Geocaching Class, Almaden Quicksilver, Wood Road Trail, June 14, 2008

On June 14, 2008, as part of the County Parks' Outdoor Recreation Program, a class was held on geocaching. Geocaching is an activity where participants use a GPS receiver to locate hidden containers, called geocaches. The locations of the geocaches are published on the Geocaching.com website. GPS coordinates are entered into the receivers. Seekers, called geocachers, use the receivers to get within about 10-20 feet of the geocache. Then they search the area looking for the hidden geocache, which can vary widely in the size and type of container. Some typical containers are film cans, Tupperware food containers, or large metal boxes. There are rules and limitations on geocaches, imposed by Geocaching.com and the County Parks. Geocaches, at a minimum, contain a sheet or book on which finders sign their names, usually a geocaching nickname, or "handle." If the cache is large enough, it may contain trading items, which can include toys, coins, or personalized signature items. It may also contain "travel bugs," which are items moved from cache to cache and tracked online. After finding the cache, finders then sign on to the Geocaching.com website and log their finds online. They may include comments about the cache experience and upload pictures. Almaden Quicksilver Park has a large number of geocaches. The Wood Road Trail has a large number of them, spaced about 1/10 mile apart. It has a wide variety of caches in terms of size and difficulty, so is an ideal trail to learn geocaching.

At the Wood Road Parking lot, park docent and geocacher Sam Drake prepares to give a class on geocaching, with the assistance of geoachers Cer and Riledwino.