Saturday, February 2, 2013

Geocaching

Saturday we did something we haven't done in a while and although we weren't completely out of the woods with fever (we just weren't sure yet), we needed to get out of the house.  Geocaching seemed like the right thing to do because it was the best of both worlds...getting OUT of the house but not really be around people just yet.  In case you are unfamiliar with "Geocaching" I looked it up in the dictionary and this is what it said...

"Geocaching is an outdoor recreational activity, first played in May 2000, in which the participants use a Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or mobile device and other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers, called "geocaches" or "caches", anywhere in the world.

A typical cache is a small waterproof container containing a logbook where the geocacher enters the date they found it and signs it with their established code name. Larger containers such as plastic storage containers (Tupperware or similar) or ammunition boxes can also contain items for trading, usually toys or trinkets of little value. Geocaching shares many aspects with benchmarking, trigpointing, orienteering, treasure-hunting, letterboxing, and waymarking."

Jay got an app on his phone and you enter in your location and it gives you all the Geocaches that are around you.  We chose some that were in the middle of the woods and some that were easier to find.  You basically are given clues as to where a treasure is hidden and then once you find it, there is usually a box with a log book and some non-valuable toys and trinkets.  You can take something out to keep but you must replace it with something of equal value.  It was a blast and the kids LOVED it.





The first one we found was one of the harder ones and it was magnetized up under this bridge in the middle of the woods.  That was fun to find!













This one was found at a cemetery and it was in a small cylinder at the end of this stick Jay is holding. It only had a log book but what a creative way to hide it!  


This cemetery was neat some dating back to the middle 1800s and included some from 4 different wars...


This one was found under this metal frames.....


Out of the 8 total we found today, we found 2 traveling buddies.  They are not to be kept but just transferred to a different geocache. They have a chip in them and can be looked up to see where all it has "been." 




 We drove through Sonic and grabbed some ice cream and this little cutie was eating hers without a spoon...silly girl!

Such a fun, FREE way to make memories with your kiddos.  We will definitely be doing it again soon!

1 comment:

  1. So cute! I work at cracker barrel in Lakeland over the summer. There is a small magnetic geocache box that is magnetized to the bottom of the newspaper vending machine on the front porch by the rocking chairs. Some woman and her son were trying to find it one day.

    -Claire

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