GeoBeagle – Geocaching Android Style
UPDATE: The below article was written in2009. We have since written about a different Android Geocaching app. Read more by clicking here or continue with your reading:
Ok, I know this site is all about Android + Social Media but sometimes as a team we have to bring you a few things that have nothing at all to do with Social Media or even a few things that have nothing to do with Android. We can’t help it. Today we want to do the first of those two. Departing from social media and online marketing lets venture into the subject of geocaching on your android phone.
What is geocaching? In few words, geocaching is a hobby where you go look for small containers of random stuff that are hidden all over in random places. Yep… sounds cool doesn’t it? We think it is. The hobby of geocaching has gained massive followers in the last several years. Mainly supported by www.geocaching.com there are currently 782,783 active hidden caches in the world.
There is a certain thrill that comes from finding one of these hidden containers right down the street from where you live. Knowing that people walk past it everyday and that you found it’s hidden contents is just… COOL. (Do people still use the word “cool” ?)
Well, now that the G1 has come out with a built in GPS antenna the possibilities of geocaching have been extended. You no longer need a Garmin or similar GPS device. Just grab your phone and go to it. There are several apps popping up in the android market for the purpose of geocaching but our favorite is Geobeagle. This FREE application does everything you need to do. You can access an online list of caches near your current location and browse by map or by list. Download the coordinates directly onto your phone from the browser and then go looking. The geobeagle app also works in conjuction with the radar app to help you find the hidden caches quicker than with Google maps alone.
After you find it you will be able to visit the webpage of that cache and log your visit right away. We are super pleased with the geobeagle app and its potential for this great hobby. We love it so much that we decided to get in touch with the developers to see what plans they have for future updates. While then don’t want to spoil all the secrets we did manage to get this much from Steve over at the Geobeagle development team. He did tell us, ” We generally do a release every two weeks with fixes and improvements. In particular, we are moving to a new UI design which should make GeoBeagle easier to use. We also plan to support cache logging from your phone in the near-term.” In addition Steve asked us to remind all of our site subscribers to contact them with any bugs or feature requests! – Thanks Steve!!!
Just to give you a final insight into GeoBeagle and this great hobby Brandon & Jacob (“the team”) went out the other day to give you a demonstration. Here is the video.
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How do I send this and Geobeagle to a friend that just recieved a new phone to geocach?