Geocaching growth
Ball State students enjoy new activity
Digging frantically through the bushes next to the duck pond, junior Lindsey Scott and senior Lisa Nicklas get some strange looks from passers-by.
"Lindsey lost her car keys," they explain if anyone asks.
The ones who listen to her excuse groan in sympathy.
They don't need sympathy, though. Scott's car keys are buried in her crocheted purse, safe from the dirt and bushes she digs through.
Scott and Nicklas are actually a two-person team of geocachers, called "Team L Squared," participating in a worldwide game of hide-and-seek with the help of a GPS receiver, clues from fellow geocachers – and a lot of excuses.
"We made up this excuse that if someone stops us we tell them I'm looking for my keys, or we're on a class assignment collecting data," Scott said. "We had people drive by us looking at us," she said, "and it was like they were not paying attention. We really haven't had a problem with muggles."
Taken from the "Harry Potter" books and movies, the term "muggles" refers to people who don't participate in geocaching. Most of the time, geocachers try to avoid attracting muggles' attention to prevent accidents or misunderstandings.
How it works
Geocaching, also called "the GPS Stash Hunt," is "an entertaining adventure game for GPS users," according to the sport's official website, geocaching.com. "The basic idea is to have individuals and organizations set up caches all over the world and share the locations of these caches on the Internet."
Participants can visit the site, search for their city, state or country and find caches that others have created.
Each cache contains a logbook, where geocachers who find the cache can sign their names or geocaching.com profile names, and sometimes geocachers leave toys or small, inexpensive trinkets.
'Rolling Rock Renegade'
Junior Nathan Bacon says has been geocaching "pretty hard-core" for about a year. He has a personal profile on geocaching.com, and goes by the alias "Rolling Rock Renegade," after his favorite brand of beer. He says he leaves Rolling Rock beer bottle caps in each cache he finds.
Since the sport's origin in 2000, thousands of caches have been created all over the world. On geocaching.com, there are 207 caches within 10 miles of Ball State's campus, and around 10 are actually located on campus.
"My favorite is near Beneficence in the bushes," Bacon said. "It's one of the coolest because people walk past it every day, and it's never seen."
Those who know about the sport, though, say they look for caches everywhere.
"Before you know it, you can't walk outside without looking at places," Nicklas said. "It's very infectious."
The local scene
Nicklas and Scott both work at Minnetrista, and learned about the sport through the center's exhibit, "GPS Adventures: From Tracking to Treasure Hunting." Minnestrista hosted the premiere of the traveling exhibit from June 2 through September 3 in 2007.
"It is always exciting to premiere a national exhibition or program. It invokes a higher lever of anticipation for our audience," Minnetrista CEO Betty Brewer said. "GPS Adventures" has also generated interest in the sport.
Neither member of Team L Squared had heard of geocaching before the exhibit opened in June.
"When [the exhibit] opened... we were curious as to what the fuss was about," Scott said.
The two decided to investigate the activity.
"We actually spent a Saturday when we were supposed to be working geocaching," Nicklas said. "It's really fun.You have a lot of really fun adventures."
Ball State students enjoy new activity
Digging frantically through the bushes next to the duck pond, junior Lindsey Scott and senior Lisa Nicklas get some strange looks from passers-by.
"Lindsey lost her car keys," they explain if anyone asks.
The ones who listen to her excuse groan in sympathy.
They don't need sympathy, though. Scott's car keys are buried in her crocheted purse, safe from the dirt and bushes she digs through.
Scott and Nicklas are actually a two-person team of geocachers, called "Team L Squared," participating in a worldwide game of hide-and-seek with the help of a GPS receiver, clues from fellow geocachers – and a lot of excuses.
"We made up this excuse that if someone stops us we tell them I'm looking for my keys, or we're on a class assignment collecting data," Scott said. "We had people drive by us looking at us," she said, "and it was like they were not paying attention. We really haven't had a problem with muggles."
Taken from the "Harry Potter" books and movies, the term "muggles" refers to people who don't participate in geocaching. Most of the time, geocachers try to avoid attracting muggles' attention to prevent accidents or misunderstandings.
How it works
Geocaching, also called "the GPS Stash Hunt," is "an entertaining adventure game for GPS users," according to the sport's official website, geocaching.com. "The basic idea is to have individuals and organizations set up caches all over the world and share the locations of these caches on the Internet."
Participants can visit the site, search for their city, state or country and find caches that others have created.
Each cache contains a logbook, where geocachers who find the cache can sign their names or geocaching.com profile names, and sometimes geocachers leave toys or small, inexpensive trinkets.
'Rolling Rock Renegade'
Junior Nathan Bacon says has been geocaching "pretty hard-core" for about a year. He has a personal profile on geocaching.com, and goes by the alias "Rolling Rock Renegade," after his favorite brand of beer. He says he leaves Rolling Rock beer bottle caps in each cache he finds.
Since the sport's origin in 2000, thousands of caches have been created all over the world. On geocaching.com, there are 207 caches within 10 miles of Ball State's campus, and around 10 are actually located on campus.
"My favorite is near Beneficence in the bushes," Bacon said. "It's one of the coolest because people walk past it every day, and it's never seen."
Those who know about the sport, though, say they look for caches everywhere.
"Before you know it, you can't walk outside without looking at places," Nicklas said. "It's very infectious."
The local scene
Nicklas and Scott both work at Minnetrista, and learned about the sport through the center's exhibit, "GPS Adventures: From Tracking to Treasure Hunting." Minnestrista hosted the premiere of the traveling exhibit from June 2 through September 3 in 2007.
"It is always exciting to premiere a national exhibition or program. It invokes a higher lever of anticipation for our audience," Minnetrista CEO Betty Brewer said. "GPS Adventures" has also generated interest in the sport.
Neither member of Team L Squared had heard of geocaching before the exhibit opened in June.
"When [the exhibit] opened... we were curious as to what the fuss was about," Scott said.
The two decided to investigate the activity.
"We actually spent a Saturday when we were supposed to be working geocaching," Nicklas said. "It's really fun.You have a lot of really fun adventures."