AMTG Virtual Southside Gang Challenge 2006 GC

enjoy

Larg coin with lots of heft.  1.75 inches 4 mm thick antique gold. Available in other metal colors. 400 coins minted. The front has slight 3-D work with slight enamel. The artwork is cartoon like and depicts a bow legged cowboy outlaw. It has script that reads "Southside Gange Challenge March 26 2006 33 34.275 84 42.767". The reverse has excellent 3-D work shows the view of a cache container between the bowed legs of a cacher. The background detail is very nice and shows a cow skull, a cactus and a branding iron with the GC "G". It has script that reads "Hid'em the best find them all". This is con number 160.  I have made the reverse be the default picture because I think it shows the work a little better. An excellent personal coin even with the cartoon like artwork.

Info on the coin:  Behind the nick "The Southside Gang" is a group of geocachers from Georgia who have fun caching and from January 2005 hid some caches under this nick, designed events and logged events if all members participated. 

LZ33, a geocacher since November 2001, designed the front of this geocoin together with CoinsAndPins. The other side was made by a friend of LZ33. On March 14, 2006, he presented it in the geocaching forum, but the first of these coins had already been activated at the beginning of March. It was designed for the "Southside Gang Challenge" event that took place on March 26, 2006, for which the "Southside Gang Challenge" multi-cache, which is still active today, was placed. 

500 Geocoins were minted by CoinsAndPins, including a limited edition of 100 coins in Antique Silver, which was sold during the event, and 400 coins in Antique Gold. The silver coins that were still available after the event were bought by ParentsofSAM. 

The 44 x 4 mm coin presents a Wild West cowboy with very long bow legs enclosing the date of the event in a cartoon-like manner on the obverse in light 3D work and with a few colours. At the top are the event name, at the bottom the coordinates 33° 34.275 084° 42.767. 

The reverse in, excellent 3-D work, lets the gaze fall between bent legs on an open ammobox. The background is detailed and shows a cow skull, a cactus and a branding iron with the GC "G", also burned into the cache box. In the circumferential ring, the name of the cacher group is written at the top and "HIDE'M THE BEST - FIND THEM ALL" at the bottom, loosely translated perhaps "We hide the best and find them all". 

LZ33 reported that several hundred (500) coins had to be produced at that time in order to obtain a symbol from Groundspeak. Also, the numbering of geocoins was the norm before tracking codes existed. Then both codes and numbering became the norm for a while. This can also be seen on this geocoin. Now it's usually just the tracking code. 

By the way, the Southside Gang is still active today and won the GGA Challenge (GGA - Georgia Geocachers Association) in 2020, for example. The 560 tracking codes listed on Groundspeak result from a subsequent purchase of codes by LZ33. They were used for trackable tokens with the design of the back of this geocoin, which the new members of the Southside Gang geocaching club have been receiving since mid-August 2020. 

LZ33 also noted what the name Southside Gang even means:
"Southside" refers to the south side of Atlanta, Georgia. Atlanta, the capital of the state of Georgia, had the most cachers at the beginning of geocaching and "gang" is the abbreviation for Geocachers Around North Georgia. The names are mostly geographically associated with Atlanta, so everyone knows where the club is located in the state of Georgia. So there is also the Eastside Gang - east of Atlanta, the Northwest Metro - west of Atlanta and others .

So many of my GCs have been muggled that I only release new ones as virtuals. If you do not approve, please leave it in the cache for a cacher who understands. Thanks.  IL