Cool activity for kids and adults: Letterboxing

Remember my childhood friend Beth, of the bento boxes for her kids' lunches? She's back with more coolness in parenting:

"I like to think I'm relatively creative with my money (aka cheap). And have found a FREE activity for all ages:  letterboxing (www.letterboxing.org)

The kids (2, 5 and 8), my mom (60), nephew (18) and I (34) did it yesterday.  As it happens there is one in our town.  What fun!

So any travelers, or adventurer, that want to do something a little different... check out letterboxing.  The stamps in the books were fun to see.  And following the clues no too hard.  My 5 year old found the box, but we all had fun exploring the surroundings after our find.  Add a picnic lunch or snack, and you can have an all day event.

-Beth

What is letterboxing?  From www.letterboxing.org

Letterboxing is an intriguing mix of treasure hunting, art, navigation, and exploring interesting, scenic, and sometimes remote places. It takes the ancient custom of placing a rock on a cairn upon reaching the summit of a mountain to an artform. It started when a gentleman simply left his calling card in a bottle by a remote pool on the moors of Dartmoor, in England.

Here's the basic idea: Someone hides a waterproof box somewhere (in a beautiful, interesting, or remote location) containing at least a logbook and a carved rubber stamp, and perhaps other goodies. The hider then usually writes directions to the box (called "clues" or "the map"), which can be straightforward, cryptic, or any degree in between. Often the clues involve map coordinates or compass bearings from landmarks, but they don't have to. Selecting a location and writing the clues is one aspect of the art.

Once the clues are written, hunters in possession of the clues attempt to find the box. In addition to the clue and any maps or tools needed to solve it, the hunter should carry at least a pencil, his personal rubber stamp, an inkpad, and his personal logbook. When the hunter successfully deciphers the clue and finds the box, he stamps the logbook in the box with his personal stamp, and stamps his personal logbook with the box's stamp. The box's logbook keeps a record of all its visitors, and the hunters keep a record of all the boxes they have found, in their personal logbooks."

Comments

[Heather]

My 12 and 9 year old nieces just told us about this a couple of weeks ago. It is a lot of fun for almost all ages.

[Oana]

Ooh fun! We play the 'grown-up' version of this: Geocaching with a handheld GPS!

[robin]

We gave my retired dad a handheld GPS for his birthday, and he takes my niece and nephew geocaching regularly. They love the 'treasure hunt' aspect, and it gets them out in the woods. Highly recommended!

[mrsgryphon]

I've been geocaching for the last few years, too (www.geocaching.com) and can't wait to take our daughter out when she gets a little bigger! There are geocaches all over the world, so at home or on vacation, there's always a reason to get outside and be active!

[Pam]

we love geocaching too - we've taken our 8 month out a few times in the backpack, but our caching is certainly not as prolific as it was pre-baby. Hubby hates to go for a walk around the block. But a walk through the woods to find a tupperware container filled with "junk", er, treasure, sign him up!

[Rachel H.]

Letterboxing isn't the same as geocaching! It's similar, but not the same. Please don't take stamps or leave trinkets in letterboxes.

Let me also recommend altlasquest.com as a useful starting place for new-to-letterboxing. Great interface and search options for finding letterboxes near you -- they even have a "kid friendly" designation to find boxes with clues that kids have a good chance of figuring out.

[Kait]

This looks like a lot of fun. I'll have to give it a try!

[Kate]

We've been doing this since before kids! Lots of fun! (deer ticks aside)

[beth]

I looked at the geocaching, but we didn't have access to a GPS device when we started. We may have to invest in one and do that too. I put in my zipcode, there are geocaches here. How cool! The kids like to see the letterbox stamps, fun for them and me. Some of the clues from letterboxing.org come up on atlasquest, I hadn't seen the kid section but will look for it. Good old-fashioned fun, hunting for "treasure!"

[annie]

We stumbled on this last year and have loved it (ages 13, 11, 8). We also loved carving our own stamps out of rubber erasers.

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