Today was the eighth anniversary of the publication of the comic strip which introduced the idea of geohashing. It is known as Geohashing Day.

Cambridge is one of the most active graticules in the world, with at least eight people actively hashing in the area, and several more hashing in Norwich, the graticule to the east. It would be excellent to get everyone together, and even hashers from outside of the graticule, in one place for one big Saturday meetup, at the traditional time of 4pm.

Location

In a field 120 metres from a public footpath south of Belchamp St. Paul, Essex, UK. The Red Lion free house is 0.9 km north of the point. Sudbury and Haverhill are the nearest well known places. OS Map

Participants

ChromeCrusaders Both of us plus Amnesia!
Sourcerer.
Tongs/B.

Couldn't make it

Benjw - beer festival commitments.
PaintedJaguar
The rest of the Tongs were moving house.

Plans

The Red Lion 0.9 km north of the hashpoint is open all day and there is food 12pm till 2.00pm and 6pm till 9pm. This is probably the closest accessible road.

ChromeCrusaders Are meeting in the pub before 4:00 to re-unite and then going to the point.
Sourcerer Arrive at 16:00 and retire to the pub.

Expedition

Sourcerer met Tongs at Bury St. Edmunds railway station and gave him a lift to Belchamp Otten. All five of us met at the pub. CC were already there. We left almost immediately on foot and headed south. 99 metres from the hashpoint, still on the public footpath, we split up. Sourcerer produced the Google Pin Cookies, slightly crushed. To minimise crop damage Sourcerer completed the approach using some more of the footpath followed by tractor tracks. Meanwhile the rest of the party tucked in to the biscuits. We all met before well 4pm and reached the hashpoint at 4:06 The rain held off.

Back at the pub there followed some genial chit chat. Neil's ex-students teased Neil. Neil teased his ex-students. Eccentric teachers past, got discussed. The non drivers had beer or Smirnoff-ice. The drivers had lemonade. The pub landlord was most accommodating, allowing us to park while we made the expedition and later allowing us to eat our own biscuits even though it was a food pub. 10/10 for the pub.

So it was an excellent celebration. Perhaps next year more hashers will be free to show up.

Let's do it again next year!

Photos

== Sourcerer ==

Sourcerer's cookies before transportation
Arrived. @52.0366,.6167
Amnesia, Josh, Callum and Neil.
Amnesia, Josh, Callum and Simon.
Google Earth Track

Tongs/B

Crox's awesome cookie cutters
The dough is looking good...
Oh no!
An alien visits in dough form. This appeared by accident!
At this point it looked like this wasn't going to happen. It was accompanied by an explanation that a vehicle had struck a bridge.
Despite the lack of zoom on my phone, you can see Sourcerer doing his thing.
Biscuit consumption in panorama form.
Sourcerer packs up while the Chrome Crusaders mess about.
The whiteboard at Cambridge station seen on the way home sums up geohashing. Sort of.

Original Speculations

For now, please register your interest in the Participants section.

Backup Plans

The location will be known only at 14:30 on the day before. The hashpoint might be in water or otherwise unreachable. Therefore, we should come up with a backup location (or alternative graticule) in case. Suggestions please on the talk page!

Picnic and cake

The weather is likely to be showery and there is a pub close by. Sourcerer still intends to bring Google pin cookies but the full-on picnic might not be such a good idea. --Sourcerer (talk) 14:06, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

Sourcerer has suggested a picnic if the weather is likely to be fine. He will bring home made bread, something to go inside the bread and cookies in the shape of Google push pins (or as close as his baking skill allows).

The Tongs love baking and will bring (at the very least) gingerbread animals.

Let me know if you'd like one of these for the cookies / gingerbread...

Crox has offered to send us a cutter, which I have gratefully accepted, so there will be cookies on the day! Tongs (talk) 15:22, 28 March 2016 (UTC)

I have received the cutters. What is everyone's favourite cookies? I will attempted to make some if there's time. Tongs (talk) 14:57, 20 May 2016 (UTC)

White Chocolate are the best.. CC

Puzzles, toys and games

Does anyone like games? We like Dobble, Tantrix, Fluxx, Go, Chess, Set, and others.
Does anyone like kites?
Does anyone like dressing up? Sourcerer has a Rastamouse costume!

Photography

ChromeCrusaders is going to try to get his drone working for an interesting photo to go on the report page.

Hope it's not near an airport - police award! --Sourcerer (talk) 11:25, 15 May 2016 (UTC)

Its looking un-likely ill have it working in time haha

Achievements


Sat 21 May 2016 in Cambridge, UK: 52.0365641, 0.6168378 geohashing.info google osm bing/os kml crox

2016-05-21 52 0