patrickWeb

Hiking

Saturday, September 5, 2009

Civil War

Civil War The summer would not be complete without reaching the goal of finding 100 geocaches since we started geocaching in 2003. I had mentioned "clever" in the last post and today I found yet another example of clever thinking by some very dedicated people in Pennsylvania. There were two multicaches that I was fortunate to be able to find. They were both in Sterling Township which is an area I know pretty well and enjoy motorcycling through. The first part of the ride for both caches was at North 41 20.477 West 75 23.354 which turned out to be the South Sterling Township Historical Society.

Just outside the building -- fortunate since the museum itself was closed -- there was a wooden sign which contained the Honor Roll of local heroes from the Civil War. There were nearly fifty listed. The first hero was the first on the list and the other was the last of those ending in "L". The next step was to enter the latitude and longitude of each resting place -- one at the Hometown Cemetery, the other at the Zion Cemetery -- to find the caches. In both cases the challenge was to find the tombstone and then go 40 feet in one case and 60 feet in the other case in a certain direction. It was quite interesting to look for the correct tombstone and in the process I saw many that were roughly 150 years old. Some were damaged by the decades of wind and rain and were not readable. I was fortunate to find both cleverly hidden caches and sign the logbooks.

The geocache owners reported that the first hero served with the Salem Independents for 3 years, joined June 5, 1861, and mustered out June 17, 1864. The second hero fought with the 2nd Heavy Artillery Pennsylvania Volunteers. He was born in 1819, enlisted at the young age of 45 and was discharged January 29, 1866. He passed away in 1905 at the age of 86.

The loss of life was incredible. At least 618,000 Americans died in the Civil War, and some experts say the toll reached 700,000. The number that is most often quoted is 620,000. At any rate, these casualties exceed the nation's loss in all its other wars, from the Revolution through Vietnam.

Hiking, Motorcycles, Travels September 5, 2009 08:33 PM

Tuesday, September 1, 2009

Clever

Geocaching The motorcycle ride to the Town of Saugerties was very nice. The four of us met downtown and went to The Dutch Ale House for lunch. Saugerties has a lot of history going back to 1677. The town is a quaint community located between the majestic Catskill Mountains and the scenic 315 mile long Hudson River. We strolled through the 19th century Village and picked off a geocache on the way down to the fully operational lighthouse. I checked the Tide Chart to make sure we could make it along the trail which is only about 4' above sea level. The first part of the multi-cache was at the lighthouse -- placed in a very clever way. The micro film canister contained a piece of paper with the latitude and longitude of the actual cache which was a quarter of a mile away. It too was cleverly placed. This cache find was #99 since we started geocaching in 2003.

Speaking of "clever", the World Community Grid just announced the completion of the first phase of the "Discovering Dengue Drugs - Together" project. It took only two years to complete because the members provided nearly 12,000 years of computer processing time to the project. Anyone can participate in the World Community Grid by installing a small piece of software similar to a screen saver. When your PC is idle the excess computing capability that it has gets pulled into a pool to help out on various projects of global importance. One of my PC's contributed a modest 94 days of processing time to the "Discovering Dengue Drugs - Together" project.

Completing this phase of the project is a significant contribution to the research of not only Dengue Fever but also Hepatitis C, West Nile, Yellow Fever and other diseases caused by the Flaviviridea family of viruses. Get the latest details about the project here and if you want to add your idle computing capacity to important projects just visit the World Community Grid.

Healthcare, Hiking, Internet Technology September 1, 2009 09:34 PM

Wednesday, April 15, 2009

Promised Land

Geocaching The weather for a hike in the Delaware State Forest near Promised Land, Pennsylvania was perfect -- not too hot and not too cold. Promised Land State Park is in the Pocono Plateau, 1,800 feet above sea level and is about is 3,000 acres in size, surrounded by more than 12,000 acres of state forests. The forests are mostly beech, oak, maple and hemlock trees and include two lakes and several small streams. Our trail map was eight years old but thanks to the Garmin Colorado 400t GPS and well market trails, my wife and I were able to have a successful hike of about five miles. We found Promised Land Cache II exactly as described at geocaching.com. A few pictures form the hike are here.

I am so thankful to have the new oxinium knee and that it allows for hiking after less than six months. Last summer it was hobbling around and a half-mile hike resulted in a lot of pain. It seems like everyone knows someone who has had a total knee replacement or is considering one. Much praise and credit is due to Dr. Sanjay Gupta and the teams at Danbury Hospital and Bethel Health Care Rehabilitation Center but I also believe the preparation and approach to rehabilitation make a huge difference as well. The factors that made the biggest difference for me are here.

Geocaching, Healthcare, Hiking April 15, 2009 07:39 PM

Thursday, July 31, 2008

iPhone - Update No. 14 (Geocaching)

Geocaching I was sitting on the Sporster in the middle of a parking lot about ten miles from the lake when a man approached me with a troubled look on his face. He was late for an appointment and wanted to know if I knew where the Northeast Eye Institute was. Unfortunately, I had never hear of it but told him I would be glad to look it up in Google Maps for him. He said, "the Internet on a call phone?". In a few seconds I had the location and a phone number which I clicked on asked them where exactly their office was and I relayed to him how to get there. He shook my hand with a big thank you and a grin on his face. As he walked away, I grinned too. The iPhone is a very high utility device. The other lesson for me was confirmation that the mobile Internet is huge and has now grown to it's infancy.

The reason I was sitting in the parking lot was to look for a nearby geocache. Geopher Lite is a GPS based iPhone application which allows you to find geocaches "quickly and easily" on the go. It actually wasn't that quick and easy but when I got back to the lake a few hours later I checked for iPhone updates. Sure enough there was an update for Geopher Lite which incorporated some of the obvious deficiencies. This is the great thing -- apps are always brought up to date with a touch of the phonetop and developers are constantly going to be making improvements. I can see that tight integration with geocaching.com is just a, probably short, matter of time. If I was in the handheld GPS business I would be concerned. The iPhone is going to disintermediate a lot of businesses.

Epilogue: Speaking of gouaches, I found a very interesting one yesterday titled "William Howard Taft's Forefathers and Family". Finding it was not much of a challenge but seeing the small cemetery across the road from the Lake Wallenpaupack Observation Dike was quite a surprise. I have driven by it hundreds of times and did not even know it was there. The cemetery was built by the Taft family more than 150 years ago and holds the remains of the great, great, great, great grandfather of William Howard Taft, the 27th President of the United States, along with about ten other family members.

Other patrickWeb stories about the iPhone

Geocaching, Hiking, Mobile, People, iPhone July 31, 2008 05:50 PM

Friday, April 4, 2008

Geocaching Update

Hiker As of this week there are 57,370 people who have accounts at geocaching.com. They have placed 550,474 caches around the world for others to enjoy finding. In the last 7 days, there have been 440,577 new log entries written by account holders describing their experiences at finding (or not finding) the caches. For me, there are a lot more to find -- since January 2003 I have found 81 caches (plus 90 benchmarks) in eight states and seven countries. I really enjoy the sport and hope to find quite a few more caches this summer. Geocaching is the tip of the iceberg of "location based" applications.

There are many GPS receivers on the market now with some breaking below the $100 mark. The hot area is GPS for cars. Many new cars offer built-in units as an option but the "after" market is much larger. One of the newest entries is Dash. The new Dash Express claims to be the first two-way, Internet-connected GPS navigation system. The device delivers traffic and destination information in a new way. You can look up somewhere that you want to go using the Internet and then have that "waypoint" delivered via cellular or WiFi signal directly to your Dash. You then select the new waypoint and the GPS will guide you to your destination. The Dash can also show you the location of all other cars nearby that have a Dash. That makes it a good proxy for traffic but what would be much better would be if all the GPS manufacturers got to together and agreed on a standard for information sharing so that each GPS could actually show the "total" traffic in the area, not just traffic of those cars that have a Dash.

I have been using GPS devices for quite a few years and have or have had most of the manufacturers. On the trike, I have the TomTom Rider. On other bikes I have Garmins. For the last few years I have been using a Magellan for geocaching. They make a really nice device but I don't like their software. GPS is becoming ubiquitous but the formats for the data storage and data interchange with PCs is a Tower of Babel. Magellan is not alone -- the entire GPS industry thrives on proprietary formats that they think help them maintain market share but actually constrict the market and confuse customers. Thankfully, there is a great piece of software called GSAK (geocaching Swiss Army Knife) that is indispensable for anyone who wants to exchange GPS data with their PC. I highly recommend it. GSAK allows you to download thousands of caches from geocaching.com to an easy to use desktop application. You can then sort them, search them, organize them in various ways, see all the logs of those of have found (or not) the caches, and a Google Map to show exactly where the caches are. Once you are ready to pack up and head for the trails, GSAK allows you to easily transfer the selected cache information to your GPS.

As soon as the backorder gets filled I will be ready to go geocaching with the new Garmin Colorado 400t. Looks like the Colorado will be a rugged and advanced handheld and it will be pre-loaded with detailed topographic maps with a 3-D map view, a high-sensitivity receiver, barometric altimeter, electronic compass, an SD card slot, picture viewer and a bright color display. I will be reporting on whether it is as good as it sounds or not. Meanwhile two of my Magellans went on eBay this week and hopefully they will make a new geocacher somewhere happy.

Other patrickWeb stories about hiking, geocaching, and benchmarking

Gadgets, Hiking April 4, 2008 11:20 AM

Monday, November 26, 2007

Florida Refuge

The first attempt at geocaching for me was on August 31, 2003. I still enjoy the sport and highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in hiking and the outdoors. The basic idea is that individuals or organizations set up "hidden treasures" (caches) in various places around the world and record the locations (latitude and longitude) of the caches on a web site like geocaching.com. An interested adventurer or hiker can then visit the web site, read some hints about the cache, download the latitude and longitude into their handheld GPS receiver, and head out on their search for the cache. The cache may be contained in a tupperware container or ammo can with some gifts and a logbook.The visitor makes an entry in the logbook and if they take something from the cache, they should replace it with something new. The visitor can also go back to geocaching.com and record their success and upload some pictures.

The weather on Sunday could not have been more perfect for an afternoon of hiking. The sky was blue and there were no clouds. Ballard Park is in historic Ridgefield, Connecticut.The temperature was 45 degrees but the kids on skateboards were in tee shirts. The cache was not hidden really well but it made for a nice walk in the park. The second hike -- in the woods -- would be more ambitious.

Florida Refuge sounds like an escape to the state of Florida but it is actually also in Ridgefield. The trail head is not easy to find and there is extremely limited parking -- room for one car to pull off to the side of the road. The yellow trail got us to the top where wooden steps and a bridge signaled that others had been there before. The abundant trees caused the GPS signal to be a bit erratic but after it quieted down we were able to find the cache. The ammo can was a bit battered but the contents were dry. By this time we were sweating in the cold air. There was not enough daylight left to go after the "Good Things Come in Small Parcels" multi-cache. Next time -- hopefully before the snow comes. Todays finds made it Geocaches found: 79 and Benchmarks found: 90.

Other patrickWeb stories about hiking

Hiking November 26, 2007 11:37 AM

Friday, October 26, 2007

Governance

Doctor and Patient It was an educational week at the Leadership Conference for Trustees, Physicians, Executives, & Nurse Executives at The Greenbrier in White Sulphur Springs, West Virginia. The conference, which focused on the subject of governance, was organized by The Governance Institute. Although not a new term, governance has taken a much higher profile in both for profit and not for profit organizations. At a very high level governance aims to assure that an organization produces a pattern of good results while avoiding an undesirable pattern of bad circumstances. The Governance Institute focuses on helping hospitals achieve best practices among the leading healthcare boards across the country.

The conference included three days of speeches, Q&A, and breakout sessions that covered many topics including clarification of a hospital board's basic fiduciary duties and core responsibilities, exploration of "best practices" of high-performing boards, understanding of various hospital-physican relationships and complexities of physician credentialing and privileging, approaches to hospital financial planning and capital allocation, and an analysis of the healthcare reform (and cost) being advocated by the various political candidates.

Governance can be a complex topic but at a high level it is mostly common sense. The way I think about it, good governance means being financially efficient but not pushing so hard on the numbers as to cause people to do unnatural things in order to "make" the numbers, focusing on how the leadership of the organization is selected and how they are paid, being transparent with the various stakeholders so they understand the decisions that are made and the rationale behind them, and insuring personal accountability is in place at all levels.

Although governance was the main focus of the conference, all of the speakers had some predictions about where things are headed with American healthcare. It was not a pretty picture. Costs are going to cointinue to escalate to the point where they are a huge part of the economy and exceed the cost of primary and secondary education at the state level. As costs rise they will be pushed toward hospitals and pressures will continue between payers (insurers) and providers. Primary care physicians, already in short supply in many areas, will be in even shorter supply as new graduates seek out speciality areas with more economic potential. As the cost of running a medical practice continues to increase many doctors will choose to become employees of hospitals. Hospitals will consolidate and as they gain economy of scale they will implement electronic medical records and become highly efficient providers of high quality care. Although America does not today offer the highest quality health care in the world, there is significant progress being made toward curing cancer and heart disease. The glass is half full, not half empty.

There was not a lot of spare time but enough to get in a look around the Greenbrier's spectacular 3,500+ acres, have a good hike up Kates Mountain Road, and also locate a benchmark near the old White Sulphur Springs train station (a few pictures in the photo gallery). That brings cumulative benchmarks found to eighty-eight. Some of my colleagues took a tour of the Bunker but we had been there before.

Other patrickWeb stories about healthcare
Pictures from 2002 trip to the Bunker

Conferences, Healthcare, Hiking, Travels October 26, 2007 04:19 PM

Saturday, July 7, 2007

The Riches of Kipp Island

When I wrote about the global sport of geocaching in July 2005, there were 181,216 active geocaches in 215 countries and in the prior 7 days there had been been 138,512 new log entries written at geocaching.com by 24,318 participants. As of today there are 423,816 active caches worldwide. In the last 7 days, there have been 325,387 new logs written by 45,911 account holders. In other words geocaching has doubled in the past two years. I suspect it will double again in the next two years. Although my own enthusiasm has not diminished, I haven't had nearly as many "finds" due to the extensive travel schedule so far this year. (I did manage to find one in St. Petersburg, Russia).

Today was a perfect day to add geocache #76 to my record, so I set out for Kipp Island in the morning before the Lake got busy. There are too many rocks close to shore to go there by boat unless you want to anchor and swim ashore. Instead I went on the jetski. The island is located in Pike County Pennsylvania and is one of four islands on Lake Wallenpaupack. It is roughly 1,000 feet long and a width less than 100 feet at the widest part. In spite of the small size, the Tupperware cache was well hidden and the GPS signal wavered due to the dense trees and other vegetation. The huge number of bugs did not help either. Five of us searched for more than a half hour last summer and could not find it, so it felt very good to have a fairly quick (and lucky) find. After signing the logbook and entering TNLN (took nothing left nothing) at geocaching.com it was off for a ride. Tomorrow is supposed to be 90 degrees so it will be a good day to stay inside and write about my early experience with the new iPhone.

Other patrickWeb stories about geocaching

Geocaching, Hiking July 7, 2007 05:54 PM

Wednesday, July 12, 2006

Burke Marks

Compass There are currently 736,425 benchmarks in the database at geocaching.com. Overall, 82,517 benchmarks have been found and recorded in 114,528 logs. In the last 7 days, 1,007 benchmarks have been logged by 407 users. Four of them were found by me in Greentown, Pennsylvania near Exit 20 of Interstate 84.

I had tried to find a 1959 benchmark named "Burke" a couple of months ago. The eXplorist 600 indicated that I was within a half-mile of and then I realized I would have to trespass on private property to get to the mark -- something I do not do, at least on purpose. I saw a sign nearby labeled Robert Burke Consulting. Upon visiting his web site and seeing that he works with Linux, I concluded he must be a nice person and likely would not mind me giving him a call. Not only did he not mind, he offered to escort me to the benchmark -- he had noticed it in the past and knew right where it was. I met Bob and his four-year old son at his driveway and off we went in his four-wheel drive truck down a dirt road and off into a field. Turns out that Bob's father owns hundreds of acres of land where the benchmark is located. Five generations of his family have lived in Pennsylvania.

Turns out that there are actually four benchmarks (Burke, Burke 2, Burke Reference Mark 1, and Burke Reference Mark 2) all within a couple of hundred feet of each other. Three were placed in 1959 and one in 1967. The descriptions given are accurate for finding them -- but don't rely on lat/lon because those are not accurate. One of them was off by nearly 200 feet. Ater many a wild goose chase, I have learned that the best way to find benchmarks is to carefully read the datasheet. Here is a typical description for finding a reference mark...

REFERENCE MARK 1, A STANDARD DISK STAMPED BURKE NO 1 1959, IS CEMENTED IN A DRILL HOLE IN TOP OF A 2 X 3 FOOT BOULDER IRREGULAR IN SHAPE AND PROJECTING ABOUT 2 INCHES ABOVE THE SURFACE OF THE GROUND. IT IS 85.9 FEET SOUTHEAST OF AN 8-INCH TRIANGULAR BLAZED MAPLE TREE, 72.8 FEET SOUTH-SOUTHEAST OF A STANDARD METAL WITNESS POST AND MARKER, 37 FEET SOUTH-SOUTHEAST OF THE CENTER OF A TRACK ROAD AND THE MARK IS ABOUT THE SAME ELEVATION AS THE STATION

The disks were all readable, although there is some corrosion. All are in plain view and the main mark (Burke) has a witness post. If you ever noticed a 3-4 foot long orange stick in the ground with some wording on it, that would be a witness post. It says basically, there is a benchmark nearby and don't mess with it! The marks would have been useful to surveyors and civil engineers decades ago, but with the advent of inexpensive and accurate GPS devices, they have become unnecessary. In spite of this, they are fun to find -- 72 for me so far and only three-quarters of a million or so to go! Lastly, remember the Honda ads from years ago -- "You meet the nicest people on a Honda"? Well, this past weekend I discovered the same thing about looking for benchmarks. If you need any systems or Linux consulting in the northeast Pennsylvania area, pay a visit to Robert Burke Consulting.

Other patrickWeb stories about benchmarking

Benchmarking, Hiking July 12, 2006 01:55 PM

Thursday, May 11, 2006

Lehigh

Cactus The traffic on the way to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania today was horrible. Makes you want a helicopter -- too bad they are unaffordable. The Lehigh University Engineering Advisory Board had a nice reception and dinner. Tomorrow we spend the day focusing on university programs to integrate engineering and business curricula. After dinner I did some benchmarking.

The first mark was just down the lawn in front of the university center (the UC as we used to call it). I had seen the flagpole many times back in the 1960's when I was a student there but never knew there was a benchmark in the stone wall around the flagpole. The pole used to be wood and is now steel but the foundation is the same and has been there since 1935 (ten years before I was born).

The second mark was at a train station just north of the river. The benchmark disk was inside the entrance doors to the station which is now a restaurant. It was placed there in 1932.

The oldest mark I have ever found was next. It was at a beautiful church. The mark was the spire at the top of the steeple -- placed there in 1885. The church would have been easy to find in the daytime but late at night in the rain it was more difficult.

I am very fortunate to be spending the night at the Sayre Mansion.

Hiking May 11, 2006 10:47 PM

Tuesday, April 18, 2006

Roman Geocaching

Vatican

I was anxious to get going so I quickly selected three geocaches that were closest to the hotel -- Forum's Revival, Coliseum, and Circus Maximus -- downloaded the latitudes and longitudes into the Magellan eXplorist GPS and hit the street. It would have been much better if I had done some better planning, reviewed the logs of others who had found the caches, and selected caches that had maximum odds of me finding them. As they say, haste makes waste.

No map in hand, I headed down the Via Veneto toward the Forum following the arrow on the GPS. I was so confident there would be plenty of time that I stopped along the way at a small sidewalk cafe called Berzitello's and enjoyed a plate of spaghetti. From there I meandered from street to street following the arrow until I reached the Forum. The IBM Business Leadership Forum focused on "Innovation that Matters". The Roman Forum obvioiusly focused on innovative structures -- especially impressive considering that many of them are nearly two thousand years old. It is a marvel that they were constructed.

After taking a few false entries I finally got to the spot -- or so said the GPS. There were a number of logical hiding places within twenty feet of the waypoint and I searched many of them. After more than a half-hour I gave up and headed for the Coliseum. At least I would find the other two caches. The Coliseum is an enormous place and there were thousands of people touring the ruins. The eXplorist said the cache was just 300 feet away. Sounds simple, but with the huge circumference and multiple levels of the Coliseum, it was not at all clear where the cache might be. If you are an experienced geocacher, you know what I mean. Sometimes you are a few hundred feet away but there is a river with no bridge in between. After an unplanned tour of most of the Coliseum, I found the spot, but not the cache. The latitude/longitude) was near a meadow and a wall just a couple of hundred feet from the main entrance to the Coliseum. After a half hour, I reluctantly gave up. Sound familiar? Well, at least I will find one of the three. Off to walk to the Circus Maximus.

This one should be easy, I told myself. Out in the open, nothing tricky about it. I got to the exact spot and searched high and low. Empty handed again. The good news is that I logged quite a few miles of walking on a sunny day. The weather was perfect. After meandering through the streets of Rome back to the Via Veneto and the hotel, I went straight to geocaching.com and read the logs of people who had found (or attempted to find) the three caches. If only I had done that *before* the search. It was tempting to head out again but the day was late and the miles of walking were enough -- and I had a plan for the morning.

Since I knew exactly where to go I knew I could hire a taxi for an hour, get to all three cache locations, and still get back in time for the opening of the Business Leadership Forum. Forum's Revival was still no piece of cake but I was able to find it in less than ten minutes. I signed the logbook, removed a travel bug, hid the tupperware container back in it's place, and headed back to the taxi. At the Coliseum, I went to the exact same spot as the afternoon before and recognized all the clues from the logs -- but still could not find it -- a big dissappointment. On to Circus Maximus to look for the microcache. Traditional caches are in tupperware containers or ammo cans. Microcaches are much harder to find -- they are usually black 35mm film containers -- easy to hide in a very small place, in this case in a three-foot high wall behind a loose stone. With two out of three finds, I declared victory, headed for the hotel, put on a tie and took a shuttle to the Auditorium Parco della Musica where Sam Palmisano kicked off the day.

As usual, I apologize for being a poor photographer, but I do have quite a few pictures to share here on flickr.

Intro to Roman Rendezvous Stories
Index to Roman Rendezvous stories

Conferences, Hiking, IBM, Travels April 18, 2006 05:56 PM

Monday, February 6, 2006

Geocaching at Demo 2006

Hiker The weather in Phoenix is beautiful. Both before and after the First Round Capital investor luncheon, I was able to head up on the trails near the hotel and find a couple of geocaches. If you have time I would recommend finding In The Rough and Camelback Mountain View Cache. Some of the others close by are very difficult to find. If you are not yet into the sport of geocaching, you may want to visit geocaching.com. There are some pictures of the day in flickr.

Other patrickWeb stories about hiking

Hiking July 10, 2005 11:50 AM

Sunday, April 24, 2005

Geocaching in Kauai and Pennsylvania

Hiker A personal review of the new Opera 8 browser is coming in next few days but I first wanted to finish the second half of the Kauai story. Since we had a very nice geocaching experience on the island and also today in Pennsylvania, this will become a geocaching update. The more I learn about geocaching, the more I like it -- there are some more stories about geocaching in the hiking category.

There are many ways to enjoy the splendor of Kauai. In January 2003, I was there on a side-trip from the Global Internet Project meeting in Honolulu and rented a Road King for an afternoon. Another way to see the scenery is by hiking and geocaching. The hike to the bottom of Wailua Falls was the most challenging I have ever experienced. At one point we had to swing from a rope to get around some rocks. Climbing back up the 300 feet or so to the top would have been extremely difficult if it had not been for ropes that someone left attached at various points along the trail. The next day we had a mostly flat hike along the beach not far from Poipu. The hardest part was enduring the extraordinarily bumpy road to get from Poipu to the parking area. The cache -- named Tiny Bubbles -- was easy to find and not well hidden. We took extra care to make it more challenging for the next visitor.

Two weeks later we found our fifteenth cache -- this one in Pennsylvania at Lake Wallenpaupack. I have been spending "escape" time at this lake for nearly thirty years and never knew there were 250 acres of undeveloped land along the shore near Hawley. The land was set aside by PPL Corporation, the owner of the lake, for public use. The area is called the Shuman Point Natural Area and Beech House Creek Wildlife Refuge. There are black bear known to be there but fortunately we did not see any. The cache we found is called Point Rock Geocache and the hike to get to it was very nice. Just right -- not too long, not too short. We made a false start by driving to the wrong park entrance. After a couple of false starts into the woods we realized we were in the wrong place. GPS always points to the right place but when the path takes you through someone's backyard, it just might be the wrong way to approach where you are going. The cache can be found by taking either of two paths. I recommend taking the right path from the parking lot and following the blue trail. After enjoying the cache, just keep going on blue back to the parking lot. The total hike is about three miles and takes about an hour and a half. We found the cache not well hidden but we left it much more hidden. I am sure the next geocacher will be grateful.

The Point Rock Geocache had a "travel bug" in the container. Travel bugs are very interesting and a lot of fun. The bugs are usually dog tags that are attached to a "hitchhiker" and move from place to place, picking up stories along the way. If you find a travel bug, you go to geocaching.com and add your own story to its journey. Each bug has a unique serial number that allows it to be tracked. The one we found at Point Rock Geocache was #490539 and it has a very interesting history. We did not take it with us this time but if we had we would have gone to the site to "grab" the bug and put it in our own inventory and then take the bug to another cache somewhere. Some bugs have been all over the world!

Other patrickWeb hiking stories
Get your own travel bug

Hiking, Travels April 24, 2005 06:12 PM

Sunday, January 2, 2005

Beach Cache

Beach Finding the John D. MacArthur Beach cache #1 was an enjoyable way to start out the New Year but it proved to be a very difficult find. The encrypted additional hint provided at geocaching.com turned out not to be true. This cache was in a pink square tupperware container, about 6 X 6 inches. The park is on an island which you reach by walking across a nicely constructed bridge that crosses the mud flats. John MacArthur donated the land in the 1970's, and facilities opened in 1989. The park encompasses 174 acres of uplands and another 151 acres of submerged lands. It is a stretch to call it a "hike" -- the round trip to and from the island is about 3/4 of a mile. Finding the geocache took much longer and unfortunately there was no exercise involved.

Other patrickWeb stories about geocaching

Hiking January 2, 2005 10:44 AM

Saturday, August 28, 2004

Little Falls Trail

The Little Falls Trail geocache was #10 for me and without a doubt the best yet. This is one great geocaching expereicne. Well hidden, dry, and protected with beautiful scenery, especially along the East Branch of Wallenpaupack Creek. The trail is just a foot or so from the falls and there are large rocks where you can sit and listen to the water. Some trails were very mushy due to the recent rains. In fact, the bridge over the creek was washed out completely and as a result some fancy footwork was needed to find an alternate path to get back on the trail.

In spite of having the Magellan SporTrak Color and a trail map, we made a wrong turn on the way back. We came to an intersection that was a bit confusing and the trail marker did not agree with the trail map. The GPS always point to the right place, of course, but the trails meander so much, it is not always obvious which way to go -- in some cases until you have hiked a long way. In this case a very long way. It was getting dark in the woods and we were really tired after hiking for miles. We came to a campsite with paved roads. It was just a half mile to where the Harley was parked. Unfortunately, it was a half mile across a lake! A car came by and offered us a ride. We must have looked hopeless. The car ride seemed like ten miles long. Had it not been for this kind soul, it would have been a very late evening. Hope you enjoy the pictures.

patrickWeb hiking log

Hiking August 28, 2004 10:58 AM

Friday, August 27, 2004

Kipp Island

Geocahce #9 was much shorter than any other but it was unique because it was located on an island. It was a short boat ride to get to Kipp Island. The Magellan SporTrak Color indicated we were just a mile from the cache but as we approached the island it became clear that the cache was on the opposite side of the part of the island that was accessible. After finding a place to beach the boat on the other side of the island, it turned out to be a very nice (albeit short) hike to find the cache. Enjoy the pictures.

patrickWeb hiking log

Hiking August 27, 2004 09:44 PM

Wednesday, August 25, 2004

The Long and Winding Road

The day was made for geocaching and Shohola Creek was made for geocaching. The creek is part of the Shohola Falls Wildlllfe Management Area in the Pocono Mountain area of Northeastern Pennsylvania. It encompasses 11,772 acres of forest which is maraged for the benefit of wlldlife and public recreation. The geocache, labeled "The Long and Winding Road", is near route 6 north of Milford, Pennsylvania. The cache is a virtual cache because "critters tore the original cache apart several times", according to the owner. A virtual cache means that there is really nothing at the destination except the longitude and lattitude. This week it was even more virtual than normal because of all the rain. In fact, we got to within 100 feet of the destination and found it to be under water. Afterward we took a ride to see the beautiful Shohola Falls nearby. Hope you enjoy the pictures. This was geocache #8 for me.

patrickWeb hiking log

Hiking August 25, 2004 09:42 AM

Monday, January 19, 2004

The Florida Caches

Hiking It will be back to Internet technology stories very soon, but I wanted to report on a couple of other areas today and tomorrow -- geocaching and motorcycling. It was tough duty during the first week of the year in Florida but someone had to do it. Blue sky and eighty degrees would mean golf or tennis for most but not being adept at either of those, I chose to go geocaching instead. Four of us headed out for the adventure with a Magellan SporTrak Color GPS receiver in hand. Each of the two caches presented unique challenges. The first was called Geo Rock Cache. The first clue that it would be "interesting" was the following on the web site. "Also note the hundreds of crabs moving around on the ground as you walk to the cache site -- no bare feet here !!" That was the first of two cautions. (read more)

Hiking January 19, 2004 11:00 PM

Tuesday, October 14, 2003

Blooming Grove

Hiker Columbus Day was an incredibly beautiful one -- blue sky, warm but not too hot, and a nice breeze. The Blooming Grove Hiking Trail was our destination in pursuit of the Blooming Grove Hiking Trail geocache. The trail was in the Delaware State Forest in Northeast Pennsylvania. The cache was a relatively new one, having just been placed on 9/21/2003. The terrain was mostly flat but very rocky. There were a couple of streams to cross. The cache was well protected in an ammo can and had many things in it including a bungee cord, playing cards, slinky, 12 pc bit set, flash light, 4-pak AA batteries, nail file, disposable camera, Handi-wipes, bug repellents, and the geocache log book. We left a repelling clip and took the nail file. It would have been nice to hike the whole trail system at Blooming Grove but time did not permit. Mainly because we got lost. (read more).

Hiking October 14, 2003 10:47 PM

Tuesday, October 7, 2003

Skyline Wilderness Park

The Magellan SporTrak Color GPS receiver said that the geocache at Skyline Wilderness Park in Napa Valley, California was 2,562 miles from home. The park is a private sector operation and the land is leased from the State. The Park is open to hikers, bicyclists and horseback riders. There are a large number of trails but they are not particularly well marked. The trail map isn't very good either. The California Native Plant Society has an area where they cultivate native plants. The Martha Walker Gardens is known all over the State and is a popular place for school groups to visit. Signs at the trailhead warned of rattlesnakes and mountain lions, but the only signs of wildlife we saw were some wild turkeys, newts on the ground, and plenty of evidence of horseback riders. The cache was easy to find but it was a good workout to get to the higher altitude was it was located. The ziploc bag needs replaced with an ammo can. (photo gallery)

Hiking October 7, 2003 11:08 PM

Sunday, September 14, 2003

View From The 49th Floor

The 6:25 AM train ride to Grand Central Station was uneventful, although I have to admit that it was hard not to think about the possibilities on this September 11. A short walk lead to the security desk at JP Morgan Chase on Park Avenue. Then a bag check (no temperature was taken as in Singapore) and up to the 49th floor for the Executive Breakfast of the New York New Media Association (NYNMA). There were seventy-five or so in attendance. After my fifteen minute presentation on "The Future Of The Internet", I introduced Chris Forbes who is CEO of Knovel Corporation (where I am a director). Chris gave an excellent presentation on how Knovel, as an information service provider, is leveraging the productivity of engineers and applied scientists. We then had a Q&A session -- and the audience was not shy. (read more)

Hiking, Internet Technology, Travels September 14, 2003 04:23 PM

Sunday, August 31, 2003

End Of Summer: Cache Found

Geocaching is definitely habit forming. The first hike to find the Tobyhanna Lake Trail Cache ended in failure as previously described. It would have been easier to just forget about it, but that was not to be. Knowing that others had found the cache made me feel I should be able to find it too. It took a second hike but we found it today. (read more)

Hiking August 31, 2003 07:19 PM

Friday, August 29, 2003

Cache Not Found

Tobyhanna State Park near the cache This sounds like a Windows error (of which there are plenty) but in actuality it is the outcome of my second geocaching expedition. Conditions were nearly perfect -- blue sky, slight breeze, 75 degrees, DEET (N,N-diethyl-m toluamide) sprayed on skin, water bottles full, and latitude/longitude from geocaching.com loaded into Garmin GPS receiver. The Tobyhanna Lake Trail Cache is somewhere along the Tobyhanna Lake Trail near the enormous Tobyhanna Army Depot. The first few miles of the hike were great -- a nice level trail and no bugs. The excitement built as the GPS receiver said the cache was just 180 feet away. Long story short -- it was nowhere that I could find. I know I was close but in spite of a lot of searching in the woods in a radius around the coordinates, I was unable to find the cache. In spite of the frustration of not getting to the goal line, the three hour hike was very enjoyable. It also got me thinking about the broader aspects of geocaching. (read more)

Hiking August 29, 2003 08:15 PM

Friday, August 8, 2003

Geocaching Hike

Eygpt Meadow Lake Today was my first attempt at geocaching and I highly recommend it to anyone who is interested in hiking. The basic idea is that individuals and organizations set up hidden storage places (caches) in various places around the world and place the locations (lattitude and longitude) of the caches on a web site like geocaching.com. An interested adventurer or hiker can then visit the website, some hints about the cache, download the lattitude and longitude into their handheld GPS receiver, and head out on their search for the cache. Once found, the cache may contain a tupperware container with some gifts and a logbook.The visitor makes an entry in the logbook if they get something from the cache, they should replace it with something new. The visitor can also go back to geocaching.com and record their success and upload some pictures. The cache I visited was called Bridge Over Troubled Water. (read more)

Hiking August 8, 2003 09:52 PM

Monday, April 21, 2003

Hiking

From time to time I digress from WiFi and Internet Technology. In recent years I have come to appreciate hiking, even though I have had no training and haven't even read anything about it. Just putting one foot in front of the other seems to work -- and it is a lot of fun and good exercise. There are many beautiful places to hike and in the hiking log is a list of some of them I have been fortunate to experience. The details for most of the entries here are sketchy, but I'll capture better information from now on and keep it in the hiking log.

Hiking April 21, 2003 11:53 AM

Monday, August 26, 2002

Kayak Jane

Today I took a kayaking lesson. So much to learn. Kayak Jane has a rental shop on Route 507 in Paupak, Pennsylvania on Lake Wallenpaupack. It looks so effortless and simple. I guess it is after you have mastered it but, like so many things, it requires a lot of practice. Keeping your arms straight and rotating your body as you paddle doesn't seem natural at first. I have a long queue of things I plan to write about e-business and Internet technology but hope nobody minds reading about some of the diversions and hobbies along the way. I also posted some pictures of other people in the photo gallery this morning.

Hiking August 26, 2002 11:09 AM