GCA5MYF CITO 2023 Season 1, Let’s Make Spaces for Wildlife by 9 Usual Suspects
This was the first 9 Usual Suspect CITO event that did not involve picking up litter. The activities ranged from making bat/bird boxes, insect/beetle buckets, bee-friendly seed bombs, nearly every attendee took something home.
Please let us know if your bat/bird boxes attract any residents and how many bees enjoy the flowers from the seed bombs.
Again we must thank everyone for attending and helping to make another successful 9 Usual Suspects event. A special mention goes to Bess’s Friends (Ray, the Woodwork Teacher and Julie) for all their hard work in manufacturing the bird/bat box, insect house kits and help in organising this event.
This Adventure Lab is based upon the legend of Saint Dwynwen, the Welsh patron saint of lovers and a little history of the beautiful isle.
Event Reminder
GCA5MYF CITO 2023 Season 1, Let’s Make Spaces for Wildlife by 9 Usual Suspects When: Friday 7th April, 2023 (Good Friday) Where: Plas Gwernoer, Nantlle, Caernarfon LL54 6BB Time: 2.00-4.00pm
GIFF Returns in 2023
This year sees the 10 anniversary of Geocaching International Film Festival (GIFF), it began in 2013 as part of the annual Geocaching Block Party held at Geocaching HQ, in Seattle. The finalist films were screened in a park near HQ and it was a huge success. This event was successfully repeated again in 2014, but in 2015 awful wet weather forced the outdoor event to be cancelled. With the finalist films ready to be shown an alternative plan was made and the film festival was released to geocachers across the world to be shown at GIFF events. This was very popular with geocaching community with 449 GIFF events hosted in 46 different countries, one of those events was hosted by 9 Usual Suspects at Witch’s Brew, Pwllheli. Since then GIFF has become an annual event in 9US’s calendar.
2016: 123 film submissions | 16 finalists | 526 Events | 44 countries 2017: 47 submissions | 17 finalists | 601 Events | 55 countries 2018: 83 submissions | 16 finalists | 656 Events | 58 countries 2019: 54 submissions | 16 finalists | 688 Events | 56 countries 2020: Cancelled due to 20th anniversary celebrations 2021: 61 submissions | 17 finalists | 425 Events | 40 countries
There was no film festival in 2022 due to HQ focusing on the 20th anniversary celebrations that had to be deferred from 2020 due to Covid 19.
To mark this special anniversary year gold has been chosen for the colour of GIFF 2023. The GIFF 2023 Souvenir will be available to anyone attending an official GIFF Event from Thursday, November 9th to Sunday, November 19th. 9 Usual Suspects will be hosting their event on Sunday 19th, venue yet to be confirmed.
Have you ever fancied making a film? GIFF 2023 may be the time to make your red carpet debut…… The deadline for submitting a film for this years GIFF is August 3rd.
For this event we returned to Caernarfon to one of our regular CITO sites Morfa Park/Parc Dre and the wooded area behind Tesco. This being our 6th CITO here since April 2018. We have increased the area picked but it is always disappointing to find so much rubbish when the park litter bins are emptied weekly. On the positive side there isn’t the fly tipping problem that we first encountered.
The hot spot behind Tesco recycling bins, again nice and tidy
Again the ‘Weather God’ looked after us, holding off the rain for the litter pick, the cake, paned and geochat, even for the visit to the recycling centre but sadly not for the unloading of the car.
Todays hard working Team with the results of their labours
Another trailer filled with all the usual cans, bottles, fast food containers and general litter. The odd finds included a couple of bread trays, part of a lifebuoy/ring stand, a silver sequinned stiletto shoe, a pair of glasses, a couple of old milk bottles and a Japanese soft drink Codd-bottle.
South Caernarvon Creameries Ltd
Phone Chwilog 251 1pt 568ml
According to the guy at the tip the oldest milk bottle, pictured above, is from the 1960’s due to the telephone number for the dairy being Chwilog 251.
Hatakosen Ramune Soda – Blueberry Flavour 200m modern Codd-bottle
The design for the above bottle was patented in 1872 by Hiram Codd a carbonated soft drink manufacturer from Camberwell, London. The original bottles were made from thick glass to withstand internal pressure with a chamber to house a marble and a rubber washer in the neck. The bottles were filled upside down, pressure from the gas in the bottle forces the marble against the washer, sealing in the carbonated drink. The bottle is pinched into a special shape to provide a chamber into which the marble is pushed to open the bottle. This prevents the marble from blocking the neck as the drink is poured.
Ramune (ラムネ) (Japanese pronunciation: ɾamɯne) History
In 1884 at Kobe, Japan, a British pharmacist, Alexander Cameron Sim, started producing a carbonated lemonade drink in Codd-bottles. This soon became very popular with the local Japanese after it was advertised in the Tokyo Mainichi Newspaper as a preventative for cholera. Today the drink remains a popular soft drink, sold worldwide, under the name of Ramune and is still available in Codd-bottles. There have been 57 different flavours which include peach, melon, and bubble gum, some of the more unusual flavours include takoyaki, curry, and wasabi. In Japan the empty bottles are recycled.
What have the council done to the park?
Improvements
We quote Norman Hughes from the council, ‘I am pleased to confirm that Cyngor Gwynedd have completed work at “Parc Dre” hopefully you will notice a great improvement and will lessen some of the workload for all volunteers.’ How could you not notice, I think the best description is they have implemented a scorched earth policy. Gone are all the massive Rhododendrons that surrounded the lake leaving vast areas of stumps and wood chip. It will be interesting to see how the council maintain their ‘improvements’.
At least the resident swans are still here
A big improvement to the park would be the re-opening of the toilets.
A very big Thank You to all who attended, your efforts are, as always, very much appreciated.
We have 3 new Earthcaches published in our area, just in time for International Earthcache Day.
Premium Member Only GC9V8WH Black Rock Sands – Intrusion Cave by The Magna Defender Earthcache D1/T2.5 GC9V8WB Black Rock Sands – Crystal Colour Cave by The Magna Defender Earthcache D2/T2.5 GC9V8WA Black Rock Sands – Faults and Folds by The Magna Defender Earthcache D3.5/T2.5
Adventure Labs
We have 2 new Adventure Labs that explore West Llandudno and an interesting site on the Great Orme.
Llandudno – West Shore created by smart_ginger nonsequential This Adventure Lab takes you along the west shore of Llandudno towards Deganwy with, on a good day, far reaching views along the beautiful North Wales coastline.
Great Orme history – WWII Coastal Artillery School created by smart_ginger nonsequential This Adventure Lab explores the interesting site of the Coastal Artillery School, which opened in 1940 and is now a Scheduled Ancient Monument.
When: Friday 7th October Where: Bragdy Cybi, Unit 4a, Penrhos Business Park, Holyhead. LL65 2FD Time: 7pm-9pm Come and lift a glass or two to celebrate Julie and Ray’s 20 year anniversary since they started their geocaching career.
Paniq Rooms, Porthmadog
When: Saturday 8th October Where: Painiq Rooms, High street, Porthmadog Time: 11am-2pm Ever fancied testing your puzzle skills in an Escape room? Why not join other local geocaches for a fun day with plenty of challenges. For more details contact Julie, Bess’s Friends through her geocaching profile
International Earthcache Day & Event Reminder
By discovering an earthcache over the weekend of 9th-10th October you will earn a souvenir. I’m not sure why Geocaching HQ call it International Earthcache Day when to earn the souvenir a log on an earthcache anytime over the weekend qualifies, surely it should be International Earthcache Weekend! If you do not have premium membership and use the Geocaching® app, limitations based on D/T ratings will be removed for this weekend on all non-premium earthcaches.
This event is to celebrate International Earthcache Day and to enable all attendees to qualify for the above souvenir. We will be meeting at the trig point where there is a Lab cache stage for Highlights of Porthmadog, before discovering the newly published earthcache: GC9V8XD Moel-Y-Gest Summit – Roche Moutonee by The Magna Defender D2/T5 and then heading to: GC89RG2 Moel-y-Gest Stalactites by Rcrosby94 D2.5/T5 We have agreed with the earthcache owners that we only have to send one set of answers to cover all event attendees. Let’s hope the weather is good as the views are stunning in every direction and makes the slog up the hill worth while. Oh There will be cake……..
Norman Hughes, Clean & Tidy Officer, on behalf of Gwynedd Council would like us to pass on their thanks and appreciation to all attendees for the work we do.
Christmas Dinner
I know we are only at the beginning of October and no one wants to think about Christmas, but we really do need to book a venue by the end of this month. Proposed date and venue is Wednesday 30th November back at the Anglesey Arms, Caernarfon. Please could you let us know if this date and venue are OK, once we have some rough numbers I will contact them to book the evening, obtain menus and most importantly the cost. At this stage there is no commitment.
Dinas Dinlle is beautiful whatever the weather, but today, the weather was perfect, blue skies, sunshine and just enough breeze to form some lovely waves.
Elaine hard at work
Base camp was set up in the corner of the first carpark to be close to the amenities. After everyone was issued with equipment and had listened to Petes brief safety briefing we all dispersed and collected litter from a very wide area.
We came here a couple of weeks ago while looking for some where to hold a Season 2 CITO and there was quite a bit of litter around, plenty for a worth while litter pick. Today we found very little litter, either the high winds on Friday had blown the rubbish away or someone has had a bit of a clear up. We still picked several bags, mostly small bits of plastic and the usual drink bottles/cans plus a fish and large polystyrene box.
After the litter pick we all returned to base for refreshments of cold drinks and cake. Eventually, after lots of geochat and a few photographs, everything was loaded into the car and people drifted off home or to the chip/ice cream shop.
Thank you everyone for supporting us by attending and helping make another very successful event also not forgetting Gwynedd Council for suppling the equipment and their on going support of our events.
We have two new traditional caches and an earthcache to report, all Premium Members only.
GC9V8WT Black Rock Sands – Stack & Stump by The Magna Defender Earthcache D1/T1.5 GCA0ADV Pen draw’r byd! by Luby 29 Traditional D2.5/T2.5 GCA0AEJ Dechrau’r Diwedd by Luby 29 Traditional D2/T1.5
Event Reminder
GC9ZVCP CITO 2022 Season 2 by 9 Usual Suspects D1/T2.5 When: Sunday 2nd October, 2022 Where: Dinas Dinlle, Caernarfon LL54 5TW Time: 11am to 1pm
Our task for the day will be to pick up as much litter as possible from the beach and car parking areas. We have given the event a terrain rating of 2.5 due to the steep banks around the hillfort, but there are wheelchair accessible areas along the promenade. By attending this event your efforts will be rewarded CITO Season 2 souvenir.
Signal’s Labyrinth, the Hedge Maze
Signal seems to be evolving into a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle.
On October 3rd, 2022 Signal leaves the Cave Maze and starts a new challenge, to complete the Hedge Maze. Like the other maze challenges there are 2 souvenirs, you must collect 50 points to earn the first souvenir and 500 points to earn the second souvenir.
Each labyrinth in Signal’s Labyrinth challenge has different point values for finding geocaches, Adventures, and bonus items. Mystery Caches are worth more points for this round on account of the puzzle solving skills required to navigate through the elaborate hedge maze. Friendly goats are the bonus item earning an extra 50 points, like previous mazes these are awarded randomly. The maximum number of points you can earn for any cache log is 85 points.
Found an Adventure Lab Cache (Adventure Location)
10
Found a Mystery Cache
35
Found a Multi-Cache
30
Found an EarthCache
30
Attended an Event
20
Found a cache with 10+ Favorite points
20
Found a Signal’s Labyrinth item
50
Found it*
15
*Log a Found it on any other cache type
You have until the 5th December, 2022 to complete this challenge
We have no new caches to report, just some event reminders:
Events Reminders
GC9ZPWC 9 Usual Suspects – Nosh & Natter 50 by 9 Usual Suspects When: Tuesday 27th September Where: Anglesey Arms, Harbour Front, Caernarfon LL55 1SG Time: 7pm to 9pm or when the last person leaves
Please note this N&N is on Tuesday night not Wednesday, also please log a ‘Will Attend’ if you intend to be there so that we have some idea on numbers.
GC9ZN6M Becky & Ralph On Tour by 3BearsUK When: Wednesday 28th September 2022 Where: The Black Bull Inn, Bangor, LL57 1NS Time: 6pm to 8pm or when the last person leaves
Becky and Ralph are on holiday, they are hosting the above event while here and would love to meet local and non local geocachers.
GC9ZVCP CITO 2022 Season 2 by 9 Usual Suspects D1/T2.5 When: Sunday 2nd October, 2022 Where: Dinas Dinlle, Caernarfon LL54 5TW Time: 11am to 1pm
Our task for the day will be to pick up as much litter as possible from the beach and car parking areas. We have given the event a terrain rating of 2.5 due to the steep banks around the hillfort, but there are wheelchair accessible areas along the promenade. By attending this event your efforts will be rewarded with the above souvenir.
TB Raffle 2022
Raffle prizes and new ticket book!
We will be starting our TB raffle shortly, this year we are raffling 5 geocoins and 3 tags, the raffle will run until International Geocaching Day 2023 event. This raffle is our biggest fund raiser with the proceeds going to help fund the website, hiring of venues and any other expenses incurred with running 9US events. As I have purchased a bargain pack of 6 ticket books each containing a 1,000 tickets there is very little chance that we will run out of tickets again!
We would like to Thank Optimist on the run and the WM Mega for their donation of 3 coins.
Lots of new caches to report and a couple of events.
GC9ZYRX Side Tracked. (Part 4 of RS trail) by CaraThom Traditional D2/T2 GC9ZY14 Graveyard of Ruins by Clueless_Goose Multi D2.5/T2
CazzaB80 has been very busy setting a new series of 17 caches, Fairbourne Flier and adding another 2 caches to her Mawddach Meander series.
GC9ZP2K Fairbourne Flier – Don’t cry over spilt milk by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T1.5 GC9ZPW1 Fairbourne Flier – Tea for Two by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T2 GC9ZPTZ Fairbourne Flier – Those is glass houses … by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T1.5 GC9ZPVJ Fairbourne Flier – Where’s Cader? by CazzaB80 Traditional D2/T2.5 GC9ZPVC Fairbourne Flier – Have your cake and eat it by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T2.5 GC9ZPVP Fairbourne Flier – Tough at the Top (almost!) by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T2.5 GC9ZP12 Fairbourne Flier – Welcome to Fairbourne by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T1.5 GC9ZP32 Fairbourne Flier – St Cynons Church by CazzaB80 Traditional D2.5/T2 GC9ZPTP Fairbourne Flier – Don’t count your chickens … by CazzaB80 Traditional D2/T2 GC9ZP2T Fairbourne Flier – No Through Road but Footpaths by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T1.5 GC9ZP1G Fairbourne Flier – Alan by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T1.5 GC9ZPV7 Fairbourne Flier – Too many cooks spoil the broth by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T1.5 GC9ZP1T Fairbourne Flier – Stone Me! by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T1.5 GC9ZP35 Fairbourne Flier – Let Sleeping Cats Lay by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T2.5 GC9ZPVV Fairbourne Flier – Tough as old boots by CazzaB80 Traditional D2/T2.5 GC9ZPTA Fairbourne Flier – All that Glistens is not Gold by CazzaB80 Traditional D2/T3 GC9ZP2G Fairbourne Flier – Swan Song by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T2
GC9ZP0M Mawddach Meander meets Fairbourne Flier I by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T1.5 GC9ZP0V Mawddach Meander meets Fairbourne Flier II by CazzaB80 Traditional D1.5/T1.5
Events
GC9ZPWC 9 Usual Suspects – Nosh & Natter 50 by 9 Usual Suspects When: Tuesday 27th September Where: Anglesey Arms, Harbour Front, Caernarfon LL55 1SG Time: 7pm to 9pm or when the last person leaves
Please log a ‘Will Attend’ and indicate if food is required as we need to give the pub numbers so they can reserve an area for us.
GC9ZVCP CITO 2022 Season 2 by 9 Usual Suspects D1/T2.5 When: Sunday 2nd October, 2022 Where: Dinas Dinlle, Caernarfon LL54 5TW Time: 11am to 1pm
Our task for the day will be to pick up as much litter as possible from the beach and car parking areas. Please arrive promptly to ensure you attend the safety briefing. The event will last for 2 hours finishing at 1pm. Gwynedd Council will be supplying litter pickers, hi-vis vests, bags and gloves. We have given the event a terrain rating of 2.5 due to the steep banks but there are wheelchair accessible areas along the promenade. By attending this event your efforts will be rewarded with the above souvenir.
