When I woke up this morning I did not expect to have a geocaching FTF (First To Find) waiting for me. First to Finds for me is pure bragging rights and there are several other geocachers in the area that are just as passionate as me so if I wanted it I had to move fast.
The waypoint had it about 10 miles away which is on the long side of me getting there first. What drove me was that if I was able to pull this off I could turn it into a really neat GeoSnippits segment for Michigan Magazine TV. I thought to myself how many people who are new to geocaching or never been out geocaching have ever seen a real FTF? So in one fell swoop I grabbed my video gear, jumped into my geocachemobile and RACED (at the limit of posted speeds) towards my goal.
Within a few minutes I had neared the parking are for the geocache. I was so glad that I brought my video camera along because this particular cache was located in the wooded area of a neighborhood park. Complete with beautiful trails and scenic pond but before I could get all that wonderful filler footage I had to find the geocache and sign, hopefully, the clean sheetz.
Armed with my trusty pouch, walking stick and cameras I was off. My Black Berry was fully charged and I used my geocaching application Geocache Navigator to find the correct route along the trails. The beauty of having an app like that on my phone is I did not have to take the time to download the information about the new geocache. It is pulled directly from the phone connection via the Internet and wha-la instant information.
After walking about .20 of a mile I reached ground zero and began looking around. Within a couple of minutes I had the geocache in hand and much to my glee the sheetz were clean. I had found my FTF for the day. The coolest about the whole thing was I captured it all on video and now it is going to be made into a GeoSnippits segment for Michigan Magazine TV.
Now normally I have my right hand girl and daughter Miss Geoness with me. She is my camera girl and keeper of me making a complete fool out of my self when I am in front of the lens. Today though she was at school and I was by myself. This makes filming a bit difficult. One of the tools that I have recently added to my collection is pictured above. It is a flexible tripod like base that can wrap around anything. In this case there was a bent tree that worked quite well. It allows me to set up shots without the use of a full blown tripod and is small enough to keep in my geocaching pouch. It is great as a third hand for a regular camera and as you can see also works well with light video cameras. You can find these in pretty much any camera store or like me a local department store and they will run you about $20.00. Just a helpful tip from me to you.
Well I have to get back to editing this episode for GeoSnippits and Michigan Magazine TV. GeoSnippits is shown in all 50 states on MMTV which can be seen on Direct TV, Dish Network, Sky Angel and Comcast. Michigan Magazine TV is featured on the RFD-TV Network.
Hope to see you out on the trails...
-HHH
http://headhardhat-geocache.blogspot.com/
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Please don't forget to visit our GeoSnippits Geocaching Tutorial Videos Website at http://www.geosnippits.com
2 comments:
I wanna be a FTF, but I have the lugging-a-three-year-old along dilema. One posted last night, haven't checked, but I'm sure it's been found already. some people w/ the phones can get there asap whereas the rest of us have to download. someday when I'm rich and famous (sigh).
Got 34 FTF's to my belt so far. Getting close to beating the other hounds around here. I know some people hate the thought of it, but I just can't resist racing out and then waiting on others to show up.
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