Geocaching - Our family’s newly discovered interest!
I love to spend my free time with my family — the kids are growing very fast, the time is flying super fast and I feel all the time that I wish had more time.
More than “me time”, I look forward to our family time together. I know that the time I’ll get to spend now with kids is priceless. I can’t do this later. It’s now or never. I’m trying hard to savor these moments and build memories that will last a lifetime for everyone in the family.
I’m constantly looking for an activity that's inclusive for each one of us — me, my wife, and our 12 and 8-year-old kids.
One of my friends had talked about Geocaching but I never got a chance to experience it myself. I knew its some kind of treasure hunt for everybody — adults and kids alike but never tried it myself.
I don’t remember how exactly it started but sometimes at the end of the summer of 2021, I ran into Geocaching again somehow. I talked to my kids on one of the weekends and they really got excited about every word I said about Geocaching.
So what is Geocaching? as I was explaining to my kids, it is a global treasure hunt that involves caches hidden at locations marked by geographical coordinates (Lattitude/Longitude). Read more about its origins.
There are “caches” hidden which contain interesting things to look at, along with the journal or logbook. Finders add their entry to the log. Finders can also take something from the cache, and in exchange add something to the cache. Just don’t disturb the location of the geocache.
Some great geo-caches have been there for more than 2 decades. You can actually see the logbook entries going back to those many years. It’s quite a surreal feeling imagining everyone who has been there, looking at the cache, and making an entry in the logbook.
There is a global community of Geocache players who take part in Geocaching in two ways 1) Hide the cache at interesting physical locations (Lattitude/Longitude pair) and publish them, and 2) Find the geocache at those coordinates.
This game has been played for quite some time (Since May 2000 — as soon as the GPS system came to life). Before the age of smartphones, people used GPS receivers to locate hidden geocaches. With advancements in smartphones (as they have GPS receiver chips) and superb mapping software, more geocaches are within reach for most of us. With maps in our smartphones, navigating to a geocache has been very convenient too.
Here is an example of what the Geocaching App shows when you open it. (Both Android and iOS versions are available. Get it from their respective app stores.)
Install the app and see it yourself where all caches are near you.
Not all caches are hidden equally. Some are easy to find, and some are so cleverly hidden, you’ve some work cut out before you can actually find them — even with very accurate GPS coordinates. That’s the best part of Geocaching — you never know how exactly your treasure hunt will go. That makes it a very fun and exciting activity.
Kudos to people who put so much thought into hiding a geocache, and their creativity in designing cache containers and cache contents. You never know what you’re going to find when you locate a geocache. This element of finding something “unknown” makes the geocaching trip a family adventure in itself.
Our first Geocaching trip!
I installed Geocaching App on my phone and what did I see. there are literally hundreds of caches hidden just where I live. As I browsed the map, I found many caches hidden on some of our favorite hiking and biking trails. That was really exciting. All of us enjoy hiking + biking, and now we get to add Geocaching to the same activity. That’s what made kids super excited about Geocaching.
We picked our favorite trail “Stevens Creek Trail, Mountain View” (behind Google offices on Shoreline).
and what did we find?
Woah!! That’s so exciting. small things, left there in the geocache by the past visitors. Isn’t that exciting to be able to connect with all of those people at different times? Geocache is that connection!
When you make an entry, and when somebody reads it in the future, you’re making a human connection! That’s very exciting to me.
Our first Geocaching trip was a success! We wanted to do more — we just ran out of time before it got dark. I did make a promise to kids, to come back again and resume geocache hunting on this trail again as there are more caches to be found on this trail.
Next Geocaching Trip: Rancho San Antonio County Park
Encouraged by the success of our first trip, we planned a second trip. This time in one of our favorite nature reserves. We had identified 3 geocaches to search for. Using Geocaching App, we located all 3 of them — each one of them was a unique find — their location, content, and most importantly, how we found them.
Surprises!
We wouldn’t have discovered this hidden shrine in Rancho Antonio County Park if it were not for the Geocache coordinates. It was off the regular trail, well hidden by the vegetation around it. We saw it only because GPS coordinates lead us to it.
Where to next?
I think we have found yet another family-friendly activity that everybody in the family can not only participate in but also enjoy the thrill of seeking the unknown.
I’ve promised kids to take them to interesting places looking for Geocaches. I can’t wait to see what we’ll run into.
Hope you’ll find Geocaching interesting and try it out. Leave your comments below on how you feel about geocaching. I would love to hear about your experiences.
Stay safe! Happy geocaching!
