Geocaching!

The kids and I tried geocaching today! I read about it from my favorite blog here in Austin. Geocaching is basically a electronic treasure hunt where people hide caches, container with a log and sometimes small toys or trinkets, all over the world. You can use a smart phone (iphone or an android) or any other form of GPS to find them! So the kids and I downloaded the free app, Geocaching Intro Free, to my iphone and found a cache nearby that said it had little toys for kids inside. Now the rule is if you take something from the cache leave something of equal or greater value. So since I knew they might want to take something I had them bring something.

Here we are starting our hunt.

Wyatt was the leader and had the "compass". The app shows you a compass that points directly to the location of the cache. Now this was our first time and we just kind of went wherever it pointed. Well lets just say we should have stayed on the path. So word to the much wiser look around and pick the best route when you're hunting (which is probably why they have the warning to do so, and has a picture of a person following their handheld GPS and walking off a cliff!!) We were led to a bit of a drop off, and I had a baby in my arms and two younger kids that needed help getting down which all could have been avoided, if I had paid more attention to my surroundings! Anyways with a bit of "sit on your bottom Kailyn I don't want you to trip and get hurt, sit on your bum SIT ON YOUR BUM!!" and "please go slow, please go slow, PLEASE GO SLOW KAY!" we made it past the rough parts and found the treasure!!! I have to tell you it was a bit stressful but finding it was super fun!

Wyatt picked a tiny jet plane and left the alien.

Kailyn found a ring and a little Care Bear purse and left a finger puppet and horse figure.

(Yes, I washed everything really good when we got home, including the kids!)

So we were going to do another one we found in the same area but Kailyn got really grumpy half way through so we left mid way to go home and eat lunch. After lunch time and Gus's nap we go out the double stroller and headed out on another hunt closer to home.

This one was a lot easier for us now that Wyatt and I had a good system. It went like this:

W: It's pointing left.

M: Can we go left, or will it take us into the woods?

W: It will take us to the trees.

M: Do you see a path?

W: Nope. Sooooooo lets just go this way then we'll see.

Worked out great!

This was our final cache of the day.

We headed over to another local park and the boys and I found this one. It was a very tiny cache and it had money in it!!! Wyatt told me this one was his favorite one, mine too. We spent the whole day outside searching for caches and really had a fun time. (We even got Travis to come along on one.) I highly recommend trying it out!!