[ technology Category ]
March 15, 2003

Hidden Treasure in Hawaii?

"There's gold in them thar hills!"

For ages and eons, man has been seeking hidden treasure. Long John Silver, Erik The Great, Lewis and Clark, Thor Heyerdahl, and many others all struck out on adventures either for the sport of exploration, the thrill of being first to discover something new, or for rush of finding the loot! Well, if you think the days of treasure hunting are over, then you've obviously never been geocaching!

What is geocaching? Well, it's simple. People hide things, and post the navigational coordinates on the Internet, with clues and a brief description of what you might find at the end of your hunt. You are armed with maps of all sorts (road maps, topographical maps, satellite images, you get the idea), a compass or, preferably, a GPS, and your sense of adventure. They hide, you seek! There are about 75 stashes on Oahu alone. This is a global game that is currently being played in over 170 countries! I bet there is treasure waiting to be found within 10 miles of the house or office where you're sitting right now! Want to find out? Go to GeoCaching.com, and type in your zip code. It's out there. You just have to find it!

A while back, Baz and I went geocaching to find "Strangled Palm Cache". Specifically, we went to N 21° 18.793 W 157° 49.403. I tried to walk there from my house in Manoa, since the GeoCaching site said it was only a few miles away, but as I got closer to the coordinates, I ran into a roadblock in the form of a giant mountainous slope. So, I called Baz, and told him I was .32 miles away from the cache, but would have to sprout wings and fly there if I wanted to go in a straight line. We had to resort to a topigraphical map, drive around the mountainous slope,and found the site in a beautiful scenic park we've been to tons of times.



Diamond Head view from the park.



The tree where the cache was stashed...

When we found the coordinates, we started looking for the clue: "You are looking for a palm tree that is being strangled by a banyan tree." We saw two towering palms away from the park, and went to investigate them. We were suddenly at the hidden crossroad of two beautiful trails. Completely hidden from the park we'd been to to see the sunset so many times. We found the tree, looked around, and found the green ammo box hidden underneath a few palm fronds. Inside we found, $2, an Aloha Shirt keyring, a Mickey Mouse toy, a set of 4 AA batteries (come in handy with your GPS!), and the logbook and pen. We signed the log book, took $1, and left a Marvin Pontiac CD in return.

It's fun being an explorer. Hunting, and not knowing what you'll find when you get there. We've been on many geocaching exursions, including a couple on Moloka'i. Can't wait to see where our explorations will take us next. And what we'll learn along the way. I know I've learned one thing. I'm going to start looking closer at the things around me, and the places I go. There's hidden treasure all over the world, and arrrgghh (pirate voice) I'm going to find it!

Here's The Skinny:
--A cheap GPS will cost you about $100 at Sports Authority or other sporting/camping supply store.

--If you need to borrow a GPS, or want to just try it out for a cache or two to see if you like it, you can e-mail me. If you're really sweet, and promise to bring it back, I'll let you borrow mine for a weekend sometime.

Posted by Beth at March 15, 2003 08:19 AM

Comments

 
Posted by hayneyz on March 15, 2003 9:08 AM:

I must have had my head buried in some Alabama red dirt, but this is the first I've heard of geo-caching. I must say that it sounds like an awesome time!

 
Posted by Ryan on March 15, 2003 6:24 PM:

Nifty! I've heard of geocaching, and read many an article and blog about it... but just assumed there wasn't anything like it going on in Hawaii.

I wonder if there are wardrivers here now, too?

 
Posted by Jon on March 15, 2003 7:57 PM:

I've done my share of wardriving in the Honolulu area. Most businesses are secure. Here and there you find some gems that'll let you check your e-mail and surf.

For a news junkie like me, riding as a passenger with friends, getting a good dose of CNN.com (and now Google News) on the road is great.

Try it some time. You'll be surprised at how many signals you encounter.

 
Posted by Mike on March 15, 2003 11:46 PM:

This is sooooo neat!!

Beth, what GPS unit do you have? Sports Authority lists a few under $200.....

Garmin or Magellan is best? What are the basic things you look for? Do you need the computer side stuff? I dont even know what a waypoint is! But I wanna play

 
Posted by lisa on March 16, 2003 7:51 AM:

Wow, there are definitely a lot more sites in Hawaii than when I first checked in Fall 2000.

Beth, can we borrow you and your husband along with the GPS one afternoon? :) Hiking is so much more fun with more people.. mostly because my fiance isn't as vocal about the mosquitoes.

One game we can't play in Hawaii is the one where you find an intersection of latitude and longitude ( I've forgotten the term, and can't find the web site) and take a photo. We don't have any integral intersections on land here, sadly.

 
Posted by tyd on March 16, 2003 1:39 PM:

Lisa, you are thinking of confluence.

I haven't been geocaching in so long. I bet it's fun on the islands. There are many places that would make great virtual caches. =)

 
Posted by Beth on March 16, 2003 7:47 PM:

My GPS is a Garmin etrex. It came with a pretty extensive little manual. It's amazing what these little babies can do! And I didn't purchase any computer stuff. I just put in the batteries, and read about putting in coordinates and waypoints, and away I went.

A waypoint is like an electronic breadcrumb. You're Hansel or Gretel in this scenario, and you can drop waypoints as breadcrumbs along your hike. The good thing about your breadcrumbs is they don't get eaten by animals & you can name them to remember what they are...giant sandlewood bush....trash can...car...whatever you'd like to remember along the way. You'd only really use waypoints if you were plannig to take a hike somwhere where there was no marked trail. Most of the cache's in Hawaii are on a trail or in parks. You're never dangerously close to being lost forever! Yay!

I have a pipe dream of starting a GeoCaching type tour business. Wouldn't it be cool for the adventurous tourist to arrive on the island, stop by your little stand in Waikiki and pick up a map, a list of clues, a list of things to pack in the car, a GPS, and discover the island and all of the best spots around town without knowing where they were going to end up! I'd love to do that in a city I was visiting!

Hmmmm....wait a minute! That's a fun idea! I'll be back..I have to work on a business plan! :)

 
Posted by helen on March 16, 2003 10:00 PM:

What is a wardriver?

 
Posted by Ryan on March 17, 2003 7:21 AM:

Helen, wardriving is, basically, "driving around in a car searching and pinpointing the location of wireless networks in metropolitian areas." See WarDriving.com for related links and news. See also: Warchalking.

I have a pipe dream of starting a GeoCaching type tour business.

Hey, niche tourism is where it's at these days! I wouldn't even invest in space in Waikiki. I'm not sure a tourist would suddenly and spontaneously spend a day geocaching (since most folks plot their daily itineraries in advance). But you can make the activity an attractive option at that planning stage, and offer specialized maps, guides, and equipment.

More directly, geocaching addicts obviously come through Hawaii and probably would love a local resource. Not only can you help them get around town and find caches, but provide the supplies for them (containers, labels) to leave their own! And don't forget merchandising...

 
Posted by Mike on March 17, 2003 3:52 PM:

Thanks for the info Beth!
Im devouring everything I can about geocaching. Like geodashing (hunting for random points), or NGS benchmarks (I always wondered what those things were!).....
My wifes more excited than me, shes the mountainclimber/hiker expert! she thought GPS=$$$ but its not even as expensive as lots of other hobbies

 
Posted by Jon on March 19, 2003 8:33 AM:

You may want to hold off playing until the war is over. Wouldn't want to see more stories about missing hikers would we?

Space Daily: Iraq war could send German cars in wrong direction

 
Posted by Beth on March 19, 2003 5:02 PM:

Wow. I never thought about that. Now I have to try out my GPS before and after the conflict starts to see if there's going to be a difference....

Thanks for the article, Jon!

 
Posted by Ryan on March 20, 2003 7:54 AM:

Well?

I would think that the U.S. military would need GPS more than the Iraqis, and unless there's a way to set up distinct, staggered service levels, I would think they wouldn't disrupt the service worldwide to inconvenience one of the smaller, weaker national militaries (in terms of technology) out there.

 
Posted by Ryan on April 20, 2003 6:35 PM:

Just a quick update! Our very own Beth has been featured (photos and all!) in a great geocaching profile in the Honolulu Star-Bulletin:

Out for the cache!
Geocaching combines outdoor activity with a treasure hunt using the Global Positioning System

The piece comes less than a week after a blurb by previous "HawaiiStories writer-abouter" Burt Lum, who also dedicated a column to the activity:


Geocaching is tech twist on treasure hunting

Both of which mention the site Beth and I built for local geocachers:

GPS Hawaii

 
Posted by Ryan on June 30, 2003 8:59 AM:

Just updating this old thread with news of another great local press mention, this one by Michael Tsai of The Honolulu Advertiser:

Geocaching turns trekking high-tech

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