Hello from a the brewery in Philippolis right next to GC9F3WN so please excuse any incoherence. Congratulations for seeing the year and in particular, welcome back to the game so many cachers who have made a triumphant return. Welcome too to the newbies and, interestingly, the ever increasing number of international friends signing up. 
The end of the year presents an annual opportunity look at the local stats and while the narratives are uplifting, the stats on project-gc offer room for improvement. If one factors in the delays some of us have in logging, the stats could be remarkably similar to last year. Moreover, on the positive side, there's been a recent upkick in hides and we'll certainly be acknowledging those who contributed to that over the next year.
Coupled with that, the number of souvenirs awarded to SA cachers and increased engagement and number of events, we've geared up to make 2024 an amazing caching year. I'd encourage you to set some caching goals. Maybe check out Adventure T and Danie Viljoen's stats towards the bottom and try get your name up there.
May it be an awesome 2024 for you, your friends, your family and your trackables!
 

A Visit from the USA
by simdeb14 and geodoc66
 

We had the pleasure of a great trip to South Africa. We came for a photo safari at Zulu Nyala but of course geocached along the way. We flew into Joburg (doing the Virtual cache GC892A2 as soon as we retrieved our luggage and starting the O. R. Rambo International Airport Adventure Lab). We missed seeing the new bonus Adventure cache or we would have tried to finish and go for the FTF that day. Unfortunately we saw it on the way home after we were through security and did not go back out for it.

The next day we cached around Sandton where we were staying. We tried for a variety and did a fun gadget cache GC4NWZ7 as well as another virtual, a traditional, a multi, an earthcache and a letterbox. Geocaching in South Africa is the same as the states - we did have one DNF which was probably due to us not being used to the CO’s hides as we felt like it was there based on earlier logs.  We hosted an event but due to my miscalculation (I forgot to account for the time difference and originally scheduled it for the same time as our arrival but the reviewer allowed us to shift it from Friday to Saturday) no one came and we were sad to not meet any local cachers.

We flew to Durban and spent a day there. We did the traditional and the Virtual at the airport. The weather was rainy so we were limited in caching but did a Virtual GC8924K there and some stages of an Adventure lab but one stage was not available (it had gone out of business and I was unable to answer the question).

We were picked up and driven to our next destination. We stopped along the way and missed getting a cache because we didn’t have it in our phones which we later realized. We had a great photo safari and were able to get a couple of caches in St Lucia and another when we visited Hluhluwe Game Reserve. We LOVED our time here and hope to return. Thanks for the caches.

 

 

New Reviewers?
Like many of you, we've also heard that Africa may be getting some new reviewers and that is exceptionally exciting! The process of appointing reviewers seems incredibly intensive and GoSA has no official input into the process.

That being said, we'd like to remind the community that with that due process must still be followed and it's likely that there will be some form of probation period. When HQ is ready to make the announcement, the reviewing team for Africa will make the necessary formal announcement and we shall certainly relay it.

In the interim, and seeing as it is the end of another year, we'd like to take this opportunity to thank our existing reviewing team for their dedication, headaches and willingness to assist our community.

 

 

Congratulations West Rand Geocachers

Having a caching event series is awesome but difficult. Congratulations to the West Rand Geocaching Community for reaching the 100 event milestone of the monthly West Rand Quick Get Together. The event series began over 10 years ago in August 2013.

 

They are your local go-to people, so keep their details for future reference
                                            

Eastern Cape	FireflyAfrica (Jonker Fourie)	082 889 2459
Free State	Uncle Chem (Richard Chemaly)	072 431 7131
Gauteng	Leon St (Leon Stoop)	071 330 8435
KwaZulu-Natal	M²C²D (Mark & Ceinwen Oosthuizen)	M 083 324 6176 C 083 324 2167
Limpopo	Boats007 (Willem Botha)	082 463 3700
Mpumalanga	Bouts777 (Gerhard Botha)	082 876 3572
North-West	Team Tip Top (Hansie & Zaneta Van Huyssteen)	H 082 753 8082 Z 083 258 5926
Western & Northern Cape	SKATTIE@1 (Elize Louw)	074 138 6360