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Statistics - bend it anyway you like!


Carbon Hunter

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What about Favourite points to Cache type corrleation?

 

I am going to hazard a guess (hypothesise) that Earthcache type gets more FPs per find in general?

Wherigo	    10.5 FPs/cache
Letterbox    5.8 FPs/cache
EarthCache   4.6 FPs/cache
Virtual	     4.3 FPs/cache
Multi	     3.4 FPs/cache
Mystery	     3.2 FPs/cache
Traditional  1.5 FPs/cache

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What about Favourite points to Cache type corrleation?

 

I am going to hazard a guess (hypothesise) that Earthcache type gets more FPs per find in general?

Wherigo	    10.5 FPs/cache
Letterbox    5.8 FPs/cache
EarthCache   4.6 FPs/cache
Virtual	     4.3 FPs/cache
Multi	     3.4 FPs/cache
Mystery	     3.2 FPs/cache
Traditional  1.5 FPs/cache

 

Interesting - Wherigo is so "enjoyable" - yet there are so few of them - and we tend to not do them that easily as cachers!

Strange anomoly. I guess itis "fear of the unknown"?

 

Great to see a new WhereI go popped up in Kzn this past week.

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Interesting - Wherigo is so "enjoyable" - yet there are so few of them - and we tend to not do them that easily as cachers!

Strange anomoly. I guess itis "fear of the unknown"?

 

Great to see a new WhereI go popped up in Kzn this past week.

 

Very interesting stat! I think Wherigos had plenty of potential but gc.com seems to have abandoned them a long time ago. There's no official Wherigo app and no promotion of that cache type at all. I haven't ever tried to make one but I think it takes considerable work to figure out how to do so :D .

 

I think they probably get so many favourite points cause they are unique cool adventures and not just another quick traditional :lol: .

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Danie, I was wondering if it's possible to generate SA stats for the ongoing gc roadtrip to see how many of us have found the souvenirs? Is it possible to see, for instance, how many unique handle found it logs have been dated between June 19 and today for SA caches with 10 or more fps?

 

I'm curious to see our spread for the souvenirs - currently the global picture shows that a 10+ fps cache has been found by plenty more cachers and it seems like cachers prefer D5/T5 caches to socialising with fellow cachers at an event :blink:. The fps one is 343 868, event 47 271, D5/T5 48 788 & CITO/EC 24 542.

 

I would think it must be tricky but can you do it :D ?

Edited by Delbadore
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What about Favourite points to Cache type corrleation?

 

I am going to hazard a guess (hypothesise) that Earthcache type gets more FPs per find in general?

Wherigo    	10.5 FPs/cache
Letterbox    5.8 FPs/cache
EarthCache   4.6 FPs/cache
Virtual         4.3 FPs/cache
Multi         3.4 FPs/cache
Mystery         3.2 FPs/cache
Traditional  1.5 FPs/cache

 

Interesting - Wherigo is so "enjoyable" - yet there are so few of them - and we tend to not do them that easily as cachers!

Strange anomoly. I guess itis "fear of the unknown"?

 

Great to see a new WhereI go popped up in Kzn this past week.

 

The FP seem to be based on the (reverse) popularity of the cache types.

(Meaning the fewer of the cache type the more the FP count)

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Another interesting set of stats from the provinces:

 

Favouritie Points awarded (per Province) - as of 14 July 2015:

 

  • #1 Western Cape 9859 (31.9% of total for SA)
  • #2 Gauteng 8326 (27.0%)
  • #3 KwaZulu Natal 4907 (15.9%)
  • #4 Eastern Cape 3372 (10.9%)
  • #5 Mpumalanga 1516 (4.9%)
  • #6 Free State 1484 (4.8%)
  • #7 North West 755 (2.5%)
  • #8 Limpopo 331 (1.1%)
  • #9 Northern Cape (324 (1.0%)

This one is interesting .. I would have thought that we in GP are the most number of cachers, and we find the most number of caches.

Meaning we have more FP to allocate.

Does this mean that the GP cachers cache a lot outside of GP?

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The FP seem to be based on the (reverse) popularity of the cache types.

(Meaning the fewer of the cache type the more the FP count)

 

I suspect the uniqueness plays a role. Wherigo's are rare and provide cachers with a very different experience, thus the tendency for cachers to be more likely to assign a FP. The whole experience plays a role, not just the cache location.

 

Been a while since I last perused this thread in detail so had to go back quite a few pages. Danie, your effort in this never ceases to amaze!

Edited by GlobalRat
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Danie

 

when you get a gap - could you look at the Power Trail / Series again - and I can update the spreadsheet - also - please add the new Western Cape SPS series - and the Tonteldoos series

 

Thanks

 

TONTELDOOS SERIES - Tusk O'2 and myself were the co-ordinators of this series a few years back. Unfortunately a number of the caches that formed the series have been archived or just fallen into "disrepair" by the respective CO's. That said, a number have survived and overall the quality of these caches was really good. My gut feel is that these caches are now just normal caches and the original objective of the series has served its time. In order to do all the caches in the series and collect the required information meant a road trip in the region of +6000km! However, any stats that can be generated would be interesting to look at.

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Most finds in Africa:

 

A basic statistic, just to get the juices flowing again!

 

1. iPajero:	          11878	finds
2. The Huskies:	   5239	finds
3. rodnjoan:	           5027	finds
4. Louise_Gerhard:	   4978	finds
5. cownchicken:	   4654	finds
6. Leon St:	           4357	finds
7. Antron:	           4297	finds
8. TechnoNut:	           4181	finds
9. Tricky Vicky & Mickey: 4015	finds
10. Danie Viljoen:	   3977	finds

The following graph shows just how far ahead of the pack iPajero is:

 

Most%20finds%20in%20Africa.jpg

Edited by Danie Viljoen
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Tonteldoos series statistics:

 

The Tonteldoos series is a country-wide series of 20 caches with a Voortrekker/Great Trek theme. (The series actually consists of 19 caches - one cache was replaced.) There is at least one Tonteldoos cache in each of the 9 provinces. There are 9 regular caches, 6 multi-caches and 5 mystery caches. These 20 caches have been placed between 29 March 2008 and 6 April 2009. 5 of the 20 caches have been archived up to now.

 

Total number of finds: 1157

Average finds/cache: 57.8

Most finds: 179 (GC1BTBM Tonteldoos VIII – Vredesboom)

Fewest finds: 2 (GC1CV4E Tonteldoos XIV - Hyslop Creek)

Most DNFs: 10 (GC1CHWN Tonteldoos IV - Louwtjie Leeus)

Most notes: 22 (GC1BTBM Tonteldoos VIII – Vredesboom)

Total number of Favourite Points: 129

Average FPs/cache: 6.4

 

Most FPs:

1. GC1BTBM  Tonteldoos VIII – Vredesboom:	      35 FPs
2. GC1CR5G  Tonteldoos VI - Jacobs Konsentrasie Kamp: 12 FPs
3. GC1F0P8  Tonteldoos V - Die Slag van Bloedrivier:  10 FPs
4. GC1C1ZN  Tonteldoos XIII - Boekenhoutfontein:       9 FPs
  GC1CRH9  Tonteldoos VII  -  Paul Kruger:	       9 FPs

Cachers with the most Tonteldoos series finds:

1. Louise_Gerhard: 19 finds
  Urban Hunters:  19 finds
  iPajero:	   19 finds
  RedGlobe:	   19 finds
5. Antron:	   13 finds
  Danie Viljoen:  13 finds
  Wilduvo:	   13 finds

661 cachers have logged finds on this series.

Average no. of finds/cacher: 1.7

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Tonteldoos series statistics:

 

.........................................

 

Most FPs:

1. GC1BTBM  Tonteldoos VIII – Vredesboom:	      35 FPs
2. GC1CR5G  Tonteldoos VI - Jacobs Konsentrasie Kamp: 12 FPs
3. GC1F0P8  Tonteldoos V - Die Slag van Bloedrivier:  10 FPs
4. GC1C1ZN  Tonteldoos XIII - Boekenhoutfontein:       9 FPs
  GC1CRH9  Tonteldoos VII  -  Paul Kruger:	       9 FPs

Cachers with the most Tonteldoos series finds:

1. Louise_Gerhard: 19 finds
  Urban Hunters:  19 finds
  iPajero:	   19 finds
  RedGlobe:	   19 finds
5. Antron:	   13 finds
  Danie Viljoen:  13 finds
  Wilduvo:	   13 finds

661 cachers have logged finds on this series.

Average no. of finds/cacher: 1.7

 

Thanks for generating these stats Danie.

 

Great to see that that 3 of them close to Rustenburg feature in the FP's with 2 of them mine!!!!! :anitongue: - albeit 1 jointly! :ph34r:

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Most South African finds during the past year:

For the year ending 22 October 2015:

1. bergbokkie:	1454 finds
2. Spesbona:	1439 finds
3. SKATTIE@1:	1296 finds
4. ChrisDen:	1097 finds
5. GorNat:	1052 finds
6. Panters:	1000 finds
7. terunkie:	 985 finds
8. AdieA:	 970 finds
9. Mixs:	 966 finds
10. The Huskies: 931 finds

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Most South African finds during the past year:

For the year ending 22 October 2015:

1. bergbokkie:	1454 finds
2. Spesbona:	1439 finds
3. SKATTIE@1:	1296 finds
4. ChrisDen:	1097 finds
5. GorNat:	1052 finds
6. Panters:	1000 finds
7. terunkie:	 985 finds
8. AdieA:	 970 finds
9. Mixs:	 966 finds
10. The Huskies: 931 finds

 

Must be one of the first times for a long while that iPajero did not feature - helps to have them visiting the USA :laughing:

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A bit of a sad stat - but Madsons will fall out of the top 50 cachers of all time in South Africa in the next week or so :(

 

SA Cacher stats

 

Quite a record so long after his untimely death....

Madsons has another record that will not be broken easily: Highest find rate (South African finds) over his whole caching career:

   Cacher	First cache  Last cache	  Days	Total finds  Avg/day
1. MadSons	2010-08-15   2012-03-21	   585	    2318       4.0
2. iPajero	2006-11-18   2015-10-13	  3252	   11878       3.7
3. Voëlhond	2014-06-16   2015-10-15	   487	    1667       3.4
4. GorNat	2012-10-23   2015-10-21	  1094	    3374       3.1
5. AdieA	2013-10-04   2015-10-21	   748	    2241       3.0
6. Spesbona	2013-05-04   2015-10-25	   905	    2621       2.9
7. Andredj	2014-06-11   2015-10-25	   502	    1403       2.8
8. Sokkies73	2015-04-06   2015-10-16	   194	     528       2.7
9. ChrisDen	2013-01-20   2015-10-23	  1007	    2672       2.7
10. JanMich	2013-01-13   2015-10-11	  1002	    2633       2.6

For iPajero to maintain their find rate for almost 10 years is truly remarkable!

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Madsons has another record that will not be broken easily: Highest find rate (South African finds) over his whole caching career:

 

Cacher First cache Last cache Days Total finds Avg/day

1. MadSons 2010-08-15 2012-03-21 585 2318 4.0

2. iPajero 2006-11-18 2015-10-13 3252 11878 3.7

 

For iPajero to maintain their find rate for almost 10 years is truly remarkable!

 

Hi Danie - I know you only keep African caches, so I checked on iPajero's total finds (including their recent US trip) and they are on 13796 finds - divide that total by 3252 days and their rate is 4.24 caches / day!

 

Cheers and great to see you back here.

 

PT

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Yearly number of finds vs. rank:

 

RSA%20yearly%20finds%20vs%20rank.jpg

This graph means the following:

  • It shows the increase during the last year, the number of new finds, for every rank. No. 1 found 919 South African caches and no. 600 found 40 during the year ending 22 October 2015.
  • If your number of finds for the last year was say 100, then you can see from the graph that you kept up with about no. 180 and found more than all of the rest, (24714 of them!)

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RSA finds over time:

 

RSA%206-monthly%20finds.jpg

This graph shows the total number of finds on South Africa caches, in 6 month periods. I was surprised to see that the growth seems to have stopped - since the middle of 2013 the number of finds appears to have stabilised.

 

I'll look at the number of cachers (as well as new cachers) next, to see if this trend is reflected there as well.

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RSA finds over time:

 

RSA%206-monthly%20finds.jpg

This graph shows the total number of finds on South Africa caches, in 6 month periods. I was surprised to see that the growth seems to have stopped - since the middle of 2013 the number of finds appears to have stabilised.

 

I'll look at the number of cachers (as well as new cachers) next, to see if this trend is reflected there as well.

 

interesting - but seems to be a trend here in KZN where there dont seem to be many new caching names that are staying the distance - but there still seems to be a bit of a dropoff/attrition as normal.

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Number of new cachers in South Africa:

 

RSA%20cumulative%20cachers.jpg

The first graph shows the total number of cachers who have found at least one cache in South Africa from the very beginning.

 

RSA%20new%20cachers.jpg

The second graph shows the number of new cachers in South Africa, in 6-month periods.

Except for maybe the last 6 months, there appears to be a healthy growing number of new cachers.

(During the last year, on average 17 new people found their first cache every day!)

 

Yesterday we saw that the total number of finds has not changed significantly during the last 2 years, yet during the same time the number of cachers has almost doubled.

That leaves the question - why are there not more finds?

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Swartland Power Series statistics:

 

The Swartland Power Series consists of 166 caches: 165 regular caches and one multi-cache. They were placed by Andredj (44), ephyfer (41), Evolutionaries (39), Sokkies73 (41) and Wotsit ter yerJimmy? (1), on a 35km stretch of unpaved road east of the N7, from north of the northern suburbs of Cape Town to just southwest of Malmesbury. These caches were placed between 28 Dec 2014 and 9 Sep 2015.

 

SPS.jpg

All 166 caches are currently findable.

 

Total number of finds: 4374

Average finds/cache: 26.3

Most finds: 52 (GC5JCXE Conflux "SPS")

Fewest finds: 17 (GC61JKQ Thorny: SPS)

Total number of Favourite Points: 155

Average FPs/cache: 0.93

 

Most FPs:

1. GC61HNK  Kinky: SPS     8 FPs
  GC61GR7  Gull "SPS"     8 FPs
3. GC61T3Q  Joshua: SPS    7 FPs
4. GC635ZE  Climax 3: SPS  6 FPs
  GC6330D  Woody: SPS     6 Fps

Cachers with the most SPS finds:

Minion & Myles (M&M): 166
SKATTIE@1:	      166
Suikerbossies:	      166
Team Neil:	      166
The Huskies:	      166
bergbokkie:	      166
sy-chispa:	      166
terunkie:	      166
waco&winnie:	      166

69 cachers have logged finds on this series.

Average no. of finds/cacher: 63.4

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Cacher numbers:

 

I am still trying to answer the question of 30 October: Given the large number of new cachers, why are there not more finds?

Let us first look at the number of cachers in more detail:

RSA%20cacher%20numbers.jpg

The green line shows the total number of cachers who have found at least one South African cache during that year, the blue line is the number of new cachers during the year, and the orange line is the number of active cachers, where active means they have found at least 12 caches during the year.

 

I think I can see the answer now. Does anybody want to hazard a guess?

Edited by Danie Viljoen
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Cacher numbers:

 

I think I can see the answer now. Does anybody want to hazard a guess?

 

Perhaps the active cachers are finding less because the fuel is costing more?

 

And just to digress a little on new cachers - My gut feel from seeing the logs that are written in my neck of the woods - there seem to be many more "one day" and "one week" wonders. They spring to life, and then disappear after finding the dozen or so caches close to home.

 

PT

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Cacher numbers:

 

I think I can see the answer now. Does anybody want to hazard a guess?

 

Perhaps the active cachers are finding less because the fuel is costing more?

 

And just to digress a little on new cachers - My gut feel from seeing the logs that are written in my neck of the woods - there seem to be many more "one day" and "one week" wonders. They spring to life, and then disappear after finding the dozen or so caches close to home.

 

PT

My 2c worth.....

There will always be a relationship between new cachers and "Long term" cachers, one cacher tells 5 others about geocaching, 4 of those finds 1 or two caches and the other becomes a "Long Term" cacher, and so forth. The graph actually confirms this.

Secondly the longer one caches, the more difficult it becomes, especially if you've cached for quite a while, then there are no new caches near your house and you have to drive further. The "Long Term" cachers are not all there for the thrill of quickly finding a cache, they are usually more thrilled by finding a quality cache, so lots of cheap quick caches removes the thrill and some "Long Term" finders stops caching because it just becomes to much of a burden to drive far and find a cheap cache... I do think the petrol price plays a role, but I think the quality of the game that we played deteriorated and therefor the "Long Term" cachers are not satisfied and finds some other game or hobby. In my opinion, a well known cacher in the Pretoria area: that used to be one of the greats: is a good example, he no longer caches but rather go on long walks and hikes.. a different but similar hobby. He finds his thrills elsewhere now...

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Lots of cachers - but they are not finding lots of caches!

Obviously, but which subgroup of cachers finds fewer now than before? All/most of us? And what changed?

 

I think that a lot of the active cachers find themselves in the same predicament that I do. I have found all the caches within a 80km radius of my home and yes, the price of petrol is a HUGE contributing factor for me. The only opportunity that I now get to cache is when I am traveling away from home. Another issue is the safety factor. As I cache alone I am loathe to get into the car for a caching "spree" in Gauteng for example. There is no way that I will tackle caches alone in Gauteng - period. When I do cache when I'm in Pretoria it is with much complaining from the other half about the constant stopping! :ph34r: I now have to wait to cache when I have a fellow cacher along for the ride.

 

I thought that when I moved back to SA on retirement that my figures would rise rapidly. How wrong was I? :blink: My "hides" figure has risen faster since returning! :P

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Where are all the missing finds? (Part 3)

 

Very interesting answers. TechnoNut is closest to the right answer, but I'll hopefully get to the final answer tomorrow!

 

Let us first look at the most active cachers, the top 100:

RSA%20top%20100%20finds.jpg

These are the really active finders, with a median yearly rate of 444 finds.

One can draw a number of conclusions from this graph:

  • Before the middle of 2011 the number of yearly finds of the top 100 was probably limited by availability - as the number of caches grew, so did the total of the top finders.
  • Since the middle of 2011 the yearly total of the top finders was remarkably constant. I am guessing this is close to the maximum rate that will only be exceeded by a very select few who has the time, resources, motivation and energy.
  • Contrary to what some of us feel, lack of available caches close to home is not statistically significant any more. I think it is because most of the very active cachers are willing/able to drive longer distances. (The ever-growing number of caches helps a lot as well - the total for South Africa grew significantly more than even the top finder was able to find.)

My conclusion is that the top 100 finders (who are currently responsible for 33% of all the finds) are not part of the answer; they maintained their find rate.

Edited by Danie Viljoen
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Where are all the missing finds? (Part 4)

 

Yesterday we saw that the top cachers are still doing their thing enthusiastically.

 

Let's now look at the low end:

First a graph showing the total number of cachers active in South Africa (yearly), as well as the numbers who have found 1, 2 and less than 6 caches in a particular year.

RSA%20cacher%20numbers%20low.jpg

 

Next, a graph of the fraction of the cachers who have found a handful of caches:

RSA%201%20-%205%20finds.jpg

 

And lastly a graph showing the fraction of cachers who have found a single cache in a particular year:

RSA%201%20find.jpg

 

The last two graphs clearly show that the number of cachers who have found only a few caches used to be fairly stable around 51% (20% for single finds), but has risen to above 61% since 2013. This corresponds with the graph of the number of finds, which flattened off at the same time. (See my posting of 30 October.)

 

To summarize - the answer to why the increasing number of cachers did not lead to a corresponding increasing number of finds, is that more and more of the new cachers only find a few caches and then drop out. As to why this is so, one can only speculate. My theory is that it has a lot to do with many more people owning smartphones now - it is much easier to get started now. In the old days one needed a dedicated (expensive) GPS, which reduced the pool of potential cachers significantly. One would have been much less likely to casually try out caching in the old days; if you already owned a GPS it probably meant you were a techie (and more likely to enjoy it), and if you decided to buy a GPS, the investment probably helped to motivate you to make it worthwhile!

 

The high drop-out rate does not bother me a lot - I don't see them as "lost" cachers because of boring caches - they were never cachers in the true sense of the word, just curious muggles trying out something new which did not stick.

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The high drop-out rate does not bother me a lot - I don't see them as "lost" cachers because of boring caches - they were never cachers in the true sense of the word, just curious muggles trying out something new which did not stick.

 

Perhaps this is an important note for us cachers and when we invite new cahcers.

 

1) We need to be inclusive at events etc. = I guess it's easy to only speak to the people we know and use language like FTF, muggle, and DNF together without the newbies knowing what's going on.

2) Perhaps we need to get these guys and take a few hours to show them the ropes and drive to a few caches you've done in the past and show them some of the fun ones in the area?

3) We need to follow up with those colleagues, friends & family that said they went caching this weekend - - help them with TB's, how to log a cache etc.

 

Maybe we need some more "Bring a Newbie" or Caching 1010 events again - those were popular a few years back.Perhaps 1 every six months?

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Cachers gained/lost

 

For the first graph, I simply counted the number of South African cachers whose first/last finds happened during a particular year:

RSA%20cachers%20started%20and%20stopped.jpg

 

The next graph is the difference between the numbers gained and lost during a particular year:

RSA%20cachers%20gained.jpg

 

Note: The number that stopped in 2014 is probably higher than it should be - one can not with certainty say that somebody who last cached in December 2014 has really stopped. (This is true even for the 13 cachers whose last finds are currently in 2001.)

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Danie, I was wondering if it's possible to generate SA stats for the ongoing gc roadtrip to see how many of us have found the souvenirs? Is it possible to see, for instance, how many unique handle found it logs have been dated between June 19 and today for SA caches with 10 or more fps?

Road Trip '15 (Part 1)

The first souvenir was for finding a cache with 10 or more FPs, between 19 June 2015 and 2 September 2015.

On 19 June there were 1965 caches in Africa with 10 or more FPs, and 733 in South Africa.

For the whole of Africa, 4245 cachers qualified for the souvenir. (1000 in South Africa)

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Road Trip '15: Souvenir 2

 

The second souvenir was for attending an Event or a Mega Event between 3 July and 2 September 2015.

There were 64 qualifying events in Africa during this period. (38 in South Africa.)

For the whole of Africa, 350 cachers qualified for the souvenir. (224 in South Africa.)

(258 cachers qualified for the first two souvenirs.)

Edited by Danie Viljoen
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Road Trip '15: Souvenir 3

 

The third souvenir was for finding a cache with Terrain rating = 5 or Difficulty rating = 5, between 17 July and 2 September 2015.

There were 437 qualifying caches in Africa. (232 in South Africa.)

In the whole of Africa, 468 cachers qualified for this souvenir. (211 in South Africa.)

(189 cachers qualified for all of the first three souvenirs.)

Edited by Danie Viljoen
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