*Always talk to a doctor before starting a weight loss regime, the content here, and the links provided should not be seen as a substitute for professional guidance from a trained physician

What is geocaching but walking/hiking with a purpose?

It seems like everywhere you turn these days, there is someone else trying to sell you the latest fad diet, nutrition supplement or ready-made meals. The weight loss industry is huge; in fact according to some sources we found American’s spend over 42 BILLION dollars a year to this end. With these tough economic times people are often cutting their gym memberships from their budgets in order to makes ends meet. So where does that leave us? Geocaching is free (well has minimal costs once you have a GPS) AND great exercise.

Obesity is in no way an America only problem, according to a recent fact sheet published by WHO (World Health Organization) there were 1.5 billion adults overweight across the entire planet! Source: http://www.who.int/mediacentre/factsheets/fs311/en/index.html

The sad fact is that we don’t really need special diets or fancy workout equipment to achieve our weight loss goals; we just need to eat better foods and be active. (And most people know that without having to spend a lot of money to learn it) We have heard through our travels and conversation with fellow geocachers that a lot of people have lost weight while geocaching. Think about it this way, if you are a man of about 200 lbs and you walk at a moderate pace while out searching for a geocache, at no incline – you are burning roughly 300 calories an hour. The longer, faster or more challenging your search, the more you burn! (You can get a full listing of calorie burn per hour here: http://www.nutristrategy.com/caloriesburned.htm)

Losing weight is nothing more than a math problem, in order to see results you need to burn morn calories than you take in. In order for a person to lose 1 pound of fat they need to burn roughly 3500 calories. If you took the above example of 300 calories for 1 hour of geocaching a day, and controlled your eating so that you didn’t exceed a normal level of calorie intake, (visit this link to see an estimate of how many calories you should be eating a day: http://walking.about.com/cs/calories/l/blcalcalc.htm) that means you could lose a pound every 12 days – just from doing something you love! No hours at the gym on a treadmill going nowhere! Use the websites above to figure out the correct numbers as they pertain to you, and get out there geocaching!

Thanks for reading! Have you lost weight geocaching and would like to share your story? Please post a comment below, contact us through our “contact us” page or post on our Facebook wall. We would love to hear your story, and if we like it enough and you’re agreeable, we’ll post it on here for others!

I love to go geocaching; I also have to travel a lot for work (day job, running this site doesn’t pay the bills unfortunately), so I get access to a lot more caches than most people do. I have found that geocaching is not only a great way to get out of my hotel room and do something besides work; it is a great way to explore the area that I am visiting!

The corporate office for my day job is in Boston, so I have to travel there quite a bit for meetings, training, etc. I had spent a lot of time in Boston previously, having grown up in Maine – it was the closest “city” to visit. And I thought I knew a lot about it’s history, layout and where things were. But through geocaching I was brought to some amazing locations throughout the city, saw some things that weren’t on the tourist maps and even found a place serving the best clam chowder I’ve ever had!

Another great way to take advantage of traveling, and finding some caches in your spare time while in an unknown area is to use your smart phone. I know that personally I was always forgetting to bring along my GPS when I was packing an overnight bag for a meeting. Not only that, but the thing is kind of bulky (I’m still using a Delorme PN-20) and I can never really just “slip” it into a pocket on my way to a meeting. I have the app from Groundspeak_(owners of geocaching.com) and although it was a little expensive (I think around 10$) I think that it is completely worth it.; my iPhone makes a pretty good geocaching device.

Say I have half an hour between meetings, or even I am walking from my office back to my hotel. With this app – I am able to search for caches and arrange them in order with those coming up first that are closest to me, plan a route to it, read the cache description (and hint if I really get lost) and also log my visit – all from my phone. For a geocaching quickie; there really is no better device than your smart phone. There are a number of different 3rd party apps that can accomplish similar things, we haven’t had a chance to use them all yet – but we encourage you all to do so and let us know what you think of them?

So what about all of you? Do you sneak in any geocaching while traveling for work, or maybe on a family trip where you’re the only one who is “enlightened” to our hobby? Got a great story about geocaching while traveling? We want to hear about it! Leave us a comment below or send us an email and if we like your story enough, maybe we’ll post here on the website!

As we promised when we took over the site, we really want the madcacher site to become a reference hub for experienced geocachers. To that end, we’re working on a variety of items, including a website redesign, an ebook and a few other “aces” up our sleeves. But we’re only two guys who love geocaching – we’re sure there are some great ideas out there, and we’re welcoming suggestions.

Our goal is to really build up a community here, and although we’ve added some ads to the site; we’re using that cash to reinvest back into what we can offer the readers. Editing an ebook or working with an artist on a new logo costs cash; but we’re happy to throw the small earnings we do make back towards useful tools!

Why are we looking at e-products primarily? To be honest, we both have day jobs and at this point aren’t looking to get into offering a retail store and spending our evenings packaging and shipping out products. Maybe we’ll get to that point, but we just don’t have the time or funds needed to build up an inventory. With e-products however we can set up on our website to automatically be downloaded, whether they are free or do have some cost to them. For the time being we prefer to keep things simple.

To that end do you have any suggestions? What are some e-products you’d like to see available on the website? How much should

Have an idea for an e-product?

we charge for such a product? Again, we’re not out to get rich here; but we do need to be able to cover the cost of developing.

Thanks for reading; we’re about half way done with our site design, keep checking back for changes!

***A note to our readers! This posting was put up by the original owner of the website. We do not share this sentiment and think the more caches in the world the merrier. We had thought about deleting this post, and actually did briefly remove it from the website when we took over. BUT we do think that both sides of the story need to be heard, and are returning it with this adder in hopes that those of you who use and love opencaching.com will also show your support for it.

Original Post

Just a few days ago Garmin, one of the leading providers of GPSr’s launched a new website, OpenCaching.com. This new website is basically their attempt to control the Geocaching market so they can sell more GPSr’s since GPS sales are going down the tube due to increased smart phone use… smart phones have built-in GPS technology.

I’m certainly not an attorney, but it’s very surprising that this is even legal. Their site doesn’t make a single mention of Groundspeak’s Geocaching.com, which is the Official Geocaching website (what a great way of saying thanks for the millions of dollars in GPS sales Groundspeak has sent their way) yet they present it as if it’s the originator and official site, although it’s simply a complete, unfair and shady copy!

The two sites seem to have similar features, although OpenCaching does have a couple small features that I wouldn’t mind seeing integrated into Geocaching.com The only major differences that I can see are that OpenCaching DOESN’T HAVE REVIEWERS, you don’t have to pay the small fee for a premium account and there aren’t hardly any caches showing up on their site, which is almost hilarious. The ONLY thing that may help them get going is lack of a yearly fee, but it’s a small fee anyway.

Dear Garmin, We understand you’re going broke. Sorry to hear that. Trying to fix something that isn’t broke isn’t going to prevent your company from going broke. It’s only going to make (scratch that) it only makes you look like a desperate, shady operation!

Let’s take a stand, Geocachers. Let’s boycott this shady operation and continue to support Geocaching.com

What are you thoughts?

It’s unintended, but funny that my last post was about nano’s, which is probably the least popular cache container because today’s post is about caches placed at people’s homes, which seems to be fairly unpopular too And I personally like both nanos and caches placed at people’s homes.

I touched on this subject a little while back in a post titled “Geocaching Hiding Spots” but I wanted to talk a little more about it. I actually have a cache in a tree in my front yard and have had other caches on my property in the past. I like these caches both as the owner and as a seeker because you simply get to meet other cachers and sometimes make new friends.

Many people feel uncomfortable going on another person’s property but they really shouldn’t. The cache was put there by the person who lives there or by someone who knows about it and is fine with it. And if they aren’t fine with it that’s their problem. Permission has been granted via the cache listing and you’re not there to do anything buy sign a log sheet. I’ve found ALOT of these caches and I have never encountered this situation though!

I always make it a point to explain on the cache page that they will not be greeted by any angry people and they are always welcomed to find the cache during the day time. I also make it very clear with BIG LETTERS that night caching is not allowed and I’ve never had an issue with night cachers. I also give them my house number! This eliminates any and all confusion as to which house it is.

When you don’t know which house it is (cache is near two property lines) THAT can be frustrating. You don’t want to trespass on

Geocaching near homes can be challenging!

the neighbors property. So in THAT case I can definitely see how it could be uncomfortable. But in general, in my experience, it’s typically pretty clear which yard the cache is in going by the coords.

So how do you feel about these caches? Do you have on on your property? Have you found any on another person’s property?

It’s been a long while since I’ve written a post here. I’ve been a busy guy getting things packed, moved and unpacked into our new home. Unfortunately that means I haven’t had much time for caching lately

Now that things are settled down that’s about to change though! I’ve already found a perfect hiding spot for a cache near our new home.

Today I just wanted to write a quick post about the recent Geocaching Bomb Scare that occurred in Anaheim, CA last month. If you didn’t hear about it, you can read all about it here.

About a dozen fire trucks from Anaheim and Fullerton were sent to the area along with a hazmat team and the Orange County bomb squad.

My first reaction is “Are you kidding me?” Geocaching has now been around for 10 years now. It’s a World-wide hobby. Any good bomb squad is going to know about the hobby. It should be S.O.P. to check the Geocaching.com site before expending all of these resources!
On the flip side of that, if you come up on a cache that is obviously surrounded by muggles should you REALLY go for it?But, what’s done is done. And it does serve as a good reminder for those of us who hide caches. Caches hidden in public places can be fun as they add difficulty to the hide, but a light post cache (LPC) for instance, in the center of a busy parking lot may not be a good spot to hide a cache unless it is in a spot where cachers can somehow retrieve and replace it discreetly, without attracting attention. OR unless you specify night cache only.

If there is one or two muggles in the area who look friendly I just tell them. “Hey, I’m playing a game called Geocaching. You can

Bomb Scare in NZ due to geocaching

read about it at Geocaching.com” I’ve done that several times and I’ve never had an issue. Most people don’t care. Some are curious and want to try Geocaching, but I’ve NEVER had anyone act worried or suspicious after simply telling them what I’m doing.

So, those are my thoughts on the whole situation. What do you think about caches in high-muggle areas?

When we first started Geocaching in order for us to know the details of each cache we were about to look for I would take a piece of paper and write down the Geocache code so we know which one to plug into the GPS, the hint (if given,) the cache size, the difficulty if 3 star or more, any info in the description that I believe may help find the cache and if one or more of the last few logs were DNF’s I add that too, just so I know that it may not be there.

After our first 100 finds or so, I got tired of spending 20+ minutes writing all of that stuff down. That’s when we started printing out the full cache page. It’s much quicker and easier, but it takes alot of paper and printer ink, especially if you have a long day of caching planned.

There are a few programs out there that help with this. The most popular is called the “Geocaching Swiss Army Knife” (GSAK) but in my experience it’s incredibly confusing and difficult to use. As a matter of fact, I uninstalled it on the same down I installed it because it just gave me a headache trying to figure it out.

SO, I’m on a mission to make cache hunt preparation quicker, easier and far less complicated! I’m going to have a piece of software developed that is simple to use… does exactly what needs to be done, nothing more and nothing less!

But I need your help! I need to know how you prepare for your hunts. I know those using iPhones are all set (I’m jealous and may end up leaving verizon just so I can get an iPhone.)

But if you aren’t a spoiled iPohone user please let me know how you prepare. Do you write down cache info? Do you print the cache pages out like we do? Do you use software?

I’ll be using the info I get from you in order to have this software developed and you’ll have the opportunity to use it once it’s finished.

Thanks and Happy Caching!

img credit: Oberazzi

Every person on Earth who takes up the hobby/sport (whatever you want to call it) of Geocaching does it for fun. I guess some may do it just to get off of their butt, but I’m pretty sure every single person who does it gets at least a little joy out of it.

Geocaching was invented for entertainment! With that being said, as long as you’re respectful (you put caches back where you found them, you leave something if you take something etc.) it should be about what YOU enjoy.

Almost every day that I decide to do some Geocaching I come across one or more cache page, log, note etc. from other cachers complaining about how easy a cache is, how hard a cache is, how common a certain type of container is etc.

For some people it IS about the numbers and other it isn’t. For some people large containers are the best, for other micros are the best.

Some people, like myself, like to take their small children out for EASY caches without the stress of a tough hunt with small children. Other people enjoy a challenge and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that either. I enjoy a challenging hunt when I’m alone as well.

Some people, like myself, don’t like caches hidden in thick wooded areas because it’s almost impossible to get a signal and to us it just sucks the fun right out o

f it, BUT some people enjoy that and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that!

My point is this: Geocaching is a hobby just like any other hobby. One person may like it for the neat swag they find. Another person may like it for the exercise they get. Another for the new places they find. Another for the sheer challenge. So why complain about those caches that YOU don’t personally like? Geocaching wasn’t invented for me or you it was invented for me AND you!

I’ll admit, this rant was brought on by a particular cacher publicly complaining about a series of 4 caches that I placed in my neighborhood. They are all P&

G nano’s and obviously this person didn’t like nanos and decided to let me and everyone else know in his log.

I just wanted to say “Sorry, I didn’t realize Geocaching was created for YOU”

Obviously that did bug me a bit,

but I’ve been wanting to write about this particular subject for a while anyway, so at least he brought out some good too

Sorry for the negativity! I’m usually one of the most positive guys you’ll ever meet, but every now and then I feel the need to let off a little steam!

img credits: akeg

Just about every time I explain what Geocaching is to someone (which is pretty often because I mention it to just about every new person I meet ) I see a confused look on their face.

You know, the kind that’s like “ok, WHY would anyone want to go find little containers with toys in them?” I’m sure you know the look.

Shortly after the confused face I explain that Geocaching isn’t just about what you find… there is so much more to it, but it’s up to the Geocacher to realize it and make it happen.

There are some days when my wife, son and myself are sitting here bored, but don’t particularly feel like Geocaching.

Don’t get me wrong, we all love finding caches, but there are SOME days when it’s just not that appealing. But many times we do it anyway! Why? I’m glad you asked

The Multiple 

Benefits of Geocaching:

1. It’s an excellent, Healthy way to stay Active – Any time you’re active and get outside to breath fresh air and move around it’s a good thing! Sitting at home watching TV usually results in calories NOT being burned and more calories being taken in, because most people are more likely to snack when they’re inactive. Geocaching results in calories being burned and since you’re busy, you’re less likely to want to snack.

2. It’s a Constructive, Fun thing for Kids – Whether you have your own children, grandchildren, nieces, nephews or even neighbor kids, take them along (with permission lol.) Kids LOVE geocaching, so it’s a great way to get them out and about as well, not to mention an excellent way to spend quality time with them.

3. It’s a Great way to Find New, Neat Places – I’ve been Geocaching for less than 2 years and I can’t count how many cool places I’ve come across looking for caches. Not only did I find these places, but in many cases I learned neat facts about them, as many cache owners will put trivia on their cache pages.

4. It’s a Great way to meet New Friends – Not only do local Geocachers organize events frequently (depending on where you are) just being an active geocaching exposes you to many great people who are also active. I have yet to attend a Geocaching event, although I plan to this summer, but I’ve still met several great people during my adventures.

photo credit: Paul-W