credit: geocaching.com

I may be one of the last smart-phone holdouts. But when I finally break down and get one, it won’t be to avoid further ridicule from family and friends, it will be to get some nifty-cool app. Like Geocaching.

Until a few months ago, I thought geocaching could only be done in certain places. But then my brother (aka: Uncle Mike) came over and rounded the kids up for a geocaching adventure—right in our own neighborhood.

For those not in the know, geocaching is a high-tech global treasure hunt that involves placing or looking for a geocache using global positioning system (GPS) equipment. The cache is a hidden container holding kid-pleasing  junk “treasures” like coins, bubbles, Pokemon cards, pens, little toys—you get the idea. Once it’s found, you take a treasure and you leave a treasure. And there’s usually a little log book where you can record the date and time you were there (the app has an electronic version).

Mike’s Geocaching App (just $9.99!) easily located all of the caches near our house—there were a lot of them (who knew?). And the built-in GPS guided the geocachers on foot to their find. (Pick one further away and bike/hike/walk to it for a healthy bonus.) You can also borrow a free GPS Unit for geocaching at some of the Three Rivers Park District parks. (Check this list for participating parks.)

In the meantime—Hey, what’s behind that rock?