Three Wise Men

In the past maps were used to seek a treasure¹. Wooden chest full of gold coins and necklaces or rubies and crowns with gold chalices and guns filled with gun powder and don’t forget grog. Yes grog, with a feistful lass by your pirate alter ego and one eyed Poly with a cracker in her beak.

But alas, modern age brings complicated technology to seek different kind of treasure. You the new age pirate have to use your wits and your stamina for this outdoor activity, called Geocaching. It requires Global Positioning System (GPS) receiver or some other navigational method to hide and seek a case or a container with a treasure² anywhere in the world.

A waterproof container obligatory contains a logbook and a pen. If large enough it may also contain items for trading (toys, books, geocoins, travel-bugs…). As a geocacher bury a waterproof container with or without trade items somewhere on the globe and with the help of your GPS record the cache’s coordinates. Post the coordinates on a listing site, located for example here.

Other geocachers seeking the treasure, will obtain the coordinates from a listing site. They seek out the cache using their GPS handheld receivers. The seeking geocachers record their achievement in the logbook within the container and online. Trade objects are free to take (except the logbook and pen) from the cache, but something of similar or higher value should be left in exchange. In that way there is always a treasure for the next person to find.

Image via Wikipedia

The first documented geocache took place on May 2000 in Oregon. Since than geocaches are currently hidden in over 100 countries around the world on all seven continents, including Antarctica.

Most of the participants of GPS ”hide and seek” activity are adults, but even children find this modern treasure hunt very amusing. Some geocaching communities organize competitions with reward for your effort. But the main purpose of these competitions is getting people in contact with each other, kind of like Facebook but healthier. Why don’t you try it your self? There’s a treasure waiting for you too!

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