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2017 British & Irish National Geocaching Awards


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Following the success of the first British and Irish National Geocaching Awards, presented at the 2016 Geolympix Mega, we're back for the second year! The awards will be presented at the evening do of the Devon Mega on August 5th, but before then, there's several steps to pass through...

 

Initially, we asked the UK/RoI/IoM & CI caching communities to suggest awards categories. Several from last year have returned, but to keep it fresh and interesting, lots of new ones have been introduced. Categories resting this year will return in future. Our thanks for all the suggestions. They've produced the list of awards categories we're now asking for Nominations for, below. Nominations and voting is open to cachers usually living in Britain or Ireland. Links and GC codes are always appreciated, Groundspeak-listed caches only please, and remember, we're looking for the best of British and Irish cachers, caches and caching!

 

Please copy and paste the categories into an email, edit to add your nominations and caching name, and send to geocachingawards@gmail.com. Or if you don't mind nominating publically - one per category only this year, and yes, you can nominate yourself or your caches! - you can post here. NOTE: Nominations close at midnight on Monday April 24th 2017, with a shotlist of finalists being released in late April/early May, to be voted on in May and June.

 

2017 British and Irish National Geocaching Awards' Categories:

 

1- Scotland's Best Cache (as with the others, which was live at the end of 2016)

 

2- Northern Ireland's Best Cache. (The Republic's is GC43, we learned last year)

 

3- England's Best Cache

 

4- Wales' Best Cache

 

5- Best Offshore Island Cache (CI, IoM, IoW, Shetland, Orkney, Hebrides, Scillies, etc!)

 

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6- Special Caching Achievement (Sadex won in 2016 & wouldn't be eligible in 2017. Someone who did something remarkable and inspiring in pursuit of tupperware, as either a Lifetime Achievement award, or for someone who’s Overcome Adversity to cache)

 

7- Since CM won the Best National Series Award in 2016, which is the Best Church Micro Series cache? (published by the end of 2016)

 

8- Best New Cache of 2016 (can be anything but events of any sort as they have their own category)

 

9- Best Multi Cache (replaces 2016's Best Non-Physical Cache)

 

10- UK's Best Mega Event 2008-2016. (22 to pick from! No need to nominate for this category. We'll put them all up for voting)

 

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11- Best non-Mega event of 2016 (includes side events & CITOs)

 

12- Best Event Series (including recurring events, such as local area meets and roving meets, plus Souvenir Day meets, but not Megas. They have their own category)

 

13- Best Wheelchair-Accessible Cache (must be Terrain 1 & have the wheelchair attribute showing please!)

 

14- Best Log of 2016 (includes those enhanced by a photo or pics. Can be a Find, Note, DNF etc, so long as it's publicly visible)

 

15- Best New Cache Series of 2016 - Could be National Series or Ring/Cluster.

 

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16- Best New Coin of 2016.

 

17- Best Geo-Traveller (coin, TB, whatever) Mission. (To make it different from last year's category)

 

18- Geocaching Family of the Year (a new category celebrating caching families where everyone gets involved)

 

19- Geocacher/s of the Year. (Who deserves some special credit and recognition? Could be the most dedicated cache owner, keenest cache maintainer, most inspiring or creative cache owner, most helpful event host, most committed -or should be- cacher who went the extra mile and more…)

 

20- Newbie/s of the Year. (Must have found their first cache in 2016, and have been a credit to geocaching)

 

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21- Best Geocaching Blog or Vlog. (Anything by a British or Irish B/Vlogger is eligible)

 

22- Best Promotional Item (non-coin) - (Either Mega-related, or a personal souvenir left in caches)

 

23- Best New Extreme Cache of 2016. (Doesn't have to be T5, but needs to be a physically challenging cache)

 

24- World's Most Desirable Cache? (Global Guest Category!)

 

25- Thank You Award - Hall of Fame (Not voted on) - For cachers no longer with us who made a significant contribution to the game. 2016's inductee was Billy Twigger.

 

The more nominations we get, the more representative and relevant these community awards will be, by better representing the opinions of British and Irish cachers. Thank you!

Edited by Simply Paul
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Posted on the Geocaching Awards Facebook group at 4am yesterday morning:

 

For the last two weeks I've tried everything I can think of to access the GeocachingAwards@gmail.com account -which had been working quite happily as recently as early March.

 

Having spent around 40 hours struggling to get in, it's time I admit defeat. I'm not sure why my password isn't working & the security is set up in such a way as I can't get a new one, recover the old one, use a validated backup email account or otherwise get in. Again, I don't know why my linked account is being rejected & the only advice Gmail give is to start a fresh account. Not very helpful.

 

So, I'm only left with one option. **Please forward your nomination emails to paulalexsmith@gmail.com**, which is working fine. I'm very sorry to have to ask you to do this but at 4am, with less than three months until the awards will be presented, I'm out of time, ideas & alternatives.

 

I'll continue to try to access geocachingawards@gmail.com but consider it a dead email address for now. If I do get in, I'll consolidate the emails so there's no duplication.

 

Apologies again for the inconvenience. The only other option was to scrap the awards for this year & that would be very unfair on the NGAs team who've already put a lot of work into them.

 

Fingers crossed & over to you! Again :(

 

Computers eh? Tsk.

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Eurovision? Pft!

General Election? You get a government no matter who you vote for.

No, the real hot poll is the 2017 British & Irish National Geocaching Awards!

 

http://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/ngas

 

24 categories to research via links & vote on (it's fine to skip categories), with the winners being announced & awards presented at the Devon Mega's evening do on Saturday August 5th 2017. http://coord.info/gc6jzny

 

Last year we got over 1,400 responses & 15,000 individual votes across all award categories. Can the British & Irish Caching Community (it's only open to cachers usually resident in the UK, RoI, CIs or IoM) beat that this year to make the 2017 NGAs even more representative & relevant? You've already topped 500 responses!

 

Voting closes in mid-July. Make yours count ☑

 

(One vote per person. Due to detected & discounted attempts at cheating last year -tut tut- additional filtering has been applied this year. Please don't waste your time.)

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I voted, but I'd like to make a suggestion in light of Groundspeak archiving Ye Ol' Survey Monuments with zero warning a short time ago : could there be some kind of recognition for Outforthehunt ? He has run that cache for over 15 years, has been unfailingly polite and swift in his responses to e-mails , and made a lot of cacher's walks so much the richer.

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I couldn't agree more with the previous post, Outforthehunt has done a fantastic job, and a real service to the geocaching community by keeping the YOSM Going for fifteen years visiting over 700 locations. (S)he deserves recognition for all that effort.

 

A real shame, and loss, for the archiving and locking of the great virtual geocache.

 

Paul, please acknowledge that contribution

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Thanks for the suggestion & I couldn't agree more. We're committed to the categories & shortlists we have this year (which refer to '2016 stuff') but I imagine OFTH will find themselves heavily nominated for Special Achievement and/or Cacher of the Year for the 2018 awards - assuming this year's continue to go well. Over 600 cachers have placed over 6,200 votes thus far, so it's ticking along happily at the moment :)

 

Thanks again for your feedback & stay tuned!

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