What to do in the Poconos: Have you tried 'geocaching'? | Something to Think About
As the weather turns from winter to spring to summer, searching for some fun outdoor activities pops up on virtually all to do lists.
Living in the Poconos makes finding something to do that is fun in the sun easy. You may take to the river or nearby lake, enjoy the outdoor pool, fun hikes or bike rides or you just might want to try something a little different― like geocaching.
If you haven't ever heard of geocaching, here is the primer education. In its Annual Report, the Monroe County Planning Commission highlights the activity and explains it as "a real-world outdoor treasure hunting game" using GPS-enabled devices.
The activity has participants navigate to a specific set of GPS coordinates and then attempt to find the geocache container hidden at that location."
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In 2017 as part of the Northampton Community College Earth Day Festival, the Monroe County Forever Green Geocaching Challenge was launched. The event had great feedback from seasoned and new geocachers which resulted in the project becoming a staple of outdoor activity.
As I had a conversation with some newcomers to the area at the local coffee shop, I mentioned that there was an opportunity to explore the area through geocaching.
Since these folks are pretty savvy about the outdoors, I wondered if they had every heard of the fun-filled activity. And, although I shouldn’t have been surprised, it was a college activity that friends got together to do.
It was explained that then, there was not the opportunity to use the phone with GPS, so one friend would map out the coordinates on paper and then the challenge would begin to find the “hidden treasure”. As reported, it was great fun and there was always the challenge that let them to the element of surprise which was, of course, the “hidden treasure”.
As part of the activity, participants choose one of six regions of Monroe County and then head out to explore a variety of preserved public lands.
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The goal of the search is to find a series of geocaches hidden at each property. The search has the explorer collect the coordinates of the final mystery-cache and finding the final cache, a small prize awaits.
In this era of STEM programs, an adventure like this is a perfect project for the kids. Making it even more fun for kids is the "Kids Caches" that were added to the program. This program has the young explorer find the "treasure chest" cache which is filled with small tokens that a child can select one item to take home.
Half of the excitement will be what is waiting the cache and what the child get to leave there for the next adventure hunter!
Adventurers are encouraged to contribute to the chest, leaving behind a token that is 1 to 2 inches in size for the next kid to find. An important point for both young and old is to replace the cache and hide it as it was found so the next person can enjoy the hunt too!
If you would like more information on how to enjoy this adventure, visit monroecountypa.gov/planning. So, as you enjoy the weather of spring and summer, venture out to a different type of “hunting season”!
Debbie Kulick writes a weekly column for the Pocono Record and Tri-County Independent. She serves on the frontlines of the COVID-19 pandemic as an EMT.
This article originally appeared on Pocono Record: What to do in the Poconos: Have you tried 'geocaching'?
