As winter was winding down, Craig resident Roy Karo read an article on a sport gaining popularity around the globe.

Geocaching.

"My wife and I started doing this just to walk the dogs," Karo said. "We discovered this thing is huge. There's a half-million caches in the world."

The sport is a combination of geography, or hiking to a location using a Global Positioning System, and caching, or hiding objects in a remote location.

The sport was developed earlier in the decade as GPS devices became more readily available. Participants soon began to hide small stashes of objects for others to find using coordinates posted on a geocaching Web site.

Now a worldwide adventure sport, geocaching takes place in 201 countries. The area surrounding Craig is home to 62 listed caches.

"We own three caches," said Schyler Schmidt, a 20-year-old geocacher. "All you need is the most basic GPS unit. Mine was about $80."

The sport involves visiting the Web site and downloading coordinates into your GPS unit of the zip code you wish to explore. Listings tell the size of the cache, the difficulty in reaching it, and terrain that must be crossed to achieve the goal.

Caches consist of a waterproof container holding a number of small items or trinkets.

Many contain "stash notes," explaining what they are and how to join the geocaching people around the world, now numbering about 10 million strong.

After finding the cache, visitors sign a log sheet and they are allowed to remove an article if they replace it with another item.

Upon returning from the cache, visitors are encouraged to log on to the Web site and report what was taken and left in its place.

Certain items are considered "illegal" in geocaching. Matches, bullets, religious and political items should not be left in a cache, and the same is true for adult-rated items or food, Schmidt said.

"It's an open thing," he said. "Stickers and business cards are all right. Cache sizes range from ammo cans to micro-cache containers the size of a gumball."

Many caches are buried or hidden in stumps, out of eyesight from an otherwise unsuspecting public.

Most stashes require walking some distance, and the honor system keeps items secure in their caches.

"If something gets lost, it's usually from someone who doesn't know about geocaching," said Seth Inness, another Craig geocaching enthusiast.

A "muggle" is the name given to non-geocachers, or people who ruin caches by not knowing what they have come across when they find a stash.

"Travel bugs" are items that have been stashed around the country and recorded into the Web site.

"A bug I found here in town is now in Germany," Schmidt said. "How they get there, I don't know."

Geocachers often hide containers at a town's welcome sign or at a "point of interest" along the highway.

The Sandrock cliffs have a cache, and so does Loudy-Simpson Park. Juniper Springs is a cache location, as is Nine Mile Gap near Meeker.

"They send you to places you normally wouldn't go," Schmidt said.

"And you meet people you wouldn't normally meet," Karo added.

With more than 30 years separating the ages of the two geocachers, the point is well made.