Caching in on Family Fun

By Katie Vorreiter

There is gold in them there hills—or at least buried treasure. No hills where you live? Blackbeard never made it to your land-locked neck of the woods? No worries: a treasure trove may be closer than you think, and the application of global positioning technology can lead you to it. You won't need an eye patch, a parrot or a peg leg. But, you will need access to the Internet, a portable GPS unit, and a sense of adventure.

The unlikely pairing of tech gadgetry and outdoor recreation has added a new dimension to hiking, camping and RV'ing. Enthusiasts the world over have taken it upon themselves to create and hide geocaches. Then, they invite the rest of us in on the fun by posting their cache's GPS coordinates online. Before striking out, seekers identify desirable caches by location, keyword, or the username of the cache owner. Next, they download the cache waypoints to their handheld GPS unit—a sight more versatile than ye old parchment scroll. Listings indicate the degree of difficulty, both to reach the site, as well as to find the cache. There are often extra hints provided, thoughtfully encoded for those who don't like "spoilers."

Everything You Wanted to Know About Geocaching   Just the Cache Facts An explanation of the basics.   Cache Events Races, contests, team events, and more.   Oh the Places We Will Go! Groups and companies that encourage geocaching.   Bottom-Line It For Me Information about purchasing a handheld GPS unit.

Typically, the caches yield a trove of trinkets. The original content is entirely up to the owner. But since etiquette calls for a deposit when you make a withdrawal, there is treasure turnover. I've yet to find any doubloons, but my children have delighted in rubber frogs, sparkly pens and the like. Don't forget to sign the finder's log. And if there's a disposable camera, snap a shot of your excavation party with the booty. Food items are ill advised, since critters can sniff them out without global positioning technology.

It's an art to hide a cache where it can be reasonably found, where a passer-by won't stumble upon it, and where it will endure. To find such a trophy you may need to peek inside a rotted tree stump, beneath a blanket of leaves or under a bridge. The treasure "chest" may be a coffee can or plastic tub—anything that will stand up to the elements. One of the more interesting containers my family has found was a World War II-era Army footlocker. The smallest? A film canister containing nickels.

The pastime itself can be gold for families. My husband and I first took our children when they were three and six. Within our campground there were four caches, all enticingly close for hikers with short legs and shorter attention spans. We've found the kids will hang in for longer hikes that involve a quest, and they can cover a lot of ground just negotiating the right to hold the GPS and lead the search party.

Note that an "enticingly close" location can be misleading. You must take into account trail switch-backs, as well as vertical climbs and descents. On leafier hikes, trees can interfere with your GPS's line of sight to the orbiting satellite and lead to the occasional error in reading. But that's usually resolved at the next clearing. And for us, the lure of treasure and thrill of the find go a long way to stave off the inevitable chorus of "I'm so tired." And not just the ones from me!

You're not likely to find any X's marking the spot, but you might glimpse lovely vistas, frolicking fauna and flowering flora. We've always had an adventure, in rain or shine. And, aside from the possibility of sunburn, poison oak or bug bites, geocaching is much safer than pirating. We've never been fired upon by cannons, for example.

Caching Up With Marky An Interview with a Cache Owner San Jose-based geocacher Mark Yvanovich is a bit humble. He and Joani have been gaming since July of 2002. In that time, he has hidden 305 caches, and found 5,309. Read the interview

Note that not all bugs are bad: the cache you find might host a Travel Bug. Groundspeak^TMTravel Bugs are encoded, trackable tags that "hitchhike" from cache to cache. When a cacher moves a Bug, she logs the new location online, and thus, its physical progress is virtually tracked.

As a community, cachers are by-and-large a green bunch. Geocaching.com, the mother lode site, encourages CITO—cache in, trash out—on a regular basis, and there is an annual CITO event. So, bring a spare plastic bag for litter removal. What other activity provides exercise, challenge, mystery, and that rosy feeling from leaving the world a little tidier than you found it?

And we do mean the world. From Afghanistan to Zimbabwe, caches abound. According to geocaching.com, there are 269,715 active caches in 221 countries. Some of them are so remote, you may need a GPS to find the countries themselves! Stowaway to Svalbard or pack your passport for the Pitcairn Islands. Try a castle cache in Latvia, and then, get tunnel vision in the UK. There's never a dull moment with those Brits. To find the Telford tunnel cache on Harecastle canal, you'll need a boat to collect clues at both the north and south portals.

You won't have to sail the seven seas to find a geo cache, however. There are plenty in urban areas as well. That film canister we found? It was hidden in the fence at our neighborhood park, in the middle of suburban Silicon Valley.

So, yo ho ho and a bottle of mineral water, turn off the Xbox®, leave the Game Boy® at home and grab the GPS. The greatest treasures you come away with may be the most intangible: family togetherness, fitness, and fun.

No swashbuckling experience necessary.

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