Friday, October 24, 2008

See you at the event on Saturday

We will be at the event Puzzles, Coins & Answers (GC!FEAF) on Saturday. Please stop by to say 'hi'. I hope to get direction on a few puzzles.

Saturday, October 18, 2008



Mobile post sent by arthurat using Utterlireply-count Replies.  mp3

Sunday, October 12, 2008

Confessions of a FTF-aholic

My name is Art...and I'm a FTF-aholic.

The day starts innocently enough, I'm at work or at home and the cell phone vibrates. Its a NEW TEXT MESSAGE from noreply@groundspeak.com! A new cache has published within a few miles of home.

"Oh, no...not again", exclaims Karen. "Where to NOW??"

"Let me check... it is within four miles of the house."

I find the listing, note the information, hand enter it into the GPS, and off we go.

After a few minutes, we are at the location of the cache. Of course, while obeying all traffic laws.

We search, and there it is.... THE CACHE!

We open it, quickly unraveling the logbook. IT IS BLANK!! We are the first to find!!

With the sounds of the Alleluia Chorus playing in the background, we proudly enter our names on the logbook, followed by FTF!! I'm busy entering field notes on my phone for later recording on the website.

Why the effort you ask? Someone must be first. For a brief moment, I can excel in an athletic endevor caled geocaching. My name appears for the first five logs on the cache listing, the rolling off into geocaching history.

Prior to my discovery of geocaching, there has only been two other times where athletics were important in my life. In fifth grade, when I kicked a grand slam home run in kickball on the last 'at bat' to win the game.

The second time is when I had bowling as a physical education activity in College. It was there, I met my wife Karen.

A FTF may not be winning the Super Bowl, but it is pretty darn exciting!

Friday, October 3, 2008

Ode to the Virtual Cache


If you listen to our show #8, we discuss finding three virtual caches on our bookended weekend adventure in the Colorado mountains. For those of you unfamiliar to the virtual cache, these we available for listing on geocaching.com as "...exists in a form of a location. Depending on the cache "hider," a virtual cache could be to answer a question about a location, an interesting spot, a task, etc. The reward for these caches is the location itself and sharing information about your visit.
Because of the nature of these geocaches, you must actually visit the location and acquire the coordinates there before you can post. In addition, although many locations are interesting, a virtual cache should be out of the ordinary enough to warrant logging a visit." (Source:geocaching.com)
A few years ago, the site was reorganized, and a companion Groundspeak site, waymarking.com, was created for tracking and logging of 'virtuals' and 'webcam' caches. This site describes waymarks as 'a way to mark unique locations on the planet and give them a voice." (source:waymarking.com)
Existing virtual caches on geocaching.com were 'grandfathered' and are available even today to visit and log.
I would like to see the return of the virtual cache for the following reasons:
1) Many geocachers have physical limitations that prevent them from finding may geocaches that are hidden. I always love it when a listing states that the cache is handicap accessible, 'except for the last few feet'. A cache is either handicap accessible or not!! By having virtiuals at historical monuments, plaques, or building; many of these locations are ADA compliant.
2) This would be good for Groundspeak from a public relations standpoint. Promoting the monuments. statues, and plaques that honor America.
3) I would prefer not to have to manage my visits on more then one site. The problem that I see with waymarking.com is that there is different logging requirements for different categories. In some cases the same location is listed under multiple categories!
4) waymarking.com does not have GPX file export. It would be useful if I knew what the logging requirements were BEFORE I got to the location.
How to bring back the virtual cache? The placement of earthcaches was standardized with the formation of earthcache.org This forced placers earthcaches to incorporate a 'learning element' into the proper logging of the cache. We can do the same thing with a virtual. A website like Roadside America can spearhead this effort in the setting of standards for new virtuals.
This important cache type should not be left to 'die on the vine'.