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Geocaching is an outdoor activity in which the participants use a Global Positioning System

Global Positioning System

The Global Positioning System is a U.S. space-based global navigation satellite system. It provides reliable positioning, navigation, and timing services to worldwide users on a continuous basis in all weather, day and night, anywhere on or near the Earth.GPS is made up of three parts: between 24...

(GPS) receiver or other navigation

Navigation

Navigation is the process of reading, and controlling the movement of a craft or vehicle from one place to another. It is also the term of art used for the specialized knowledge used by navigators to perform navigation tasks. The word navigate is derived from the Latin "navigare", meaning "to sail"...

al techniques to hide and seek containers (called "geocaches" or "caches") anywhere in the world

World

World is a highly common name for the planet Earth, but it was originally used to mean the sum of human civilization living on it, specifically human experience, history, or the 'human condition' in general....

. A typical cache is a small waterproof container (usually a tupperware or ammo box) containing a logbook. Larger containers can also contain items for trading, usually toys or trinkets of little value. Geocaching is most often described as a "game of high-tech hide and seek", sharing many aspects with orienteering

Orienteering

Orienteering is a family of sports that requires navigational skills using a map and compass to navigate from point to point in diverse and usually unfamiliar terrain. Participants are given a map, usually a specially prepared orienteering map, which they use to find control points...

, treasure-hunting, and waymarking

Waymarking

Waymarking is an activity in which people can locate and log unique and interesting locations around the world, usually with a GPS receiver and a digital camera. Waymarking differs from geocaching in that there is no physical container to locate at the given coordinates. Waymarking identifies...

.

Geocaches are currently placed in over 100 countries

Country

In geography, a country is a geographical region. The term is often applied to a political division or the territory of a state, or to a smaller, or former, political division of a geographical region...

around the world and on all seven continents, including Antarctica

Antarctica

| style="border-top:solid 1px #ccd2d9; padding:0.4em 1em 0.4em 0; vertical-align:top;" | 14,000,000 km²
280,000 km²
13,720,000 km² |-! style="border-top: solid 1px #ccd2d9; padding: 0.4em 1em 0.4em 0; vertical-align: top;...

. As of October 12 2009, there are over 919,800 active geocaches over the world.

History

Geocaching is similar to the 150-year-old game letterboxing

Letterboxing

Letterboxing is an outdoor hobby that combines elements of orienteering, art, and puzzle solving. Letterboxers hide small, weatherproof boxes in publicly-accessible places and distribute clues to finding the box in printed catalogs, on one of several web sites, or by word of mouth. Individual...

, which uses clues and references to landmarks embedded in stories. Geocaching was imagined shortly after the removal of Selective Availability from GPS on May 1, 2000, because the improved accuracy of the system allowed for a small container to be specifically placed and located. The first documented placement of a GPS-located cache took place on May 3, 2000, by Dave Ulmer of Beavercreek

Beavercreek, Oregon

Beavercreek is a hamlet in Clackamas County, Oregon, United States, located four miles southeast of Oregon City.-History:According to Oregon Geographic Names, the name "Beaver Creek" was first used for a school district in this area in the early 1850s. It was named for the creek that flows through...

, Oregon

Oregon

Oregon is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. It is located on the Pacific coast, with Washington to the north, California to the south, Nevada on the southeast and Idaho to the east. The Columbia and Snake rivers delineate much of Oregon's northern and eastern...

. The location was posted on the Usenet

Usenet

Usenet, a portmanteau of "user" and "network" , is a worldwide distributed Internet discussion system. It evolved from the general purpose UUCP architecture of the same name....

newsgroup

Newsgroup

A usenet newsgroup is a repository usually within the Usenet system, for messages posted from many users in different locations. The term may be confusing to some, because it is usually a discussion group. Newsgroups are technically distinct from, but functionally similar to, discussion forums on...

[news://sci.geo.satellite-nav sci.geo.satellite-nav] as . By May 6, 2000, it had been found twice and logged once (by Mike Teague of Vancouver

Vancouver, Washington

Vancouver is a city on the north bank of the Columbia River in the U.S. state of Washington and the county seat of Clark County. According to the Washington State Office of Financial Management's estimate in April of 2008, the city has a population of 162,400, making it the fourth largest city in...

, Washington

Washington

Washington is a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. Washington was carved out of the western part of Washington Territory which had been ceded by Britain in 1846 by the Oregon Treaty as settlement of the Oregon Boundary Dispute. It was admitted to the Union as the...

). According to Dave Ulmer's message, the original stash was a black plastic bucket buried most of the way in the ground and contained software, videos, books, food, money

Money

Money is anything that is generally accepted as payment for goods and services and repayment of debts. The main functions of money are distinguished as: a medium of exchange, a unit of account, a store of value, and occasionally, a standard of deferred payment...

, and a slingshot

Slingshot

A slingshot is a small hand-powered projectile weapon. The forked Y-shaped frame has two rubber strips attached to the uprights, leading back to a pocket for holding the projectile.It is normally fired by holding the frame in the non-dominant hand, extended at arms length...

Origin of the name

The activity was originally referred to as GPS stash hunt or gpsstashing. This was changed after a discussion in the gpsstash discussion group at eGroups

EGroups

eGroups.com was an email list management web site. The site allowed users to create their own mailing lists and allowed others to sign up for membership on the list. The web site provided archives of the messages as well as list management functionality. Each group also had a shared calendar, file...

(now Yahoo!

Yahoo!

Yahoo! Inc. is an American public corporation headquartered in Sunnyvale, California, , that provides Internet services worldwide...

). On May 30, 2000, Matt Stum suggested that "stash" could have negative connotations, and suggested instead "geocaching."

Geocaches

For the traditional geocache, a geocacher will place a waterproof container containing a log book (with pen

Pen

A pen is a long, thin rounded device used to apply ink to a surface for the purpose of writing, usually paper. There are several different types, including ballpoint, rollerball, fountain, felt-tip. Historically, reed pens, quill pens, and dip pens were used. Modern day pens come in a varity of...

or pencil

Pencil

A pencil is a writing or drawing device consisting of a slippery, thin stick of pigment and clay, usually encased in a thin wood cylinder, although paper and plastic sheaths are also used...

) and trade items then record the cache's coordinates. These coordinates, along with other details of the location, are posted on a listing site

Website

A website is a collection of related web pages, images, videos or other digital assets that are addressed with a common domain name or IP address in an Internet Protocol-based network...

(see list of some sites below). Other geocachers obtain the coordinates from that listing site and seek out the cache using their GPS handheld receivers. The finding geocachers record their exploits in the logbook and online. Geocachers are free to take objects (except the logbook, pencil, or stamp) from the cache in exchange for leaving something of similar or higher value, so there is treasure

Treasure

Treasure is a concentration of riches, often one which is considered lost or forgotten until being rediscovered...

for the next person to find.

Typical cache treasures are not high in monetary value but may hold personal value to the finder. Aside from the logbook, common cache contents are unusual coin

Coin

A coin is a piece of hard material, usually metal or a metallic material and sometimes made of synthetic materials, usually in the shape of a disc, and most often issued by a government. Coins are used as a form of money in transactions of various kinds, from the everyday circulation coins to the...

s or currency

Currency

In economics, the term currency can refer either to a particular currency, for example the US dollar, or to the coins and banknotes of a particular currency, which comprise the physical aspects of a nation's money supply...

, small toys, ornamental buttons, CDs, or books. Also common are objects that are moved from cache to cache called "hitchhikers", such as Travel Bug

Travel Bug

A Travel Bug is a registered trademark of Groundspeak, Inc. used to describe a dogtag used in Geocaching. It is moved from cache to cache, and its travels can be logged on the geocaching website . Each travel bug tag is printed with a unique PIN, which is needed to post a log online...

s or Geocoin

Geocoin

A geocoin is a metal or wooden coin minted in similar fashion to a medallion, token coin, military challenge coin or wooden nickel, for use in geocaching...

s, whose travels may be logged and followed online. Cachers who initially place a Travel Bug or Geocoin often assign specific goals for their trackable items. Examples of goals are to be placed in a certain cache a long distance from home, or to travel to a certain country, or to travel faster and farther than other hitchhikers in a race. Higher value items are occasionally included in geocaches as a reward for the First to Find (called "FTF"), or in locations which are harder to reach. Dangerous or illegal items, weapons, and pornography are generally not allowed and are specifically against the rules of most geocache listing sites.

Geocache container sizes range from containers as small as the tip of your little finger ("nanos"), to film canisters (often called "microcaches"), too small to hold anything more than a tiny paper log, to five-gallon buckets or even larger containers.

If a geocache has been vandalized or stolen, it is said to have been "muggled" or "plundered." The former term plays off the fact that those not familiar with geocaching are called "geo-muggles" or just muggle

Muggle

Muggle is the word used in the Harry Potter series of books by J. K. Rowling to refer to a person who lacks any sort of magical ability and was not born into the magical world. It differs from the term Squib which refers to a person without magical abilities but with a magical ancestry. The word...

s, a term popularised by the Harry Potter
Harry Potter
Harry Potter is a series of seven fantasy novels written by British author J. K. Rowling. The books chronicle the adventures of the adolescent wizard Harry Potter, together with Ron Weasley and Hermione Granger, his friends from the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry...

series of books.

If a cacher discovers that a cache has been muggled, it can be logged as needing maintenance, which sends an e-mail to the cache owner so it can be repaired, replaced, or archived (deactivated).

Putting food in a cache is not advised. Animals can smell food through the container and will find a way to get into the container or just take it.

Variations

Geocaches vary in size, difficulty, and location. Simple caches are often called "drive-bys," "park 'n grabs" (PNGs), or "cache and dash." Geocaches may also be complex, involving lengthy searches or significant travel. Examples include staged multi-caches; underwater caches, caches located 50 feet (15 m) up a tree, caches found only after long offroad drives, caches on high mountain peaks, caches located in challenging environments (such as Antarctica or north of the Arctic Circle

Arctic Circle

The Arctic Circle is one of the five major circles of latitude that mark maps of the Earth. In , it is the parallel of latitude that runs approximately 66° 33′ 39″ north of the Equator. The region north of this circle is known as the Arctic, and the zone just to the south is called the Northern...

), and magnetic caches attached to metal structures and/or objects. Different geocaching websites list different variations per their own policies (e.g. Geocaching.com does not list new Webcam

Webcam

A webcam is a video capture device connected to a computer or computer network, often using a USB port or, if connected to a network, ethernet or Wi-Fi....

, Virtual, Locationless, or Moving geocaches).
Variations of geocaches include:

Traditional: The basic cache type, a traditional cache must include a log book of some sort. It may or may not include trade or traceable items. A traditional cache is distinguished from other cache variations in that the geocache is found at the coordinates given and involves only one stage.

Multi-cache: This variation consists of multiple discoveries of one or more intermediate points containing the coordinates for the next stage; the final stage contains the log book and trade items.

Offset: This cache is similar to the multi-cache except that the initial coordinates are for a location containing information that encodes the final cache coordinates. An example would be to direct the finder to a plaque where the digits of a date on the plaque correspond to coordinates of the final cache.

Night Cache: These multi-stage caches are designed to be found at night and generally involve following a series of reflectors with a flashlight to the final cache location.

Mystery/puzzle: This cache requires one to discover information or solve a puzzle to find the cache. Some mystery caches provide a false set of coordinates with a puzzle that must be solved to determine the final cache location. In other cases, the given location is accurate, but the name of the location or other features are themselves a puzzle leading to the final cache. Alternatively, additional information is necessary to complete the find, such as a padlock combination to access the cache.

Letterbox Hybrid: A letterbox
Letterboxing
Letterboxing is an outdoor hobby that combines elements of orienteering, art, and puzzle solving. Letterboxers hide small, weatherproof boxes in publicly-accessible places and distribute clues to finding the box in printed catalogs, on one of several web sites, or by word of mouth. Individual...

hybrid cache is a combination of a geocache and a letterbox in the same container. A letterbox has a rubber stamp and a logbook instead of tradable items. Letterboxers carry their own stamp with them, to stamp the letterbox's log book and inversely stamp their personal log book with the letterbox stamp. The hybrid cache contains the important materials for this and may or may not include trade items. Whether the letterbox hybrid contains trade items is up to the owner.

Locationless/Reverse: This variation is similar to a scavenger hunt
Scavenger hunt
A scavenger hunt is a game in which individuals or teams seek to gather a number of specific items—usually not by purchase—or perform tasks as given by a list...

. A description is given for something to find, such as a one-room schoolhouse, and the finder locates an example of this object. The finder records the location using their GPS hand-held receiver and often takes a picture at the location showing the named object and his or her GPS receiver. Typically others are not allowed to log that same location as a find.

Moving/Travelling: Similar to a traditional geocache, this variation is found at a listed set of coordinates. The finder uses the log book, trades trinkets, and then hides the cache in a different location. By updating this new location on the listing, the finder essentially becomes the hider, and the next finder continues the cycle. The hitchhiker concept (see above) has superseded this cache type on geocaching.com.

Virtual: Caches of this nature are coordinates for a location that does not contain the traditional box, log book, or trade items. Instead, the location contains some other described object. Validation for finding a virtual cache generally requires you to email the cache hider with information such as a date or a name on a plaque, or to post a picture of yourself at the site with GPS receiver in hand.
Earthcache: A type of virtual-cache which is maintained by the Geological Society of America
Geological Society of America
The is a nonprofit organization dedicated to the advancement of the geosciences. The society was founded in New York in 1888 by James Hall, James D. Dana, and Alexander Winchell, and has been headquartered at 3300 Penrose Place, Boulder, Colorado, USA, since 1968. As of 2007, the society has...

. The cacher usually has to perform a task which teaches him/her an educational lesson about the earth science of the cache area.
Webcam: Similar to a virtual cache; there is no container, log book, or trade items for this cache type. Instead, the coordinates are for a location with a public webcam
Webcam
A webcam is a video capture device connected to a computer or computer network, often using a USB port or, if connected to a network, ethernet or Wi-Fi....

. Instead of signing a log book, the finder is often required to capture their image from the webcam for verification of the find.
Event Cache: This is a gathering organized and attended by geocachers. Physical caches placed at events are often active only for the event date.
Cache-In Trash-Out (CITO) Events: This variation on event caching is a coordinated activity of trash pickup and other maintenance to improve the environment.
Mega Event: An event that is attended by over 500 people. Mega Events are typically annual events, usually attracting geocachers from all over the world.
GPS Adventures Maze Exhibit: An exhibit at various museums and science centers in which participants in the maze learn about geocaching. These "events" have their own cache type on Geocaching.com and include many non-geocachers.
Wherigo cache: A Wherigo
Wherigo
Wherigo is a GPS based activity that can be played outdoor which comes from the same authors of Geocaching. A simple description is a mix between an adventure game and a geocache search....

cache is similar to a multi-stage cache hunt that uses a Wherigo
Wherigo
Wherigo is a GPS based activity that can be played outdoor which comes from the same authors of Geocaching. A simple description is a mix between an adventure game and a geocache search....

cartridge to guide the player. The player plays the cartridge and finds a physical cache sometime during cartridge play, usually at the end. Not all Wherigo cartridges incorporate geocaches into game play. Wherigo caches are unique to the geocaching.com website.

Project A.P.E. Cache Type.

In 2001, 20th Century Fox

20th Century Fox

Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation , also known as 20th Century Fox, or simply 20th or Fox, is one of the six major American film studios...

in conjunction with Geocaching.com released a series of caches intended to promote the movie Planet of the Apes
Planet of the Apes (2001 film)
Planet of the Apes is a 2001 science fiction film and remake of the 1968 film of the same name. Tim Burton directed the film, which stars Mark Wahlberg, Tim Roth, Helena Bonham Carter, Michael Clarke Duncan, Paul Giamatti and Estella Warren. Planet of the Apes tells the story of astronaut Leo...

. The containers were all 60mm ammo cans with the phrase Project A.P.E. stencilled on the side. Clues were given to the location of the cache each week, getting more and more specific. Eventually, the cache would be published. Inside each container was an item from the movie. In 2003, 20th Century Fox separated themselves from the promotion completely and most of the caches were adopted by their respective owners. Many were soon archived, and only two Project A.P.E. caches of the Project A.P.E. cache type remain today as a result of this, however one cache that is now a traditional cache was a former Project A.P.E. cache as well. Two Project A.P.E. caches still remain, one near Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and one 35 miles outside of Seattle, Washington

Seattle, Washington

Seattle is located in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. Situated in the western part of Washington State on an isthmus between Puget Sound and Lake Washington, about south of the Canada – United States border, it is named after Chief Sealth, of the Duwamish and Suquamish tribes...

Obtaining data

GPX files contain information such as a cache description and information about recent visitors to the cache. Geocachers may upload geocache data (also known as waypoint

Waypoint

A waypoint is a reference point in physical space used for purposes of navigation.-Concept:Waypoints are sets of coordinates that identify a point in physical space. For the purposes of terrestrial navigation, these coordinates usually include longitude and latitude, and sometimes altitude...

s) from various websites in various formats, most commonly in file-type GPX, which uses XML

XML

XML is a set of rules for encoding documents electronically. It is defined in the produced by the W3C and several other related specifications; all are fee-free open standards....

. Some websites allow geocachers to search (build queries) for multiple caches within a geographic area based on criteria such as Zip Code

ZIP Code

The ZIP code is the system of postal codes used by the United States Postal Service . The letters ZIP, a backronym for Zone Improvement Plan, are properly written in capital letters and were chosen to suggest that the mail travels more efficiently, and therefore more quickly, when senders use the...

or coordinates

Geographic coordinate system

A geographic coordinate system is a coordinate system that enables every location on Earth to be specified in three coordinates, using mainly a spherical coordinate system....

, downloading the results as an email attachment on a schedule. Although often a time-consuming process with many possibilities for error, appropriate client software allows cachers to build individual GPX files.

Converting and filtering data

A variety of geocaching applications are available for geocache data management, file-type translation, and personalization. Geocaching software can assign special icons or search (filter) for caches based on certain criteria (e.g. distance from an assigned point, difficulty, date last found).

Paperless geocaching employs PDAs

Personal digital assistant

A personal digital assistant is a handheld computer, also known as a palmtop computer. Newer PDAs commonly have color screens and audio capabilities, enabling them to be used as mobile phones , web browsers, or portable media players. Many PDAs can access the Internet, intranets or extranets...

or other electronic devices to carry geocache information instead of paper. Various applications are able to directly upload and read GPX files without further conversion. Newer GPS devices released by Garmin

Garmin

Garmin Ltd. , incorporated in George Town, Cayman Islands, is the parent company of a group of companies founded in 1989 by Gary Burrell and Min Kao , that develops consumer, aviation, and marine technologies for the Global Positioning System...

have the ability to read GPX files directly, thus eliminating the need for a PDA

Personal digital assistant

. The release of numerous cellphones which have a GPS chip built in, has enabled another platform for paperless geocaching.

Terminology

There are various acronyms and phrases commonly used in logs, both online and in logbooks. These words and phrases include, but are not limited to:

"DNF" is an acronym for "Did Not Find", or when a geocacher hunts for a particular cache however is unable to find the container.
"FTF" is an acronym for "First To Find", used by the first person to locate the cache and sign the log.
"ICT" is an acronym for "Ivy Covered Tree", used in the description on where a cache may be hidden.
"TFTC" is one of the more commonly used acronyms, standing for "Thanks For The Cache". This is often used at the end of logs to thank the cache owner, or CO.
"TFTH" is an acronym similar to TFTC, however it stands for "Thanks For The Hunt" or "Thanks For The Hike" or "Thanks For the Hide". It shares the same purpose as TFTC.
"TNLN" is an acronym for "Took Nothing, Left Nothing", used when a finder of a cache does not trade any items in the cache. Just "TN" or "LN" can be used individually as well.
"SL" is an acronym for "Signed Log", used when the participant visited the cache and signed its logbook. This acronym can be combined with the one above, and then condensed to make "XNSL", which stands for "exchanged nothing, signed log".

Ethics

Individual geocaching websites have developed their own guidelines for acceptable geocache publications. Though not universally required, the Geocacher's Creed provides ethical search guidelines. Government agencies and others responsible for public use of land often establish their own guidelines for geocaching. Generally accepted rules are to not endanger others, to minimize the impact on nature, to respect private property

Private property

Private property is the tangible and intangible things owned by individuals or firms over which their owners have exclusive and absolute legal rights, and can only be transferred with the owner's consent. Private property can take the form of real estate, homes, factories, automobiles, capital,...

, and to avoid public alarm.

Controversy and issues

Cachers have been approached by police

Police

A police service is a public force empowered to enforce the law and provide security through the legitimized use of force.The term is most commonly associated with police services of a state that are authorized to exercise the police power of that state within a defined legal or territorial area of...

and questioned when they were seen as acting suspiciously. Other times, investigation of a cache location after suspicious activity was reported has resulted in police and bomb squad discovery of the geocache. Schools have been occasionally evacuated when a cache has been seen by teachers or police, as in the case of Fairview High School in 2009. A number of caches have been destroyed by bomb squads.

The placement of geocaches has critics among governmental personnel and the public at large who consider it littering. Some geocachers try to mitigate this perception by picking up litter while they search for geocaches. Geocaching is not illegal

Illegal

Illegal, or unlawful, is used to describe something that is prohibited or not authorized by law or, more generally, by rules specific to a particular situation .Illegal may also refer to:*Illegal...

, and is usually positively received when explained to law enforcement officials (e.g. police officers). However, certain types of placements can be problematic. Although disallowed, hiders could place caches on private property without adequate permission (intentionally or otherwise), which encourages cache finders to trespass. Caches might also be hidden in places where the act of searching can make a finder look suspicious (e.g. skulking near schools, children's playgrounds, banks, courthouses, or in residential neighborhoods), or where the container placement could be mistaken for a drug

Drug

A drug, broadly speaking, is any substance that, when absorbed into the body of a living organism, alters normal bodily function. There is no single, precise definition, as there are different meanings in drug control law, government regulations, medicine, and colloquial usage.In pharmacology, a...

stash or potential bomb

Bomb

A bomb is any of a range of explosive devices that typically rely on the exothermic chemical reaction of an explosive material to produce an extremely sudden and violent release of energy. The word comes from the Greek word βόμβος , an onomatopoetic term with approximately the same meaning as...

threat (often in urban settings, under bridges, near banks, courthouses, or embassies). Hides in these areas are discouraged, and cache listing websites enforce guidelines that disallow certain types of placements. However, as cache reviewers typically cannot see exactly where and how every particular cache is hidden, problematic hides can slip through. Ultimately it is also up to cache finders to use discretion when attempting to search for a cache, and report any problems.

Websites

Numerous websites list geocaches around the world. In the United States

United States

The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...

, where most geocaching services are hosted, only a cache's coordinates are in public domain. Other cache information, including the description, is protected by copyright law. Geocaching websites vary in active protection of cache data.

First page

The first website to list geocaches was announced by Mike Teague on May 8, 2000. On September 2, 2000, Jeremy Irish emailed the gpsstash mailing list that he had registered the domain name geocaching.com and had setup his own Web site. He copied the caches from Mike Teague's database into his own. On September 7, Mike Teague announced that Jeremy Irish was taking over cache listings.

Geocaching.com

The largest site is Geocaching.com, owned by Groundspeak

Groundspeak

Groundspeak, Inc. was founded to manage , the largest geocaching listings website.-Geocaching:Geocaching is an outdoor treasure-hunting game in which the participants use a Global Positioning System receiver or other navigational techniques to hide and seek containers anywhere in the world...

Inc., which began operating on September 2, 2000. With a worldwide membership, Geocaching.com lists hundreds of thousands of caches. Each cache is reviewed by regional cache reviewers before publication with an emphasis on family-oriented caching. Free basic membership allows users to see coordinates for most caches in its database; premium membership includes a fee for additional features, including advanced search tools and caches designed for premium members. The website includes about 904,000 caches in over 200 countries around the world, as of September 2009.

Geocaching.com no longer lists new caches without a physical container, including locationless/reverse and webcam; however, older caches of these types have been grandfathered

Grandfather clause

A grandfather clause is an exception that allows an old rule to continue to apply to some existing situations, when a new rule will apply to all future situations. It is often used as a verb: to grandfather means to grant such an exemption. Frequently, the exemption is limited; it may extend for a...

in (except for locationless/reverse, which are completely archived). Earthcaches are the exception to the no-container rule; they are caches in which players must answer geological questions to complete the cache. Groundspeak created a waymarking

Waymarking

website to handle all other non-physical caches.

Geocaching.com also supports the discovery of benchmarks, which are a location (only in the USA) "known to a high degree of accuracy" Sometimes these can be metal disks, radio towers, or a bolt in central locations or on a highway. Their main purpose is for surveying an area. Geocaching gives the longitude and latitude to this location and the user must rely on given clues to find the benchmark.

NaviCache

Navicache.com started as a regional listing service around February 2001, but quickly gained popularity among those looking for a less restrictive alternative to what was currently available. While many of Navicache.com's listings have been posted to other sites, they also offer many unique listings. Navicache.com also lists nearly any type of geocache (within reason) and does not charge to access any of the caches listed in their database. While all submissions are reviewed and approved, Navicache is more liberal in approving caches believing that the pastime belongs to participants rather than a governing agency.

TerraCaching

Terracaching seeks to provide high-quality caches made so by the difficulty of the hide or from the quality of the location. Membership is managed through a sponsorship system, and each cache is under continual peer review from other members. Terracaching.com embraces virtual caches alongside traditional/multi-stage caches and includes many locationless caches among the thousands of caches in its database. It is increasingly attracting members who like the point system. In Europe TerraCaching is supported by Terracaching.eu. This site is translated in different European languages, has an extended FAQ and extra supporting tools for TerraCaching.

GeoTruckers.com

Drivers of larger vehicles such as RV's and trucks (18-wheelers) can often find it very difficult to find caches during their travels due to the lack of parking available for large vehicles at most cache locations. GeoTruckers.comis a free site that is dedicated to the drivers of such vehicles. Members can submit existing caches that have sufficient parking for large vehicles which are kept available as bookmarks on the Groundspeak site and available for download. There is also a discussion forum available where members can discuss topics unique to driving and caching in large vehicles as well as general discussion.

Other sites

In many countries there are regional geocaching sites, but these mostly only compile lists of caches in the area from the three main sites. Many of them also accept unique listings of caches for their site, but these listings tend to be less popular than the international sites. There are some exceptions though, e.g. in the former Soviet Union the site Geocaching.su remains popular because it accepts listings in the cyrillic alphabet

Cyrillic alphabet

The Cyrillic script writing system isan alphabet developed in the First Bulgarian Empire, and used in the Slavic national languages of Russian, Bulgarian, Belarusian, Rusyn, Serbian, Macedonian, and Ukrainian, and in the non-Slavic languages of Moldovan, Kazakh, Uzbek, Kyrgyz, Tajik, Tuvan, and...

. An additional international site is Geocaching.de, a German website. Statistics websites such as CacherStats and CachingTree allow cachers to track statistics online.