Chinese GPS Manufacturer BHCnav

BHCNav handheld GPS units

OpenCaching North America is an alternative Geocaching website, so this Geocaching product certainly fits the bill for a blog post. Above you see the four handheld GPS units suitable for Geocaching use manufactured by BHC Navigation Co., Ltd., of Zhongguancun, China (suburban Beijing), which is considered the Chinese Silicon Valley. There are rumors among GPS bloggers that BHC is interested in the North American market, and the popularity of Geocaching is the most likely reason for that. After all, they have an English language web site. Which has surprisingly few translation and grammar errors, although it is authored in HTML, uncommon in this day and age. By all accounts, this English website appeared in the later half of 2013. As of press time, we have not heard back from BHCnav as far as interviewing anyone from the company, or even (probably unrealistic) hopes of getting our hands on one of the units, but decided to do a post about them anyways, as we’re confident very very few Geocachers knew of their existence. Who knows, if we hear back, there may be another post in the future.

BHCnav was legally registered in Beijing in 2004, and the four handheld units seen above, the NAVA series, were launched in October 2010. They claim on the about us page on their website to have over 40% of the Chinese handheld GPS market.

Pictured from right to left are the NAVA 200 (Gold), the NAVA 300 (Light Gray), the NAVA 400 (Green), and the NAVA 600 (Dark Gray). Their model numbers increase from least expensive to most expensive, not unlike the Explorist Series from Magellan, for example. You can see detailed information for each unit by going to http://www.bhcnav.com/navagps.html on their site, and clicking on the name or image of one of the units. You will then find yourself on a web page for each individual unit, with tabs for “Overview”, “Feature”, “Specs”, “In the Box”, “Accessories”, and “Maps & Software”.You can also find the NAVA Handheld GPS brochure in .pdf format, which gives an overview of the four units, and a comparison.

Looking at the specs, these units don’t seem much different than the low to mid priced Garmin or Magellan units! All four have a color display, come loaded with a worldwide base map, and claim an accuracy of 3-7 Metres (1-3 Metres with the SBAS (satellite based augmentation system) of WAAS in North Amercia, EGNOS in Europe, or MSAS in Asia). They also come with a BHCnav software CD, a USB cable, and a neck lanyard. They all support paperless Geocaching (3,000 Waypoints), as well as 60 routes with 6,000 points, and 50 tracks with 25,000 points, the points in the later two being total, not per route or track. Additionally, the higher priced NAVA 400 and NAVA 600 will accept a micro SD card up to 4 GB in size. The most expensive unit, the NAVA 600, is the only one with a 3 axis electronic compass, the others having differential compasses. None of the units have a touch screen.

At this point, we only know that BHCnav has an English language website, and is rumored to be interested in entering the North American market. However, there has also been speculation, that an agreement could be reached with such companies as Lowrance, Magellan, Delorme, Rand McNally, or even Cobra (which once tried the handheld market, but failed) to market the BHCnav units under their name. Or we may never see BHCnav units sold in North America in any shape or form. No matter what happens, you most likely heard about BHCnav here first. 🙂

The HikerJamz Geocaching Talk Show: January 25th, 2014

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Hikerjamz Geocaching Talk Show has a new episode every Saturday at 3:00 pm. Eastern (New York) time here on Blog Talk Radio. We will discuss news, events, different types of caching tips and tricks and from time to time we will have a special guest visit our show. Hikerjamz Geocaching Talk Show is sponsored by CacheFace.com which is a dedicated social network for geocachers to connect and share in their caching passion globally and in real time. All Geocachers are welcome to join for free. To learn more about Geocaching, go to geocaching.com/guide and find the Q&A’s on what geocaching is all about. Thank you in advance for listening to our show. Host: Hikerjamz from Ohio and Co-Host: KandB from Arizona USA. Don’t forget to like us on our show page !

(The GCDoc Video) Daydream GEOCACHING


Published on Jan 24, 2014
The Doc is fed up with wintertime GEOCACHING! Join him as he daydreams of warmer GEOCACHING ADVENTURES!

VIDEO LINKS FOR MOBILE VIEWERS
http://youtu.be/xxAhJ_hSTJQ

OTHER VIDEOS BY THE DOC! —- http://www.youtube.com/thegcdoc

CONNECT WITH THE DOC!
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Sporadically featured OpenCaching Network cache: Der Laputische Gruß

The observant reader might note we’ve had a few Sporadically featured OCNA caches on the blog, but the title of this post references the OpenCaching Network. That is because this strange cache, although it’s posted coordinates are in the USA, is actually listed on sister site www.opencaching.de. We have mentioned in the past that Opencaching.de is by far the world’s second largest Geocaching listing site, and actually has listings in over 40 Countries, mainly placed by German cachers traveling abroad. There are currently 7 caches listed in the United States, including a virtual at Disneyland.

Gulliver and Laputa
19th Century depiction of Gulliver and Laputa

The cache name is in German, of course, and translates to “The Laputian Salute”. Laputa is a floating Island, approximately 4.5 miles in diameter, from the 1726 novel Gulliver’s Travels by Johnathan Swift. (The book is in the public domain, and the link takes you to a free downloads page). The residents of Laputa were gifted in Math, The Sciences and Music. They were a rather strange bunch, but you can read about that yourself, this is a Geocaching Blog, after all! This cache is actually a Locationless Cache, and one with a very strange logging requirement, where you have to figure out what a Laputian Salute is, and render the Salute to the last finder of the cache. You do this by projecting a Waypoint 2 miles and 500 Metres from your home coordinates in the direction of the last finder, going to that location, and rendering the salute, with photo proof, of course. Alternatively, (for privacy reasons, I imagine) you can project the waypoint from the nearest bakery to your home, of all places. Just when you thought this cache and the circumstances behind people finding it couldn’t get any stranger, it does…..

The cache was hidden on December 2, 2005, by OCDE username Laputischer Freiheitskämpfer, which translates to Laputian Freedom Fighters. This cache owner hid only this cache on OpenCaching.de, and found never found any. We can only speculate they were an experienced Geocacher who mainly used Geocaching.com, and posted their cache on OpenCaching.de because Geocaching.com hadn’t allowed locationless caches since early 2003. We mentioned the posted coordinates for the cache, were in the United States. The first cacher has to start somewhere, so the cache owner apparently thought it would be interesting if the first finder rendered the Laputian Salute outside The White House in Washington, D.C.!

The cache sat with no log entries for over 8 months until Batona, a well known user of Alternative Geocaching websites from New Jersey, saw the cache, and apparently rendered the Laputian Salute outside the White House. Google research shows him asking if anyone knew what a Laputian Salute was in a GPSGames.org forum, and being given a link to what it was by another poster to that forum (link is long since gone from the Internet). However, it appears he thought he still had to project a waypoint 2 miles and 500 Metres from home to claim the cache, so he only posted a note, not a find.

Locationless Geocache
DG rendering the salute

Fast forward 6 years to 2012, and the Der Laputische Gruß cache still hadn’t been logged as found. And with good reason, no one knew what a Laputian Salute was. Google was of no help. Batona chose to post his picture of his salute on his personal blog, which was long gone from the internet. The link he was given on the GPSgames.org forum in 2006 was dead, as was the link for “more information on the free republic of Laputa” that you can see on the cache page. By the way, we strongly discourage visiting that link, as the laputa.de domain is expired, and you’ll get pop-up ads in it’s place. Additionally, the cache owner probably hadn’t visited OpenCaching.de since shortly after the cache was listed, and could not be contacted. So along comes OCNA Admin Dudley Grunt, who saw the cache on our OCNA Cache Maps, as caches from other OpenCaching Nodes do show up on our maps. He proceed to “ask around Facebook” (not just amongst Geocachers) if anyone knew what a Laputian salute was. Eventually, he got what he felt was enough of consensus from different people on the matter, and he went out and rendered the salute and claimed FTF on July 27th, 2012. The cache has since been found a total of 4 times.

Certainly not a cache for everyone, as there are a number of cachers out there who don’t like “additional logging requirements” as they’re called. And Locationless caches are ancient history to the overwhelming majority of the Geocaching populace (unless you’re a regular user of fellow alternative Geocaching website Terracaching.com), as all existing ones on Geocaching.com were locked down forever on January 3rd, 2006. But if you’re looking for a unique Geocaching experience, you’ve found it with Der Laputische Gruß! Feel free to sign up for our sister site opencaching.de and give this one a try. Click the British flag at the top of their site for the English version.

The HikerJamz Geocaching Talk Show: January 18th, 2014

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Hikerjamz Geocaching Talk Show has a new episode every Saturday at 3:00 pm. Eastern (New York) time here on Blog Talk Radio. We will discuss news, events, different types of caching tips and tricks and from time to time we will have a special guest visit our show. Hikerjamz Geocaching Talk Show is sponsored by CacheFace.com which is a dedicated social network for geocachers to connect and share in their caching passion globally and in real time. All Geocachers are welcome to join for free. To learn more about Geocaching, go to geocaching.com/guide and find the Q&A’s on what geocaching is all about. Thank you in advance for listening to our show. Host: Hikerjamz from Ohio and Co-Host: KandB from Arizona USA. Don’t forget to like us on our show page !