Geocaching climbers don't need Pokémon to get going

Crowds of people have been taking to the streets with phones in hand to chase after the latest coveted Pokémon character. But while the recent mobile app has taken the world by storm, climbers have for years been searching for hidden boxes in remote places using electronic devices. While Pokémon players search for virtual characters, climbers and extreme sports enthusiasts have long been making their way to caves and cliff edges in search for the hidden geocaches – boxes hidden in remote locations and found using GPS on their smartphones. Once located, users log in details about their activity. In the few weeks since the launch of the Pokémon Go app, parallels have been drawn between the popular application and the geocaching one, since both games require users to step out into the real world in search of specific coordinates. But for fans of app-based treasure, searching for caches, which have names, is regarded as requiring much more skill and could potentially be somewhat dangerous at times. An avid climber who has located a number of the toughest geocaches hidden in Malta told this newspaper that there can be no comparison between the two games. “One is completely virtual,...