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11 tips for geocaching to help survive the game

Eleven tips about geocaching to survive the game that I learned the hard way….. Geocaching has been a way of life for me for a very long time. For most people they don’t understand what it is or how to play? But many who get to go along a hunt, get hooked and want to do more.. Geocaching itself is what my children call treasure hunting. You can go online to www.geocaching.com sign up it is free to get started. They have a video that explain what geocaching is. When you figure it out and you get the coordinates of the area you want to go see, mostly out in woods. With a GPS \geocaching app to find the pirates treasure. One very important rule is if you take something you have to put something in it’s place, and sign the log. So here is some tips that may help you to survive the hazards of nature and to be prepared to have fun….

1. What to pack? Now this one can come in handy for even a dooms day preparer. I have learn from my two hyper balls of joy (kids) that water, a few snacks, and a first aid kit is a must. Especially if you are out in them woods for more then an hour or two. If you life in area where there are poisoned snakes and spiders you will need a snake and spider bite first aid kit (Walmart online sales a few good ones) . My own personal pack is a small day pack with the basic first aid kit, bug stray, a few snacks enough to cover a whole meal for my hungry monsters, five bottles of water and a hand full of tradables, three pens, a small pad of paper, the coordinates for just in case, my GPS loses the coordinates (trust it has happened on more then one occasions ), a pocket knife, twitters (for them micos and nanos minis.) Gardening gloves ( to help with climbing and moving logs. ), and a telescoping magnetic pick up tool ( more then once handy, and some of the puzzle caches well need it. Unless you want to look like a monkey using a wench, be my guess )

2. A good Walking stick- to most this can save your life. Imagine trying to go down a hill where that geocache lays you are gonna fell going down or back up that hill with out one. I have learned that the hard way. Try explaining that to a cop why you are all cut up from falling without explaining all of geocaching experience. Trust me some will think you are crazy. That’s a whole other story.. (. I use a strong wood walking stick I found out in the woods by my house but they have some nicer ones online if you’d like )

3. Travel in packs- if you are wanting to hit a power trail this is a good one to follow. (Power trail - a road or trail that has a lot of geocaches on it some forming images after you complete them ) When we tryed a few power trails it was a long road almost a 200 mile drive. We took turns getting out of the car and signing the log book. Which a another good example of having a good walking stick my guy friend had decided to go with us and he didn’t have a walking stick he got out of the car walked over to where his Gps said the cache was , by some tall grass. Walked right into the tall grass and disappeared. He fall 3 feet down. Lucky for hi! It was muddy so it was a some what a soft fell he was all right. Make sure you are in good company too. People who have a since of humor in stressful situations. It can make all the difference, in the experience. I took a few old friends of mine to. Geocaching event and one ended up being a drunk trust me not a good drunk either.

4. Plan ahead- I can’t stress this one enough. Sometimes the weather will change and other times the weekend plans fall through. Or you suddenly decided to go caching. I do this alot . I try to plan ahead of caches that i want to check out through the week on my way home from work. If they sound easy. Always check the comments at the bottom of the cache on the site. Most time it will give you clues if it really is hard or not. Also check the weather for your area. Don’t want to be in the middle of cache hurt and it down pours on you. Trust me wet shoes are no fun in cold weather.

5. Good GPS\app- depending on how much money you want to invest in a gps. Some gps cost lot of of money and they are just as good as an app on your phone. For the smart phones \ droids the google app store has a lot of geocaching apps most of them are free. There are a few that cost money. But my personal fav. is c:geo it is free and has never let me down. The iTunes app store has a lot of free apps too, on geocaching. (I am clueless on what app is good never owned an apple phone but I have friends who do and they love them so no hate from me ) Now for a GPS if you want to spend money on a trail GPS that is up to you. There are many of different kinds some are really good but cost a very pretty penny. And they have some that don’t cost a lot that are just as good. Most trail gpss can jump and skip ahead while you are just walking trying to make it to the cache. Like one minute it will think you are right on top of it. Then it will say you are 5 feet from it, my advice stand still and let your gps/ phone catch up with you. My personal favorite is Magellan eXploist GC. Its price jumps a lot on this gps . from 50 to 400 sometimes higher. But there are a lot of good GPSS that are just as good. But Garmin and Magellan are the top makers for trail GPS.

6 Good phone with water proof case- now if you decide to not get a trail GPS that is just find. I would personal invest in a waterproof case.it will help even in every day life too. You don’t want to be by a river getting that one cache that will make it 100th find for the day, and you forget to put your phone in your pocket and oops . It falls in the river. Not good, I have done that a few times thank god for bowls of dried rice, but the case I invested in finally saved it…

7. Write/label phone number on stuff- this tip is very useful if you want your items back, if you have lost while you were geocaching. I have lost a few GPS s but only one has returned to me. Because of me using a black shapery on the inside by the batteries in the case of writing my phone number. The guy who found my gps was just walking down by the river, and notice it on the bank. He called me. Oh I was so happy to have it back. He asks me what I would use it for. I told him about geocaching, not surprising he had not heard of it. When I went and got it. I was nice , and took him on a near by treasure hunt. He loved it. Most likely hooked for life.

8. Kid friendly caching - Now I go caching a lot with different friends and more so with my kids and their friends. For them I always try to get the medium size caches that are easy to get too. The really good ones are the ammo boxes the kids love to find them because they know there is more stuff to look at. Try to remind the kids who come with you that they just can’t grab and ran, when it is open. My youngest would do that a lot when we had her go with us. Now she let’s the younger ones go first and she reminds them not to grab and go. Other cachers will have their calling cards in the containers to prove they were there some will take them. We like to leave them just incase. (I know some cachers likebit if you take them am collecte them but that choice is yours too.) But remainder please leave something of equal in its place of the tradables you take. ( tradables you can get a lot at the dollar stores like small party favor as spinning tops, dices, small figures, etc.. ) 9. An extra geo kit contain and pad of paper- I have run across geocache containers that have been restored a few times. When this happens it is a good idea to email the owner of the cache so they know of the matter you can do that by going to the geocaching site of the geocache you are trying to find and the owners name should be right by the title if you click on it you can email them that way. If you are able to replace the container (which is completely up to you ) then do so. Most owners are grateful when you do just let them know what you did and that you have the old destroyed container. Some want the old container. And remember put what was iinvaseold container in he new one. I have made little pads of paper for just in case too of logs getting wet or destroyed. So I��ll put a new log book in the cache if needed and I’ll let the owner know if I do. But sometimes owners also will not answer you on the emails. Because sometimes they will abandoned the cache sometimes.

10. Good pair of boots\shoes - this one to me is a big most also. I’ll tell you why on this one. It has been putin the archived, so i can tell you the name. Return to soggy bottom! (https://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC127TZ_return-to-soggy-bottom?guid=be178d64-655b-4f27-9ae7-c9804f9daab5) This one cache had a reputation of being very hard to find. It is rated a 2.5 stars on both difficult and terrain. I have gone there a few time to find it . once I lost my shoes in the mudd trust me my cousin was laughing so hard from me not having shoes. Another time I lost my truck keys that one did it for me. I never return to found it. That cache took more from me then I am sure it was worth but it was fun. Never got my keys either.

11. Geocaching Language- now that is something I am sure you may not know. But if you been caching for awhile you will know these ones. Just sum bacis words and terms we use. Muggle this is a non caching folk (yeah we stolen it from Harry Potter sorry J. K. Rowling. We love it we used it.) Try to make sure while you are geocaching that no muggles see you. Cache or caching, pretty easy it’s a geocache. Ftf is when you are the first one to find the cache and no one else has signed that fresh log book. And last but not lest, byob this is a term for bring your own pen/ pencil. These are mostly for the super small caches like micros. I hope these little tips help you survive the hardness of nature, and makes geocaching a little easier good luck and happy caching….

ELIZA CHURCH

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Walmart's scheduling system and how it effects the average associate.

( I have tried finding a decent news site to share this on. But nothing so I share it here.)

Walmart has decided to go by a schedule program. They have had this program for years and management would have to go in and make changes for the workers. From my own personal account I had worked there for over a year an a half . I just quit a few days ago because I could not change my availability. Here it was a slap to my face. I had two choices. 1. Work the late night hours, leaving my 10 year old home alone. Resulting in losing custody of her. Remind you her father has nothing to do with her, so I am all she has. Or choice #2 quit and look for a different job. So I quit. I walked away from a $11.52 an hour, full time job with good benefits, and paid vacations. Now that things are ribbed raw and unemployed. I write so that others know the truth.

It is sick and to me a reality check. So as a fellow employe of Walmart, yes it is a good place to work the people are friendly and the managers have a sence of humor (most of them). But when it comes down to it. The regular worker who has a family to maintain and care for, the schedule changes are not family friendly. I was told by the manager who did the scheduling : these hour changes are for the Consumers. So that we as workers would be there more to help the Consumers.

The hours I was working was convenient for the stay at home mothers shopping for their household. Now that the changes had taken effect for me, they had me working some nights until 11pm. And onther nights they had me working until 8pm. These times maybe convenient for the consumers but the workers also shop at the Walmart they work at too.

I have talked with fellow employees about this and they are outraged. One of the area managers, she was disgusted by the changes. She too has a young child at home, that she loves to come home to. So she can hear about his day and they play video games together. But if she has to work until 9 or 10 pm at night who would put her son to bed, or cook meals for him? It is sad to say, the Co manager of the store wants to keep her because he values her work. She does an excellent job. And she loves what she dose, but she may have to look else where for employment because of her scheduling hours.

Another coworker he is a very hard worker and also happy and smiling. He has three very young children his wife stays home with them at night. But in the mornings he stays with the kids while she works. His schedule has him coming in the morning, so they would have to hire a stranger to come into the home to care for the kids while they both work. He refuses to do that because of all the horror stories, of bad babysitters gone wrong.

Another coworker she has build her life around her hours that she has had for awhile now. She gets out in early afternoon and keeps up her grandchildren so her daughter can work as an police officer in the afternoons. She now has to look for different employment so her daughter and her can survive. She is not happy losing her job over availability of this schedule changes.

One more employee, he has no children. But he has a mother that he visits on his days off. He is disappointed with the changes, now he has to change his own schedule. Which he would not see his mother as often.

We as employees of Walmart didn’t know of this change until it was upon us. Some have decided to stick with it. And others, like myself, have decided to walk away from all the benefits and look for employment else where. Our life’s matter too Walmart, but you don’t see that. My question for Walmart is how can these hours help your employees and consumers?

Walmart is no long a family based company anymore, it has not been for along time.

Sadly, One of our AP workers ( security ) said and I quote “ Walton is rolling in his grave, as we speck. He would be very unhappy if he know what was really going on.”

The research I have found on this issue was pointless. The articles were hogwash. They never talked about how it really effected the associates and their lives.

ELIZA CHURCH