Urban geocachers navigate a concrete environment
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Ruth Kramer of New York uses a GPS to lead a geocaching trek through Downtown. -
A "geo-coin" is left behind at a Downtown cache. -
Ruth Kramer on a geocaching trek through Pittsburgh. A New York City-based stage manager for the Pittsburgh Public Theater, she lives in Pittsburgh several months a year.
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Ruth Kramer glanced from side to side, checking for "civilian" onlookers when the GPS unit lying flat in her hand indicated she had reached the spot.
There was wire fencing overgrown with ivy on one edge of the sidewalk under her feet and the Allegheny River near the 7th Street bridge, Downtown, on the other. Somewhere near the spot, "The Leprechauns" had placed "the oldest surviving micro-cache in the City of Pittsburgh." And we were going to find it.
"The Leprechauns" are the owners of this cache, which is invisible to passersby but a cinch to find for a geocaching veteran like Kramer. It is a small, black rectangular box -- 2 inches by 1 inch -- suspended in a corner between two metal sides of the overgrown fence. Three years of experience and 980 found caches have helped Kramer to develop what she calls her "geo-sense" -- an ability to pick out spots where someone would likely hide a geocache, anywhere from a log book stuck inside a magnet on a lamppost, to an Altoids box hanging from a fishing line in a metal grate on the sidewalk, to a Tupperware container under a statue.
Geocaching is a "real-world outdoor treasure-hunting game." The website Geocaching.com reveals more than 1 million locations of caches around the world and beyond -- there is a cache orbiting Earth aboard the International Space Station. Each cache has a name, GPS coordinates, a description and a crypted hint. Cachers can use a GPS device or the Groundspeak Geocaching Application on a smartphone to reach the vicinity of treasure.
Caches can be anywhere. Many think of them as being hidden in the woods -- hanging from the branch of a tree or hidden in its roots. But urban geocaching offers treasure seekers a different sort of adventure, one that requires navigating a concrete environment, while stealthily avoiding glances from the many surrounding "muggles," or non-cachers.
The online map of Pittsburgh is densely packed with squares marking caches at each location: a handful of spots on the streets Downtown, clusters in each park (including 11 in Schenley Park, 10 in Frick Park and eight in Highland Park), and several scattered along the converging rivers. They are everywhere -- too many to count. One cache in Point State Park serves as the finish line for cachers who have completed the Pennsylvania All-County Challenge, which stipulates finding a cache in all 67 counties in Pennsylvania.
No matter where the cache is located -- off the trail in Schenley Park or somewhere in Market Square -- finding it can be tricky. Kramer came prepared.
First Published November 6, 2011 12:00 am
