3. “ The decision to discontinue Selective
Availability is the latest measure in an
ongoing effort to make GPS more
responsive to civil and commercial
users worldwide. --This increase in
accuracy will allow new GPS
applications to emerge and continue to
enhance the lives of people around the
world.”
President Bill Clinton
May 1, 2000
4. Dave Ulmer, the very
1st Geocacher!
Here’s a great example
of a typical Geocache.
12. Additional Hints:
Decryption Key
A| B|C|D|E|F|G|H| I | J |K|L|M Ybbx arne gur srapr
Look near the fence..
------------------------N|O|P|Q|R|S|T|U|V|W|X|Y|Z
(letter above equals below, and vice
versa)
Geocaching is a sort of high tech treasure hunt where waterproof boxes such as Tupperware are hidden through out various locations across the globe. It is all made possible thanks to modern technology such as GPS.
GPS or ‘Global Positioning System’ was invented by the US Department of defence for their military to be able to locate objectives or targets in unfamiliar surrounding or even in the dark.
In 1996 it was decided to integrate this technology into commercial and scientific practise, which made it available for public use, but it wasn’t until the year 2000 that President Bill Clinton ordered that’ intentional degrading of the civilian GPS signal be discontinued.This meant that this technology was made widely available over the world
and in fact the day after, this was taken into affect, a computer consultant by the name of Dave Ulmer decided to test these new capabilities by hiding a container in the woods, in it were a log book and pencil and even a few prizes.
For the people that bothered to locate his ‘stash’ using their GPS devices. The co-ordinates were posted to a website and soon became popular online where people were asked to write their name in a logbook and if they took something out they must put something of equal or greater value in!
The first person to locate Ulmer’s hidden container was a man named Mike Teague, who began posting locations set by other people around the world on his website. This was essentially the birth of Geocaching!
As technology is ever advancing, we are now able to use GPS on our mobile phones, making geocaching more popular than ever!
The aim of the exercise is to track down a specific geocache by using the GPS on your mobile phone.
Locations and Co-ordinates for these can be found on http://www.geocachingwales.com/ or even www.geocaching.com if you’re feeling really adventurous and are travelling in other countries and as of May 2012 there are almost 2 million active geocaches around the world.
There are also clues such as decrypted messages that will help you to find them such as..
Does anyone want to try and decrypt this?
After researching Geocaching, our aim is to visit Swansea city centre in where some known geocaches are located and track them down ourselves. This should prove to be an interesting, knowledgeable and hopefully fun activity.
Thank you for listening and are there any questions?
