How a frontyard cache kicked of a 9 hour nightadventure

As you might know, I am not a fan of frontyard caches. Nose around in other people’s frontyard while the neighbours are watching you from behind the windows is not particularly my cup of tea. Last autumn however, I got an invitation via Twitter from @adriaanfemke_a to visit their frontyard cache and have a nice autumn beer. This last offer was exactly what I needed to pay them a visit. Besides the beer offer, I was really curious who the team behind the very creative caches like ‘Van de kaart’ is.

After the first handshake, the topic quickly changed to quality caching. After exchanging some recommendations for quality caches, there it suddenly was: the offer I could not refuse. “In January we are going to do ‘Waardeloos!’, would you like to join?” Off course I would like to join! The cache is going to be archived end of March and according to many people this is currently the best cache in the Netherlands! I was already working on this cache myself but got stuck at the third exercise, which was pretty worthless. A friend of A&F had already cracked the challenges and got a start certificate for end of January. Yes, I was very happy to join them!


The weekend before our night adventure, we had a little preparation meeting, which ‘forced’ me again to find a frontyard cache but also gave me the opportunity to meet some other geocachers. Again, the meeting was a lot of fun and we all were excited for our night adventure. During the next week, there was some sad news, A&F could not join our adventure. So, a few days later, I found myself in the woods, temperature -4 degrees Celsius, only the light of 4 flashlights and with 3 people I just knew for a week… We walked 20 kilometers, taking 9 hours and a daylight trip the day after (we made some terrible mistakes) but we had worthlessly great fun! ‘Waardeloos!’ truly is one of the best caches in the Netherlands.

However, what most changed my mind is, is what a boring frontyard cache can start… So if you are planning to find a frontyard cache, make sure to announce your visit so you can meet the people behind the cache. Please keep in mind that I am not accountable for the fun you will have!

A&F have already found ‘Waardeloos!’ as well. The cache will be archived in March but cache creator Phoenix Night is already working on its successor ‘H!’. With great expectations my new geocaching friends and me are all looking forward…

Not only birds are tweeting

As you might have noticed, at his been silent on my blog for quite some time. I have experienced that blogging takes time, time I did not have. So I limited myself to 140 characters with a twitter account. Posting geocaching adventures in 140 characters appears to be fun, challenging and fast. So if you want to follow my geocaching adventures, follow @rhrnl on twitter.com!

But.... I have a little more spare time recently which I will use for some topics which need more than 140 characters. So for some 'easy reading' geocaching content or geocaching stuff to think about, keep your eyes on this blog! By the way, the best way to follow a blog, is by using a rss reader, like google reader.

When I signed up for my twitter account, I discovered that not only birds are tweeting. I was not the only geocacher active on twitter, half the geocaching community was already there! Twitter appears to be an excellent medium to keep posted on everything what is going on in the geocaching community. One of the most active geocachers on twitter is hollands most notorious cacher @barnynl. If you like his nagging sense of humour, simply follow him on twitter and you will be among the first to know who his next target in his fight against the decay (verloedering) of geocaching is. This way twitter appeared to be very good for my daily need of geocaching content!

Which interesting geocacher do you follow on twitter for your daily need of geocaching content? Share the fun with me and tweet me his accountname!

Geocaching is going Social!

With the release of the beta maps late December, you got this pop up when you visited the beta maps for the first time. In this pop up there was the announcement of something called Geocaching Social, something I see a huge potential for and I already blogged about half November. With the recent release of new features on the site and loads of interesting features in the pipeline, Groundspeak is really moving forward with the geocaching.com website to get all potential out of it. I just hope that geocaching social turns out to be something like I have described in my November post or even something better!

Are you also curious what Geocaching Social is going to be or do you have your own opinion about what it should be or could add to the geocaching community? Write it down as a comment to this post or discuss it on the globalcaching forum (in Dutch). Big thanks to Hemma for referring to my blog!

Ps. I am having plans to revive my blog. More details will follow next week, so subscribe to the RSS feed already to keep updated!

Geocaching.com, a social media?

About 2 weeks ago I posted a functionality request called ‘follow my friends’ geocaching adventures’ on the geocaching.com website. Basic idea of this request is that I want to get an e-mail digest of the logs of my geocaching friends. This way I am updated on the adventures of my friends, so we have something to talk about when we meet or call and I get inspiration for my own geocaching adventures from the positive experiences of my friends. If they had a positive experience finding a geocache, I would like to have that experience as well and will go out and try to find the same cache.

From this idea, I have thought a little bit further down the road. Geocaching claims to be a game with a strong sense of community as you can read on the geocaching.com homepage. I asked to myself: “Can the geocaching platform not only have a sense of community, but actually contribute to peoples lives by making the platform more social? To answer this question, let’s first define what ‘social’ is. According to Wikipedia social media is described as following: “Social media are media for social interaction, using highly accessible and scalable publishing techniques.” According to this definition, geocaching.com is already some sort of social media. Geocachers can publish caches and other user can find them and publish their experience in a log. Other users can watch caches and read the logs of other peoples. This is graphically represented in the picture below.



But is this information highly accessible? No, at this moment it is not. On the geocaching.com website there is no feature which informs you about new caches in your area. The geocahing.com website always waits for your action. Many websites in the geocaching community have built a solution for this issue and keep track of and inform you about the latest additions. In contrary to caches, you can be actively informed about the latest logs on certain cache by using the ‘watch cache’ feature. But, as mentioned before, the information in a log is not only interesting for people who are watching a cache, it is also interesting for people who want to be informed about the adventures of a certain geocacher.

My simple request increases the accessibility of information. But it does not increase the social interaction. You can receive the log in your mailbox, but you cannot respond to it. For example if a friend of mine has, to my opinion, experienced a great adventure, I want to let him know. My friend, or other people, can respond to my message which gives us interaction.

This interaction is great opportunity for the geocaching.com website. Why? Because if you can interact through the website with other people in the community, even expand your social network by interacting with people who are not on your friends list, the geocaching website has not only a sense of community but actually has an added value to peoples lives, by being a platform to expand your social network. It will not only be a fun game to play, but it helps you meet other interesting people in a fun way as well, by meeting online and searching for a geocache in the woods together.

There are many platforms to interact with your friends and meet new friends online, like Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn. A geocaching social network will never become as big as these names, but it will be far more interesting for geocachers because it has that extra dimension to it. Meet online, go out there and find that cache, together as friends.

Growing pains of geocaching related websites

A few days ago, the webmaster of globalcaching.nl was questioning whether he should continue the site or not. On metacaching.nl there has been no activity at all recently and geoaching.nl is struggling with decreasing number of donators. What is going on the world of geocaching related websites?

Like any other organisation, geocaching websites go through different phases as they grow. This process is described in theories. Interesting is, because the process has been described, the growing pains could have been predicted and thus prevented.
Let’s see what the problem is according to one of these theories, the theory of Greiner. This theory states that each phase ends with a crisis. The phases can follow in a random order but this is the most common sequence:



Looking at the youngest website, globalcaching.nl, in its first year after the release it has already passed the first phase. New, creative tools have been made and a leader has described a clear vision to be followed: ‘Give the geocacher tools to find the most suitable cache listing according to his needs, without setting rules or influence the available geocaches.‘

Globalcaching.nl is now in phase 2. More and more tools have been added to the website and the amount of work is getting too much. Also the criticism that comes with executing a vision became almost too much for globalcaching.nl which was the reason for questioning the contingency of the website. A vacancy for a new programmer has been put on the website, which has not been filled yet.

To go through the autonomy crisis, a lot more is needed than a programmer to get the work done. The key will be to activate the user base. This can be done by involving small groups of users in the design of new tools on the site or giving them a specific role in the organisation, like forum moderator. When the user base is activated and involved, they will help globalcaching to get the work done by using their network to find the resources to make their design reality.

Most important however is to secure the contingency of the website. If the current owners stop their work for the website, their must be someone who can step up and continue the work. If the contingency is not secured, the user base cannot be activated. Nobody wants to put his precious efforts in the hands of a single person.
About Metacaching.nl I can be short. There has been some creativity which resulted in some interesting tools, but for further growth a vision is needed which makes this website stand out from the rest. A leader is needed who can create and execute such a vision.

Geocaching.nl is more complicated. This website already exists since 2002 and already has a significant organisation. As I already said before, the number of donators is dropping which is a sign of a crisis. Other indications are that no new tools have been developed recently and volunteers are leaving there position in the organisation pretty quickly for various reasons. Shortly said, the new middle layer of the organisation is failing to deliver results because either they are not capable to do so or the top of geocaching is in their way and worrying about the details. These are symptoms of a control crisis.

A good look at the middle layer is advised. Are they able to translate the demands of the community into solutions which fit into the vision of the top of the organisation, or are they only executing the vision of the top of the organisation without looking at the community? This is really important as the middle layer is the link to the geocaching community and they are the only ones in the organisation who can react to changes in the community.

Also some attention is needed for the top of the organisation. Are they making sure their vision is executed or are they executing their vision themselves? In other words, are they able to let go the details into the hands of the middle layer and trust on the creativity of the middle layer to execute the vision of the top of the organisation?

All geocaching related websites in The Netherlands are struggling at this moment. All of them have something good about them and I hope for the geocaching community that they will get out of the problems so that they can offer us useful new tools and we can keep on using the big amount of information on the forums.

Garmin Oregon; Trashbin or...

First I would like to thank someone. I would like to thank the guy who was telling something about his weird hobby Geocaching at the television show 'Kopspijkers' back in 2005. Finding tupperware boxes with help of million dollar satelites, that's weird! But wait a minute, this sounds like hiking, navigating and challenge. I like those things! This sounds like something for me! Thanks man, for this great addiction!

A few months later I bought my first GPS. Let's see if geocaching is something for me. It had to be cheap GPS because I did not want to spent a lot of money on a hobby I did not even know I liked. So I bought my first GPS on ebay and it happened to be a Garmin Etrex H.

Now, 3 years later, Geoaching appeared to be something I like a lot. So, I treated myself with a new, more advanced GPS last Christmas. First I was looking at a Garmin GPSMAP60CSx but this one is missing the Wherigo functionality, a very promising new trend in Geocaching in my opinion. When I read about the Garmin Dakota and Oregon series, I was sold. The Dakota is also missing the Wherigo functionality but the Oregon had all the options I wanted.

There are a few different versions of the Oregon. The 200 is the most basic version. The 300 has an electronic compass added, the 450 has detailed maps added included and the 550 has a camera but not the cards.

The first test for my Oregon was 'Van de Kaart', a recommendation. According to the description, this cache is not very easy and various options of the GPS need to be used. All I need for a good test! It was January 2nd and the first thing I discovered is that it is very hard to use the touch screen with gloves. The next thing I discovered is the accuracy of the Oregon. I found all waypoints within 2 meter of the GPS indication. With being used to the avarage accuracy of the Etrex, something like 20 meters, this was a major improvement. I do not like searching but I really like finding. Now I could tell whether the waypoint information was hidden on the trashbin or on the restplace right next to it. This will save me a lot of searching without finding! I would never have found a difficult cache like 'Van de Kaart' with my Etrex.

Another big improvement compared to the Etrex is the map. When you enter a new coordinate you hit the 'view map' label and you can immediately see whether the new waypoint makes sense or not. Now, I can immediately see whether I made a miscalcalculation or a typo so my waypoint appears to be in the water or on the other side of a river, which has happened a lot in the last 3 years.

Using the Oregon is very easy. I never needed the manual (is a manual included anyway?) for 'Van de Kaart', which includes a cross projection and multiple different date notations. There are also some strange things, like it seems that the Geocaching module of the software is only written for traditional caches. The additional waypoints of multicache are loaded as seperate waypoints and not as child waypoints related the the geocache. Also creating a new waypoint for a multicache is not very straight forward and is only possible from the main screen. What I also have not been able to do is getting the geocaching dashboard active when navigating to a normal waypoint. This dashboard is the most usefull dashboard because it is the only one with the map and compass active in a single screen. If somebody has managed to achieve this, please let me know!

Another missing thing is the danger area option, which is used in more and more caches recently but I was a bit lucky I did not need it for 'Van de Kaart'. Hopefully this will come in a software upgrade soon. For software upgrades, by the way, use the Microsoft approach and install the upgrade when the first hotfix is available which fixes all the issues in the new version because the bugs can be very disturbing. Another point of concern for me was battery usage, but allthough the Oregon is using more power then the Etrex, you can easily spent a day caching on a single pair of batteries.

Besides these few minor remarks, I am very pleased with my new Oregon. If you are thinking about buying one, Do not think about it, just do it!

How to spent a weekend around CacheDorado 's-Hertogenbosch

The city of 's-Hertogenbosch in the Netherlands is an area with a high cache density. Mainly responsible for this high density in caches is Geopatra, who has named this area 'CacheDorado'. According to him, there is a cache for everybody. But which cache is for you? I have put some recommendable caches in four groups for you; 'Point hunters', 'City walks', 'War theme' and 'Nature up north'.

Point hunters
For point hunters there is a lot to do in the cachedorado. There are a few bike routes combing multiple low distance caches: Fietsroute 2 from 's-Hertogenbosch to Drunen, Fietsroute 5 from Hedel to Nederhemert and Fietsroute 6 Elshout to Drongelen. Expect a lot, but not very spectacular, caches nearby interesting and less interesting spots.

City Walks
's-Hertogenbosch has a very nice city center and multiple cachers have taken the oppertunity to guide you through the city. Very special about 's-Hertogenbosch is that city center and nature are very close. You can best experience this in Hopman Henks version, but if you are more interested in the city walk and less in nature I more recommend Le Comtes version in combination with Jurassic Park. Off course Geopatra also has a city tour but the puzzle took me too much time so I have not found this one yet. Another recommendation is Moerasdraak, which starts close to the city center at very busy junction but after an exciting walk you end in nature with a nice view on the city.

Nature up north
North of the city center, there are some caches in special areas. Diezemonding for example, an area without any paths, 2 meter high thorny plants and cows. Another recommendation is Bovenwaard with animal skeletons all over the place and a cache with a nice plot but mainly very nice handcrafted waypoints. Unfortunately this caches is offline for some time.

War theme
South of 's-Hertogenbosch there are some very interesting war themed caches. Vughtse Heide takes you to the place where prisoners of camp Vught were shot in world war II. At Tower of Evil you can visit the museum related to the camp. Probably the best cache in CacheDorado is 'Het geheim van Elzenburg'. A war themed cache about trust and betrayal with a very, very good plot. Not war themed, but close to the war themed caches is IJzeren Man, a challenging cache which deserves its place in this post.

So, CacheDorado has something for everybody, a lot of good caches. But what it does not have is a cache that everybody likes. A cache that you have to do, which makes you come to this area. Or, is it this one, just outside the CacheDorado?