Geocaching is a recreational sport that my kids and I love to do. It involves finding hidden treasure in the woods based upon the use of GPS coordinates. The main web site that compiles a master list of all these treasures is geocaching.com which is run by Groundspeak.

They’ve just announced that they have submitted their official iPhone app to the App Store and expect it to be available within two weeks. While there are several other geocaching applications for iPhone, none has the functionality that is expected from the “official” Groundspeak App:

The first release will not have the feature to log caches or filter hides and finds, but it will be included as a free upgrade as we add that functionality

Some non-obvious features:

* You can look up travel bugs and find out their goal while out on the trail
* Saved Items allows you to save a cache listing and navigate to it, even when you are out of network range
* The application starts in beginner mode which only shows traditional caches. Advanced shows all types
* To help with speed issues on, say, the Edge network, you can restrict the number of results to 5, 10, 15 or 20

P.S. – If you think you have trouble getting a 3G signal in your house — try getting both a 3G AND GPS signal in the middle of woods located in the middle of nowhere.

Groundspeak via: TUAW

Related posts:

1. Groundspeak Geocaching for iPhone – available now
2. Geopher Lite brings geocaching to iPhone