Axiom Home Page Forums General Discussion The Water Cooler Any geocachers out there?

Looking for GPS recs. I'm looking at the Garmin GPSMAP 60Cx and eTrex Legend HCx.

The primary use is for geocaching but I want to be able to use it as a car nav in a pinch, though my iPhone and Google maps is usually enough. I want easily added maps, so memory card options are a big plus. I also prefer the newer GPS chipsets (SiRF Star III), so I'd prefer "newish" units vs older stock ones.

Thanks!

what the heck is geocaching?

Randy, Geocaching is a treasure hunting game where you use a GPS to hide and seek containers, I've played it once with my brother inlaw and our kids up here, we all had a great time.

I've actually been reading the website for about an hour. Great, now my kids think we need to do it.

Yeah, the kids are a big reason. We're a pretty active family and trying to keep that going w/ the kids. My wife likes to trail run and I cycle. If we can get our 5 and 2 yr old on hikes with a purpose, we'd be on a roll.

My 5 yr old likes the idea of a treasure hunt. There's even a handful of caches w/ in 5 miles of our house, some w/ in 1 mile.

I'm intrigued with the idea of taking this with us to Yosemite next month and Mexico in a few.

My family is interested, then I told the wife we would have to spend at least $100 for the GPS unit. Now she is thinking we can just go hiking without a GPS.

but what if you get lost?

The Garmin GPSmap 60Cx is an excellent gps. I've been using gps's of one sort or another for work (and play) for about 15 years now and the 60Cx is now our Departments standard. The newer model (as opposed to their first few runs) has a removable microSD card which allows users to load a ton of map layers (e.g. road, topographic, bathymetry, etc) or compatible GIS layers (e.g. pipeline, logging road, seismic cutline layers for access routes in the boreal forest) onto the unit. This model has excellent battery life, is waterproof, has WAAS and has incredible satellite receiving capabilities. The later feature is particularly important if you plan on using a gps in dense forest cover.

I occasionally use it for navigation while driving just because I own the gps, but handheld units like the 60Cx aren't the best units for this use as the relatively small screens don't cover much navigational area with the detail needed driving in unfamiliar urban environments. If I were going to buy a gps mostly for driving navigation, I'd look at the dedicated units with the larger displays.

The 60Cx is a fairly pricey gps as far as handheld mapping gps's go, but they are the best (accurate, durable, versatile and fast). I haven't used any of them, but some of the folks I work with have bought units from Garmin's cheaper eTrex line for personal use and have been quite happy with them.

Any recommendations from anyone on a cheap GPS unit that could be used for this Geocaching and navigation in the car. Seems like Walmart and other stores have handheld units for around $100. Also, I'm starting to see cell phones with GPS enabled for sale, would these work?