TAG :: Toronto Area Geocachers

When OpenCaching.com launched, one of the big questions on everyone’s mind was – Will Garmin support non-Garmin devices on the site? Today we have an answer: Yes, yes they will.

Garmin has launched official geocaching clients for the OpenCaching.com site today for iPhone and Android based devices. Since I use an iPhone, the screenshots are from that version. All the usual features one would expect are here in the app.

You can lookup caches (50 at a time), navigate to them via map or compass, log them or …. hide caches. Yes I just said hide caches. While Groundspeak has the idea of hiding a cache with your smartphone ”under consideration” (or do they?) … , Garmin – a GPS company – is enabling people to create or even publish caches from their smartphones while in the field. The app does indicate position error when grabbing the co-ords, but it remains to be seen whether we’ll see a lot of inaccurate placements, better than expected smartphone GPS performance, or simply people using the app to mock up their cache listings to be finished later. There’s nothing stopping a person from submitting this as a “Draft” to OpenCaching then just copying that info over to Geocaching.com as well.

The app also includes a “Guide” so you have the Opencaching guidelines right there in the field. Handy when you’re thinking about a placement, and aren’t sure if that would be allowed.

Multi caches are supported as well, you can create additional waypoints for a cache from the compass screen – click the waypoint symbol with the + on it in the top right, and carry on caching.

You can mark caches as Favorites (not Favourites in Canada ….) and you have a “Logbook” icon where you can see all your log entries to date.

The app is free (vs $9.99 for Groundspeak’s) but that is to be expected when the site is trying to get a foothold in the market. Links to OpenCaching.com downloads are at the end of this article. Try it out, see how you like it. Compare it to Cache Me if you use iPhone

Some screenshots from the App: