Geocaching: FREE Real-World Outdoor Treasure Hunt (Fun Activity for the Entire Family)
One of my favorite Spring-time family activities is to pack a picnic and head for the park – it’s FREE and usually lots of fun to enjoy beautiful nature with those you love! 🙂 If you also like the outdoors and want to embark on a unique and FREE family activity, you may want to consider geocaching.
What is geocaching you ask?! Geocaching is a FREE real-world outdoor treasure hunt where players (young and old!) try to locate hidden containers, called geocaches, using a smartphone or GPS. The basic idea is to locate hidden containers, called geocaches, outdoors and then share your experiences online.
In recent years, my kids, hubby, and I had the opportunity to go geocaching and it was lots of fun! We found a geocache that was hidden about 25 miles from our home so we all piled into the car with our GPS system in hand and headed that direction. Once we were within walking distance of our “hidden treasure”, the kids jumped out of the car and used the GPS device to find the geocache. It took about 30 minutes of avid searching to finally discover the geocache cleverly placed underneath a pile of rocks.
The kids were so excited to open the geocache and fill out the logbook (i.e. a tiny notebook) with their names, ages, and date that they located the geocache (it was really cool to look back in the logbook and see that this same geocache had existed for the past 5+ years). They then were able to choose a special “treasure” from inside the geocache (i.e. a small plastic dinosaur) and they also left a “treasure” of their own (a plastic spider) for the next person. All in all, we had a great day on our geocaching trip and spent nothing out of pocket other than the gas… it was well worth it! 🙂
Check out this neat video below which explains even more about geocaching…
[youtube=https://www.youtube.online/watch?v=-4VFeYZTTYs&w=536&h=327]
Do you want to go geocaching? Here’s what you need to do…
* Head over here to register for a FREE Basic Membership.
* Visit the “Hide & Seek a Cache” page.
* Enter your zip code and click “search.”
* Choose any geocache from the list and click on its name.
* Enter the coordinates of the geocache into your GPS Device or smartphone app.
* Use your GPS device or smartphone to assist you in finding the hidden geocache.
* Sign the logbook and return the geocache to its original location.
* Share your geocaching stories and photos online.
Have you been geocaching? If so, did you enjoy the experience? Let us know!