Geocaching

Sunday - On our way back to Sarah and Jason’s apartment, they shared with us their new hobby, geocaching. There is a website which lists all the geocaches that are located in a given area. These “geocaches” are hidden stashes that individuals have hidden and recorded the location of them on this website with coordinates, or maybe just clues about where to find them. Then others will go and, taking these coordinates or clues, will try to find them. Sort-of like a treasure hunt. For more information you can check out the website: http://www.geocaching.com/

Jason is using an app on his cell phone to map out the location of a geocache in the area. Some caches are very difficult to find and may require walking off road several miles. This particular geocache was rated an ‘easy’ one and was close to the road.

We spotted the geocache, in this case, a camouflaged ammo box, hidden under a small tree. Some geocaches are this size, though some are very small, hidden in a sardine can or something similar.

Inside the ammo box is a plastic bag that contains a small notebook and a number of small ‘trinkets’ (plastic toys, cars, etc.).

After finding the geocache, you are to sign the notebook, and then later record the find on the website.

Then you take out one of the ‘trinkets’…….

And add one of your own. Sarah and Jason usually add a coin from some foreign currency which they have collected.

Some of the caches have been in the same location for several years, and have been found as many as a hundred times. It is fun to see who all has found a cache, and where they are from. It is interesting to think of all the ‘hidden’ items that are around your area, and all the people who are engaged in the activity of searching or hiding. Almost like an underworld……