Canada and the Netherlands, despite being on opposite ends of the Atlantic Ocean, share a special bond that began during WWII.
A little bit of history to begin....
A Dutch/Canadian Princess
Following German Occupation of the Netherlands, the Dutch royal family took refuge in Canada, arriving first in Halifax and then moving to Ottawa. Princess Margriet was born in exile to Princess Juliana of the Netherlands and Prince Bernhard of Lippe-Biesterfeld. Her mother was heir presumptive to Queen Wilhelmina of the Netherlands. The maternity ward of Ottawa Civic Hospital in which Princess Margriet was born was temporarily declared to be extraterritorial by the Canadian government, thereby allowing her citizenship to be solely influenced by her mother's Dutch citizenship. To commemorate the birth, the Canadian Parliament flew the Dutch flag. This is the only time a foreign flag has flown over the Canadian Parliament Building.
Liberation of the Netherlands
In the final months of the Second World War, Canadian forces were given the important and deadly task of liberating the Netherlands from Nazi occupation. From September 1944 to April 1945, the First Canadian Army fought German forces on the Scheldt estuary — opening the port of Antwerp for Allied use — and then cleared northern and western Netherlands of Germans, allowing food and other relief to reach millions of desperate people. More than 7,600 Canadian soldiers, sailors and airmen died fighting in the Netherlands.
Ottawa Tulip Festival
The Canadian Tulip Festival is the world's largest tulip festival and was established to celebrate the historic Royal gift of tulips from the Dutch to Canadians immediately following the Second World War as a symbol of international friendship. The Festival preserves the memorable role of the Canadian troops in the liberation of the Netherlands and Europe, as well as commemorates the birth of Dutch Princess Margriet in Ottawa during World War II—the only royal personage ever born in Canada. The tulip has been a symbol of friendship between the Netherlands and Canada. The Dutch royal family still annually presents 20,000 tulip bulbs to Canada.
To celebrate and to help continue the special friendship between Canada and the Netherlands, I've teamed up with Dutch geocacher Lingezicht to create a Dutch/Canadian collaboration or team work geocache.
How does it work?
The Canadian geocache consists of two stages:
Stage 1: Contains the final coordinates for its sister geocache in the Netherlands.
Stage 2: Is the final for the Canadian geocache.
In order to obtain the final coordinates for the geocache in Canada, you can team up with a geocacher who is in Europe! Or travel there if you are so inclined to do so. The Dutch geocache (GC9GXJ7) contains 4 waypoints that will allow you to determine the final coordinates here in Canada. The Canadian geocache is somewhat shorter and the final coordinates for the Dutch geocache can be located at the posted coordinates.
If you prefer to not wait for your next trip to the Netherlands to obtain the information yourself, then a European geocacher can provide you with the final Canadian coordinates and in turn, you can provide a European geocacher with the final coordinates of the Dutch geocache.
An easy way to find a friend in Europe to team up with would be to ''Write a Note'' on either the Dutch or Canadian geocache indicating that you are looking for a Dutch/European team mate. We ask that if you chose this route, that you only collaborate with one geocacher and do not provide the final coordinates to anyone else, otherwise that defeats the purpose of the Canadian/Dutch team work (or could ruin a good reason to visit the Netherlands).
The final location of the Canadian geocache is:
N 044° 47.(A+B+D)C0
W 063° 42.AA(A+B)
The geocache is also locked, the 3 digit code to unlock it is:
(A+C) C (D-A)
We take the position that you should only log a cache if you have actually visited it. Logging this cache hence doesn't imply permission to log the Canadian cache (and vice versa). Of course your name in the logbook still means a valid log (by definition), therefore there's nothing we can do about that, but our intention should be clear.
