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Leap Year 29 February 2016 - East London Event Cache

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Raziel775: Thank you so much to everyone who joined and made the evening fantastic! Can't wait for next leap year!

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Hidden : Monday, 29 February 2016
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Geocache Description:

Leap Year 29 February 2016

 

 photo Leap-Year-2016_zpsug73uzlu.jpg


Venue:

SILVER EAGLE SPUR, VINCENT PARK

29th February 2016

Start time :18 : 30 - 19:00

End time : 20 : 00

Children welcome smiley

All costs for your own account.

Please log your "will attend" and how many will be in your party, so that we can get the right number of tables!

 

 

A Leap Year is a year that has 366 days, instead of the normal 365 days. Leap years usually happen every four years.  The first leap year was established in 46 BC by Julius Ceasar, the dictator of Rome.

A Leap Day, February 29, is added to the calendar in Leap Years. This extra (intercalary) day makes the year 366 days long – and not 365 days, like a common (normal) year. Leap Years occur nearly every 4 years in our modern Gregorian Calendar.

Why do we need these extra days?

The reason is that Earth takes approximately 365.25 days to orbit around the sun every year. It’s that .25 that creates the need for a leap year every four years.

During non-leap years aka common years – like 2015 – the calendar doesn’t take into account that extra quarter of a day actually required by Earth to complete a single orbit around the sun. In essence, the calendar year, which is a human artifact, is faster than the actual solar year, or year as defined by our planet’s motion through space.

Over time and without correction, the calendar year would drift away from the solar year and the drift would add up quickly. For example, without correction the calendar year would be off by about 1 day after 4 years. It’d be off by about 25 days after 100 years. You can see that, if even more time were to pass without the leap year as a calendar correction, eventually July would be a winter month in the Northern Hemisphere.

During leap years, a leap day is added to the calendar to slow down and synchronize the calendar year with the seasons. Leap days were first added to the Julian Calendar in 46 B.C. by Julius Cesar at the advice of Sosigenes, an Alexandrian astronomer.

Reference:

http://earthsky.org/human-world/why-do-we-need-leap-years

Additional Hints (Decrypt)

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Decryption Key

A|B|C|D|E|F|G|H|I|J|K|L|M
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N|O|P|Q|R|S|T|U|V|W|X|Y|Z

(letter above equals below, and vice versa)