Discussion: Geocaching and orienteering cross-over

A multi-stage geocache near Springfield, Massachusetts, where one locates the various stages using an O map instead of GPS.

A similar cache is available in Gatineau Park: GCG6VB.

A couple of years ago, I invited the local geocaching community to an 8-hour navigation race (aka rogaine) that had a "technology" category where GPS coordinates of each control were given out. Nobody came.

If we're trying to attract more people to our sport, it makes sense to build some bridges to our closest neighbors. We've talked about trail runs, adventure races, and adventure runs, but not really about geocaching.

"but not really about geocaching"

That may be true recently but not indefinitely into the past. I'm too lazy to go looking very hard for it but I seem to recall Eric Buckley in a previous thread recounting an occasion when both orienteers and geocachers were using the same park at the same time. I don't recall exactly what was attempted beyond socialising but my recollection is he concluded the two groups didn't have all that much in common activity-wise (orienteers not much interested in geocaching and vice versa).

I remember being at an O-meet at Hawn Sate Park where we were warned that geocachers would be in the area. I saw some. Walking so slowly they pretty much they looked as if sweating might ruin their GPS unit.
I think no one would show up if they were going to have to spend 8 hours looking for locations where there were no souvenir box.

Right now, geocaching is the draw for our kids when we go to O meets (which usually occur in parks with caches). One of us runs, the rest go hunt the cache. Keeps everyone occupied and happy.

But yes, from my minimal exposure to the website, geocachers seem to care more about an interesting hunt, hide, and cache than they do about planning the route between caches. If you got someone involved who was well-known for having good caches, you might get somewhere in planning a crossover event. I think it would be tough for an orienteering purist to design something that geocachers would be attracted to.

Since my earlier post, I did some searching for "orienteering" in the geocaching forums, and also for "competitive geocaching". Yeah, it does sound like there's not much common ground between the two camps.

But then again, maybe it's exposure. How many geocachers are in US, and what if just 1% of them like orienteering if they tried it? That would still be a lot of people.

Slightly different question -
I'm wondering how many people who try the permanent courses in various parks end up as "orienteers". I asked a Park Ranger once and people DO use the permanent courses. (I should find out how many before making the following suggestion... not sure if it's a handful per day or per year)

Assuming that it's a reasonable number: How can we convert these people to come to orienteering events?
One way might be to have a website where they can upload their permanent course GPS tracks, and compare to others who have run the course (based on age, experience, year). Show the routes. Maybe have some comments from the course designer on good route choices..... and then guide them to a local orienteering schedule and encourage them to come (and if you have their email and permission, maybe send a reminder or a welcome note).

And, come to think of it....... you could do the same for the geocachers.

Having found over 2300 geocaches (and unsuccessfully sought that many more), I can tell you that my caching adventures are all about route choices. However, I'm pretty sure that I'm an oddball cacher and an oddball orienteer.

I have numerous geocaches out there that require a lot more than showing up to find a cache. I have one in Upper Merion that uses an orienteering map; another on the edge Valley Forge park that uses 15 miles of boundary markers as waypoints. Another near VF park that requires hikes up Mt. Misery and Mt. Joy.

As you can imagine, these geocaches hardly get any "traffic".

I don't get very excited about geocaching anymore unless I can make a challenge out of it, like biking or running a long way to get there. Ones on islands in rivers and lakes I still look forward to.

Your location makes it unlikely CHand, but I'd almost say you grew up with the "Swallows and Amazons" books. That whole outdoor exploring thing. And they had maps.

Tried geocacheing for the first time a couple weeks ago. I was a little annoyed by all the "treasures" talk and how the event briefing made it seem so kid-geared. I was also annoyed that I went to the event thinking it would be a competition, expecting it would be align the lines of an adventure race or orienteering, etc but there was no competition aspect at all. Just go out and find the treasure... So I did what any good orienteer would probably do and turned it into a competion regardless, swearing I would make it to the cache before anyone else did. Mission successful. That all said, I enjoyed being outside and getting some practice time with my gps. Plus I did note that skills I picked up from orienteering came in quite handy. It was a good experience, but I think geocacheing would attract more orienteers if there was more of a competitive aspect.

GPS orienteering anyone?

As far as getting perm course people into orienteering, I noticed at a perm course that the maps issued to people wanting to try the course out didn't have any info for the local club or OUSA, etc. At minimum I think it could help to have things like club website, local club info, OUSA website, brief intro to orienteering sport, contact info, etc printed on the back of perm course maps.

"GPS orienteering" a classic oxymoron.

For what it's worth, our club has at least once (a few years ago) offered a GPS version of a course at a club meet. I think the club interface person to the GPS community tried his best to publicize it, but there were no takers. Of course, that is only one data point (not enough to generalize from, I realize), so it might not mean a great deal, but our one try at it met with total failure.

Here is an example of Orienteering GPS. He used an old orienteering course/map (VF - Orienteering Half Marathon - partial) to run while using a passive GPS devise to track his whereabouts-accuracy. There were no bags to pick up after he was finished. We did add one CP (#10), to force him to the top of Mt. Misery.

What about putting GPS coordinates on permanent courses? Would this generate any interest? If the coordinates were printed on the map, the people looking for the controls would have a O-map in hand and might then cross over. I guess that if there are punches at the controls (as there are on some permanent courses), that this isn't enough of a "treasure" to find and may not excite people.

Boyle, you're not the only oddball cacher and oddball orienteer.

Having orienteered for the past 20 years and picked up geocaching recently I'd say that even through the two activities sound similar the crossover stops at the 'finding things in the woods' part. It's reasonable to think that Geocachers would find orienteering interesting but I think it would be a hard task to try and draw them from on to the other.

Geochacing is all about being a spur of the moment leisure activity, a whole day out to be done at your own pace. It's not a competitive race/sport like orienteering is.

>What about putting GPS coordinates on permanent courses?

hittaut.nu does this in Sweden.

Back in 2004 my club in Victoria, BC did some publicizing of an O-event on the local Geocaching webpage for Vancouver Island, inviting anyone out with their GPS to the O-event for a special "GPS category". I don't recall hard numbers, but atleast a dozen individual teams/groups came out and we even provided the coordinates online before the event so that they could upload them to their devices. The twist was that we also provided them with a marked O-map at the start line ...everyone team/group came back to the finish line with smiles and said they packed up their GPS's by the second control because the maps were amazing! I subsequently left Victoria, but I believe that a few geocachers continued on in the world of O ...trading GPS's for compasses.