E.M.U. 3: Trace Elements Anglesea, Victoria, Australia
By Mr Emu on 13-Feb-09. Waypoint GC1K2YR

I was originally planning to "Temporarily Disable" the caches in this series while I reconfigured each of the first four puzzles (E.M.U.s 0, 1, 2 & 3 were confirmed as within the boundaries of the Great Otway National Park) and moved the caches to acceptable nearby locations. As it turns out I've spent (wasted!) the last week of my holidays trying to do just that, but am not at all satisfied with the results. In many cases the point of the cache was a unique viewpoint that I wanted to share - not something that is easily substituted. The puzzle workarounds were starting to look a bit ridiculous, and although E.M.U.s 4, 5 & 6 were in the Anglesea Heath and could have stayed, the series is pretty-much "broken". I don't even want to talk about the cursed E.M.U. 7 !

I am very sorry to disappoint the cachers who had recently convinced me to keep this well-appreciated series alive. I tried, but after the last week's effort I've decided that it's time to retire this specific series. Don't worry, the unique containers will be cleaned and freshened-up. You never know when the "caching muse" will strike!

Thanks to all of the cachers who attempted the puzzles and made the trek to the caches. I really appreciated all of the generous comments in your logs.

*** If there are any cachers who found at least three (3) caches in this series and have not yet claimed their "pathtag bonus", please get in contact with me as soon as possible with your preferred mailing address. (Now that I've got the logbooks in hand, don't worry if you can't find the "verification codes" - I can verify claims.) ***


*One final comment: in the process of collecting all of the containers today I was once again disappointed to see all the signs from our fellow citizens who don't adhere to Parks Victoria rules e.g. multiple well-worn (and illegal) mountain bike single-track created in National Park, people walking German Shepherd dogs off-leash in bushland in National Park (where on-leash is acceptable), rubbish strewn through carparks and bushland etc. My faith-in-humanity meter is lying idle on the "0" mark at the moment...

At least I got some good exercise. Those caches weigh almost 7kg, and I think I covered quite a few km of bush tracks.

07 January 2011 15:07:00

Today this was my second. Once again 12 months in the making and the missing link came from a note from º.

Boom I was happy to come thru with this one.

At the parking spot for GZ I dont think the funghi was going to be spread too much in todays weather but cleaned the shoes (coming in/out) and toom off to GZ.

Another pleasant walk that soon had me spotting that familiar looking eye.

Stopped to take in the area signed the log and was soon on my way.

Another in this great series that others will certainly miss.

TFTC

Cache number 143 for us, found after a nice walk in from the Pt Addis road carpark. This was the first of 4 for us on this series today.

As with a lot of this series, I managed to obtain the raw information pretty easily, but the final adjustments proved tricky and with time fading before the series is archived, I had to phone..well..email a friend. This was the second find for us in the series overall, but the first in what turned out to be the main container hide for the group. Most impressive cache Mr Emu and it will be sad to see them gone. It must have been an effort to get them in and it will be an effort to get them out !

As mentioned, the cache was damp, but I guess that doesn't matter now . We grabbed a plastic snake to ward off the real ones we expected to see during our travels today and a bottle opener for the refreshing ale I was sure I would have earned by the time I got home.

Thanks so much for this series and even though I wasn't able to solve this completely on my own, I had heaps of fun trying !

02/01/2011 12:51 Found: #165 #5/23 Huge (for me) cache day with lochb and PrincessDiala. I had to go back to my Form4 physics for this and luckily it was fairly straightforward. A little bit of thinking later and I had the correct Eastern co-ords as well. We were beaten to the car park by a girl that had jogged past us back at EMU2, BEFORE we got to our cars. I assume she is a triathlete in training. Never seen a shoe cleaning machine before but a quick scrub and we were off. An easy find at GZ by PD (I think) I forgot it was downhill as we walked, until I had to go back up afterwards. Luckily it wasn't too steep this time. Thanks Mr. EMU for the cache and physics lesson.

Found today in the company of two others from the Vic puzzle solvers group - PrincessDiala and Landau351, before this series is being archived.

This puzzle didn't take much time to solve.

We were considering briefly to walk here from E.M.U. 2, but luckily decided otherwise. Parked the car, and ran into the same family on bikes again.

A very nice walk and we found the cache quickly. TFTC and the puzzle, Mr Emu!

Oooh, that is a new structure at the carpark..
A cinnimon fungus cleaning station.
Well that now makes sense to archive...
Sad to it it go Mr Emu..

We made a special effort to solve and then find this series which has intrigued and challenged us for so long. This took probably the most time to solve out of the whole series, thanks to that little twist . The walk in was terrific on such a nice day, and the somewhat familiar E.M.U. cache was immediately spotted. Haven't seen one of those for a while (since June last year with E.M.U. 1). Pity it all has to go . TFTC Mr Emu.

Great cache, good puzzle and a great walk to GZ. I wish I had the chance to do the rest of the series.

Thanks.

Found today on our second day "in the field " on this series....I am getting sick of saying this, but.... Great puzzle, great walk, these EMU containers are sensational, Parks Victoria need a rocket up the ...... I could not even find a track to GZ. THATS HOW MUCH DAMAGE CACHING DOES. Thank you Mr Emu.

I had been planning a trip down here for ages so was sad about the GOR series going , but pleased that Mr Emu had left these ones open a little longer. Inevitably I went the long way around but that is caching!

For some reason the cache was damp but that won't be an issue for long.

A quick note for anybody who may be interested in attempting the E.M.U. series. I have altered my recent archiving plans (at request) so that all eight of these caches (#'s 0-7) will remain active up to - and including - Saturday 08 January 2011. After that date, I have no option but to archive the caches permanently.

* I am quite happy to provide guidance/hints for those that need help, but you will still need to do some work (and walking!) in the end.

Heard that these are going to go off line and having solved the series a couple of months back did not want to miss out on the find. Excellent Series and am sad to see Mr Emu pulling the pin on these ones. Thanks for all your hard work Mr Emu. Great job and these will be missed.

As of December 2009, Parks Victoria do not permit geocaching in the Otway National Park.

Although this puzzle cache has been enjoyed by geocachers for almost 2 years, I have independently considered the environmental impact of it's placement in light of the "Leave No Trace" ethic, and decided that it's due for retirement.

Collection and Archiving of this cache is planned within the next month.

There is something very satisfying in finding and logging caches in this series.
Suscoe arrived here today and found the cache where it should be.
Contents a little damp, dried as best as I could. at least the log book is dry.
left Egyptian, took archer.
A beautiful location.
Only one left to go now in this series
Off home to figure out some Geometry
Thanks to Mr Emu for this terrific challenge.

Thank you Mr Emu for a great day out. The boys found this amazing cache without any probs ,
Thank you again for creating such an amazing series.we can't wait to find some more..
TNLN SL
TFTC

2010-07-03 10:55 After completing E.M.U. 1 and 2 we parked at the suggested parking for this one. We enjoyed the walk into GZ and enjoyed the local wild and plant life. Very interesting trees. Thanks again Mr E.M.U.

With Alsume, EuDes and Joffa1970, we had a good look at the ADZ since our path seemed to have been somewhat obliterated, but a passing mountain biker encouraged us on. We had to wait while PacketStorm4 caught up with us as he was showing young Harry some of the arcane techniques of geocaching . The cache was well found at 12:25pm by all and sundry. TNLN Thanks again Mr Emu for another challenge well met.

Found with EuDes and Asume.
Thank-you for the late nights and finally a wonderful day day on the surf-coast and beyonds.
A Fantastic cache series.

This was another one of the series that was within 20 metres or so of our January bushwalk through this sensational area, although we remained blissfully unaware of its existence back then . With our multi-team attack of the series today, it was third on our hit list. The nearby fuel reduction burn hadn't seemed to have deterred mountain bikers or other walkers so we somewhat naughtily perhaps proceeded to GZ where we were soon logging the find at 12:25 . A great puzzle and a wonderful area.

TNLNSL. Thanks Mr Emu.

Having had a big day yesterday solving 5 of these E.M.U. puzzles, we just had to have a crack at finding one of them after our AWG bushwalk 98 around the Torquay area. Unfortunately no time for the rest today, but a plan is hatching, with still a couple of puzzles to solve we will time our return to get the rest. With this track having been part of bushwalk 97 a month ago, we were cursing that we had not tried to solve this puzzle earlier. Fantastic cache container. Can't wait to see the rest!
took boomerang keyring
left shark
thanks Mr Emu

Find # 3140 and 7th of the day at 11:22 am. Accompanied by Feathertop on our Great Ocean Road Trip.Another nice hike in the heat, TNLN, left my mark in the log, Thanx MrEmu....

If we'd done our research better we might have tackled #2 from this side and taken in the multi but it was too late and now too hot by the time we discoverd this so the multi now lies high and dry for us.
Anyway this puzzle was one that took me back to the days when I loved this stuff and was soon solved.
Another nice walk to GZ, but from now on we would be driving.
Thanks Mr Emu.

Tristan the Travel Turtle Tag (TTQWTC) has come for a flying visit back in time.

I was able to solve this one the night before we left home to do the Great Ocean Road drive.
The walk to GZ was quiet warm. I wouldn't want to do this one in the rain, it was slippery enough when it was dry.
I really loved the hide - most creative!
I am looking forward to solving the others in this series an discovering their hides.
Thanks Mr Emu for this cache!

Found with bucketeer
TFTC

Our 3rd E.M.U. recovered @ 16:24 after a lovely walk in.
Surprisingly a muggle runner (Russian Spy ?) appeared from nowhere just as we located the remains.
This was one the first of the series I started solving, but was not nearly as easy I initially thought. Very clever indeed Mr E(vil)mu.

10:55
It took the initiative of ppras to mobilise the forces of maccamob and Phetlern to launch the offensive. Knowing that is was six months since the demise of the navy vessel; we assumed we would be searching for the fused hard rocky masses of the former robots. Phetlern could not have joined the hunt without the invaluable contribution of CDNB as their brains trust.
An easy puzzle that took us back to our school days had us on a short chatty walk quickly arriving at this location and the now familiar fused robot remains hiding another cache.

TNLN .. SL .. TFTH Mr Emu.

Rated: for Overall Experience

Found by Mary & David at 1055, in company with pprass and Phetlern. David enjoyed this puzzle - it fell out quite easily! Taking Bushfire's advice, we'd planned to approach E.M.U 2 from this end and complete a nearby multi at the same time. Only a short walk from the car park and, with all the chatting, we were there before we knew it. Soon spotted the now-familiar camo and then we were again on our way. Our thanks yet again to Mr Emu.

[This entry was edited by maccamob on Monday, July 13, 2009 at 10:30:02 PM.]

Found at 10.50am GAFF5 in the company of maccamob and Phetlern.

The group headed of in some drizzling rain and were steeled for a 4km or so return trip, however knowing that this would be the hardest part of the days adventure - little did we know then what was in store for us later in the day!

The walk to this cache was very pleasant and fast! We got to GZ before we knew it as we were chatting about all sorts of caching and non caching topics - a bit like that scene from City Slickers where they were teaching one of the guys that you can record a program on a video while watching another show.

This puzzle was very satisfying except that we needed a push on the east co-ords adjustment.

Thanks Mr Emu.

Went for this walk with Bushfire, who wanted to see if he could find his sunglasses - which he put down next to the cache when logging months ago! Unfortunately a search resulted in no trace - not even a element of the glasses were found....

Found this one after walking from EMU 0 and having RSF1010 with the car at the other end. Lovely walk and perfectly timed, the sun set just as we got back.
Thanks for the excellent series so far, and the lovely views,
Indiana08

finished our walk from EMU 0, was a great hide, and found just as the sun was disappearing, tftc

Found this with saraci.jaee and Indiana08 in the disappearing daylight today. Thumping kangaroo activity nearby. Cannot marvel enough about this series ...
TFTC! TNLN

10:42 Found on our Touring Tassie and Beyond 2009 Trip!

Our 4th find of the series, and another very well constructed container that had been lugged out there. A had all the puzzles solved before we left home for Tassie, we we had wanted to find all of the series, but in the end we fell 1 short due to poor road conditions.

A pleasant walk which was a lot easier after doing EMU 2. This series showed us so much of the area that we would have just zoomed past, so thanks for the oppertunity!!!

TNLNSL

10:42 Found on our Touring Tassie and Beyond 2009 Trip!

Our 4th find of the series, and another very well constructed container that had been lugged out there. A had all the puzzles solved before we left home for Tassie, we we had wanted to find all of the series, but in the end we fell 1 short due to poor road conditions.

A pleasant walk which was a lot easier after doing EMU 2. This series showed us so much of the area that we would have just zoomed past, so thanks for the oppertunity!!!

TNLNSL

My science teaching background came in very handy on this puzzle, but even then it wasn't completely straight forward. After some tinkering it fell into place and I was one step closer to finishing the series.

I continued my bike (and often walking!) tour of the area this morning and made it here pretty quickly, but once the cache was signed and retrieved it was much more effort getting back to the car.

I was happy to get the difficult caches out of the way early. There were some lovely spots here to go with the clever puzzles.

Thanks,

R - B

CSJ and I enjoyed the hike through the outback. I kept hoping I'd see some kind of deadly snake (something exciting to write home about), but the only ones were inside the cache. And made of plastic. Oh well. Great puzzle, great container, very nicely done - TFTH!!!

P.S. I didn't have anything on me to leave, but I took a brown snake from the cache....hope that's ok!

Located @ 1130Hrs by the well oiled assault team of Bushfire, VKC1SR, Pteranodon and Suitman. E.M.U. unit located and identified, relevant details noted, and replaced. Seemed to have left a pair of Bushfire's sunnies around here somewhere ... Oh well .. off to the next one ...

Found in the company of Bushfire, VKC1SR and Suitman. Quite a few hours have been spent on this series in the last few days which have been thoroughly enjoyable and I applaud Mr. Emu for the whole package of puzzles & caches, a great experience all round.

One of the others left a Pteranodon, so I had to take that & bid farewell to the wombat retrieved from E.M.U. 1.

Well a team assault was in order for these tricky puzzle caches. Headed off with Bushfire, Suitman and Pteranodon.
A nice easy find at 1130. The start of the long walk!!! Loved the container. Will log thoughts in E.M.U. 7
Took:Wombat
Left Pteranodon

This EMU cache was under attack from Pteranodon, VKC1SR, Bushfire and the Suitman in a combined attack. We found it at 11.30.Some where near here Bushfire lost his sunnies, called in to check on the way back but could not see anything. NI-NO Thanks again for the effort in setting up the series.

Dropping in Bobby coin as this is more than a fair cache Guv!

Found today with Snakecatcher. Had this one nearly worked out when it hit Geowife "like a ton of bricks." Next thing I know we were all bundled in Snakecatcher's 4x4 for yet another trip to Torquay.......
Took snake pathtag (Sorry snakecatcher, I really liked it!) left shark patch. TFTC!

Found with Geewok this afternoon, Loving the cache containers. My GPS was a little out maybe entered a wrong didget into the old Garman 72. Oh well, Geewok got his hands onto it first.
Thanks Mr Emu am realy enjoying these.
NINO

FTF!!!
Approached this one from totally the wrong way, walked around on a track for a while before deciding we should tackle this one in a better way. After Km's of walking and after the cache itself frightening the bejeibers out of me. Cache was in hand. Very good construction i must say!
Still working on the rest of the puzzles!!

FTF with PacketStorm4... i was very tired after walking the complete wrong way lol but eventually got there. It was very funny watching PacketStorm's face when he discovered the cache gave him quite a fright.

TFTC

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