Alpha Core

As we’re preparing for our summer vacation to Sweden, we’re going over our checklist of things we want to take along. One of the items pretty high up the list is the GPS device we recently ordered at Futurumshop (a Magellan eXplorist 210) for our geocaching adventures. We’re a bit afraid that it might not be delivered in time, while it seems that Magellan is having serious delivering problems right now since they didn’t have any models at the local Globetrotter store neither anymore. Oh well, we keep faith and aren’t running around screaming and frantically waving our hands in the air… yet.

Update (July 11th, 2007): it seems Magellan changed its distributor, found a new one and will be able to start distributing to shops in Europe from the 15th of July on. Shops can’t order any Magellan units right now because a) the old one doesn’t do anything anymore for Magellan and b) the new one is not ready to do so yet. Patience, my young padawan…

Update (July 13th, 2007): finally the waiting is over! I called about 16 shops in Belgium, hoping for a device still in stock somewhere. Unfortunately, it seems Garmin is a lot more popular than Magellan, because 80% of the shops just sell devices of that manufacturer. Eventually, the very friendly people of Avventura near Brussels transferred one from their shop in Gent and I could fetch it in Brussels already the next day! Then, we canceled the order at Futurumshop. Hurray!

Maybe it’s time to talk a bit more about geocaching. Let’s first of all explain what it is exactly, I quote Geocaching.com:

Geocaching is an entertaining adventure game for GPS users. Participating in a cache hunt is a good way to take advantage of the wonderful features and capability of a GPS unit. The basic idea is to have individuals and organizations set up caches all over the world and share the locations of these caches on the internet. GPS users can then use the location coordinates to find the caches. Once found, a cache may provide the visitor with a wide variety of rewards. All the visitor is asked to do is if they get something they should try to leave something for the cache.

So basically, you get the location of a hidden container from the internet and then go there to try and find it. If you do so, you write your name in the little booklet found inside and proudly mark that you found it on the website where you found this location to start with.

One of the nice things about geocaching is that you constantly visit places of which you probably didn’t even know they existed or at least didn’t know so very well before. At one time you might be visiting a long forgotten, charming little alley in a city, the next time, you’re standing ankle-deep in a muddy field searching for a cache that’s probably not there anymore, or that’s at least what you tend to start believing after searching for a long time while the rain is lashing down upon you. Recently, we were geocaching in Leuven (Belgium) and discovered quite a few of these hidden places in a matter of a few days. Then consider that Leuven is the city I lived in for 16 years and I need to say no more. Also the picture on top of this blog is an fine example of one of the breathtaking views we came across already on our recent geocaching trips.

The caches that you find are often not the great prize pots you might expect, but most of the time buckets filled with stuff you’d rather not touch without gloves. However, writing your nickname in the logbook is the most gratifying act of the hunt. Often, the caches are just small film roll boxes that just contain a roll of paper to write your name on. These are called micro-caches. Personally, I like them the most while they can be hidden the best and they for sure don’t contain any trash.

There are several different kinds of caches. The most basic types are traditional caches. Obtaining the coordinates of a traditional cache is very easy, you just get them from the cache page on the internet. That’s it! Multi-caches are a bit trickier. Here you get the coordinates of the first cache and in it, once found, the ones of the next cache are revealed to you. Multi-caches are often composed of a series of two or more caches relatively close together (a few kilometers) that need to be found before you can find the final, often bigger one. Another popular kind are mystery caches. To get the coordinates of these, you have to figure out a puzzle of some sort first. There’s really no limit to what kind of things you have to solve first before getting a valid coordinate for the cache.

Strange creatures called travel bugs often inhabit these caches. Before having you run off completely disgusted, let me assure you, they’re far from real bugs. They can be whatever kind of object you can imagine and have a metal tag attached that uniquely identifies them. When you find one, you can look them up online to obtain more information about them. Before visiting a cache, it can be very useful to know what travel bugs are supposedly inside for they all have their own goals they want to accomplish and you can already decide if you take one or not to help it on its way. Currently, I’m in possession of Pike Bait, a travel bug looking like a blue fish and that wants to be near ponds or big lakes, preferably where there are big pike. I’m planning to take it on our trip to Sweden and satisfy its desires in a cache there somewhere. Note that there are also coins called travel coins that work a bit in the same way like travel bugs.

Geocaching gives the bike tours or trips you make an aim and it’s a great experience to finally find a cache you were looking for already for quite a while. Of course, we find our caches always immediately, because no geocacher is going to admit that he thought finding a certain cache was difficult, hehe. Anyway, we can heartily recommend geocaching as a hobby to everyone! It’s great fun and you get to visit a lot of places on the go. We hope this article gave an insight into what may at first sight be a rather strange hobby and maybe it encourages you too to give it a try. We sure hope so!

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