High, Wide & Handsome (Wellington) Pukerua Bay, North Island, New Zealand
By wharekumara on 08-Sep-07. Waypoint GC15RDY

I will try to replace this cache over the upcoming NZ summer, but if someone else would like to inherit ownership of this cache then please let me know. It's been there for over 17 years so it'd be great to keep it alive!

Fun scramble! The top of the cache is smashed and everything inside is destroyed

This geocacher reported that the container is damaged.

Great find while wandering around the coast. Nice view from cache spot. Tftc

This cache made it to number two on my list of unfound Wellington caches. I had wondered if I was capable of getting to the cache site so I was prepared to bail out if things looked like they were going to get too tough. As it turned out, I made the climb fairly easily although I took my time and plenty of caution needed to be exercised. I found the cache quickly; it has a broken lid but the latest logsheet remains in great condition.

Nah.

Decided to extend the "local walk" a bit wider today and did the Pukerua Bay to Plimmerton coast walk. Only saw 1 other walker so is far safer than lining up for McDonalds!
Cache took a little while to locate but other than a collapsed lid it was in good condition. Took nothing and left nothing. Getting up was the easy bit, somewhat more of a challenge getting back down but made it carefully! I wore gloves at all times so no nasty covid surprises for the next finder. TFTC.

enjoyed my walk from the Plimmerton end round the isolated coast, saw a goat, a couple of sheep, a heron, some oyster catchers and some shags plus a couple of dead puffer fish, not too hard to get to the cache following the fence up and down, good views from the top, the cache lid is cracked so is letting water in and the original contents are looking very sad, however the replacement log in plastic bag was nice and dry, TFTC

Quite a climb to get to this one with lots of sheep tracks to follow. Got there eventually to a great view from the top. Quite a long reach required to get to the container. Log really wet so stuck in a replacement waterproof log in a plastic bag.

Well.....In my usual caching fashion I ended up making this one a 5/5. DO NOT APPROACH THIS CACHE HEAD ON FROM THE BEACH! That was very dangerous. I was a little concerned for my safety and even stopped about midway to consider heading back down before I fell down. "Should I go continue?" I thought. Well it was honestly easier to go up than down at this point. I made my way across many scree fields, sticky thorn plants, and thank goodness for the little scrub bushes. They saved me a lot! I keep pushing up and up and up and then checked the GPS. I was 20 metres above it! So carefully I made my way back down. I felt really good to be behind the fence, knowing I at least had a little protection if I fell. I followed the fence until a certain point (using the hint) and got to GZ. Basically had to rip part of the bush back it was so overgrown! Sure enough, the cache hasn't been found in almost 3 years! 1037 days to be precise. After signing, I simply followed the fence back down to the beach for a much safer descent.

This certainly was a memorable adventure and the views were incredible today. Glad I picked a day with nice weather. Thanks very much for the cache. I wonder when the next geocacher will find it!

TFTC, a quick find after scrambling up the hill with LCBuilder and the geodog Beautiful day for the walk.

Phew! That was a walk and a half, thanks for the cache

#6536. A nice little exploration of Pukerua Bay. Met a walker with two dogs on the way. Interesting to also see two wild red deer in separate locations en route browsing almost down to the coast. They were relatively small, just a bit bigger than a large dog. They moved away so fast – so no photo taken.

GZ was all quiet. Quick find, less than 6 metres away, at an elevation of 80 metres. Great views – certainly high, wide and handsome. The cache was in good condition, but unfortunately neither Eli's 'Mental Challenge' RAGWORTS Geocoin nor DADIDIDA-0005 was in the cache. Took nothing, left nothing, signed log. Thanks for the cache.

Took 41 minutes to get from the cache location back to the car, after negotiating Wairaka Point, with the incoming tide. Managed to keep the feet dry though.

Knocked off work a little early today and decided to collect a few targeted caches, this being one of them. Pleasant walk to GZ with only a few others around. At one location the seagulls were very unhappy with my presence, however I managed to navigate my way past them to get to the point of ascent. Very staisfying find, have been keen to knock off a few of these older caches. TFTC, #7238

We had a great time walking along the coast and then making the rather scary ascent to the cache. Thanks heaps for a very rewarding challenge - well worthy of a favourite point.

A really fun climb up to GZ. We really enjoyed this cache, thanks.

Found. Great stormy day today. Hopefully miss the next rain band on the way home. Great run around to here, I used to walk this way beach combing

Started to go this way today with a friend, grabbing some of the other caches nearby. Got to the same spot mentioned by others, with the high tide mark clearly to be seen and the tide still coming in. We decided to come back another day and keep a better eye on the tide timetable. Definitely will need more than 25 minutes each way - we are figuring on 40 minutes as a safe amount.

together with egika

Stormy day - the way up was strenuous. Down was fun sliding the gravel
In: TB

Forgot to log the TB

#5854. It's taken us a while to get around to having a go at this one. I think you'd be doing well to walk to the base of the cliff in 25 mins, especially as the going is tougher once you round the headland. Once we got to the base of the cliff I decided to following the fence line up, and that worked pretty well. The climb was very steep to start with, and I was pleased when it eased off a little. Spotted quite a few goat higher up. Quick find at GZ. Great views. Thanks for a challenging cache.

We were a bit worried when we saw where the high tide mark was in places but we safely made it there and back without getting wet feet. One spot involved a a bit of climb up and over a high rock which was tricky for people with short legs (me) but with a helping hand from StreetWalker, I made it over and back again, if somewhat inelegantly.

Many people were taking advantage of the lovely winters day and were enjoying the seaside but all was clear around GZ as most people don't seem to walk this far! After another unsuccessful attempt at "Connect the Dots" it was good to have a find under our belt today. Thanks for the adventure.

What an incredible view! Hard work getting up, but made it with Grandad and his bionic knee. Only one TB in the cache which we retrieved, and left jet pack men for next hunter.

TFTC

Found it with Rattlingdags after a bit of a scramble It seemed a long way up. TFTC.

Found it, what a climb

Great cache, this is my first Geocache venture. Had a great time, tiring but worth it. Good times!

Took a die and left a box of brainteaser puzzles.

Discovered this with Airkeeper04, my first one too - fantastic views and great adventure!

Yay i found it, took awhile trying to find it at the end. I highly recommend this one.

Found It.
Left Travel Bug:JACM5A Teazle The Australian Shepherd

BRILLIANT CACHE!!! Favourite point and will recommed to my friends

A very nice venue for a family afternoon walk to burn off the Christmas dinner. Left the rest of the group on the beach and made my way up the fenceline. Got up to the cache in quick time but the return was somewhat slower and I don't think that I loosened my death grip on the wires the whole way down. Definately not my favourite terrain but I am glad that I made it as the views were stunning. TFTC

Brilliant ! I loved this one. A steep scramble up, a fantastic view along the coast then an exciting slide down the scree. From beach up to cache and back down to beach again took a bit under 20 mins.

Found during a day walk around the coastline on a very pleasant day - 9 of us from the Manawatu Tramping and Skiing club. Four of us took on the climb - another for geocaching reasons, and the other two for the adventure. Very glad to have some company for this one - it is steep! Took a fairly direct route up through the scrub - very impressive views from the cache site! Came down via the fence on the upper slopes so as to have the wires to hang on to. All up it took us 20 minutes from the beach below. Thanks for the adventure wharekumara!

This is a pretty awesome cache! Stunning views, turquoise sea and beautifully hidden.

Left floaty anchor, took toy car.

Dropped off TC
TFTC

Also got this cache today. It was harder than i thought and well worth the 4 Terrain, would only attempt this one in good shoes and dry weather. From 0 m it took me more than 45 min to get to the cache and back. I choose the more obvoius grey path but maybe this was not the best option, since you have to cross at one point which is hard with all the loose rocks and steep parts. Really not a sunday afternoon walk. But anyway you have a lot of scrambling involved here. The way back down the same grey path was more a kind of stone surfing. The hardest cache i did in NZ till now. Out : GC. TFTC. Sherlock Hood.

Apart from the drizzle - great location. Came at cache from the top with farmer's permission. Left a NZ coin. Cache all OK. Unstable scree slide provided a way down....

A warm stroll down the coast this afternoon taking about 30min from the 'Hole in the Rock' to the area below the cache. Opted for the fence line approach and made a rapid gain in altitude considering the steepness of the terrain. A quick find which is really appreciated after the hard work has been done in getting to the cache [^]. Lovely views from a different perspective. Have been past in the boat looking back at the cliffs. Dropped off a Geocoin that wants to be near water. TFTC and the great day out.

Walked down to the beach with my partner as far as the Hole in the Rock cache. I left her on her own to go chase after this cache. I thought it would only be about 40 minutes out and back, and turned into about 2 hours! Along the way I found a seal, several sheep, and even a crab hiding in the rocks. I wasn't prepared for the climb, and what a scramble it was. Next time perhaps I'll read the cache description a bit better.

TNLNSL, TFTC!!

Ryan

Jr taybee has this own account how am logging this old find under his new Username (Jr taybee) was log as part of taybee team

started walking at 9.30 to get to moana rd., other end of track Got to Ground Zero at 10.15 up the hill we went. yes Jr taybee was out font on this is one got to elevation 76 and yes the cache was in its hole all dry and good sign log and take same pics back down the hill and off to Moana rd 6kms more walking Thank for the
Walk TFTC # 0714

Awesome views, easy find, pretty dodgy scramble up (and down). Not one to do with baby on the back.. SL, TNLN, TFTC..

#56 - Whew! Our hardest cache ever so far! A reasonably fast walk around to the bottom of the cliff for us, had to scramble over a rock at one point as high tide nearly cut us off from continuing on further to the cliff base. Perhaps if you were keen and walked very fast would you make it in 25 minutes. It took us about 35 minutes, but that's beside the point.
What a great cache location! We ascended with the more direct, 'beside the slip, in the green' approach to the cache. Took a while to 'cache' our breath at GZ, then started searching, not so quick of a find, got taken to the wrong location by the GPSr first, and had to scramble another 30 metres, which in this terrain is alot of work. Once we were in the right spot, it was an easy retrieve. All in all about 1 hour 30 minutes in total. SL Took Singapore coin & photos TFTC!

TFTC I enjoyed the walk at the base of the hill to the cache. The climb is a different matter.

#169 T4TC left home late PM. Did my Honey do's first. Had read about a fence line.. and off we went. Got what I thought was a fence line that would take me up and yes it would but>>>> the voice of reason in the background said hold on a minute lets see whats around the corner and the next corner. Glad to have listen to that voice. As it was a quick find from the right fenceline. Enjoy looking at the coast line again as I use to fish here many many many moons ago. Personal coins came for a visit.

Went for a walk this afternoon to hunt down this one which has been on my "to find" list for a long time. Decided to climb up via the fenceline which was safe and relatively easy. An instant find for the cache which is dry and in excellent condition. Really enjoyed the walk around the coastline and the climb up the hill - just the sort of cache I like best! Signed log, TFTC.

(#0048 - 1412hrs)

A beautiful Sunday. After a quick climb up the slope found the cache. Amazing view from up there. Big climbs always make the view better. Saw a stingray gliding round in the shallows.

Rocks were a bit big for the run down in some places, but I love scree slopes. This cache led to the final destruction of my shoes, which have now been replaced with a pair exactly the same. Merrels all the way!

TFTC

1567 Best cache views of the sea, must tell Guano Gerbil about this cache, he will love it! TFTC

Had difficulty finding it after a long and hard climb. TFTC!

Decided to try what looked like a little track up the hill instead of the scree. Hmmm....not such a hot idea! Nearly gave up half way. But ploughed on, with prickles in hand, to the top. Took a little while to find the cache and dreaded the thought of the climb for nothing. An easier trip down the scree...our shorts bottoms took a battering! Not our favouritist cache ever. TFTC

A very pleasant day out doing the local geocaches. Quite a long walk, but weather was quite good and views great. Hugo the dog and I were soon closing in on the target area. Bit of a hesitation before attempting the climb, but came this far - better get it done. Hugo did his best, but had to carry him part of the way. Very nice find and good place for a rest before going down. Have to say going down was much worse than coming up!! SL TNLN TFTC

Tackled this one from pukerua bay, nice walk along the water front untill we had to go up the hill. ohh what a mission but we got there, nice views up there got a few photos on the cell and made our way down the slip. great cache and a random spot too.

TFTC

Came from Pukerua Bay, easy walk in and then thought about having an easy walk out when we saw what we had to climb. But up the slip we go. Great view Great trek.

A good walk around to base. Decided to look at clue before climbing as didn't want to sidle along a steep face unnecessarily. Glad we did. Certainly was steep, but my 8 and 10 year olds coped with the terrain like mountain goats.
Great view on such a sunny winters day.
Took Sparkee TB.
TFTC.

#108. It certainly is a loooong way up. The cow skull is a gruesome reminder of what may happen should one slip while up there... thanks for bringing me here, SL, TFTC. -2x plush toys, +moonstone, +spider, +tb

[This entry was edited by LeftyNZ on Sunday, May 31, 2009 at 10:49:20 PM.]

Got a phone call last night from a fellow cacher telling me about his achievement for the evening, so not to be outdone by Mr Boxhill and always willing to take up a good challenge as long as it is safe, on with the hiking boots and away I go, I think the 25 minutes was a little bit understated but that’s fine, a bit of rock hopping and a bit of mountain goatting, and before I knew it I was at the GZ, but bugger I forgot my camera, that really brassed me off , so need to be back for some photo shot’s, Great spot really worth the great adventure and walk THANKS!!!, TFTC TNLNSL (587)

Kayaking and caching what could be better. Paddled around from Pukerua Bay and scoped out my proposed route up to GZ from out on the water. Changed into my boots and headed on up. Enjoyed the climb up and actually found my self above the cache before I knew it. Sat and enjoyed the view and the feeling of satisfaction of achieving the find, took some photos and carefully descended back to the beach. TNLN SL TFTC ( and a great adventure).

awesome treak and hike up. had diesel dog in tow. well worth the effort. left 2p coin. took cricket ball and geocoin. SL TFTC.

Does anyone else feel like that - The sense of acheivement when you set yourself a substantial target, and then 'knock the bugger off'? I felt a few cm taller walking back along the beach in the late afternoon sun today than I did on the way in, and defininatly had a bigger smile on my face.

25 mins from the car park? Maybe, if you were really determined you could do it in 25 mins, I prefered to enjoy the journey though so didnt push that particular boundry. This was my stamping ground as a teenager, walked this way many times to fish from "Why-er Rock". A few spots of rain on the walk in- almost tropical as it literally stopped after 30 seconds or so. Once at the base of the cliff I tried the frontal approach first, and while 2 steps up and 1 back would have got there eventually, I decided it wasnt really going to be a winner, so sidled up the left side. Toward the top I had the GPS in my mouth so as to allow use of all four limbs to climb, and was rewarded by a "Beep" when it got close to GZ - a useful feature of the 60Csx as it happens!

Murphys law - a sheep has died within a few cm of the cache, and while it doesnt smell too bad at the moment, this might be an additional challenge in the height of summer. Considered shifting the cache away from the carcus, - while there are lots of other bushes, I couldnt find any that had suitable readily identifieable clues to aid subsequent hunts, so left in situ.

Swapped out the TB' for a coin and signed the log.

Decided against running back down the scree. Yes it would have been fun, but I couldnt bring myself to promote erosion , its bad enough as it is. I set off along the fenceline heading north-ish, and this turned out to be a reasonable easy decent most of the way. If anyone wants to go up this way, try heading to GZ from the following starting point S 41 02.224 E174 52.107.

Thanks for the challenge, I enjoyed it.



[This entry was edited by Outward Bound on Sunday, October 26, 2008 at 4:10:50 PM.]

..... I huffed and I puffed.... and I huffed and puffed some more.

Stellar views, and good exercise. A great cache and easy find (in contrast to another of your caches [B)]). +tb

Yep, steep alright! Easy find, but definitely not quick. Great views in perfect conditions. Quite a little adventure!
Took nothing, as the getting was the prize; left nothing, signed log. TFTC!

Out with roaming kiwi on this find, was my 4th for the day. Had a great time heading up the shingle slide, i went right up the top and down to the cache site while roaming kiwi went up and across. Fantastic views from the top, another gr8 cache.

this was my 3rd find of the day on a great sunny day out with Morriskiwi ,hiked around from the carpark at the end of the road and had great fun climbing up the rock slide to get the the cache ,awsome view from up here ,the cache itself was a nice easy find once we got up there.
+Old Capital TB
-Geocoin

TFTC

Excellent location, but watch your approach. No point climbing up the right side of the scree slope, it's a long climb to the top and then back down... instead head up thru the 'green' to the left or follow the fence line.

Thanks man, great views and walk.

What a fabulous way to spend an afternoon that was otherwise dull and gloomy in Wellington - out here on the coast, was sunny and hot! Beautiful walk along the rugged coastline with Matt, Frank, David, Jacod, Phyllida, Jase, Michelle, Charlote and I. I didn't get to the cache myself - piked around 20 metres below and slid back down the skree ***weeeeeee*** I don't have much of a head or heights so passed the geocoain onto Matt to do the deed. Regardless an awesome caching experience - well done!!!

The first two finds were split between the Japanese notepad and the intended notebook logbook. I have removed the notepad (to reduce confusion) and left the first page with the notebook, so all log entries can be at GZ. I'll try to get up there soon with a stapler to attach the single notepad page, but if you're heading to the cache, feel free to help out staple it up yourself. Thanks!

This is an excellent site for a cache. What a view!
Easy find. Nothing taken. Thanks. Photo added.

Holy bad boy big brother Batman!
Yes folks, this is Makara Beach (GCEDD) on steroids. If you've done the Makara Beach cache then just think much further, much higher, and much steeper and you've got the picture.

This is a challenging cache, I fully agree with wharekumara's warnings in the description, you will need a head for heights and you will need to use your hands for climbing (not just balance). The scree is very loose and tends to start moving whenever you step on it. Makes a great expressway down though, only took about 2 minutes, woohoo!.

Shot out after work and got to see a great sunset but it was a bit of a race against time to be off the slope before nightfall. One and a half hours all up return to the car parked at the Pukerua Bay end.

Found a familiar Geocoin in the cache so grabbed that for a trip to the SI, and signed the log.
TFTC

Geocoin dropped off

Published