Pohaturoa Rock (Bay of Plenty) Whakatane, North Island, New Zealand
By TheWonderStuff on 22-Jan-08. Waypoint GC18TP6

Ein schner Ort

On my way to the East Coast and getting some caches on the way. Nice to have an earthcache in the middle of town that has some history to it. Thanks FP given

First saw this at night and thought it was a tree. However this morning after checking for any caches realised a second look in daylight was a must.

Thank you for showing me this place.

Thanks for this. Had only driven past before

I am in Whakatane with S-i-l and Junior visiting our Niece and her new son NS. After Junior went to The Warehouse to get supplies, we found some kiwi as part of an Adlab. Whilst hunting, S-i-l phoned about meeting up at a cafe. In the Cafe I read the instructions to complete this earth cache. Oops. I need to include a tape measure in my geokit. Oh good, Nephew just happens to have one in his car. Thank you, Jarod! A bit bendy though, so did my best to measure the height. What an interesting history this rock has. Being born to parents who follow Christian beliefs, I was dedicated (baptised) to the Lord God Almighty . I wonder if Maori still follow their baptism traditions. Thank you TheWonderStuff for this fascinating earth cache.

Visiting here from America. I'm here with my older sister visiting our little sister and her husband. Thanks for the short history lesson. We enjoyed touring the downtown Strand and picking up a few smilies. Thanks for the adventure and smile. Answers sent. Favorite point awarded.

Cool rock! We're driving back to Tauranga and stopped in this cool town so had to find some caches. Thanks!

Nice walk around this little town. Every place in Nz has some great geography

Whow, sussah21 and me on a yourney to New Zealand. We have planned this trip for many years, and finaly we are here.We will visit lovely places, hopfully see animals and birds that we dont have back home.Thank you so much for all the caches.Greetings from Sweden and Norway Fin tur. God stemning hele veien.Tusen takk for alle cacher og vedlikehold.Favorittpoeng deles ut litt her og derChallenger blir for det meste logget som notat og sjekkes senere. M nok jobbe iherdig mot stadig nye ml jeg ikke visste jeg hadde.Alt er bra med cachen om ikke det nevnes verst i teksten.

Thank you for showing the bow.

A small group of us from team SEAC (Keylev, Stik-a-crane & Uncle Sam) came down this way for the weekend. Interesting place. So glad places like this are looked after for everyone to enjoy. Thanks for bringing us here. Keylev submitted the required info on behalf of the group and also posted the photo. TFTC.

Another team member will post the answers.Weekend away with my geocaching buddies from Team Seac. Took a drive down to Whakatane on Saturday and did the Bird Walk trail, then went to Galatea and did the foothills trail...that was a long 20 km's return trip...but got most of the caches.Thanks to the CO's for placing the caches. We had a great few days exploring the area.All logs signed "Team Seac" or "Seac"

Keylev was submitted the evidential image of our visit and messaged the CO the intel required to log this find.Was down this way with Keylev, HeMaLuDy, and UncleSamNZ, for a quick 2day trip to the Galatea foot hills, we had an earlyish, start from Auckland, our little group decided to take another stop here to continue the cache finding.TFTC.

A quick weekend adventure away with some of the Team SEAC crew..ahhh its been so long since we did this!!Very cool to find this right in the centre of town! Found the info, took the measurements and pic and onto find some lunch! Thanks for the cache.

Thanks for the cache and greetings from Czechia

An amazing piece of history! Not at all what you’d expect in the middle of term. Thanks for the reason to stop here. Answers emailed to cache owner and photo attached.

I've been past this a few times, but finally made the time to stop, guess at the measurements (a couple of muggles were sitting nearby and I decided not to ask them to move!). Many thanks for taking the trouble to set this earthcache up.

Interesting history
TFTC
Managed to get through from Ruatorea last night
Bit of luck the roads will be open this arvo so l can return home today

This EC is so cool. What an amazing rock. Sent answers

Day 4 and loving the chance to explore.

So exciting to be heading to NZ. Have not been to the NI so looking forward to exploring. Did not make it to the last Mega because of Covid so wonderful Kittykatch and I can get here now.

Thanks for getting me out and about TheWonderStuff

New Zealand North Island - Day 4
Found with Joolay on a trip to NZ to find the GeoTour. We stopped in town tonight and enjoyed lots of good caching and some nice fish and chips. We were drawn to the rock before we knew it was the earthcache. Such a cool story and interesting place to visit. Answers have been sent to the CO.

Thanks for the cool cache TheWonderStuff

Attempted this earthcache after completing the nearby AdLab. A really interesting place to visit like many in the Whakakane region.
Many thanks for setting up.

Thanks for this cool earth cache! Answers sent. Pic is mine although I'm not on it. I use phone so also no GPS to be put on it. Either way, nice place and even more interesting when you know a bit more about it's history and context.

After walking the nice Trail I walked through the Hole.
Thanks a lot.

We were biking from Ohope beach to town and for sure this one could not be missed. For some reason the message functionality to owner fails, so cannot send the answers - but I have them and will retry later. Thanks for the EC.

400. Find number 400!!!!! Yippeeeeee! We walked down from the tip and got a few others in the way to help get to this milestone. Awesome place that I have driven past 100’s of times but never stopped.

Great spot, just couldn’t stay too long as the kids were too keen to climb!

Found - Mrs McMike2012 & I now live full-time in our caravan & travel the country visiting places we want to visit … we are now parked up at Opitiki … decided to head into Whakatane to do some messages … stopped here specifically to pick up this Earthcache … answers have been messaged to Cache Owner & will log this in anticipation of receiving the ‘all clear’ … pleased to add another 'smiley face' to the tally … TFTC ... TN except photos:LN:no Log to Sign ... #2,636 for us.

As we were in this area today we decided to have another of this earthcache,quite a lot of history based itself around a very significant rock.
Answers have been sent.
Thanks for bringing us here and the placement.

Sort of running all around town for the Adventure Lab and then I realized it was parked right next to the EarthCache.

Grab the tools necessary to make the measurement and wandered over to it. After sorting out the answers I admired the big rock for a few moments before heading off.

Thanks for the EarthCache!

This rock is very impressive and has a lot of history
many thanks

Made a quick trip to whakatane today and only had time for two caches, this being one of them. Have emailed the answers through. Nice spot, interesting rock. Thanks for bringing me here and for the info in the description. TFTC

I called by here as part of my mega road-trip, but didn't log at the time. I knew I'd be calling by here so I thought I was prepared by bringing measuring tape. However I didn't account for the wind so the fabric tape wasn't all that great and I really needed the metal-retractable kind, so my measurements were rough estimates (all the more complicated by the structure going through the hole).

Answers sent. All good here, and TFTEC

Love an easy earth cache! Did I mention the Thai across the street was bomb? thanks a bunch!

Answers sent. Fun day with buzzybb. Tftc

A great day out with kimbathelion. Answers sent.

I’ve been to Whakatane many times for summer holidays but have never had a good look at this, so it was an enjoyable cache thank you.

Second time down here this evening, this time to get the required info, thanks for bringing us here starting to cool down, time to grab what we can before heading back

Parked nearby as part or exploring the area. Historic spot

TFTC

Thanks for making us stop and take notice of this very cool rock. It has an interesting history.

Nice lil activity for the day and our first earth cache. Tyftc!

I was a bit gobsmacked with this one - didn't quite expect that in the middle of town. Circumnavigated it to find answers to some questions and then despite paddle chick having a tape measure we resorted to other measures for the rest, Answers sent. TFTC # 17,030

Isis58 and I are on a mission over the long weekend to find as many TMGT and PWGT caches as possible with the occasional normal cache thrown in as time allows. After dinner we headed out for a wander around town, having quickly read what was required for the earthcache I grabbed my small tape measure to measure the hole in the rock which wasnt much use. Having never been to Whakatane before I wasnt expecting a huge rock in the middle of town. We arrived in town after dark and left before sunrise so didnt see much in that time. Thanks for an interesting earthcache TheWonderStuff, answers for us both have been sent to CO

#11188

Unique having a sea cave in the middle of town. Would’ve made a great round-about! TFTC.

Visited this spot during my East Cape Easter 2021 journey.
Lovely spot.
At last i have enough time to enjoy this beautiful area.
TFT EC!

#12,190. Surprising earthcache right on The Strand in Whakatane. Good to learn about the geology and history of this iconic landmark rock, cave formation and spiritual site. It is now so much further inland from the bay itself and even from the Whakatane River estuary. Answers emailed to the cache owner.

Thanks for the earthcache placement, and for bringing us to this site, and …

.T h a n k s. .f o r. .t h e. .c a c h e.
.M a u r u u r u. .k o e. .n u i. .a t u. .h o k i. .t e. .k e t e r o k i.

Out for a walk after finishing work for the day. TFTC

Its early morning so we have the place to ourselves. A pity this had a metal structure to protect us from falling debris. Great cave. Cheers. Thanks for the cave info on the cache page.

Day 16 - Saturday 2 January 2021 - Whakatane to Opotiki today. Some TMGTs to visit before we leave town. Meeting up with The Seagnoids sister for the evening. And the rains came, with drums beating and an awesome night lights show.

The Seagnoid, Zara, Toby and I are off on another geocaching escape over Xmas, this time to the mighty Coromandel, then over to Opotiki and stop off at Rotorua to return home on 5 January. Had an fabulous time exploring many wonders of our country. Rounding up over 400 caches along the way, with a few LABS, 20 odd TMGTs, virtuals and lots of interesting earth caches to keep the mind busy. Watching the sun come up on New Years Day at Mt Maunganui was spectacular. Lots of walking and even more driving. But had an awesome time. Thanks to all COs who made this adventure so special.

TFTC love these caches with do much hystory

North Island Campervan trip Day 6

After the fantastic holiday I had a few months ago traveling around the South Island, making the most of one of those incredibly cheap campervan deals available at the time, I figured it was worth taking a week off work before the stresses of the usual holiday period to enjoy some of the delights to be found around the top of the North Island.

This would be a great chance for me to seek out some targeted caches such as the TMGT ones as well as some that would help me with my Jasmer grid, missing minutes (for a couple of challenge caches I'm working on) and any other caches that caught my eye.

With the wild weather, I had decided to play it a bit safe and spent last night in a Motor Camp in Tauranga. I was intending to head back down to Whakatane/Ohope and then start the journey back towards Auckland today, never quite knowing how far I'd get by the time evening rolled in, especially as it was a later-than-usual start for me this morning.

This was a nice straightforward Earthcache. My only issue was that being on tour I did have some of my caching stuff, but not my tape measure on me. So I had to pace out the dimensions (not easy with that cage in the way) as best I could. My answers have already been sent to the CO. Nice to see some of the local history so readily accessible.

Thanks for setting this Earthcache up.

A relatively simple earthcache to complete. Answers sent and photo attached of the rock.

Spent a few days down in Rotorua with AliGle, visiting her family. Took a drive to Whakatane today and completed this Earthcache while in town. Answers emailed to CO and photo of GPS inside cave attached. TFTC!

Down in Rotorua with Vistra for a few days. Found ourselves in Whakatane today and grabbed a few caches. Enjoyed this earth catch. Very interesting cave and memorial.

I came down yesterday around 10:30pm to Whakatane with my sister Cynthia, my brother Doug and Mum. We were here for my Aunty Margaret's funeral, quite a sad affair as funeral's are.

But this morning, we have just left our Holiday Park around 9:30am and my family is not into caching, but I mentioned to them all there is this cool cave to come and have a look at. That piqued their interest. So we came here, I loved the big hole and amazing to see the ocean was right up here at one time. Mind you though, the ocean is only 100m away, but maybe that hole was several meters under the sea! Who knows for sure.

So after taking a star jump foto (my sis asked me to do that) and taking note of the plaque we moved on. A very cool spot for an EC, thanks TWS for bringing me here. A FP while I'm at it. This cache was the only one I was able to do with a restrictive family, but that's ok, now for a look around, then the funeral then a catch up with family at Ohope beach then off home.

1)5 1/2 by 7 metres approximately.
2) and their tears.

Answers sent

Answers sent

We walked down the hill to Pōhaturoa rock. It was interesting to learn about the history of it and the significance of the waterfall behind it and how the rock was formed. Thanks for this earthcache

Such an extraordinary piece of history to this place! We never would have known about it if it wasn't for this cache. We were visiting Whakatane on a caching adventure and it was a beautiful day. TFTC

They have certainly done a lot of work around this "rock" since one of us lived in Wkakatane many years ago. Back then it was just a wilderness. It was good to see the improvements. TFTC.

Cool rock. TFTC

Today it was a nice day with a lot of sun. In the afternoon we took a walk aling the shops to the Irish pub at the corner. We love their IPA. On our way we passed the rock to get the answers. I will send the answers by message box because zi cannot open the mailbox.
Thanks for showing this part of Whakatane. Greetings. Comateam.

Nice place to show .
We had a verry nice vacation in New Zealand, thanks for showing.
Answers are send

greetings from the Netherlands

tftc nice wee earthcache found with abcdf4

As our plan change again for today
We decided to head to Whakatane
Thanks to CO for a great day

We are down in Whakatane for the long weekend to have a look around and grab caches - particularly the TMGT ones - after getting down late last night we had a nice leisurely start to the day and came over for our second find of the day. Neat place to visit and Mrs Tuolei helped me out with the cache as I was a bit unprepared but we got there in the end. Took photo with Albert the geohound which I will add when I get back to Auckland as the slowness of the wifi here has to be experienced to be believed.

Thanks for the earthcache - all good here.

We came over to Whakatane today to do the three TMGT caches that we couldn't do last time after some low life broke into our geomobile. We also wanted some more yummy corn and $5.00 for ten cobs was a pretty good deal. After completing the three TMGT's we intended to clean up the rest of the outstanding caches around the area and this was one of them. Took a while to find parking as the town was very busy. Have often looked at this lump of rock in awe. It seems to stand there all on it's own and we were not aware of its history or of the fact there was a hole right through it, so thanks for the history and geology lesson TheWonderStuff.
Have a FAV for bringing us here.

Nice location, found with MrsC on a day around Whakatane. Answers sent to CO

Found with mr c who has sent the answers thank you

Geoson and I visited this Earthcache today. An impressive rock to have in the main street! Answers have been sent to CO. Tftc. MattieH from Tassie

Had a great day here after first heading into maketu for a pie we ended up here in whakatane. We bimbled about the main town anf retrieved a cache before driving down to the end car park to wonder down the walkways amd nab a few more caches. Including this earthcache. White island was still smoking when i had a look with the binoculars. Tftc with isistibisi.

Strolled down the river to have a look at the Wairere Falls, Muriwai's Cave and this rock. Tftc with jakesrage

On the way to Kohi point. Such an interesting place and nice lookout. Tftc

A nice quick find today with Ms_KR while waiting for takeaways from the nearby Thai restaurant.

Christmas holiday road trip to Auckland. Day seven, from Gisborne to Whakatane.

Thanks to all CO's for publishing and maintaining their caches. Cheers.

Info with Karma Reprint. He tino põuri ahau no te mea te parekura kei reira/ we got this while waiting for our Thai takeaways. It was a bittersweet evening as we sat and had dinner on the balcony of the Whakatane Hotel, thinking of the Wkakari disaster. Tftc

After the evening meal, a short walk to digest.

---
Thanks TheWonderStuff for the geocache [^]
Greetings from Belgium,
Frank et Muriel

Happy geocaching

#16034

We love learning while geocaching and this cache certainly gave us interesting information. We sent the answers to the CO. Enjoyed our short walk around the area. TFTC

In Whakatane doing the TMGT series plus a few others...interesting read about caves thanks for stting this cache TheWonderstuff

We are away on a short stay with other motor home friends. We headed off caching while they did other things.This was interesting, especially being a sea cave. Luckily we had a measuring device with us. Thanks for bringing us here TheWonderStuff

Photo

Logging late. Was here with a fellow cacher today and took approximate measurements. A great idea and place for this. (Answers sent), met Julesyb as we were leaving.

I am logging using the Cachly app template so please excuse generic logging along the way. It’s just my way of keeping track, but I do genuinely thank each and every one of you cache owners for taking the time and energy to place these cache. Many Thanks for bringing me here. Cheers.

Made a mad dash to Whakatane this morning from Maketu to get the souvenir
Saw McJandals too
TFTC

Great rock with some history! We walked around and read a lot of information, and hopefully found the right one too! TFTC!!

I have some time before dinner to grab a few caches and this was one of them. Thanks for bringing me to this special location - well worthy of a cache.

TFTEC

On holiday in this area so doing a few caches while here. Great feature in the heart of the town. Answers sent to CO.

We arrived in Whakatane a bit to early to go directly to our motel. So we walked around the town first. After making some photo's I opened my geocaching app and we were right on the spot of this earthcache. We looked up the answers. Thanks for this earthcache.

Just adding a photo

Last log of the day....had to head back home to Tauranga after spending the morning at a swim comp for the kiddies....had a nice walk along the beach....got to stop and look at something educational...this was a great little centerpiece for Whakatane.
Well worth the stop, thanks - will post answers soon...

A bit quieter at night time! Thanks for the encouragement to read the plaque. Interesting learning about the history of the area.

A bit quieter at night time! Thanks for the encouragement to read the plaque. Interesting learning about the history of the area.

Enjoying a bit of an adventurous drive once more.
I am in Whakatane for a couple of days .
This amazing rock caught my eye....and I have sent my answers to the CO!
Fingers crossed!

Had a wonderful two days in Whakatane, and despite this morning's rain and storms, we still managed to get into town, visit the museum, find all the bronze kiwis, visit the cave, the waterfall, the breakwater, the sandbar, walk by the river, admire some more sculpture, see the lion... and nab this earthcache. Interesting on so many levels. TFTC TheWonderStuff

My wife sent the answers into the CO. What an interesting part of Whakatane. For some reason my image won't upload. Please ref to Nosynel's photo until I get it sorted.

After a long scenic drive from Tologa Bay to Whakatane around the East Cape today's drive will be shorter. We are driving from Whakatane to Waitomo. We decided to bike along the cycleway by the river. I was pleased that we did this earth cache. What an amazing feature. I sent off JDScout and my answers for the earth cache and the CO responded quickly.

We crossed Cook Strait using the Inter Islander on Saturday. Today is day five. We spent the full day in Gisborne yesterday day.
This Easter JDScout and I are off on an East Cape adventure. We are driving in our campervan from Christchurch. This has been something we always wanted to do. I am combining this trip with geocaching.

Sadly there is no large event in New Zealand in 2019 but there are a few Mega events planned in Australia. I plan on going to the OzGeomuster in July. To find out more visit this site: https://www.ozgeomuster.com.au

If you can't make Aussie. New Zealand will have another large event in 2020 in Auckland. I will keep you posted in my logs.
Thanks for hiding this geocache.

Lovely spot. Tftc!

Photo at Pohutaroa Rock

Did it in the dark, so added to the fun. Answers sent as requested, photo of me with essential piece of Geocaching equipment, a writing stick - phone is my GPS

Answers sent to the CO.

Excellent Earth cache

Thanks to thewonderstuff
Good fun earth cache
G’day from AUS