Hunting out latest craze

Geocaching is taking the world by storm and there’s plenty of people in the local area trying to put Lurgan and Craigavon on the map... literally.

In the simpliest possible terms geocaching is treasure hunting using a Global Positioning System (GPS).

Using handheld GPS devices, iPhones or portable Sat Nav systems geocachers have to locate weather-resistant containers housing a variety of goodies.

They use co-ordinates which can be downloaded from the internet to get to the general area where the geocache is hidden, then follow clues to pinpoint the specific location.

The first geocache was hidden in Oregon on May 3, 2000 and there are currently over one million of these special boxes hidden throughout the world with nearly 300 in Armagh alone.

There are three geocaches in Lurgan Park - one of which was found in the hollow of a tree by the Lurgan Mail team of Graeme Cousins and Matthew Dawson using a handheld GPS device borrowed from the Prince’s Trust team.

There have been unconfirmed reports that Lurgan Mail editor Clint Aiken was spotted in the park at the weekend waving his iPhone at suspicious looking shrubbery and shouting ‘Ready or not, here I come’. (What I do at the weekend is entirely my affair - ED).