Santas Secret Spots - The 3rd Annual Christmas Quiz
The Alpkit Christmas Quiz is back. In previous years we have asked you to listen to our bad whistling and look for our invisible foamy Alpkid. Well this year things haven't got much better. Each day we are going to set a map based puzzle, ok it doesn't sound so fun.. but we are offering a cool SatMap Active 10 GPS unit for the eventual winner! For those of you who have no idea what these are, well they are the next generation of GPS/Mapping gizmos and you are really, really going to want one.
So what do you have to do? First you need to read or look at the question, then read it again as there might just be some hidden meaning in the question. Then again there might not.
We are not going to make the puzzles easy, well not on purpose anyway and remember if you work it out and post it on a forum then you stand less chance of winning so our advice is to keep schtuum. You will also need to be careful how you work things out, Wiki might say one thing and another website another. In every case the answer we have on our question sheet is the one that counts!
Results
The results have been checked and the winner of the Alpkit SatMap is Stephen Archer. Stephen has been a regular player and even though no one managed to get the correct answer every day, Stephen crucially got the answers correct on the final two days and thus scored the big points.
It could have been so very different, Stephen has told us that he was initially concentrating on Sicily, however a film buff mate put him back on the right track!.
Thanks to everyone who played, we certainly had a lot of fun and would like to know what you thought of it, especially how some of you got some of the more difficult puzzles!
Solutions
Day 8: Flying over Sicily Santa is caught out by a snow storm and veers into a tree. Losing his SatMap he is unable to finish his deliverires and feels like his life is wasted. A passing goat directs him towards a small town bar for guidance. What is the name of this town?
A cheeky one this last question. The key link was the nationality of the goat which of course was Italian. Now.. goat is 'Capra' in Italian which leads us to the 'director' Frank Capra, who was coincidently born in Sicily! One of Capra's most famous films was the Christmas favourite 'Its a Wonderful Life' in which George, played by good guy Jimmy Stewart, feels like a looser and drives in to a tree during a snow storm. Having linked all that together, it is clear the answer just has to be 'Bedford Falls'. Hats off to the 3 people who got that correct.
Day 7: Meanwhile.. back in Scotland, Santa gets into the seasonal spirit with a festive tune and a wee dram of single malt from a nearby distillery.
He had parked his sleigh on the summit of a rock close by, but the sea mist had come in and visibility was poor. Luckily he had set the grid reference of his sleigh into his SatMap. What was the grid reference?
Big points were up for grabs yesterday. As of 18.45 only 1 person had the correct answer and it looked sure they would grab the full 1000 points for the day! However.. awareness of the consequences was high and some late night activity by several contenders has swung it around again so the competition is still wide open. The answer for yesterdays puzzle was Carrol Rock (NC843078). Well done indeed to the 8 who got the correct answer.
Day 6: Rudolph has slipped on some ice in the Arctic circle and has injured his knee. Now Santa's sleigh can no longer travel faster than 60km/h he has decided to warm up by flying south to somewhere in the world where he can travel from London to Paris in under 10mins. He can then travel from Paris to Poland in under 15mins. Where can he possibly be heading?
Yesterdays question really split the leader board so it is still all to play for. The answer was the Pacific Island of Kiritimati - also called Christmas Island.
Day 5: Which crusty bake is served off the Hogs Back?
A bit trickier today, but still quite a few people got it right. The Hogs Back is a part of the North Downs between Farnham and Guildford in Surrey. A short distance from the Hogs Back you will find the small village of.. Christmaspie! (Grid ref: SU929497).
Day 4: Santa isn't the only one who likes to dress up. In 1913 a young British army officer sharing a name with a well known festive celebration dressed up in disguise in an attempt to reach a significant unclimbed peak. For a long period this peak was referred to simply by a number, which number was it?
The young British officer was Captain John Noel, who had the bright idea to dress himself up as a Tibetan in an attempt to get a closer look at Mount Everest, then also known as Peak XV (15).
Day 3: Tired from travelling Santa was about to check in to Inverlochy Castle for a well earned rest. Unfortunately low cloud and strong winds had made navigation difficult and the troup of shivering reindeer touched down on a wind swept barren landscape. Luckily Santa could see from his Satmap that they were at Grid Reference NN 166 712, but with little visability what two grid bearings should he use to get to safety?
The answer is of course 231 for 150m and then 282. Anyone that didn't mention those figures didn't get it right. If you gave us the bearing with the magnetic variance added on then you also got it wrong, as we did ask for the Grid Bearing. If you answer contained 231 and 282 then give yourself a pat on the back. For more info on this vital piece of Mountain navigation
click here.
Day 2: Keeping on the festive theme what is the name of this geographical feature?
It was an easy one.. Christmas Island!
Day 1: As is well known in the Christmas fulfillment industry Santa is now using all kinds of electronic Gizmos in order to get around to everyone. To ensure he uses the most efficient route he has programmed all his waypoints in to his Satmap. What is the grid reference of the summit of Twyn Disgwylfa showing on his Satmap?
A lot of people got caught out yesterday and didn't read the question, no good just typing the first thing you think of and typing it in to Google. There where several bits of information on the screen: Tumulas, 258, Twyn Disgwylfa and Mynydd Dinas, using all these bits of information it was possible to get to the right answer. The most important was just to look at the map of the screen and check it against where you thought it was. We told you those maps would be useful!
So the correct answer was: SS761915
Help and advice
If you have a copy of every Landranger map then you are going to have a big advantage, equally if you are already the lucky owner of a SatMap then it might prove pretty useful. For the rest of us some web favourites will help solve the puzzles.
