New Ontario Geocaching Association Executive

Ontario Geocaching Association Logo
Ontario Geocaching Association

The nominations for OGA Executive positions has now come to an end. All of the executive positions were filled. There was one candidate for each of the executive positions, everyone who ran was unopposed and acclaimed for their respective position. Six members of the current executive have chosen to stay on, some in new roles. January will be a transition month with the new executive team being in place officially starting February 1st.

OGA welcomes the following executives in their positions:

President – Brenda H. (brendah)
Vice President – Gregory P. (northernpenguin)
Secretary – Shiloh S. (Treknschmidt)
Treasurer – Lucas C. (Luc & Sweety)
Webmaster – John R. (teamvoyagr)
Executive Officer – Central, Lisa D. (wheezor)
Executive Officer – Eastern, Lib M. (bluelamb03)
Executive Officer – Golden Horseshoe, Ralph S. (res2100)
Executive Officer – Northern, Roger S. (Mag Magician)
Executive Officer – Southwestern, Rob M. (Swamper68)
Executive At Large – Mark H. (greywynd)

I am looking forward to a great two years with the OGA and will be doing my best to work with the others to make the OGA a great association!

How Hard is a 5 Terrain Geocache?

How hard should a 5 terrain geocache be? Should it be almost dangerous? Should it require gear?

By definition from Geocaching.com, a 5 terrain rating for a cache requires the use of specialized equipment such as climbing gear or a canoe.

Tree Geocache
It’s WAY up there. Yes. Geocaches are in trees too!

But what if a cache is very high in a tree and you can’t use specialized gear? The cache is so high that climbing gear would not be able to attach to anything. Yet the branches are getting so thin at that point they feel like they are going to snap off. Would that then constitute a rating of 4.5 instead of 5? As much as you would love to be able to use some climbing gear, there just isn’t anywhere to hook it. But the height has even the best of them trembling in their shoes.

Continue reading How Hard is a 5 Terrain Geocache?

OGA Elections

Ontario Geocaching Association Logo
Ontario Geocaching Association

It is that time again that the OGA (Ontario Geocaching Association) is looking for nominations for this year’s executive elections.

So far there looks to be a good group of nominations. Some names that have been on the executive in the past and some that are new. One nomination to follow is yours truly. Swamper68. If your up to giving some time throughout the year, make sure to send in your nomination. Know of someone who would be a great executive member, get that nomination in there!

Time is short though. The OGA is only taking nominations until January 1, 2011.

To find out where to send your nominations and a list of current nominees make sure you visit the Ontario Geocaching Association’s website.

And don’t forget that you need to be a premium member of the OGA in order to be nominated.

GSAK (Geocaching Swiss Army Knife)

GSAK (Geocaching Swiss Army Knife) is a great tool for the semi-serious to the full out, totally obsessed geocacher! GSAK is a program that you can download and install on your computer to keep track of caches in your area, caches you have hid and caches you have found. It is a database driven from your computer. Macros can be installed to create “Filters” for accomplishing different tasks. I use about 6 ranging from creating a cool profile stats page to being able to grab finds for the day from my Garmin Dakota 20 to uploading caches to my car Tom Tom XL.

I will be adding new tips and tricks about GSAK that I have found since I started using GSAK. Being a fairly serious cacher I use it all the time. I will list a few basic things that I do with GSAK here and expand more in later issues.

Continue reading GSAK (Geocaching Swiss Army Knife)

Can you cache in the Swamp?