What is Geocaching ?
What Is Geocaching ? Geocaching is an open-air game with no time and space limit, which can be expressed as following the shared clues, solving riddles, and reaching the treasure called “geocache” or “cache” at the end of this process, using GPS (Global Positioning System). . Treasures are hidden by other players and the coordinates of the treasure are often added to the system along with riddles. Although the majority of the game is based on walking, it can be enriched with many different nature sports such as climbing and diving.
It was opened for civilian use by Dave Ulmer (Beavercreek, Oregon) on May 1, 2000, in order to ensure the widespread use of the GPS system outside of military studies and thus its further development. In this way, Geocaching started with the placement of the first box on May 3, 2000 and the registration of the placed box on “Usenet newsgroup sci.geo.satellite-nav” on May 6, 2000 (45°17.460’N 122°24.800’W) is now worldwide. It contains millions of registered boxes.
The first added box is known to have been found twice and logged once (Mike Teague of Vancouver, Washington). In this sense, what makes Geocaching different, which has similar features to letterboxing, benchmarking, orienteering, treasure-hunting, waymarking and encounter, is the movement over GPS. Although the activity received names such as GPS Stash Hunt and GPSStashing in the first period, after the discussions in the gpsstash group within eGroups (Yahoo) and Matt Stum’s proposal to change the name of “stash” (hidden storage) to “cache” (box) on May 30, 2000, “geocaching” was started. has been named.
What is Treasure?
The box, which is expressed as a treasure in geocaching and is aimed to be found, consists of a log book, pen and a waterproof plastic container that often contains a surprise.
How to Play Geocaching
The player holds the box enriched with a logbook, pen and optional small gifts. He notes the coordinate of the point he is holding. And adds this coordinate to the site. Games can be played on many sites, especially geocaching.com. With any other details, if any. Other players follow the information on the site. Sometimes by solving puzzles etc. They try to reach the relevant point with the help of GPS. The player who finds the box adds his own information to the logbook in the box and then to the website.
Sometimes small gifts may come out of the box. Mostly, these gifts consist of objects that are transferred from box to box, such as specially produced Travel Bugs, medals called Geomedals and coins called Geocoins, as well as inexpensive, souvenir small items such as small toys. Geocoin and Travelbug holders can usually set a specific goal and track the items they own online. The objects of these tracked vehicles are transported from one box to another by Geocachers.
Rules of Geocaching
The first Geocacher to find the hidden box is defined as the First Time Finder (FTF). FTF is the person with the most valuable gift. In addition, valuable gifts can be found in boxes that are quite difficult to find. If these boxes, which do not have any size limit, are destroyed or stolen, the player who reaches the box announces the relevant treasure as “damaged, plundered” on the website. The reported box is corrected, relocated or removed if necessary, by contacting the keeper via the website or e-mail. This condition is known as Muggle. That is box damage and treasure theft. It is made by curious people called Muggles who do not know this game. For this reason, it is not enough to go to the coordinates of the boxes and just find the box.
Websites
Since 2000, the official address of the game is geocaching.com. Apart from that, there are also many different geocaching websites. Websites contribute to the development of the game over time. In addition to the paid and free features they offer, each website can host different variations and rules. For example, QR code scanning based game (bitcaching). Also a multi-cache game based on the rule of following many interrelated boxes on the route. It’s just two of them.