Geocoin Review: Grodan Frog

The first personal coin that I traded for was a Grodan Frog from Karin (grodan & fiabus) herself! This little guy is just adorable! I wanted the nickel finish (I seem to gravitate towards nickel and silver) and this is the one that glitters...an added bonus!



I was stunned at how cute this coin was when it arrived and I held it in my hand. It's a very simple design but a wonderful personal coin. I just had to learn more about it from the cacher who created it. First, the geocoin details:

Official Geocoin Name: grodan - Personal Geocoin of grodan & fiabus
Commonly Known As: Grodan Frog or grodancoin or frogcoin
Size: 1.5” diameter, 3 mm thick
Finishes/Minting Numbers: No remint - 100 Copper, 100 Nickel/Glitter, 50 Antique Gold/Translucent
Trackable?: Yes, own icon, own prefix (GF) GF stands for grodan & fiabus
Produced by: Personal Geocoins

And now a short interview with Karin (grodan)...

ELTADA: Is this your first geocoin?

Grodan: Yes, it is

E: Personal coins are a different kind of geocoin that represents a cacher. With the understanding that “grodan” means “frog”, how do you feel this coin represents you as a cacher? (for example, why did you pick a frog to represent you and how did you come up with this image versus a more traditional image?)

G: Our cachername is grodan & fiabus where grodan is the female and fiabus the male, grodan is what we used to call our daughter when I was pregnant with her because we didn´t know if it was a boy or girl we were having. Since then I have been kind of hooked on frogs so it was the natural choice for my cachename and later for my coin.

E: What made you decide to mint your own personal geocoin?

G: I thought it could be good to trade them to get more nice and beautiful coin for my collection.

E: What advice do you have for cachers that are interested in having their own personal geocoin minted?

G: It is good to go through a company if you feel unsure of how to deal with mints and designs and shipping and so on. And remember that if you sell them yourself there are a lot of extra costs to remember, like paypal fees and postage costs.

E: Do you feel it is any more difficult to mint a coin if you are located outside of the US? Why or why not?

G: I don´t feel there has been more difficult because I live in Sweden, no, e-mails are fast all over the world.

E: Was there anything that surprised you about the process of creating your own personal geocoin?

G: No, not really. Because I used the knowledge of Rusty at Personal Geocoins so he did the job. Maybe how well he knew what I wanted the coin to look like, seems like he understood at once when I told about a change.

E: With the vast array of choices for finishes and effects on a coin (metals, glitter/glow/translucent, shaped/round, size/thickness, etc.), how did you decide which you would use for yours?

G: That was hard, but I had some metals and colours in mind, green for a frog, and I knew I wanted one glitter, shaped was easy since I collect animal-shaped coins, size was supposed to be micro but it felt so small when measured so I went with 1.5 instead, for the other two I spoke with Rusty and he came with advice, some taken and some not.

E: Is there anything else you would like to share about the Grodan Frog?

G: Only finish left for sale and trade are the copper. Since our cachename is grodan & fiabus there is also a fiabus coin, (shaped like a sitting cat - because fiabus comes from my husbands cat Fia that is playful (busig)) called fiabus - Personal Geocoin of grodan & fiabus. The plan is also to make personal coins for our kids but that is not in the real close future, maybe sometime next year.

My many thanks to Karin for sharing her story about her personal geocoin.

"Fab"ulous Holiday Cache

Now that it's December, I feel the need to highlight this nifty cache idea. Last year, my first holiday that I have been caching, I found a cache with some friends in the Unionville area placed by a family team called Fababoo (GC178GD). Where it is, is not as important as how it was put together.

Don't get me wrong, I have been known to find a micro or two and I know there are TONS of cachers who enjoy quick caches that boost their numbers. Many like the find more than any other part of geocaching and thus a fast, lamp skirt micro is right up their alley. But I really enjoy the process of finding the cache. Locations that are beautiful or interesting get me hooked right from the beginning. And this can be hard in an urban area.

This cache in particular interested me because it was in a nice conservation area smack dab in the middle of a suburb. It had lovely trails and even though we went out on a REALLY cold day, we had a blast exploring the park. It held a very nice surprise though at the end. Winter caching in Canada can be a bit like cheating as you follow the geo-prints right to GZ, but as we peeked inside the cache, we found these lovely custom ornaments. The cache owner stocks up his cache on a regular basis so that anyone who visits gets to take home a wonderful keepsake. I can't say that I have seen a nicer signature item and you can tell a lot of work went into them.

Fababoo has been stocking the 2006 and 2007 caches regularly and there is rumour that there may be a new one (or perhaps more than one??) placed in honour of 2008. I hope to get out and find the 2008 to add another cache to my find list, another memory to my geocaching adventure and maybe if I'm lucky, another decoration for my tree.

Thanks to Fababoo for a "Fab"ulous series of caches!