Hide and Seek #17 - darthcacher1 (Auckland) Auckland, North Island, New Zealand
By keylev on 09-Jan-16. Waypoint GC69505

Great hide

Easy find with a seam of sandflies

#462Managed to elude the stormtroopers and find Darth. He was dry and in good spirits.

First rock turned over and there it was. Thanks for the cache.

Sunday is day off which makes it caching time headed near the airport and in the industrial zone. Tftc

The rain is so that means geocaching! There are a few in the island so hoping to smash out them all! Armed with raincoats, trail shoes, some swappables, 3 pens (as I like to lose them) and a friend!

Thanks to COs for placing and maintaining!

A lucky guess had the cache in hand on first try. Going to give up soon for today as I am likely to get blown into the water. Tftc

Beautiful evening along here. Thanks.

Fun find with rebel98, thanks

We were there the night before, under the stars with team SEAC, remember it well.

Fun find with rustynz today, thanks

Snel gevonden

Nice easy find. Found with toby84

Found with Reny90

On a roll tftc

I was searching too far under initially. Kimbathelion had it in hand soon after. Tftc

Cache located after a bit of a search. Tftc

Fairly straightforward find (though it took checking in a few spots) on a nice day. Thanks!

Appreciated not having to put my head under the tree- no insects this time! Tftc

Quite a bottle bank in here. Midges buzzing in swarms around here so moved away a bit to sign the log. TFTC # 18,475

Cool spot

Found after about 10 rock checks….found a skink under the first one though! Thanks for placing these caches.

A pretty simple find, TFTC here keylev.

I decided to pop out here for a few caches on a fine but breezy afternoon. I had never been to Puketutu Island, even in the 8 years I lived in Auckland, and to be honest knew little about it.
But curiosity brought me here. That and a couple of target caches, a short Ad Lab, and plenty of trads. I enjoyed the different view of parts of the city, and the birdlife. Not too many issues, just the one DNF.

Replaced.

A not so mad day caching,.. but I certainly benefited! Out with Keylev and NZTravellers again. As they have all gotten most of the caches in this area, it was up to be to play catchup to these 2. They were feeling extremely charitable and I wasn't going to pass the opportunity up. Sure they used me for cache maintenance labour, but as long as I get to sign the logs, I don't very much care

On the maintenance run with CO and only too happy to find these off as we go. TFTC

We had a quick look around, particularly under the big rock to the side of the tree. No luck and with a few previous DNF’s we didn’t try too long.

Turned over every rock near the tree, no luck

Too many rocks and way too much glass.

Couldn't find it under any of the obvious rocks and there was lots of broken glass

Looked everywhere the rocks won today

Got my ass kicked on this one
So many rocks could not find
Had helpers and still no luck
Next time thanks

Quick find nice hide TFTC

Found

Good condition! tftc!

Found after it rained

Was quite tricky so I was pleased I had helpers with me....

Found this while at the CITO.

Thanks for the cache!

Found it while attending a CITO nearby. Pretty quick find once I was on the right side of the tree! In good condition. TFTC

Quick and easy find after the nearby CITO today.

Our weekend plans of a ride out to Raglan were put on hold as our son and his family needed to head down to Auckland due to family reasons and we were able to put them up for the weekend. With uncertainty around what we were doing for the Saturday I put aside any caching plans and awaited the outcomes. We ended up going to the CITO, I then got to hang out with CyclicalCaching and his partner for one path around part of the island, then around the other way with alunb. Managed to get quite a few of the caches around here before a trip out to Sylvia Park for some retail therapy.

**13,984**
The cache was located a little further from the hint item than originally assumed but located after widening the search area. TFTC

Great view of the harbour from here
TFTC

After 15 mins looking for this one came up empty-handed.

Coords spot on. Found after a little while. Tftc

TFTC!!

Hint not super helpful but got there after a few minutes. TFTC.

We found this cache during our holidays, when traveling around Auckland!
Thanks for showing!

Best regards bhudi from Germany

#12592 @0810
In Auckland for a few days for my daughters wedding this afternoon. Before she announced her wedding date, I had planned to get at least 96 caches of various types sizes and D/T ratings etc. to get my find numbers up to 101 and as my other leap day achievemnets as possible. However once she anoounced leap day as her wedding day I had to pare back my goals for the day to just finding 21 caches as quick as I could first thing in the morning. I chose this area for the concentration of caches. Unfortunately, being under time pressure, if I couldn't find a cache within a couple of minutes, I had to move on. This cache was soon found. TFTC.

No. No smiley.

Decided to take advantage of the reasonably good weather and head out to complete Puketutu Island. Invited my youngest nephew to join me for some one-on-one caching. I gave him my GPS and let him be our navigator, which he thoroughly enjoyed. All up we located 20 caches, had 3 DNFs and walked 10km.

We had to search a few spots before finally locating the right one.

Nice quick find while in the area. Great walking track and scenery. TFTC

Quite a few rocks around here but we could manage to find the logbook.
TFTC and greetings from the north of Germany
4 Hippies

Found with duderino64 and gaoliya! Gao found first. #8 today! Took us a few minutes...lots of rocks! Log is good and dry. Tftc!

How many rocks can there be? Got it!

Took a while to find the right spot. Tftc!

Walked the short distance here from the car, which we parked at the next one. As we got to GZ is started to sprinkle, and then as we searched it really lashed it down, almost horizontally. Luckily for us, that meant one side of the tree was sheltered and that side was cache-side. We searched around leaving no stone unturned until we turned the right one. We didn’t bother turning any more after that. By the time we’d signed and replaced it had died down so the walk back was wind-assisted but dry. Think this was our last find of the day, so thanks for all the fun!

The rocks got us today

Good to make a find here after the previous dnf. Tftc

Lots of rocks found the right one eventually

Tftc

In Auckland for a few days so only aiming a few caches. Brought my bike up so had to use it on some of these. TFTC

Der heutige Tag stand im Sternbild des großen Cachers. Also in etwa wie die letzten Tage. Auf dem großen Spaziergang ging es hier entlang. Nach einiger Suche, manchmal etwas länger, manchmal schneller, haben wir das Logbuch dann schließlich in der Hand gehalten. Strange, that the last cacher (007-Kelkheim) hasn't signed most of the logbooks. No sign, but online log? Just if the owner mind. Thanks a lot for the fun today.

Heute ging es für fazzyOne und mich auf Powertrail-Tour. Unser erster Tag in Auckland stand ganz im Zeichen der Powertrails rund um diese Seen. Bei immer noch bestem Wetter konnten wir doch recht viele Dosen nach meist längerer Suche finden.
Leider scheinen nicht alle Cacher diese Cacherunde so zu würdigen, zumindest steht einer in zwei oder drei Dosen von den über 20, die er geloggt hat. Naja muss ja jeder selber wissen... Danke für diesen schönen Ausflug heute.

Bevor ich die Heimreise antrete war noch Zeit für eine ausgiebige Cachetour Auckland. TFTC

What rock!? Found it! TFTC!

Our final day in New Zealand before we fly to Australia tomorrow decided on short walks and drive bys towards Puketutu Island. No problems finding the cache. Stamped and returned. TFTC

Made it to Auckland, New Zealand and am ready to party! These were so darn close to our hotel, we couldn’t resist.

Weather: High cumulus clouds ️
Footwear: Zorries
Cache condition: Great!
Last found: January 8, 2019

TNLNSL, T4T$;-)
Thanks, nziceman, for taking the time to maintain this cache.
#11186 @ 8:28 PM.

Out today for an attempt on this series of caches. As we were a part of that fateful trip, we decided that it was time that we went and got these caches. So a plan was hatched to grab them sometime these school holidays, and that day was today.

Pulling up at GZ and the hint was read by Mrs. Liver Bird. Hmm, that sounds familiar. Let's hope that we have better luck this time than we did with the last cache that had this same hint which we had to DNF. Well, there were a few objects that were mentioned in the hint at GZ, so it took a little while to investigate these. After a shortish search, one of the objects was overturned and there was the cache. Phew, found it.

TFTC

Looked under a lot of rocks and eventually got there!

Not a fan of rock caches and this one proved elusive.

#6 for the day. Thanks

Found on a walk around the lake. Nice caches.
Logged as SWEx4 together with Nogana, Pidjas and ursus67.

A nice walk on our first day in Auckland. Sunny and all welcoming!

TFTC nziceman!

-----------------------
Four women from North of Sweden on holiday in New Zealand and Australia. Leaving the winter at home.

Pidjas, Långanfans, ursus67 and me, Nogana, were logging as a team using the nick SWEx4.

A walkabout round the vulcanolake. We found the cache.

…,…,…,…,…,…,…,
The cache was found together with swe x 4. Långanfans, Pidjas, Nogana and ursus67 who are on a journey to Oceania
Today we visited Auckland.

Round the vulcanolake. Thank you.

Found under the first rock I checked for once. Really pleased. Hate rocks.

Huntsman2015 and I watched in amazement as Ayden4asmile found it almost immediately

First rock I looked under! That's a new record for me! Tftc

Ttfc

I think your camping trip accommodation sounds more like a fun game of sardines rather than hide and seek. Yet again I haven't done any of darthvader1's caches but I did see the name on some logs in this area. I found this cache quickly with a good hint, thanks

I still need some Caches to reach the 1000 in NZ, so I went out for a little tour around the airport again. I could find a lot of nice and fairly hidden Caches and had fun.
Also this one was no problem.
Thanks for hiding!

On a 24hr mission to Auckland with Philip.Perry and three of my kids started caching at about 3pm getting back to accommodation at 330am then up and back on the road for a xouple of hours before heading home. We decided we had three caches we had to find this mission then the rest was all about getting our numbers up so concentrated on a high cache area. Meet Sethraven just on dusk who helped us on a cache we couldnt find before she headed home so that was great. Really enjoy caching in Auckland at night no traffic and no muggles to get in our way. We only had a few DNF caches for the day which isnt to bad. Thanks to all th CO for the caches.

Had a cheeky Auckland Mission on the cards this weekend - just had to drop the family off in Pukekohe first and then meet up with Davidsonclan. We had a few caches on the list today but mainly this was just a numbers mission. A late start meant we'd be late to finish but 3am isn't too bad. There were some great finds and some grotty finds but cheers to the CO's and those that help maintain their caches. This cache was found quickly and in good condition thanks to accurate coords a straight forward placement. Cheers nziceman TFTC.

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**What are you doing Labour Weekend 2018? Wellington is set to host New Zealands largest Geocaching Event of the year! Check out the details on the [WENZ Website](https://sites.google.com/site/wenzgeo2018/home) or visit the event's [Facebook Page](https://www.facebook.com/groups/590545297801072/). Once you're registered and have logged your attendance on the [WENZ Event Page](https://www.geocaching.com/…/GC78NMQ_wenz-event-2018-wellin…) you're all set, see you there.**

Back to turn the DNF frown upside down as I noticed the cache had been replaced. This I have now done but seem to recall it was a bit damp on the inside already. This was the last of the series DNFs I had time to change to a smile but have to be back at the airport next week so will see if I can find time then. Thanks for the replacement!

Third cache find tonight and hopefully manage to collect them all in this section, but there is much more traffic compared to last night.

TFTC.

[;P]

Thanks for the cache.

thanks for the cache

Out running some maintenance for NZ Iceman so took the opportunity to sign the log. Was present at placement.

New container placed. Hint updated to better reflect where it is.

Another DNF in the series. Me not looking properly or really not there?

I didn't find it either.

No luck today, hope to have better eyes next time.

Didn't find, despite resorting to the very explicit hint. May need a check.

With a rainy afternoon in front of us, we still needed to get in our walk... so it was a treat to find these trails of caches so close to our hotel! Thanks for the fun!

Nice easy find TFTC

Out with Hegenor just before she was ready to leave NZ to do this powertrail.We didn't manage everything but the ones we looked for were easy apart from one DNF. Not sure I like the smell of sewage though.
Easy find.Thanks for the cache.

I'm from Norway, escaping the cold winter and travelling around New Zealand for 7 weeks, using geocaching as my tourguide. Today was a very sad day, my last day in NZ. I have driven 10000 km, been in all the counties of NZ and found 632 geocaches. It's been an amazing journey, I have seen sooo many beautiful places, got lots of new friends, met some amazing geocachers and found lots and lots of fantastic geocaches. I will for sure come back here, and next time, I will spend more time here. It's still a lot of places I haven't seen yet, and places I want to come back to. Thank you to all the CO's who have placed caches for me to enjoy.

I met thegreatauk at an event in Northland in the beginning of my travel, and since we were both in Auckland now, we decided to go crazy geocaching together the last days. Today we spent the day focusing on challenge-caches, before we finished off with a powertrail near the airport.

About this cache:
A quick and easy find, thanks to the good hint. Just the way I like powertrails to be. Tftc

Our only blue face left in this series. Darthcacher1 was sent to do the honors on this one. he made a quick find, although as previous logs stated the cache is in a bad way, in 3 pieces with a very sodden log sheet. Unfortunately we had not planned for our day and read those logs before we left home or we would have come prepared to repair the cache. As it was we rummaged through our bag and found a tin of mints - so the kids had a treat on the way home - which we have put a new log sheet in (not waterproof unfortunately). We have included the original cache and the temporary tin in a zip lock bag. Hopefully that survives until the CO can perform further maintenance. Found with purply.
We will never forget that camping trip - there were 11, 4 left and that left 11.

TFTC. Having delivered the noncacher to the airport I decided to increase my numbers as I had a couple of hours spare.
Thanks keylev for placing the cache and the trail. I will be back to complete it.

Cache in very bad shape. Sorry for the cache.

Well a wet day in Auckland and down to my last couple of hours in the city and with a hire car I thought I would come up here, walk for a couple and do some park and grabs.

Thank you for this cache, had fun exploring the area and loving the series.

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Did you know that planning has started for a Major Event in Wellington in 2018? Check out the details on the [WENZ Website](https://sites.google.com/site/wenzgeo2018/home) or visit the event's page on [FaceBook](https://www.facebook.com/groups/590545297801072/) and don't forget to log your attendance on the [WENZ Event Page](https://www.geocaching.com/…/GC78NMQ_wenz-event-2018-wellin…)
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Found with Mum as 'Jess & Caro'. She is now Carø and I now have my own geocaching profile so we are sorting my logs for caches we found together. TFTC!