Another fun event brought to you by the
Merriam-Webster
leap year noun
/ˈlēp ˌyi(ə)r/
1: a year in the Gregorian calendar, occurring once every four years, containing 366 days with February 29 added as an intercalary day.
Geocacher's Dictionary
leap year noun
1: an additional day for another geocaching adventure and to increase the numbers for the year
2: an additional day to schedule a special geocaching event
3: an additional day to get together with geocaching friends
LEAP YEAR IS FINALLY HERE!
Have you been waiting since 2016 to fill in that pesky little hole in your "My Finds Each Day of the Year" grid?
If so, then this event is for you! Now you can finally qualify for all those Calendar Challenge caches which require finds on all 366 days!
Many people are trying to cover their “caching calendar” with a find on every day of the year. If you haven’t thought about your caching calendar yet, you still might want to think ahead and come share some Geocaching fun with us! (someday the “numbers” and “stats” might be important to you, and you won’t want to be kicking yourself because you have to wait til 2224 for the next Feb 29th to roll around!)
So...why does Leap Year and Leap Day exist, anyway?
Glad you asked!
Leap Day is needed to correct for the difference between the calendar year and the astronomical year.
The calendar has 365 days per year to represent Earth’s movement around the sun every 365 days.
But Earth just ate a Chili-Cheese-A-Plenty and is actually moving a tad slower than that!
It actually takes 365 days, 5 hours, 48 minutes, and 46 seconds for the Earth to revolve around the sun.
The bean-counters (and scientists!) adjusted our calendars to compensate for that extra time, by adding an extra day to the year about every four years (but not every four years!)
If we didn’t correct for the difference between the two calendars, the Northern Hemisphere would eventually end up celebrating New Year’s Eve during the heat of summer and in the Southern Hemisphere, more folks might be surprised with a snowy Christmas!
As a matter of fact, by the year 2736, the entire United States would celebrate the 4th of July in deep winter!
We will be enjoying our bonus day at the NFL Play 60 Fitness and Obstacle Park at the Rail Yard!
At 2:29 pm on 2-29-2020, come join us for an 29 minute long (plus a minute give or take) meet-and-greet with the added bonus of filling that elusive date in your Jasmer Grid!
(While nothing has been *formally* announced from Geocaching HQ, we suspect that there might be a little something special released for this day, too!)
As always, feel free to bring your trackables to swap, share, and discover.