One of the two geocaching trails around the reserve required some work on it. So I have been busy doing that all morning
So, what is geocaching? Well, simply put, it is a treasure hunt. Various items are hidden, and then their GPS coordinates are posted on a website www.geocaching.com and the idea is for other people to try to find them. When they do, they leave their name on a piece of paper that is inside the hidden object and often make a comment on the website. Rather like a high-tech version of 'hunt the thimble'.
We have two such trails around the reserve. One is a traditional trail called 'Wildlife of Frampton' where each object hidden has some connection to our wildlife. The other is a 'multi-cache' trail. Rather than finding many different objects, instead you need to find signs and glean information from them (eg years, names of people and so on). Once you have done that, using a code you can transform this into the co-ordinates of the final cache, which is an object.
Today I needed to replace one cache which had gone missing (people do unfortunately sometimes walk off with them. Or even bring them in as lost property) and re-site another which had become inaccessible.
Does all this sound like fun? Then do come along and have a go! Dedicated GPS units can be bought from most outdoor stores or online for under £100. Or else you can download an app for your mobile phone. Eventually I do hope to have a GPS unit available to hire in the visitor centre too, but this is in the future.
Reedbed, freshwater scrapes, saltmarsh and wet meadow. Frampton Marsh has it all! Come and pay us a visit soon.