Category: News

All the latest news from the world of geocaching.

/ Eric Schudiske /

Geocaching.com Presents – EarthCaches

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EarthCaches draw geocachers to wonders of the natural world – often hiding in plain sight. Gary Lewis, Geoaware, and the Director of Education for the Geological Society of America created of the very first Earthcache in 2004.

Mt. Yasur on the island of Tanna

An EarthCache delivers adventurers to a location found at specific coordinates. But rather than discovering a container and signing a logbook you earn a smiley by undertaking an educational task and learning about the natural environment.

Watch this video to go along with Terry Baker,  TerryDad2, who has set up more than 250 EarthCaches in six states and two countries. TerryDad2 takes you on a tour of West Sulphur Mountain Oil Spring (GC1A5E2) in Ojai, California, where oil is naturally seeping from the ground.

TerryDad2 exploring an EarthCache

EarthCaches started with one in Australia and three in the U.S. state of Colorado in 2004 and now there are over 11,000 published EarthCaches. There is at least one on every continent.

Examples of educational tasks are answering questions about the site: how far something has eroded down, the size of a waterfall, or, in the case of the Oil Spring, the affect the oil has on the adjacent plant life.

Have you found an EarthCache? Tell us your favorite EarthCaching experience.

Near EarthCache in the Valley of Fire, Nevada

 

/ Eric Schudiske /

Geocachers Care – Worldwide Well Wishes for Japanese Geocachers

Sendai Airport before and after (courtesy: "Smell the Roses")

Worldwide well wishes pour in for Japanese geocachers caught in the chain reaction tragedy: a 9.0 earthquake, followed by a tsunami and then a nuclear disaster.

A Japanese geocaching family, tmiya, is located near the flood ravaged epicenter of the deadly March 11th earthquake. Tmiya, a married couple with two daughters, live in Miyagi, Japan. The geocachers placed GC2173Z “Underbody of a jet plane” in 2009.

The traditional geocache was hidden in the port city of Sendai. Eleven geocachers logged a smiley on the difficulty 1.5, terrain 1 geocache before a wall of blackened water scoured the coastal landscape.

Location of GC2173Z

The cache page for GC2173Z now has more than 130 notes. Most are well wishes from the global geocaching community. The notes read: “May you and your family have much strength during these tough times for you” and “Our thoughts and prayers are with you in this terrible time. I have found a lot to admire about the Japanese people.”

They are posted from countries around the world such as Germany, the U.K., Canada, France, the United States of America, the Czech Republic and from inside Japan itself. One note from a French geocacher is simply signed, “Fraternité Geocaching” or the “Fraternity of Geocaching.”

This fraternity united in their compassion for a family most will never meet. Perhaps the most endearing post came just three days ago. Japanese geocacher strikeeagl wrote: “We were Tokyo geocaching community confirmed a cache owner tmiya and his family both alive in safe.” Another note posted more recently reads, “We could confirm that he is fine 5 days after the earthquake… I would appreciate you if you could encourage him.”

Join the geocaching fraternity and post your own note of encouragement to tmiya and the Japanese geocaching community on the cache page.

 

 

/ Eric Schudiske

Groundspeak Weekly Newsletter – February 2, 2011

Announcing International Cache In Trash Out Weekend 2011

Cache In Trash Out (CITO) is the geocaching community’s initiative to clean up parks and other cache-friendly places around the world. While out hunting for a geocache, geocachers collect litter along the trails and properly dispose of it. The community also supports the initiative by organizing larger cleanup efforts known as CITO Events. These events may occur at any time of year, but many are held during the annual international Cache In Trash Out Weekend each spring. This year, Cache In Trash Out weekend is scheduled for April 30 & May 1, 2011.

Over the course of 2010, the community held nearly 400 CITO Events. Many of those were during Cache In Trash Out Weekend. Let’s beat that record! Start planning your CITO events now!

Benefits of Adding Home Coordinates

Please enter your home coordinates so we can provide information on new geocaches and geocaching events near you.

/ Eric Schudiske /

Snowshoe Geocaching – A Geocaching.com Video

White fields of deep, powdery snow can’t stop geocachers from embarking on a high-tech treasure hunt. They simply adapt. Watch this Geocaching.com video to follow along as geocacher Greg McCaddon, Totemlake, leads a group of eight on a snowshoe geocaching adventure in the postcard-perfect mountains of Washington State.

Snowshoe geocaching

Geocachers say snowshoe caching is like preparing for any winter sport. It’s recommended you dress in layers, bring water, food, survival gear and (of course) your GPS receiver loaded with nearby caches.

Totemlake hosts a Hike of the Month for local geocachers. Watch the video to see the unique token that each participant receives and what goes into the cache on each Hike of the Month.

Explore more than 30 Geocaching.com videos in our gallery.  Share a video on “Basics of Hiding a Geocache,” watch a Travel Bug® move from cache to cache around the world and visit the highest and lowest geocaches in existence.

/ Eric Schudiske

Groundspeak Weekly Newsletter – January 12, 2011

EarthCaching is a great way to combine science education and Geocaching.

EarthCaches are locations that people can visit to learn about a unique geoscience feature or aspect of our Earth. Visitors to EarthCaches can see how our planet has been shaped by geological processes, how we manage resources and how scientists gather evidence to learn about the Earth.

This week marks the 7th anniversary of the first EarthCache: “Earthcache I – a simple geology tour of Wasp Head” (GCHFT2) in New South Wales, Australia by geoaware. The listing went live on January 10th, 2004 and 96 people have since logged a smiley.

If you are considering submitting an EarthCache for review, please read the updated EarthCache listing guidelines. The wording of the guidelines has been clarified and the guideline about logging requirements has been separated into two guidelines: one about logging tasks, one about logging photographs.

Important points about the EarthCache guidelines:

• Any requests for photos are considered optional.

• Logging requirements should be centered on the Earth Science at the location.

• You will need to provide the reviewer some information about permission or your EarthCache publication will be delayed.

• If your EarthCache is not quite publishable, you and the reviewer will work together to ensure that it meets the guidelines.