How and why did you start geocaching?
Often, when I meet fellow cachers, I wonder how they got into geocaching. After all, it is not an Olympic sport. It is not a sit down with a beer on a Sunday afternoon and watch it on TV kind of thing. I will post my story, and I hope that you will do the same.
The first time I heard about Geocaching was from Samtimchan. He tried to explain it to me and it went straight over my head. I really did not get what was so fun about punching in numbers to a GPS and going to that point to say that you have been there. A year or so later FerguesonTea was posting on Facebook about going out to check on their caches after the winter.
I was home recovering from a motor vehicle accident and was beginning to get a little stir crazy. I thought, “What the heck is this geocaching thing?!” So I googled “what is geocaching” and found geocaching.com. I watched the video and got very excited about what a fun thing it would be to do with the family. After all, our girls are teenagers and it becomes hard to involve them in activities as a family unit.
I could hardly wait for Andrew (Snoik) to get home from work so I could show him the video! I don’t think he was quite as excited about this as I was! ;P
I posted on Facebook that I thought geocaching sounded fun. A friend immediately offered to loan us his GPS to give it a try. We had no idea how to use it, but we found many caches by looking at the map to figure out where it may be located and then walked in circles to match up the numbers on the unit. We had so much fun!! I was amazed to see that there were caches so close to our home in Maces Bay.
About a month later we attended our first event which was an Intro to Geocaching my Mud in the Face. YNDS taught us how to use the GPS Snoik had bought me for my birthday a couple of weeks before. Caching became that much better knowing how to basically use the GPS.
The kids no longer cache with us. They think it is boring. I live with the satisfaction of knowing that one day they will rediscover this great sport and go with us again. In the meantime, we enjoy meeting fellow cachers and making wonderful friends. Caching is a small community and most cachers feel like chosen family members.
I hope you will share your story of what brought you to the dark side! lol
I still remember the day I found out about Geocaching. It was early spring 2003 and was at work and some how ended up on geocaching.com, not sure how. I was working in Gander, Newfoundland at the time and there were 5 caches around Gander. I signed up and printed off 3 of the listings and went out after work with my coworker. There was still snow on the ground and we looked for two of the three without a gps, just using the map and description we thought we could find one. We never did find one and I put it on the back burner until I got a proper GPS. I never really forgot about it but I didn’t know anyone doing it in Gander so it never became a priority until I moved to Moncton. So 4 years later I got a GPS but could not remember my username or the email address I used to sign up so I made a new account and still use it today. Not sure how long I will do it, will probably drift away one of these days.
I first heard about Geocaching in 2002 when I was living in the Maryland USA. I read an article on a Delta Airlines flight and checked it out. I had one of the original eTrex GPS at the time and it was paper based caching at its finest in those days. I picked up 24 or so at the time including the Blair Witch House virtual which was pretty cool.
Then life happened – we moved back to New Brunswick, got married, bought a house and started having kids… so hence now I have a 2671 day slump on my profile.
I picked up caching again in October 2010 and haven’t looked back since. I love this hobby (my wife calls it an obsession/addiction… but she is the one that bought me a new GPS for Christmas !!)
My story can be found on either one of my blogs:
http://mamcgarrigle.blogspot.ca/
http://thegrumpygeocacher.blogspot.ca/
It was actually way back in 2002, from my Dad. My Dad had a GPS,not for geocaching but for tracking his route back to the truck when he was out hunting etc. He read an article about it somewhere and told me about it. He was visiting me in Freddy and mentioned this geocaching thing and he brought his GPS along(He didn’t have a computer at his place but I did). Ok, off we go looking online, find the site and register. I wish I could remember my old username and email I used, a long since abandoned hotmail account is all I remember. Too bad, be neat to have an account that old, with a 9 year inactive streak, haha. All I remember is we found one downtown by a church. Then Dad went home after his visit and well, kinda forgot about it. Nine years later I’m newly married and my wife and I are thinking of a relatively cheap hobby to keep ourselves amused and active. Bam, memories come back to me and Dad out looking that day in 2002. We buy a GPS and 400 plus finds(300 plus for my wife) we’re fairly addicted(weekenders, not a whole lot during the week). Even got my mother in law and brother in law into it this summer. They’ve put out over 20 caches themselves. It’s taken us to gems in our own backyard basically and I can’t see a point where this hobby will get old. Cheers guys and gals.
I had accidently found a geocache and I thought it was neat. I never really got on to it till about a year later where a freind from England was visiting. He mentioned geocaching and I remembered that cache. He said he would take us so off we went. We managed to find one and I have been addicted ever since. The story of triple ccc entry into the geocaching world.