Polly Plaits

With an every increasing access to GPS via phones and tablets, Geocaching has seen a huge rise in popularity.  And what is not to love!  It gets you out and about, exploring new places (perhaps even some old places you had forgotten about) it's fun, adds interest to a walk and gives you an excuse to play with your phone!  It is also a worldwide phenomenon; there are over 2 million Geocaches all over the world ranging from Nano (tiny ones, you may probably miss if you don't look REALLY closely) to giant ones (Like this one in Cyprus)  A cache is a container for a logbook and sometimes swaps, you find it, sign the book and do your little 'Geo-dance' (Just me? Okay, you don't have to do the dance)

 

So what is it all about? What do you have to do?  Well it's simple really.  Find out where the caches are, I recommend the Geocaching website, although there are other sites.  Sign up (it's free!) and then decide where you want to go and look.  You can enter your postcode and find those near to home, or if you are planning a trip somewhere why not see if you can 'grab a cache' while you are there...

 

Now this is where we may potentially part ways, you see I have a confession, I do not own a GPS device, or an internet enabled phone, so how I go about finding a cache is slightly different.

 

So if you have access to tech click here, it will tell you all you need to know (don't forget me once you are off travelling, send a pictures or a tweet!)

 

However, if like me, you are poor people who can only get on the internet at home, school or if you sit outside a pub that happens to be part of 'the Cloud' then read on.

 

As I type this I have clocked up 28 caches*, all of them found without a handheld GPS.  So how do you do it?  Through the power of Google maps.

 

Once you sign up to Geocaching.com and have a look around the caches that are in your area, you will notice numbers at the top of each listing like this:

 

                                   N 51° 27.406 W 002° 31.135

 

These are the co-ordinates at which the cache is hidden.  If you enter these into Googlemaps you will get as close as you are going to get without tech. (As Geographers you could, of course, look up these co-ordinates on a map, and plot the whole thing properly, but ain't nobody  got time for that!)

 

You should get a map, put the satellite image bit up, and see what you can see.

As this particular map doesn't show a road, you can't utilise the 'streetmap' facility, which can sometimes get you really close in to your target, but with the satellite view you can still work out where it is you need to be.  Often the cache listing will give you a clue, use this to get any extra information you can (you can also look at the gallery of photos other people have added,there is one of Han and Florrie on the gallery for this cache!)

 

Then, you go for a walk, keep an eye out in the area, especailly for suspicious looking piles of twigs (or stickoflague, as we call it) these are often hiding caches, and you will get very good at spotting it after a while.

 

Once you find the cache - making sure there are no muggles about- sign and date it, and if you can put a small swap into the box (we use go-gos, or little badges) Don't forget to log the find on the website - and if you are doing the National Trusts "50 things to do before you are 11 and 3/4, then update that site too.

 

Tell us what you thought, and send us your pictures.  We could get a gallery of geocachers going, perhaps you may even decide to 'plant' your own.

 

 

Either way, be good, have fun and learn lots!

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* This article was orginally written April 2015, I now have 34 caches...I also have a slightly better phone, although I still haven't got room on it for a geocaching ap - it's full of spotify tunes!