Tag: Nosh & Natter

News & New Caches 98

First we must apologise for the lack of recent posts so this one maybe a bit longer than normal!

Lets start with the caches that have been published since our last post

GCABP1M watch out for the trolls! by CheesyPasta Traditional D1.5/T1.5
GCABQDY Brambles of Lon las by CheesyPasta Traditional D1.5/T1.5
GCABRND The Wright Box by Brynvj Traditional D1/T1.5
GCAC0DF Bay Books by escapefromwork Multi D3.5/T1
GCAC3VK Bryn Wylfa View by cacheB8S Traditional D1.5/T1.5
GCAC6DN Coastal Cache. The old Lifeboat Station by cacheB8S Traditional D1.5/T2.5
GCACB4E HHH – A Hunt on the Hindlea Headland by cacheB8S Traditional D2/T2
GCAC9PK Portable Magic by escapefromwork Traditional D2/T1

Event Reviews

GCAB60H CITO, A487 South, Quick Pick by 9 Usual Suspects D1/T4

Before………..
After……….

Thank you everyone for attending and for all your hard work in tiding up this lay-by. Again our weather god was on our side, it might have been grey but there was no rain until we had packed up. After the previous days rain we were very surprised on attendance numbers. With many hands making light work we saw the area quickly transformed, 11 bags of rubbish picked from this very small area. In an ideal world there would be no litter as everyone would dispose of their rubbish responsibly.

The hard working team

After a litter pick we always message Gwynedd Council with our results and reporting any concerns we might have, the following is taken from our latest report:

“We think part of the problem here is caused by lack of litter bins. The lay-by is a popular stop off point for visitors travelling to/through our area, a litter infested lay-by is not a good look. Please could the council consider placing a couple of bins in each lay-by.” 

We received the following reply from Norman Hughes:

“Thank you all for your work, clearly a great improvement. Thanks for highlighting this location I have passed on your comments regarding new bins at the location. I have also forwarded your message to our Street Scene Manager. I will update you once I receive an update.
Again many thanks to all volunteers.”

Let’s hope we won’t have to be back here for a long time……..

Nosh & Natter 59

GCAB6AZ 9 Usual Suspects – Nosh & Natter 59 by 9 Usual Suspect D1/T1

What an awful night? Not the weather you expect for the end of July! Again we were amazed at the turnout for an outside event, not just wet but very cold for July. A huge thank you to Cemlyn for coming to our aid and opening up his works canteen, giving us a dry and very comfortable venue for our event.

Wheel of Challenge, Iconic Cacher

What comes next in Wheel of Challenges? – Official Blog

The Wheel of Challenge, Streak Star!, ended on Sunday 6th August. The next challenge, Iconic Cacher, started on Monday 7th August and finishes on Sunday 3rd September. To qualify for the 2 souvenirs, easy and hard, find as many different icons that you can.

Earn the easy souvenir for this challenge by finding and logging these three different cache types:

  • Traditional Cache
  • Adventure Location
  • Event Cache

Earn the hard souvenir for this challenge by finding and logging these eight different cache types:

  • Traditional Cache
  • Adventure Location
  • Event Cache
  • Virtual Cache
  • EarthCache
  • Multi-Cache
  • Mystery Cache
  • Letterbox Hybrid

The next challenge will be announced on August 29th.

News & New Caches 89

Just one new traditional cache and couple of event reminders/updates.

GCA8Y30 Passing by the barrier by MagpieNorthWales Traditional D1/T1

Event Reminders

GCA5EAK 9 Usual Suspects Re-visit Ynys Enlli Event
When: Sunday 28th May 2023
Time: 12pm-4pm
Where: Café Tŷ Pellaf Farm, Ynys Enlli
I have just looked at the weather forecast, it looks perfect, so we are very confident there will be no problems with our ferry crossings. We will put an ‘announcement’ on the event page just to confirm our sailing. Don’t forget cameras, sunscreen and hats! See you Sunday.

GCA8D9R 9 Usual Suspects – Nosh & Natter 57 by 9 Usual Suspects
When: Wednesday 31st May
Where: Anglesey Arms, Harbour Front, Caernarfon LL55 1SG
Time: 7pm to 9pm or when the last person leaves
For this months N&N we are back at the Anglesey Arms, lets hope for a lovely sunset!

Postponed Event

We are postponing our visit to Coed y Brenin as several of the caches are missing and we are not sure when they are to be replaced. As soon as the series is back up and running we will reschedule.

Springwatch 2023 is Local

The BBC’s Springwatch returns to our screens on Monday 29th at 7.30pm and will continue at 8pm from Tuesday 30th May until Thursday 15th June. This year our local wildlife will be featured in two live broadcasts from Gwaith Powdwr Nature Reserve on the 30th and 31st May and Cemlyn Nature Reserve on the 13th June. Plus there will be daily features from wild places around North Wales. If you miss any episodes the series will be available on iPlayer after the live broadcasts.

News & New Caches 87

Just one new cache and a couple of events to report since our last post.

GCA8FE7 Quiet time! by CheesyPasta Traditional D1/T1.5

GCA8D9R 9 Usual Suspects – Nosh & Natter 57 by 9 Usual Suspects
For this months N&N we are back at the Anglesey Arms, lets hope for a lovely sunset!

When: Wednesday 31st May
Where: Anglesey Arms, Harbour Front, Caernarfon LL55 1SG
Time: 7pm to 9pm or when the last person leaves

Magic Maker Souvenir Event

To celebrate custom made geocaches HQ are awarding the Magic Maker Souvenir for anyone that attends or hosts a Magic Maker Event between June 13th to July 3rd 2023. We are please to announce our event has been approved. As part of the event we will be running a competition for favourite custom local geocaches giving everyone a chance to vote for the winner. Please nominate your chosen caches in your ‘will attend’ logs remembering to quote GC code.

GCA8D3G Maker Magic: 9US Get Creative…..

Where: Plas Gwernoer, Nantlle. LL54 6BB
When: 1st July 2023
Time: 2.00pm-6pm (the bar will remain open until the last person leaves!)

North Wales Wildlife Trust

Looking for some inspiration for a wildlife garden? North Wales Wildlife Trust are holding an open day giving everyone the opportunity to explore their wildlife garden in Bangor. Advice from experienced wildlife gardeners will be available all morning. Free, no booking required but please sign in at the office.

When: Monday 15th May
Time: 10:00 – 13:00
Where: Llys Garth, Garth Road, Bangor

News & New Caches 81

One new traditional cache to report since our last post.

GCA6CFV Goedwig by Jacq123_1911 a jonboi Traditional D3/T3

New Event

And for once not hosted by 9 Usual Suspects!
GCA656C Nikoski and the Bee on Tour – North Wales 2023 by Nikoski D1/T1
When: Sunday 30th April
Where: Incredible Edible Garden, Conwy
Time: 11-11.30am
Suffolk cachers Nikoski and Bee of Good Cheer are back holidaying in North Wales and would love to meet up with local and not so local geocachers.

Event Reminder

GCA5YNK 9 Usual Suspects – Nosh & Natter 55 by 9 Usual Suspects D1/T1
When: Wednesday 29th March
Where: Anglesey Arms, Harbour Front, Caernarfon LL55 1SG
Time: 7pm to 9pm or when the last person leaves

Wheel of Challenges Souvenirs

We see no rest from souvenir challenges with this week Geocaching HQ launching its next souvenir challenge, Wheel of Challenges. Starting on Monday 3rd April 2023 this is the same day the current challenge and last labyrinth, The Dragon’s Lair, ends. Wheel of Challenges will run for 6 months, with a different challenge each month. This could be from finding a certain number of geocaches in a month, to testing how long you can keep up a daily streak. Each challenge will begin on the first Monday of the month.
Challenges will begin on the following dates:

  • April 3, 2023
  • May 1, 2023
  • June 5, 2023
  • July 3, 2023
  • August 7, 2023
  • September 4, 2023

Aprils challenge will be announced on 28th March with the details of how to earn the new souvenirs.

Challenges, are they good for Geocaching?
Do they inspire you to find more caches? Are there just too many challenges that they become boring? Or do you just ignore them? We have our views, it would be interesting to hear how others feel.

News & New Caches 69

We have three new caches and the first N&N of 2023 published since our last post.

GCA3BB5 Seibiant Y Cob (The Cob Rest) by Hitch-Hikers Traditional D1.5/T1.5
GCA3Q7F snail mail by amymarie87 Traditional D1.5/T1.5

Premium Member Only
GCA3QTQ #3A – Ramble – Stump by Bess’s Friends Traditional D1.5/T1.5
A new edition to Bess’s Friends Ramble series.

Event
GCA3QRN 9 Usual Suspects – Nosh & Natter 53
When: Wednesday 25th January, 2023
Where: Black Boys Inn, Stryd Pedwar a Chwech, Caernarfon LL55 1RW
Time: 7pm to 9pm or when the last person leaves

We have struggled to find a pub who can guarantee that their kitchens will be open on Wednesday 25th evening, hopefully this is only going to be a short term problem. We regret that dogs are not allowed in Black Boys building but are allowed at the tables out side.

Event Reminder

GCA31ZX 9 Usual Suspects Present Ski Sunday by 9 Usual Suspects Event
When: Sunday 15th January 2023
Where: Plas Gwernoer, Nantlle LL54 6BB (Pete & Ann’s)
Time: 2pm – 4.15pm

Ski Sunday is coming to the Nantlle Valley. We have 2 races planned, downhill and slalom with prizes for the top 3 on the leader boards. Wrap up warm, join us either as a competitor or spectator for a fun filled afternoon. The Cache Bar will be open, snacks, fondue and hot drinks will be available on a self service basis.

A ‘will attend’ log will help us plan the day and especially with catering!

Parking is at the house, please note our gateway is very narrow and the pillars are not forgiving!

News & New Caches 54

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.

Event Reminders

Just a quick reminder of forth coming events, starting with tomorrows CITO.
GC9N9C1 Plas vs Plastic by Squaddie101 CITO D1/T1.5
When: Saturday 12th March 2022
Time: 9.30am – 4pm
Where: Plas Llanfair LL65 3LE
Why not attend the above event and be part of the Million Mile Beach Clean at the Inland Sea on Anglesey and earn 2022 CITO Season 1 Souvenir pictured below.

GC8MAT4 Community Celebration Event – Final Daily Grid by welshgirl11 & gmoseley88 D1/T1.5
When: Friday 18th March 2022
Time: 4pm to 6pm
Where: Dinas Dinlle
Join Lon & Gwyn in celebrating completing their Daily Grid at Dinas Dinlle. We are hoping to have a couple of new caches go live…………..

GC9PMX9 9 Usual Suspects – Nosh & Natter 44 by 9 Usual Suspects Event D1/T1
When: Tuesday 29th March 2022
Time: 7pm to 9pm
Where: Anglesey Arms, Harbour Front, Caernarfon LL55 1SG

News & New Caches

Caernarfon By-Pass

At last we can report the Caernarfon By-Pass is now open seeing an end to the A487 delays and chaos from Llanwnda roundabout to Plas Menai roundabout Caernarfon. The planned opening on Friday was delayed to Saturday because of Storm Eunice. 17 major structures were built as part of the 9.8km scheme and 99% of the excavated materials were recycled and reused on the bypass. The project also includes improved active travel routes for walking and cycling in the area.

New Caches

We have 4 new caches published recently in our area:

GC9NMN1 Rock on by BobPuffin Traditional D2/T1.5
GC9NMMF Roam with a view by BobPuffin Traditional D1/T1.5
GC9NMNN Storm Warning by seanx90 Mystery D1.5/T1.5
GC9N46C A Fine Pair # 1648 ~ Pont Cyfyng by RichieBlod D1.5/T1.5

Event Reminders

We have no events for months and then we have 2 events in the next 7 days!

GC9MVER 9 Usual Suspects – Nosh & Natter 43 by 9 Usual Suspects Event 22.2.2022
GC9N17R 9 Usual Suspects Go Peering Around the Pier by 9 Usual Suspects D1/T1 27.2.2022

Guess the Cache

Answer to Guess the Cache 5 is the famous landmark on the Nantlle Ridge, a great spot for taking a breather and admiring the views:

GC52GYT QUEEN VIC’S PILLAR RESURRECTED (WBMC 13) by signyred Traditional D5/T5

Guess the Cache 6

The only clue is cache GZ is just out of the photo on the left.