Monday 31 December 2012

Looking back over the year

Looking back over the year I have to say its been a good year all in all.

The bad things first, the few bouts of bad depression, falling out with a good friend and my daughters rebellion against everyone. There was also the caching ban by a certain few but I won't go into that.

However a lot of positive things happened, being the first to one hundred 5/5 s being joint first with wonky donkey into the most geolympix events attended, the geolympix, the Christmas summer camp event to name a few.

I've also started to learn Linux coding language, got a raspberry pi or seven and made my tv project which I'm yet to show off.

I also came joint 5th in the country for the employee of the year competition, staying the night at the fa Hilton up leictershire way. Second in the depot back shift member of the year for all my hard work and highly regarded by those above for my hard work dealing with the cross government mail contract and do pleased that my efforts have been appreciated especially on my down points.

I also got to take out caching some friends who I introduced to 5/5 caching but to find a proper 5/5 in this day and age is hard. While I never hit the 9 or 10k mark in geocaching a 8.5 does me fine, just wished the weather and depression didn't hold me back as it did.

I'm still learning to use the raspberry pi, hoping to learn more about the gertboard in the coming year and make more projects hopefully geocaching orientated and hopefully patch things up with old friends too.

While 2012 has been a great year overall with lots of achievements and things learnt I hope 2013 will be better.

Happy new year all and feel free to click on the links on the side, just need 6000 clicks to get my cheque from google lol.

Sunday 30 December 2012

my tv pi project

It all started when I saw skpang's portable computer project. From that point I knew I had to try and make my own one.

Once I had sourced a cheap 3.5" screen on eBay for about ten quid I was set to go, I will be getting a 7" next as its a bit small to work on but for films and iplayer it's good enough.

Firstly I had to take the screen apart to by pass the 12v to 5v bit. Luckily I found four pins pass this bit that I could connect to, so after hacking the lead down and adding a USB lead to power the screen I soon had the av lead reattached and shorter. The only problem I did have was as the screen was cheap it did have a few pixels that were dead.

Next stage was to add raspbmc to the pi, I also added iplayer and a few other uk on demand catch up tv add ons. I then got a remote control to use on it, an open case to let it ventilate and heat sinks to keep the heat down.

I also added the ledborg, but need to work on that even through it does work and lights up the case nicely.

I then purchased some cheap three quid speakers from babz media to do the sound and run them, the tv, raspberry pi, wifi and remote receiver through a cheap 7 way USB hub bought for a couple of quid and run by a 5v 3a decent power lead to ensure there is enough amps, on a 1amp psu the device kept crashing.

The raspberry pi has been slightly clocked to allow it to keep up and so far no problems watching films, even through before I slightly clocked it it did stutter here and there, now the only stuttering is when the Internet can't keep up with it.

So total price for the project including the pi leads, psu etc came to about 70 quid. Taking out the stuff I can use for other projects (or if you already have a pi and the basics) would come to around £20.

Have a go, nice easy project and I now have a 20 quid portable phone charger to try and run it all from 5v 2a 8500mh so should be able to keep it running for a few hours.







Dunsden series

We went out on the dunsden series near reading today, wore Wellies which I was grateful for due to the waterlogged area. We passed a house that was once lived in but had been left in a bad state. Parking at near 9 we went round anti clockwise, frodo covered in mud within seconds. We could also see the tracks of other animals as we walked round. A few dnf s, but a good day out, a good view of reading and also the floods. Later on we went to get a cache in a hedge and actually found two dormice playing in the hedge. Near the end the footpath Was flooded, knee deep and over the tops of my Wellies, frodo became cleaner here as he swam around in the footpath. A nice afternoon out and nice to get back out after the recent weather and seasonal illnesses.

Thursday 27 December 2012

bugs, virus s and sd cards

After a great Christmas I was hit today by a big that left me in bed disliking light especially tv light. So after a good sleep I was able to come up with new ideas.

First was I have an sd card that claims its write protected when it's not. Thanks to a friend I will try out this https://www.sdcard.org/downloads/formatter_3/ tomorrow to see if it will fix it.

Next I'm trying to come up with making my own camera rocket that I can fire up into the sky and take pictures. I've got most of the concept there, tube, big elastic, parachute, but just need to find a way of running an old web cam with small battery and USB/sd card and can power for a few minutes, have wondered about just using a wifi cam straight to pc. Any ideas or other projects that could help then let me know.

Next up is the raspberry pi user guide book, a very good read and I've learnt more from this than all the Linux and unix books I've been reading recently, certainly a well received Xmas present.

Over the coming week or so I should have lots more bits coming to add or use with the raspberry pi, so watch this space.

Tuesday 18 December 2012

Not much

Not much to report been too busy with my pi s, however with a week off soon I will be able to spend some time writing and learning python to hopefully do something with the gertboard.

Saturday 15 December 2012

wow great service

After contacting newit earlier during the week a helpful Jason said to return the pi. Well today the replacement has arrived and a quick turn round at Christmas.

A big thank you to all at newit, merry Christmas and have a happy new year from a very happy customer.

Monday 10 December 2012

Xmas pi n caching

We went to the excellent Christmas geocaching event yesterday by the Cachehoppers, I kind of got dragged as I wasn't up to talking to people even through I doubt it showed.

We got to do around half a dozen caches with a couple of ftf s for good comfort.

Today I was up early, needed to get a doctors appointment. 8.30 am straight through to receptionist who seem to think they can assess you on the phone. "erm
I need to see the doctor I'm not having a good time and I'm on anti depressants". Soon had an appointment for ten minutes later so quick run outside and de I've the car to turn up just in time for my appointment. Extra tablets later I was back at home.

Whilst drinking a cup of tea I notice the memory card on pi 2 the tv project was at an odd angle, on closer inspection I could see the sd holder wasn't holding so will have to see how I can get this solved. Took off the heatsinks and out of the casing so it's ready to go back as soon as I hear back from the suppliers.

Tuesday 4 December 2012

not much about pi

Not much to report really, have been rather down with depression. Have felt so low that at times I've wanted to lock myself away from everyone.

Caching has been quiet, not due to weather, just lack of nearby caches and quality caches. The trend for a soggy film canister just seems to grow, whilst a good quality hide deminishes.

On the pi front I have finished a few kits, the gertboard is running but with problems on LEDs 3,4,7,11. All the connections seem to have power and all LEDs work, but not plugged into the pi. Even after replacing the red LEDs with green and amber it didn't improve things. I then got the ladder board kit to find one red and two amber don't want to work and same again resoldered it. Then two berryclips where led s 2 and three don't want to work neither, which leads me to think its either the board or the software, answers on a postcard.

Yesterday the other part of team text got their 5000th cache, well done to Thierry and Helena on achieving it.

Sunday 25 November 2012

raspberry caching

Headed off to the raspberry pi event at Milton Keynes today, no real caching planned and not suitable clothing but ok for the drive bys on the way up.

After two dnf s things improved then 2 hours later I arrived at the event (caching makes your journeys last longer).

Didn't know what to expect and soon saw dr sollys geotruck so knew if things went quiet there be someone to talk to about geocaching.

Within minutes of arriving I found someone who had done a light and fan project which pricked my ears as I had been looking at how I could do this and now with the ability to use unix code to see the thermal CPU temperture I reckon it be easier.

There were many friendly and welcoming people, skpang who runs a electronics business and a whizz with electrical stuff showed us a set up using a reversing camera as a monitor, excellent idea and one i want to do.

A lady who is a school teacher was telling us how hard it had been to try and get pi s into school and one that annoys me considering how cheap these devices are and the fact that these things could be what brings in new programmers etc to a future generation.


At the end of the event we went on a tour to see some of the old computers, including collisus and the witch. The witch is a two tonne machine from the 1940 s used by the harwell scientists to work out their huge calculations in the atomic research establishment. We were lucky to be shown it up and running and certainly an interesting machine. Whilst looking at the other computers there I came across one with basic code. Remember this:

10 print"hello";
20 goto 10
Run

Yeap that brought back memories, then there was one, yes, well two, bbc micro machines my first insight into computers when I was 8 and those famous red buttons at the top.

After the event myself and dr solly went off caching, a linear route, with two vehicles we parked one at one end and one at the other end. Things started off ok till we got near a bridge and found with dr sollys walking stick that it was about knee deep with what was left of a walk way and a plank of wood. After some careful adjustments we were able to make our way across.

Later on we did a night cache nearby and realised once we did it that we had passed some caches that I hadn't done so got one on the way back to the car. Note next meet run a pocket query of the area. The night cache was a huge cache with some good goodies. Dr solly torches left at various good caches including this one.

Along the way we talked caching and pi s and one idea I need to do is turn off the GUI off one of my pi s, also need to add the hard drive dr solly gave me for a file server project .

For what was meant to be a morning out ended up being a great day out, thanks to everyone at raspberrypimk event and dr solly .








Monday 12 November 2012

geocaching pi

Not really been up for much outdoorness recently, might be the time of the year or I can't be bothered to drive for an hour to get to a trail.

However I have started a new project called raspberry pi. It's a £20 quid computer that you need to then buy a lead to you tv (99p) a case (a couple of quid) power pack (couple of quid again) wifi or Ethernet and USB keyboard and mouse (about 7 quid) and a USB powered hub (three quid). Oh an an sd card of minimium 4gb and preferable class 10.

So for under fifty quid it's up and running, I currently have two. One is plugged in with ssh and vnc so I can play and learn from anywhere. The other I interchange the sd cards, one card has xbmc on it and since changing the class 4 card to a class 10 doesn't seem to buffer or drag no more I know have a better way of watching films than with my apple tv.

Ok I've had to start learning Linux and unix and have been lucky to find many of the books on amazon second hand costing a grand total of £2.81 including postage for many books costing ten times what I'm paying for brand new. Yes I've had one dirty book with part of a page ripped out, but 99% of the books have been received like brand new.

My current project is to make a cloud at home to use from anywhere. I did succeed with my first file server and ended up connecting my tb harddrive back to the router and have since started adding all my DVD s to it as my music (200gb) is already loaded on there after going through a spate of buying secondhand CDs for less than a quid including postage and using iTunes to get a better quality with their service and cloud thingy and certainly cheaper than buying the old albums from iTunes.

So what have I planned? Well I'm looking eventually to run one of these devices from the car with mobile data, touchscreen, live maps and live cache status of caches, ambitious? Yes but an interesting project it will be.

Saturday 27 October 2012

mega day out

Firstly sorry for not posting in a while it's been hectic with the only big trip out to sussex to do the Leigh valley loop and a few 5/5s that we were passing, one being an excellent one in a tunnel.

Today however we went to the Halloween event in Northamptonshire. Starting the day off early we managed to get twenty caches on the way up including a night cache thanks to my excellent led lenser torch and find a ten pound note floating in the street.

Once at the mega it was a case of downloading the just published caches with my mifi dongle and netbook and adding the caches to the gps s.

The caches were so well thought out that it was impossible to fault any. After getting caught in a bad hail storm that soaked us we still plodded on and later on participated in the excellent night cache series of 14 caches and a cache in a tunnel under the nearby main road where I came across my first live and wild otter. By the time I got my camera phone out it was gone.

Finishing the day on nearly 80 caches and some of the most excellent caches to date. We meet up with friends and like with all caching events made new friends too.

Once again a big thank you to the organisers, it was one excellent day and with mega status too it just shows all the hard work and dedication the team have shown.

Will we go again next year? Silly question really, a big yes from us and once again thank you.

Monday 3 September 2012

weekend caching

We spent the weekend in Weymouth a place that seems to have a cache every 528ft

After solving all the Olympic rings we decided to hit Weymouth to get them. While we had plenty of dnf s on caches we focused out time on the Olympic series as that was what we were aiming for, getting all the clues for the bonus's.

While we solved them all we hit a brick wall with red bonus 5 and the bonus bonus. The red bonus involves a 5 mile hike or you can drive to a carpark less than 528ft from the cache and pay a huge parking fee for the priviledge which we refused which then meant we couldn't get the bonus bonus either which was a shame.

The series took us to some great locations around Weymouth that most tourists know nothing about and took us on some nice walks. There were a couple of caches I would question as being placed within guidelines, but there was some excellent ideas too.

All in all we enjoyed the whole series and the weather after a windy first night with a power cut to the whole of Weymouth turned out to be a great weekend both weather wise and caching plus time to do other things.

Tuesday 28 August 2012

I need a new gps

My poor Oregon 300 which replaced my two etrex s is in a sorry state so I've started the task of looking for a new one, an Oregon 550 as I'm not keen on the new Montana devices. I managed to find one for £260 but still pricey then I thought, if all my unique viewers to my blog donated £1 each I could afford a new gps immediately. But will that happen? Watch this space ....

another 5/5

I qualified for the mario Mctavish 365 day challenge a month ago, so yesterday on a trip to hayling island we picked it up with some drive bys and some caches on hayling itself. Whilst we picked up the last two of the day I popped behind a tree to relieve myself as nature was calling and to my suprise in front of me in the tree was a munzee. So out with my phone to capture it. Whilst I'm not really into munzees if i do come across any now I do capture it with the phone app.

Today I been sorting out some puzzles in Weymouth to do, fed up at staring at the oc screen I turned it off but with a smug grin that there is a good days worth of caching ahead next week :)

Later this week we are going to the camping event up Nottingham way so anyone going feel free to say hi.

Saturday 25 August 2012

depression

Well today I thought I talk about something that affects me, depression.

It's when the brain doesn't get enough serotonin which is the happy stuff naturally found in cocoa. Because my body doesn't make enough of it I have to take tablets to increase it. However exercise also helps, I find geocaching a great way to boost it and today went out with frodo to get some caches that friends had kindly sent me co ords for.

With walking being a prime example recommended by doctors, my doctor always encourages me to get out and go geocaching as not only am I getting exercise to try and boost my serotonin levels but the buzz and feel good factor also from finding a cache brings you up too.

Today we did around Wiltshire, not feeling up for one of stans excellent events we decided to get a few drive bys and do a nice series near littlecote involving traditionals, puzzle, wherigo and a letterbox cache of which frodo enjoyed to especially trying to sniff out sticks at gz and eventually taking one from the stickoflague.

There was a clever safe cache where you had to pick up the co ords and safe combination which we enjoyed, the combination was rather stiff but eventually we got there and the safe opened :)


In the distance we could hear the rolling thunder but stayed dry only seeing rain when we returned to Wantage which had suffered some flash flooding.

What a nice afternoon out, just dread next week all the logging.

Tuesday 21 August 2012

an apology

I would like to apologise for any hurt or upset that I have caused anyone recently with my posts. It's been due to frustration and my mental health and I have ashamedly taken it out on my friends and reviewers who I do class as friends too. I must remember this is only a game that we all enjoy, again I'm sorry.

Saturday 18 August 2012

pq s and garmins

Had an interesting chat today so thought I do a blog on getting pq s onto your garmins.

Firstly log onto geocaching.com and click down right side on build pocket queries.

Next create a new query

Name the pq, for this ill call it today, tick day you want then how often you want it to run. Where it says show me 500 caches of change to 1000

Types=any
Containers=any

Then tick: I haven't found, I don't own, are not on my ignore list, is enabled

Tick difficulty and terrain

Leave within and go to from origin and select what you want, here I'm choosing home.

Within a radius leave at whatever

Place during=none selected

I'm not choosing attributes but they are there if you are looking for say a night cache or a scuba cache.

Then click submit information.

Next click on pocket queries at top then go down to tab pocket queries ready for download and click on tab.

Click on the name of picket query you have just created and choose to save.

Open up the zip folder and highlight the two files ending in .gpx one is caches the other is waypoints

Turn on gps and choose delete all routes reset all trip info under settings and then plug into the computer. Open up the garmin folder on the computer open garmin and you will see some files and folders geocache_visits.txt is here for upload if you have done caches (upload field notes on gc site) if you have already done that then delete this file.

Click on gpx folder delete archive and current folders and anything else in here and paste the two .gpx files here renaming the long number as 1.gpx and the other with -wpts.gpx to 1-wpts.gpx and your all done.

However I save mine to memory card which is memory card, garmin, gpx again delete everything in this folder before pasting the two gpx files and renaming them as mentioned in last paragraph, this I find helps them load up quicker

Go to bottom and choose remove hardware and remove all when told to do so unplug and turn on your gps, it will take a moment to load up and if correct when you open geocaching you be able to find caches. If not (and the reason I recommend sd memory cards) is you can turn it off take out the card, turn it back on and load up, reset waypoints and then turn off, reinstall sd card and turn back on, this time they should load up with no problems. If you are unfortunate for them to go down in the field at least with memory card you get the option to remove it and retry.

Hope this blog helps you out if not feel free to comment.

Monday 13 August 2012

my weekend

Spent much of it rechecking caches wading through water and crawling up tunnels, one I tried when I was 10 but gave up. This became a place for another cache and even found a quick way back in if I need to perform maintenance. This place even led to my old back garden which was cool.

Then looked at a few places to place the very last one which will involve keys, locks and stuff used so far, plus a few new bits. Problem is all the work needed to get this in place so probably be another weekend.

Already have several favourites on my first in the series as well as an attempt on number two. All have to be done in order to do the next stage and so forth.

Friday 10 August 2012

placing new caches

In the past week I have placed another cache in the all about the numbers series. Problem is trying to find the ideal locations. I looked at the river at steventon where it runs under the road by the cherry tree pub. The problem here is not getting under the tunnel it's the fact you have to trespass a foot to get to it so I had to abandon the idea. Just before I abandoned the idea I thought of using a kyak, however the water wasn't deep enough and too much reeds in water too .

Then back to Wantage, Wantage has about 300 caches in about 5 mile radius, which is great for caching but not for placing caches. On looking at several great locations to place a good cache idea I was stumped, why? A film pot cache that's why. Wherever I look and find the ideal spot for a huge cache it's scarpered by a film pot within 524ft.

Now don't get me wrong I'm guilty as the next for putting a film pot out for the sake of it. But when you trying to put a good size cache out, surely a bigger cache should win priority? I've even been out maintaining and removing caches I feel are just there for the sake of it or too small freeing up space for bigger and better caches.

Just this week I went to the army surplus store to get two big ammo cans for eight quid a can, some where Manky, but after a look at them all I got two good ones, might go back for more.

If people went out and did some of the oldest caches like Coombs hill or the queens oak and saw what size these caches were in the early days, what is in them and how big the logbooks are, then perhaps they would go out to their small caches and archive them and place some bigger caches or find locations which you would want to show someone. After all what would you like to see? An underground tunnel or a bush with disused needles?
Yes there is the chance of it being muggled, but a well placed cache with a lot of thought that's gone into it shouldn't get muggled.

So while I look at places for its all about the numbers 3 and 4 have a think about your own caches or a friends, maybe being honest to yourself and them and think you know what? Our caches are pretty crap along that stretch how about we archive them and place a bigger cache up that tree or in that hollow?

Tuesday 7 August 2012

what's geocaching

This is what I was asked today. So how do I explain it?

Geocaching is basically a high tech treasure hunt where you get the co ords off geocaching.com put them onto your gps device and head off in search of the box aka cache.

Once you get down to a few feet you hunt around for the container, this can be small dog tag micro or up to a huge box. They can be devilish as in a cache hidden inside a hollow log to a magnetic sign with a logbook inside it.

As more and more phones come with gps you can download an app to your phone to start with before moving onto a proper gps.

Sunday 5 August 2012

out puztok caching

Out today with frodo, parked at a parking spit off Walton steer near to fiddlers island and did about ten caches including metal bijou s excellent cache at the old swimming baths and four puztox caches, the ones that the reviewers allowed. This brought us to some parts of Oxford that we didn't no existed including a little alley way. We got caught in the rain and the thunderstorm and also filled another d/t thank you simply Paul for the puzzles and placing them :)

Saturday 4 August 2012

team text on manoeuvres

Today myself and frodo went out caching, it's been the first caching weekend where we got up when we woke up and been local. It was also not about numbers today and we were so much happier than how we had recently when our with another team.

We first of all did coate water park, finding a stolen cash safe close to gz, couldn't get the staff in site interested so didn't bother, just leaving a log online to cache owner.

The next was a puzzle cache, nice idea of picking up a key and heading to stage two to use it, however the cache was sodden.

We noticed a nice bridge in coate water park but no cache under it why? We later dropped off a puztok at a cache on coate water park and yes frodo found ball one of four today.

The next area to hit was the gorse hill series, not a favourite, film pot mixed with rubbish and needles, again a huge tree out of everyone's view could take a nice size cache half way up, what was there, a film pot in ivy grrrrr, why, why, why? However frodo found himself another ball, now we are bored, need some quality.

Decided to head home and did the shrivenham circular series, after the rain it dried out for the rest of the walk with a nice view of white horse hill and yes ball three on this series.

After this we went to do if only a multi, this had to be the best all day, nicely planned series, decent size container, proper logbook and now one of my rare favourite points.

As we drove home a puzzle popped up on email, soon had it solved and we disappeared to gz to get a ftf :)

The day isn't over yet but I'm deciding shall I go out and get another new one. ???

puztox

Puztoxs are a collection of 10 different colour and different cipher coins each one has a phrase which you can use to set or decipher a puzzle. A phrase of outstanding or black or even d=3 will point puztox owners to the correct cipher.

Although groundspeak are being funny on these at moment, we are seeding the black one online, so feel free to copy and forward on the picture to as many people as possible. The plan with the black one is to put a cache out using the name and your postcode. If we can get 500+ caches put using "outstanding in the field" then your postcode eg ox1 1aa then hopefully the reviewers and groundspeak will give in.

http://twitter.com/_smstext/status/231411826540302336/photo/1

Thursday 2 August 2012

and so behold my caches were published

It took nearly a week and re editing my puzzles but now all published :) a ftf has been reported to me on one with three chasing another cache and no try on my super hard one yet which I'm about to make even harder lol. So anyone not quick enough will find its even harder, probably 20 minutes longer :)

Have fun and enjoy.

Wednesday 1 August 2012

podcache show

Just a quick blog today, show 11 of the podcache show is out featuring many cachers including figures on his 10k cache and myself on my 5/5s and my exhausted review of the day at the very end.

Monday 30 July 2012

groundspeak emails

It looks like groundspeak are having email problems, just starting to get emails through now for caches I archived Friday. Just wondering if this could also be the slow time in getting caches published? Answers on a postcard

settings, doh....

Thanks to Collin at ukgeocaching podcast I have solved the unable to comment problem and the silly predictive text problem.

maintenance and puztoks part du

Day two of puztokgate and the reviewers are not budging waiting for orders from groundspeak. Now don't get me wrong but I've come across a frog coin cypher that was published in Bristol surely then that should be archived for similarly the same thing.

Whilst most people have bought these puztoks at £10 for a set of ten, some have been given out to cachers to seed and dr solly has tons to seed whilst out around the country. It's also obvious the codes will come common knowledge as they become popular, but why is groundspeak being so anal?

Ten letters equalling ten numbers isn't exactly rocket science to work out. There is many online program's that can figure out the cipher and most cachers can work out the first 4 to 5 characters from the puzzle icon location as it has to be within two miles of the icon. So this leaves the last three nothings and last three westings and guess what? At least two of the numbers will probably be in there from the 51 or 001 of the co ords making it a 1 in 16 chance of getting the next number correct on first go. All I can say is keep submitting them for review they might then just take the hint.

Back on to maintenance today another couple missing in action and one moved from 8 ft up a tree to near the base by the tree surgeons so I archived it. One other needed a new and dry logbook and container leaving me with three more to check on.

I also placed a new cache called lots of top cheating which involves yes, cheating ask people for the co ords, follow cachers to the co ords, the only rule is that you must physically sign the cache.

Sunday 29 July 2012

maintenance and puztoks

It all started Friday when I discovered my 5/5 had been trashed, not an easy one to get to at least a 12m ladder or ropes so had to be someone who had done it in the past. The container was within throwing distance which frodo found minus the camo tape.

So Saturday I started to go round maintaining my caches and placing some new caches. First container needed a new logbook so I archived it and placed a new cache nearby. The next was fine, however the next two on a byway were gone. Not to be put off I decided to place new ones using puztoks that I got from the geolympix.

Puztoks are 10 different coins in ten different colours each colour having its own cipher. One is a=2b=4 and so on another a=3 b=4 and so forth.

The idea of them is to use as a cipher tool and no different to googling online decipher tools on the Internet. With a 1 in 100 chance of getting the first letter correct with out then then 1 in 81, 1 in 49 and do forth it's not quantum physics. The fact that you already know that the first 3 are 51 2 and 001 2 gives you the first four of 10 numbers giving you a 1 in 36 chance of getting the next number and so forth.

However on sending them through for review the reviewer said no as they need more info and guidance from groundspeak this is after they published a series in Oxford including GC3Q2VT and GC36E5G

I have asked geocaching friends with out these tokens to crack them and most have in less than ten minutes using little more than a map or gps to punch the numbers in and plot where the cache will be.

So what now? I'm waiting for the reviewer to get back, the organiser of the geolympix is now looking into this and many locals with puztoks are wondering if they bought a white elephant?

Well it's not stopping me, I know of a dozen caches waiting to be published and I'm going to place a lot more yet to the stage that they will just have to do something.

So if you have puztoks get placing out the caches and maybe you will get a sensible reviewer who uses common sense. If not publish a quantum physics thesis and set the cache with that lol.

Saturday 28 July 2012

GC3RC7Q awaiting publishing

My monkey tree cache a 5/5 was found by me and frodo destroyed, the only way to get to it is at least a 12m ladder or ropes. only one person came to mind who even had a grudge and to top it all off they even had time to peel off the camo tape. thanks to frodo for finding it. So far many people have pointed the finger to the same trasher sorry cacher. So i decided to put out another hard cache,but this time harder to solve so the only way they will find it is to solve the puzzle which a. they dont do and b. they cant do as their brain capacity couldnt cope. Therefore someone else will have to solve it or tell them where to go. Cant wait to see how people do and see if i cant guess who will be next after whoever the FTFer is. Im not saying anything now on how i put the puzzle together or the location of the cache, but i will say it brings the very old with the slightly new of which will become apparent at gz and many people wont even know it existed, thats what caching is about bringing people to new places.

Thursday 26 July 2012

Geoylimpx and the last couple of days.

Ive been so so busy in the last couple of days. It all started with the bike ride on Tuesday, this was a lovely ride with various icons picked up and a blank d/t square filled in (to find another one has changed and become blank again). Rode past JK's house and a few of us met at the pub and after cooling down decided to go do the south section of jolly jax's new series that's based on the otmoor challenge. At the start i decided to pack my waders hearing of the depths that the water gets to and only needed them on for one cache to get through. in 30c heat wearing waders is a weird experience. there was some good hides on this series and some high d/t's in places which always a bonus. At the pub meet i didnt stay long as i hadnt eaten all day and was starting to dehydrate so decided it was time to head home, log what ive done, cool off in the bath before preparing for the nights night cache event. Arriving a bit early at the night cache event on christmas common i was greeted by simply paul, here i was informed that i had come second in the treasure hunt game at the last event and kindly was able to pick a prize, sadly no hoodies as i would have had one. While Paul set up the night event i was left to greet anyone who turned up including Alex aka wonkey donkey. Near to the start we were broken from the peace as two military helicopters flew over and over very low down on night training exercises, no doubt they would be wondering what a group of cachers were doing out here at this time of night. Some more people turned up and Paul told us what we had to do (no i wont give it away as it will make it more interesting if I or Paul hold another one) so off into the forest to find our prey. I soon had one to hand, but a new twist had been added, Paul was going to come into the forest after 10 mins to hunt us down with only a headtorch and light saber and lots of noises. Soon Paul was on his way and suddenly in the distance i could see the light saber waving about, kind of spooky. Soon he was near so i sat down next to a tree with my torches off ready to do a blinding light and run attack lol. but he walked passed and i followed a little way before making my escape up another path. Later I could see wonkey donkey coming down the track so into stealth mode using just a uv light to see my way i followed down another track and jumped out on him. By now we had been in the forest an hour so we decided to make our way back looking for other cachers which my led lenser torch would illuminate quickly and make them look like started rabbits. I only found one so came in third place, but had my pleasure of stalking and jumping out of people in a forest that had deer and other nocturnal animals within. Wednesday morning (well the nightcache was technically Wednesday morning but Tuesday night) was the walk meet up at Woodstock. Sat in the shade we talked about ways of using the new puztok's designed for the geolympix in our caches and ideas to go on. Later we went for a walk around Blenhiem Palace in blistering 30c+ heat. The first cache found by me, the third once everyone had given up and seen the dnfs from the previous two attempts and joint find on the forth with wonkey donkey. On to the evening it was a trip to Coombe Hill for the closing ceremony of the geolympix, not only was we at i believe the highest point in Buckinghamshire at around 825ft but Britain oldest remaining traditional geocache is up here, a nice size ammo box hidden in a nice location. The BBC Mike Bussell cache is up here featured on a bbc news story on geocaching last year, so got them too. A group photo and closing words from Paul on the event and everyone given a pictok to put out in geocaches in a hope it will take off, mine will go out somewhere wherever i end up on holiday next month. Whilst up here me and wonkey donkey set about solving the night cache trail head. we ended up at the pub for a cold drink and some food before finally cracking it to the amusement of team hippo who had set it. This was an excellent night cache that got harder and harder and needed two of you due to some of the stages where you had to re pick up the trail. We soon had the numbers to hand and soon lost the trail as we looked round i could see two trail markers, heres the next stage i shouted as i headed to it to find it was a deer hiding by a tree which got up and ran off. When we eventually got to what we thought was gz we were then pointed to the next stage where wonkey donkey showed me something on my garmin i didnt know existed and we soon had the nice size ammo can to hand. Well what a week, im looking forward to seeing all the pictures soon and am back to work today for a well earned rest :) This week is certainly one i will remember and most enjoyable mega event/week ever. Thank you to Paul and the geolympix team for all their hard work and also to everyone who attended and made it so successful.

Monday 23 July 2012

Another gold for me

After doing my stats today I decided to check www.project-gc.com to see my rankings and yes now confirmed im oxfordshires top cacher again by beating jollyjax (a lovely bloke) back to the top.

my stats

username has 7958 Finds on 7956 unique Geocaches
username has 7958 Finds on 7956 unique Geocaches

Statistics generated on 23/07/2012

Cumulative Finds by Month
Cumulative Total
Annual Totals


Finds by Month
  2012       2011       2010       2009       All  

2012
  177
 
216
 
362
 
190
 
363
 
90
 
125
 
Total finds 1523
Days caching 92
Average finds per caching day 16.6
Overall finds per day 7.4
Average finds per week 52.0
Average finds per month 226.1
Month: JanFebMarAprMayJun JulAugSepOctNovDec
Days caching: 2312117141213     

2011
  302
 
217
 
510
 
494
 
513
 
243
 
404
 
523
 
232
 
137
 
202
 
292
 
Total finds 4069
Days caching 254
Average finds per caching day 16.0
Overall finds per day 11.1
Average finds per week 78.0
Average finds per month 339.3
Month: JanFebMarAprMayJun JulAugSepOctNovDec
Days caching: 231527303130181717131320



Milestones
Milestone Date Interval   Code   Cache Name
1 01/08/2009 United Kingdom GC1HBDX pooky luke's ultimate kid's cache
1000 11/04/2010 253 days United Kingdom GCM86J Great Bedwyn Lock (Wilts)
2000 16/10/2010 188 days United Kingdom GC19YGV Alban Way 1 - ST. ALBANS LONDON ROAD
3000 12/03/2011 147 days United Kingdom GC2MKGV Roffey Roam #12
4000 02/05/2011 51 days United Kingdom GC2R464 Piddletrent-hides #6
5000 30/07/2011 89 days United Kingdom GC309CE Bunkered?
6000 12/11/2011 105 days United Kingdom GC35PC6 Colden Common Circulation #4
7000 27/03/2012 136 days United Kingdom GC3CE4K 015 - Wiston Wobble
7958 22/07/2012 117 days United Kingdom GC3P05Y Geolympix 2012 CITO - Giving something back

username should reach 8000 finds in 6 days (3 Caching days) on 29/07/2012



Finds by Miles from Home
  Number Percent  
< 10 1042 13.0 %  
10 - 20 1871 23.5 %  
20 - 30 675 8.48 %  
30 - 40 639 8.02 %  
40 - 50 556 6.98 %  
50 - 100 2825 35.4 %  
100 - 200 346 4.34 %  
200 - 500 3 0.03 %  
500 - 1000 1 0.01 %  
> 1000 0 0 %

Average Distance: 41 Miles

Finds by Type
  Number Percent  
Traditional 7469 93.8 %  
Mystery 235 2.95 %  
Multi 137 1.72 %  
Event 44 0.55 %  
Virtual 24 0.30 %  
Earth 22 0.27 %  
Letterbox 14 0.17 %  
Wherigo 5 0.06 %  
Webcam 3 0.03 %  
Mega Event 3 0.03 %  
CITO 2 0.02 %  


Finds by Difficulty Rating


Finds by Terrain Rating


Finds by Owner
  Number Percent  
1 - Flatcoat Walker 182 2.28 %  
2 - poshrule 178 2.23 %  
3 - The Teddies 150 1.88 %  
4 - LordOfTheCachers 145 1.82 %  
5 - Costells 141 1.77 %  
6 - stanthews 127 1.59 %  
7 - Renegade Rabbit 118 1.48 %  
8 - RoobyDoo 112 1.40 %  
9 - KPFB 95 1.19 %  
10 - kryfto 94 1.18 %  
  Number Percent  
11 - The K9 Crew 90 1.13 %  
12 - TedsTeam 76 0.95 %  
13 - BHA LOYAL 73 0.91 %  
14 - The Cache Hoppers 71 0.89 %  
15 - TheAdamss 70 0.87 %  
16 - PJ&L 68 0.85 %  
17 - The Fruitloops 61 0.76 %  
18 - Newmanmadhouseteam 60 0.75 %  
19 - Slogger007 60 0.75 %  
20 - GeoCotch 58 0.72 %  
These didn't make it to the top:
Rothallo (56) kevham1 (55) Merstham Mafia (55) cookie cook (54)
stephia4 (54) Geo J0 (52) Cache and Cake Club (50) Lord Of The Cachers (48)
j4pos (47) cachedrag0n (46) Simply Paul (46) Gowenhouse (45)
CotswoldOx (44) rob72 (44) turtle140 (44) Fleetwinders (43)
SpankyBanksy (41) Pedal Pushers (39) CaptainJack. (38) chilihouse (38)

username has also found caches placed by 1202 other people

Finds by Weekday
5496 Weekend Finds (69%) : 2462 Weekday Finds (31%)


Finds by Container


Some Numbers
Overall Total Finds: 7958 finds in 612 caching days over 1087 total days (56.3 %)
Overall Averages: 13.00 finds per caching day, 7.32/day, 51.25/week, 222.85/month
Last 365 Days: 3089 finds in 180 caching days over 365 total days (49.3 %)
Last 365 Days Averages: 17.16 finds per caching day, 8.46/day, 59.24/week, 257.61/month
Most consecutive days with finds: 112, from 11/03/2011 to 30/06/2011
Most consecutive days without a find: 13, from 04/03/2012 to 16/03/2012
Current Streak: 3, from 20/07/2012 to 22/07/2012
Most finds in a day: 144 on 25/02/2012; 132 on 28/03/2011; 124 on 28/08/2011
Best weekend caching: 233 finds, on Saturday 27/08/2011 & Sunday 28/08/2011
Best week caching: 307 finds, from Monday 25/04/2011 to Sunday 01/05/2011
Most finds in a calendar month: 523, in Aug 2011
Most Cache Types in a day: 11 ( ) on 22/07/2012
Most Countries in a day: 2 (United Kingdom United States ) on 05/07/2012 Note: includes locationless caches.
Most States in a day: 4 (West Midlands, Southern England, South East England, East Midlands) on 24/07/2011 Note: includes locationless caches.
Most Counties in a day: 7 (Berkshire : South East England, Berkshire : Southern England, Berkshire : , Wiltshire : , Wiltshire : Southern England, Wiltshire : South East England, Oxfordshire : Southern England) on 11/04/2010 Note: includes locationless caches.
Fastest 100 finds: 1 day on 22/01/2011
Last 100 finds: 8 days
Fastest 1000 finds: 52 days from 12/03/2011 to 02/05/2011
Last 1000 finds: 118 days
Total cache-to-cache distance: 27443 Miles, Note: includes locationless caches.
1.10x Earth Circumnavigation,
0.115x Distance to the Moon
Maximum distance in a day: 825 Miles - 2 caches, on 05/07/2012
Note: includes locationless caches.
Nearest cache found: No.Puzzle GC3K2JF United Kingdom
Furthest cache found: 817.96 Miles, Keep it Moving GC9D2E United States
Most Northerly cache found: N 54° 20.058, Torver Back common (Cromm Cruac) GCN61X United Kingdom
Most Southerly cache found: N 50° 25.769, Face it, you're stumped! (Devon) GCJAZH United Kingdom
Most Easterly cache found: E 6° 36.899, EXO Area 52 (Bokelt) GCGWVP Germany
Most Westerly cache found: W 20° 27.504, Keep it Moving GC9D2E United States
Cache centroid: N 51° 28.288 W 1° 09.084
Centroid is 11 Miles from home: England, United Kingdom United Kingdom
Youngest cache found: 22/07/2012, Geolympix 2012 CITO - Giving something back GC3P05Y United Kingdom
Oldest cache found: 11/06/2001, The Queens Oak GCBE3 United Kingdom
Caches found which are now archived: 986 (12.3 %)
Log Length, words: Total Words: 156765, Average: 19, (Total Characters: 821555)
Longest: GC3Q5YR 549, Shortest: GC1TKTW 1


Notes


United Kingdom - 7852 finds in 42/72 Counties

 1 2 - 9 10 - 24 25 - 49 50 - 74
 75 - 99 100 - 149 150 - 199 200 - 249 250+

  County Totals: Sort by Totals        County Totals: Sort by Name  


Finds by Bearing


Finds by Month


Finds by Year Cache Placed


Finds to 23 Jul for Each Year


Finds by Found Date
Date
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
Jan 39 53 20 4 12 2 104 45 25 8 4 2 2 5 9 2 6 1 2 1 34 117 19 5 10 3 2 1 1 1 22 561
Feb 1 15 1 54 2 36 15 14 1 1 18 3 4 24 18 82 16 8 124 16 1 4 1 24 146 3 1 1 2 X X 636
Mar 3 1 30 1 82 12 42 2 2 2 4 58 24 3 3 2 50 3 105 13 42 22 11 17 28 16 103 144 28 21 105 979
Apr 15 68 7 1 14 27 1 1 77 18 41 6 8 88 1 48 25 52 3 1 1 5 5 9 82 2 1 63 99 69 X 838
May 88 54 19 8 46 113 3 9 12 2 5 37 55 73 10 9 1 3 18 63 6 24 13 4 1 54 21 77 36 128 7 999
Jun 1 1 23 1 13 34 10 10 2 2 62 2 17 1 8 2 3 28 7 56 29 7 29 21 26 15 4 5 1 1 X 421
Jul 2 1 87 57 2 2 12 3 35 55 8 1 4 9 11 51 8 2 4 53 11 48 25 100 35 7 15 6 65 35 93 847
Aug 25 8 12 7 15 5 16 6 7 2 1 2 93 22 33 33 14 2 1 53 20 23 2 11 2 28 114 124 97 24 18 820
Sep 1 33 88 52 1 30 6 62 7 1 8 51 5 1 1 5 66 1 41 8 2 5 8 7 23 13 6 1 1 5 X 539
Oct 41 43 26 5 2 2 1 1 7 6 2 1 12 2 4 85 1 18 4 1 3 2 2 12 20 1 5 2 2 68 9 390
Nov 4 4 6 1 1 3 8 1 4 1 2 77 85 10 21 3 1 1 40 17 3 1 2 2 15 41 75 27 3 1 X 460
Dec 2 1 6 24 27 12 1 1 1 83 66 28 24 6 1 1 1 1 13 1 1 1 6 58 1 1 2 1 17 1 79 468
222 282 325 215 217 278 219 155 180 181 221 268 333 244 120 323 192 120 362 283 153 259 123 270 389 184 349 452 352 354 333

366 Found Dates, out of 366 (100%)
0 FTF Found Dates, out of 366 (0%)
Green cells or black text indicate at least one FTF on that day

Difficulty / Terrain Chart
Terrain
Difficulty 1 1.5 2 2.5 3 3.5 4 4.5 5
1 366 591 113 19 23 12 1 1 1 1127
1.5 186 2257 742 147 234 24 3 1 3594
2 110 428 835 283 239 68 5 4 1972
2.5 36 134 132 294 71 20 5 1 693
3 25 84 53 51 48 18 7 2 5 293
3.5 8 26 23 5 7 7 3 1 2 82
4 3 5 11 8 8 3 13 5 2 58
4.5 1 5 2 1 5 4 18
5 3 4 8 1 1 1 1 1 101 121
738 3534 1917 808 631 155 39 21 115

75 Diff/Terr combinations found, out of 81
1285 (16.1%) finds were rated with Diff or Terr of 3 or greater


Finds by Placed Month
Date
Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec
2000 X X X X 0
2001 1 1 1 3
2002 3 3 5 5 2 1 4 2 2 3 30
2003 4 4 6 1 3 4 3 2 4 2 2 35
2004 3 5 19 7 7 3 6 5 3 4 5 8 75
2005 4 7 19 5 11 2 11 8 3 6 6 2 84
2006 9 16 14 13 4 4 12 10 10 13 21 16 142
2007 18 14 11 31 20 30 38 11 38 38 24 38 311
2008 43 64 68 28 46 46 24 39 52 52 25 173 660
2009 94 71 124 107 78 137 175 65 123 210 64 42 1290
2010 60 69 197 180 206 171 124 138 202 212 225 149 1933
2011 116 124 230 413 315 349 320 214 120 146 255 83 2685
2012 123 185 195 68 47 79 13 710
470 562 884 863 740 827 728 497 556 687 631 513

127 Placed Months, out of 147 (86.3%)

Average Distance by Bearing


Finds by Placed Date
Date
1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31
Jan 32 27 35 14 12 4 13 13 28 15 13 1 3 10 13 7 7 33 13 13 7 7 8 11 11 30 10 52 13 6 9 470
Feb 17 13 76 22 26 8 15 13 29 20 10 10 9 41 11 16 12 8 100 24 12 6 6 9 17 6 13 11 2 X X 562
Mar 27 15 35 20 21 25 42 16 18 16 35 98 67 20 9 4 11 8 3 42 28 50 42 18 35 13 13 78 43 20 12 884
Apr 71 15 56 22 14 20 19 23 46 28 50 49 24 10 17 29 43 40 20 8 9 33 31 13 49 14 14 33 56 7 X 863
May 30 34 19 19 23 10 72 38 12 21 34 22 34 14 58 61 11 16 19 9 32 27 19 10 37 5 8 10 10 18 8 740
Jun 75 43 10 27 7 47 10 5 4 8 20 15 27 59 13 58 31 17 15 39 53 25 60 10 10 24 29 17 53 16 X 827
Jul 7 6 16 13 56 43 14 41 46 24 41 22 24 24 14 23 14 24 5 19 27 19 24 31 19 40 11 26 32 17 6 728
Aug 23 17 10 10 5 6 5 8 20 6 9 5 7 28 23 29 15 13 5 41 13 24 19 18 14 12 26 17 42 12 15 497
Sep 5 11 53 32 18 17 9 14 9 20 12 38 5 6 8 1 10 16 71 22 45 8 21 7 27 19 9 8 9 26 X 556
Oct 5 21 14 48 10 17 20 32 35 21 23 25 6 8 50 4 14 30 20 9 32 9 40 11 33 19 13 23 63 22 10 687
Nov 12 14 20 11 7 10 8 8 31 7 96 15 24 37 14 28 5 6 23 32 16 34 24 12 48 14 16 32 23 4 X 631
Dec 8 5 14 9 8 1 8 9 9 10 14 13 5 5 9 5 13 17 14 52 4 7 7 127 3 4 9 19 78 5 22 513
312 221 358 247 207 208 235 220 287 196 357 313 235 262 239 265 186 228 308 310 278 249 301 277 303 200 171 326 424 153 82

366 Placed Dates, out of 366 (100%)



Stats generated by FindStatGen3 V4.3.07B by rutson and lignumaqua, running on GSAK v8.1.0.10
Themes from pisg by Morten Brix Pedersen and FormicaPL

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