the sport began. The geocaching web page carries a disclaimer to that effect. Claiming ignorance has never been a valid defense and won't be in this case. Even if there was no criminal intent a legal violation did occur. Whether the NPS policy is reasonable or makes sense is not the issue here. If you feel it is unjust you can always plead your case to the Federal magistrate. I personally feel their stance is unreasonable and caching can be a relatively harmless form of outdoor recreation, but the Director of the NPS did not solicit my opinion. So work to change the policy, but until the policy is changed we must obey it.


The Forest Service and BLM apparently do not have an official policy on geocaching (yet), leaving it to local managers to regulate as needed. Locally here, the FS is aware of geocaching, even monitors the cache locations. None have been a problem yet so they are hands off.”

“But we had a similar incidence where we hunt elk and deer. We park our trailers at a trailhead, which is allowed, and we drive down the road to where there is a trail that gets us up and into the hunting area.

The problem is there is a two-track road that runs from the main road to about 1/3 of a mile to the trail. This road has been there for as long as anyone can remember. One guy has hunted there for over 25 years.

After a morning hunt, we were sitting around the trucks when the forest service drove up the two-track. They threatened to ticket us for driving off the main road and on a road that was not marked for access. The forest service puts a little sign with a white arrow on brown background where you CAN drive.

Our response to them was if we are not supposed to drive up the road, how come they just did? They never did come up with a good answer and they didn't ticket us, and they have not closed the road.

Just a couple of moronic rangers who had been transferred in from another state recently.

The wierd thing is they were at our trailers prior to that giving a hunter from Wisconsin a hard time because he had drug a deer he had killed into the trailhead where he was waiting for a ride to come pick him up. They threatened to ticket him because he was in our trailer warming up and NOT in posession of his kill.

Some rangers are just moronic. But there are some who are reasonable and logical.”

“The crimes and abuses of the few, effect the many.

I can't take my dog into many areas because of the ignorance of a few people that don't obey the rules. I say, throw tampons everywhere, especially the one with the wings...and the extra wides.”

“Stop your whining. You knew Geocaching was not allowed in National Parks. You knew that dogs were not allowed. Get it through your thick skull that dogs do have a negative impact on wildlife and wilderness. Stop being so selfish. Your original comments are no longer included in the cache details. Did you include information about dogs? Did you encourage people to bring their dogs or warn them that dogs are not allowed? I don't know how why can defend dogs in the Park when one of the posters specifically mentions a deer chase that knocked over a child and probably injured the deer.”

“You can shove it up your bearded clam, Mr.bacpac. You and your false accusations are as wrong as the park rangers. Unfortunately, it's people like you that from a whim bring up subjects to light and unfoundedly accuse, and then from there it is just assumed that is the case until proven otherwise. How am I to prove you're worng other than saying "You're worng!"...when you ARE wrong.

Those geocaches were placed a year and a half ago back when the area was a National Recreational Area, and the Park Rangers have known they were there and yet never removed them themselves, and I did NOT know there were laws in forbidding this in any shape or form, and I was NOT directly contaced or indirectly informed to remove them. And dogs are allowed you dikhead, just not offleash, it's just that you're anal when it comes to your stance of how much you dislike dogs and therefore you who truely knows nothing of this situation now also unjustly makes a mountion out of a molehill. And I didn't encourage dogs to be brought you a$$wipe, and you won't find it on the cache pages because it was not and never was stated. OK 3 posts of about 20 indicated they brought dogs and only 1 of these mentioned a dog chased a deer. Bid whippidy doo...Do you know anything about the area???,the housing development to the west with dogs constantly running loose through this area, the roadkill from the nearby roads, the roar of Harley Davidsons down Wheatley Road adjacent to this area, the refuse that makes it's way downstream, etc. etc. and so on and so forth. And the issue is one dog???? You're F-in clueless old man! Unfortunately it's people like you that make problems worse for others by your own petty stickman accusations, sure they sound good and appear valid coming from the mouth, regardlesss to the fact that it's actually untrue, unfounded and drastically over exemplified. It's people like you that make something from nothing and exhasterbate problems for others by YOUR OWN false accusations. Ba$tard!”

“YOU and your remarks, coming from a person who has 2 caches in State Parks. Of course SPs MUST allow them or you wouldn't have placed them in the first place, right? But what is the difference between a SP and a NF, a name designation that provides different rules to the land? Is that it? Are they truely any different, I wonder.

You do NOT make any mention of dogs in YOUR writeup stating not to bring them, keep them on a leash and whatnot. How do you know the parties that found your caches didn't bring dogs, and that wilderness and wildlife weren't disturbed? What a hypocrite you are.”

“Hi, thought I'd chirp in on this. :-)

I wrote an article on geocaching for our paper. The "find" I referred to is located under an old railroad bridge on a very popular state bike trail. I did have concerns that in giving that much information, that the state DNR might come and remove it -- ya know, figuring someone might fall in the river while searching?

To my knowledge, they haven't, which makes me happy. In fact, according to the page for that cache, a DNR trail guy said he tried geocaching and found it after my story. (I posted a note on the page. He wrote me back, so I have info on him, intending to do a follow-up story... so I could ask him what Minnesota DNR officials think about it.)

However, while it's great to want to place the caches everywhere, in reality you can't. National parks are out. At this point, I think good locations might be county conservation areas... places that are cool to find and your average Joe Blow house hubby/wife don't know about them. And they are usually very happy to find these locations, as evidenced in so many posts on the geocaching website.

Yet there is another part of me that does worry about damage to the land. I have hunted some caches that, when I got in the specific area and still wasn't finding it, I looked for disturbed and bare ground. Let's say, around the base of a tree.

I was hunting a cache in the Chicago suburbs I found that way. Looked for the tree trunk with bare dirt around. Hmmmmmmm, only one really looked bad. Sure enough, the cache was in a hole in that tree's trunk.

I've seen this other places as well. Get to the general vicinity and just look for what might seem at first glance to be a game trail heading off the main trail -- except you might see the tracks of boot lugs instead.

Maybe it's just because I was hunting during winter -- and the ground was bare (no snow) and much more susceptible to tracks -- but I've noticed this at pretty much all the caches I've been to. I'll have to see how bad it is when there is vegetation and brush around in the spring and summer.

I really like caching... the whole idea, the hiding, the search, the discovery of new, cool locations... but I'd be lying if I said the wear and tear on an area to reach a cache doesn't concern me.

I don't know what a happy medium is. It will be an evolving sport and something will be compromised on, I imagine.”

“I only hide things I don't want somebody else to find.”

“Buddur, Buddur, Buddur. You continue to ignore the consequences of your actions. You refuted the NPS claim that dogs were part of the problem. Evidence shows that that there were problems with dogs. There were carvings on trees. It has been widely published that the NPS does not allow caches. It has been discussed in this forum. Continuing to claim ignorance is no excuse.

I am wrong, the rangers are wrong, and anyone that doesn't overlook your illegal action is wrong is that it? You give geocaching and all geocachers a bad name.”

“From the geocaching FAQ...

"* Will it be on private or public land? - If you place it on private land, please ask permission before putting it there! If you place the cache on public lands you need to contact the managing agency to find out about their rules. You will be in violation of federal regulation by placing a cache in any area administered by the National Park Service (US). The National Park regulations are intended to protect the fragile environment, and historical and cultural areas found in the parks."

From Buddur...

"(4)Dogs distubing wildlife I know nothing about...There have been only 3 posts from Furnace Run cachers that stated they brought dogs with them. Does that mean wildlife was truely disturbed? A dog in the wilderness does not a disturbed wildlife make!"

From Buddur's cache logs...

"August 8, 2001 by Search Buddies (27 found)
Found cache late in the evening...needed to be sure enough daylight remained for the way back. Took bottle opener and left thermometer. Literally watch for deer on this one. Bailey, golden retriever, went up a slope on the side of the hill and evidently spooked a young deer that leaped out of the woods onto our grandsons back, knocking him into the creek. He is OK, Thank God. Thought we would see some deer on the route to the cache but didn't want to see one this way. If you don't mind getting your feet wet this is a different kind of trail."

I haven't fibbed, I have made no false accusations.”

“When I placed the caches there were NO disclaimers, etc. And I'm supposed to read the FAQ, lurk the forums and read every post and article written about the subject??? I placed the caches about 1.5 years ago, and since then every so often get an Email saying someone found the caches. That's it.

OK, I quickly scanned the posts in seach of the presence of dogs and missed the one post states 1 deer was definitly spooked. I too have almost been run over by deer, deer run through the woods all the time and if you're in the worng spot they'll run right past you. You're a hunter, you should know this, and I'll bet this has happened to you too. And yet, the deer were disturbed??? Spooked...they ran...but were they really disturbed??? Deer get spooked all the time by natural and man-made phenomena...much more often than one time in 1.5 years by a cacher and their dog. Frankly, this all seems so silly, a hunter worrying about the mental stress of a spooked deer hundreds of miles away. Why don't we just hunt, shoot it, gut and clean it and bring it home for dinner. That's more like it, right?

You know nothing about my caches and have not been to their locations and found them and therefore cannot make valid claims wrt them. You can read the posts and derive enough to also make something from in reality nothing. I'm not giving caching a bad name, it's the overembellishment of the effects by the Rangers who have tarnished the name of this ONE cache. They blew things out of proportion and what am I supposed to do, keep my mouth shut and let everyone who reads the NPS comments believe they are true, or do I speak up and take a chance of irritating the NPS by clarifying the embellished claims?

It's already bad enough when a Park Ranger trumps up charges and overembellishes the fact that wildlife was disturbed, all making the situation seem much worse that it truely is. But what really burns me up is when people like you who know nothing about the cache and it's location make MORE accusations as in your 4/13/02 post about me purposely not including info about dogs, etc to purposely misinform cachers.

You just get off pushing peoples buttons and poking sticks, and you do a fine job of it.”

“Budder, you want to sound off as the victim of a conspiracy by the National Park Service, but the NPS has a policy against caches no matter what the reason. The Rangers didn't trump up charges, they didn't have to.”

“I'm no victim of any conspiracy and I don't claim to be, I'm just saying that a "mountain was made out of a molehill" wrt the effects of that one cache. It was obvious the ATV tracks which never came close to the cache were from someone who frequents the area, and yet the presence of the cache was to blame. With this came petty implications that made the situation seem worse than it truely is. Maybe charges weren't *trumped up* per sa...they just jumped to conclusions!”

“not all nps sites are anti dog...Ozark Scenic riverways is cool with them. My comment is that the desecrations of the "FEW" effect the many. I have no problems with obeying the rules, as was hashed out some months ago...Oh yeah...BTW...ya gonna make the canoe trip in May?”

“Watch out for the black helicopters silently hovering over caches.”

“Guess I better obtain a list of geocaches so I don't stumble into trouble. Oops, there goes a black helicopter chasing a cach seeking dog. LOL.”

“Just saw on www.geocaching.com that a cache I wanted to hunt has been returned to the people who placed it by a park ranger.

Seems geocaches are no longer allowed in Minnesota state parks. (Although the stupid ranger posted it as a "FIND".... GEEZZZZZZZZZ.. lol! And then he told how it was no longer allowed.)”

“How do you post such grammatically perfect posts, Ms.lizs? Do you write your posts in a word program, spellcheck, then cut and paste your post? Or do you read, re-read and correct your posts prior to posting them?

The NPS and subsideriaries don't like people touching THEIR land, um...wait a minute...isn't it supposed to be OUR land??? It's obvious that if the NPS wanted to put out caches, they would, but it's just that they don't like people beating them to the punch. They allow themselves alot of leeway as to what they can do themselves to the land, but restrict everyone else who may do activities that are much less detrimental to the wilderness and wildlife.

You watch... Soon most parks will have their own geocaches, placed by none other than NPS representatives.”

“Who would place a cache by a ranger? Seems like they were just asking for trouble.”

“NOT grammatically perfect. LMAO! Good catch, Violin. (And it's a curse that I catch everyone else's stuff, and then need someone else to catch mine. My posts usually have errors.)

And Buddur, interesting point. Maybe that will happen. This is a state park... how many states will follow their example? I keep expecting to see caches used as tourism or other type of business/commercial "lures." I bet that will happen, too.

Our county already had a "Discover Winneshiek (County)" promotion by the local tourism council three summers ago. You had to find the answers to questions by visiting farflung county conservation parks. Find them all and you qualified for a prize. No coordinates, no GPS, but the same kind of idea.

We have a Laura Ingalls Wilder site in the county. I could readily see placing a cache somewhere on that property to help increase their visitation numbers by what had been an unknown audience: geocachers.

Or how about one in a store, or used car lot, or whatever... to get people into the business? I would expect a lot more of that type thing to happen.”

“I have no problem catching Geos, they slow down traffic with their little squeaky wheels and lawnmower engines they should STAY OFF THE ROAD.”

“I've heard of rangers takeing the caches also, but not yet in Yosemite.”

“LMAO, steve hiker. Good'un!!”

“thinair, there shouldn't be geocaches in Yosemite, as it's a national park.”

“Why ?”

“NPS policy is geocaches are inconsistent with the NPS mission.

I know it doesn't make any sense, but that's the policy.”

“Well we will just have to leave more there then! I'm sure they have better things to do than to remove them.”

“Stick to National Forest or BLM land. Those two agencies have no national policy on geocaching, leaving it to local managers to deal with them on a case-by-case basis. Isn't that the way we all want it to be?”

“I took my two children (12 and 8) on our first geocaching experience yesterday. I was afraid they would find it too boring and dull. However, they managed to completely take over the project. We found 5 of 6 during the day. My son quickly mastered the e-trex learning as much about it in about 15 minutes as I did in a week. My daughter took it upon herself to organize the geocache information into a notebook and to keep records of the time and date that we made the finds. She also kept a record of what we took out and put in the cache. All in all it was pretty amazing to watch them get excited about it. They both want to turn it into a science project.

Next time they are here, we are placing a geocache. They will spend the next two weeks gathering what they want to put in the box. They have already learned about "travel bugs" and have decided we should put one in our cache.

It is certainly refreshing to find out that ole' Dad can come up with a "cool" thing to do on weekends.”

“LOL!! Fun stuff, eh, chili? (And I still haven't figured out all the Etrex's features... heck, I lost the book while I was OUT GEOCACHING. LOLOL!! Yes, I know I can print out a full guide from their site... I just haven't yet.)

You know now, to be really "cool," you need to purchase the travel bug tags from the www.geocaching.com website. I think the tags are barcoded. You put them on your bugs to more easily keep track of them.

You can also purchase travel bugs themselves from there. But I think you can come up with a cute one on your own. Just put the site's tags on it.

I'll never forget the poor travel bug that got within like 1 mile of its destination, given as a riddle. It needed to go to the highest point in Missouri. Some dipwad never looked at the information on it, took it from the nearby cache and it ended up probably a thousand miles away.

He apologized...... and now the travel bug is totally unaccounted for. Oh well... so goes life... and GEOCACHING!! lol

Right now the one and only geocache I've placed is AWOL. Well, one person couldn't find it anyhoo. I need to get out and check it.”

“Right on, Chili! I just scored some Nat Geo Topo CDs and so I'm ready to get on with some Geocaching!”

“My kids are hooked. We found 5 Sunday. They are now to the point they can find them in short order. My daughter found one that my son and I had stepped over at least twice. It had a camo cover and was tucked under a log.”

“With some kids, you almost don't need the GPSr.

Went caching with a friend and her daughter and friend, while we were trying to understand the directions Nephews Cache the girls figured out where it was.

See how long it takes you to figure it out.....”

“this looks really cool. there are tons of these things within a few minutes of my house.”

“Looks like there are 20 or so caches within 20 miles of my house so...I'm going hunting soon!

My eTrex is set for
WGS84

Question...should I use
HDDD MM.MMM or UTM ?

I have the Topo! CA program ...it will do either one.
Which is easier for a GPS newbie?”

“Windwalker - If you are using a USGS topo map, UTM is much easier. If you have a GPS with a downloadable map, I am not sure it matters very much...I suppose it depends on the accuracy of what you were given.”

“Unless I am mistaken, the Geocaching.com site (if thats what your using) uses degrees min min or Dº M.M' for lat and long.

You can usually set your GPS up to read two different coord systems, use what works best for you. I believe UTM is easier to read on a map, but Degrees min, min and degrees min, seconds are easier to use in the GPS. I suspect it's what your use to.”

“If you use easyGPS for the Geocaching.com site, it will down load everything in D M,M'”

“Yeah...I'm using easyGPS but I upload to Topo! from the GPS so I can see the waypoints on the map and then print it out. Topo! converts everything with one click and will put UTM grid lines on the maps too! I'm just trying to figure all this techno stuff out ;)”

“I'm using the same combo. I'm still trying to learn all the tricks. It's cool to do some x-c hikes and snowshoe/ski trips and plot your course on the map when you get home. When we do our winter trips I can give folks a map and route they can follow to find us....funny, some go right to us, others wander around for hours.

Heres something else thats kinda fun, it uses Microsoft's Terraserver and downloads both topo maps and satellite photos. in a big screen kinda format. USAPhotoMap”

“My Parents have a cabin in Camp Nelson (4,800') there are 3 caches
right around that little mountain town and 2 more just up the road a bit (7,000')...I wonder if my wife wants to go to the cabin next weekend? ;)”

“This sounds fun. I am going to find a few around my area. It will be good practice with my GPS.”

“An old friend and I did a cache a few weekends ago. Inside was cordinates to the "real" stash. Took another hour to get to the next spot which was down a RR grade, through a swamp, and up a big hill to a beautiful waterfalls.”

“This past weekend I got to use my GPS to save the butts of stikmon and myself while out hiking on our trip this past weekend.

Moral of the story: always mark the campsite. LOL!

Then, as you find yourself running out of daylight (and with no headlamps) you just go "caching" to find your campsite. LOL!! It was the best "find" of all early Saturday evening.”

“My youngest son and I tried our had at geocaching today...It's pretty cool. My son loved it...we found two today!”

“WW, have fun! My 12 y/o son and 8 y/o daughter are hooked...”