Shelter From The Storm The Ponds, New South Wales, Australia
By Hammerman & Trixter on 21-May-11. Waypoint GC2WNTN

Stopped off for this one after work.

Tricky hide. TFTC.

After finding this one I don't see that it fits within the guidelines http://support.groundspeak.com/index.php?pg=kb.page&id=304, specifically the following point.

[quote]Geocache placements do not deface or destroy public or private property. Geocaches are placed so that the surrounding environment is safe from both intentional or unintentional harm. Keep both natural and human-made objects safe. No object or property may be altered to provide a hiding place, clue, or means of logging a find.[/quote]

The reviewer can contact me to discuss. I wont place it in a log here.

Archived due to rules.

came back twice to this one today and couldnt find it both times.. have to come back another day

Finally found myself back in the area and after having a chat about the clue with the CO at Bifrost and realised I had been on the right track, it took me less than a minute to retrieve the cache. How do you guys come up with these ideas for caches??? SL #336 and a favourite point.

Thanks For The Cache
Found while out on an afternoon caching run with the geofamily

needed a little assistance for this well built and hidden cache

Thanks you sneaky lil buggers

Found with TeamBooo, Booo Booo & Glenwarra

After meeting one of the CO's at last weeks hill's event and being given advice on what to bring we arrived at GZ and searched, Geo wife started foot taping so we took a PAF and got a better idea of what to look for and soon had CHI.

Thank you gentlemen for more hair pulling frustration.

TFTC

Cool Hide. We found this on our 2nd visit. We were almost about to give up when we found it. Thanks!

Nice hide. This one was well hidden with soem great camo. I looked high and low...thought it was something and then nothing....tried a few more things and then tried again..and bingo. wow! Nice hide. I loved the camo. another favourite.

Our 5601st overall find.

Found this one with FF today and it took us a little bit to locate, in the end it was me that put my hand on it. A tricky little hide. Though one that I'm fairly sure doesn't fit within the guidelines.

Thanks Hammerman & Trixter for the cache.

Found during a run around the area with Big Matt and Shell.

A return visit to this location and having completed a similar hide earlier in the day helped reveal it this time. A nice little hide.

Thanks Hammerman & Trixter for the cache.

I gave this one a good crack today but unfortunately it wouldn't present itself to me.

I'll be back to give it another go shortly.

Thanks Hammerman & Trixter anyway for the hunt.

After spending some time at Bifrost I decided that I needed to actually find a cache! I had previously spent some time searching the shelter so I felt that I knew the structure almost as well as the bridge from where I had come.

Since my earlier Shelter DNF I have run into both COs and they had both confirmed I'd been searching in the right area. I have also done some of their other caches, so have learned something of what they are capable of! Fortunately GZ was deserted when we arrived so GeoSon and I had the place all to ourselves. This time while looking around, a small detail was noticed, and then the cache was revealed.

Thanks H & T for another creative hide - I'll have to keep coming back to tick all the others off the list as well.

Out and about for a days caching in the hills with jk Courtz who had all ready
done this cache so it was my turn had a look around and just had the wrong spot
at first so with jK shouting words of encouragement I found the right spot, cache
retrieved signed and replaced...TFTC..H@T...

09.30am, GAFF3, this being our second attempt, today we had time to sit and think this one out without the muggle musicians. Is it up here, is it down there, is it under that ?????

After we thought we thoroughly checked everthing we decided to go back over everything, then hey, that moved.

A very sneaky hide H&T.

SL, cache in good condition.

TFTH Hammerman & Trixter

Parked the car close to the shelter and was about to get out and search, but noticed a couple cuddling there. So waited a while for them to leave - great. I walked over and wasn't looking for 1 minute when three men arrived with takeaways and took up residence. Time to look somewhere else!

Returned a bit later and had the place to myself. I looked and thought and looked some more. All I have to show for it is my second H&T DNF in one day. Oh well, now there are two reasons to return!

With eight of us here for almost 20 mins (that's a long time) and it still eluded us.
Another to add to the list for next trip.

This one eluded our group today. We searched for around half an hour but then had to leave. Will have to come back when next in Sydney.

Bugger, this was not the start we wanted for day two of our weekend raid on the Sydney burbs...

Eight hunters, more than half an hour on site and no cache... Not happy Jan. A conversation with the cache owner later in the day gave us a hint on what we missed... To put it simply, another evil H&T hide, that's what...

Hopefully we'll get back down this way some time and secure the find... [^]

Ooh, not a good start to the day, with a DNF on this notorious hide - but not unexpected either! I wish we'd have enough time to stay and search our hearts out, but with flights beckoning this afternoon, we decided to move on and leave this for a return trip sometime. On the plus side, there were no muggles to disturb the search! Thanks anyway. =^.^=

Here in the company of the MCBC - 2 of us from Vic, and 6 from Qld - on a weekend raid of Sydney caches.

Unfortunately we didn't have the time to stay longer for a more thorough search... next time!

1040am, No luck with this one this morning, muggle musicians decided to camp at the shelter for Sunday morning practice during our search.

We enjoyed the entertainment anyway and will return another day.

TFTH anyway Hammerman & Trixter

Well as Gunnie69 so succinctly put it not the start we had hoped for this morning...

Later in the day we received some hint's that made a find a chance but the tyranny of time & distance means this is left for another day...

Thanks Hammerman & Trixter

More like "beware the oncoming storm". I had 20 minutes max at GZ, the other half called and wanted a visit to the local shopping centre for the usual groceries "while you're out" and the geokid needed to be picked up at Rouse Hill in 25 "or else"... oh and it looked like it was going to rain any second, just to add to the pressure cooker atmosphere. Now where to start??
I canvased the structure at all accessible points, so I thought, and with a few minutes left, in sheer desperation, reached for the PAF option and received the directions. Now with the clock ticking and Armageddon looming it sounded something like, "Up.. down.... 2, no maybe 3, medium, small, look for square, circle, triangle...um I can't recall...." ... ahhhhhhhhhh!!!!!! [8]
No actually it wasn't quite that bad... Thanks RS for the advice
I actually enjoyed this one.
TFTH H&T
#735

A night visit with one of the COs and some earlier finders. Alfyboy and I clambered around, much to their amusement, for quite some time before picking up some vital info from earlier logs and then spotting the obvious. Thanks again H&T.

Cache Hunt 827; GAFF4; Weather, Nightime; Helpers, Baktrak, Extremepc, Steveishere, Lessue; Cache condition, Great; Find of the day, 5th; STATUS, Found; GPSr at GZ - 1m

So we drove up to this next cache and parked along the road. Baktrak and I were the only ones still to find this one, so the others amused themselves with our very thorough searching. Up, down, turn around, here, there, almost everywhere! The only up side, was that Coords are pretty spot on, so we got the slightest nod from the crowd that were were at least somewhat in the right place.

I believe a good 25min went past, with the two of us checking and rechecking many different places. Reading some recent logs, had Baktrak point at something and THEN I made the connection and 'BAM, and the cache is OURS' Finally...found the thing. Sneaky and nasty and tricky are many words I would use for H&T...BUT...This is what caching is all about! And...if you want a hint...it ain't no mint tin..BAM! TFTC.

The most challenging cache i have come across to date. After doing my best to decipher the clue, I armed myself with the several implements of destruction and bingo, CIH. Thanks, very memorable

Back here again and now at 10pm this became our 32nd find for the day. We decided to have supper here so while making the coffees and plating some snacks, geo-wife found this elusive cache. Then I had to retreat to the geo-mobile and construct a clever little device to assist it retrieving it. Well done extremepc on an excellent constructed cache. .

Scoured the shelter in a group of six for a solid 30-45 minutes. Couldn't make heads or tails of the hint. We'll return but for now it's a DNF. A slight push in the right direction would be much appreciated ^.^

Spent some time looking over all the bits with no one around, and when I think I finally found the hide and was going back to the car for a retrieval tool when muggles appeared to have lunch. at least next time i will be armed with the tools and will make short work of it.

Found with the family.

Found with the family.

We had tried for this once before and, I must admit to cursing you two. Today, armed with some clues we tried for it again. Had my other half not been there to get it, I know, without a shadow of doubt, that I would not be logging this now. He was on a roll today! TFTC- Good to get this one off our map.

I found a cache just like this a while ago and had a chat to that cache owner at a recent event. That made me want to return to this one. Even so, I didn't spot the right thing at first and failed to see what I was looking for. So I called Canary for help, but the phone dropped out before I could ask him and I got his voice mail after that. Bugger. But it then only took a few seconds more of looking and I spotted what should have been the obvious place from the start. A nicely constructed hide, but very cruel if you don't know what you're looking for. Thanks

out with geogirl, we were looking in all the wrong places at first. Thankfully, the GZ coords were SPOT ON, so we soon had the cache in hand! Fantastic hide! Nicely hidden! SLTFTC!

no luck here today

Ok how hard can a simple cache in a Picnic Shelter be.... should have know it would be harder than I though. First clue: it's a Hammerman & Trixter; Second Clue: Car of muggles nearby. Third Clue: The sudden drop in temprature causing rest of family to stay in the car's warmth.

OK so i walk around the shelter, I looked in the shelter. I looked for signs of tampering. I counted the DNF's and after reading some logs begain to form an idea... but we where on a time limit and I had no jacket on so with head held high and tail between legs I scampered back to defrost.

no luck today
will be back

Having already done one like this one today it didn't take long to have the likely spot scoped out. The retrieval took a little more messing around but after fashioning up a special Webguy patented retrieval tool we soon had the little bugger in hand.

Thanks for the cache.

1:17pm
Probably took the two of us less than 10 minutes to scour the site and turn this sucker up, no PAF required. Though, we did make it harder for ourselves than we needed to and tools needed to be created for the retrieval.

Have now done 4 of these types.

Cheers

Clue meant nothing but as I started reading out the first of the last ten logs (but when did I print it off, from which date and what direction? hehe), Charligirl had CIH within seconds of arriving at GZ. Clever hide that should have taken a lot longer and could easily resulted in a DNF.

Would of spendat least 30mins here trying to find this one. Can we have a hint please

TFTC, great hide, cheers:)

No luck here for me.

What a ripper! Fantastic spot, well disguised. Loved this one.

Tricky. Cache well constructed. Tftc.

Found it.

I spent pretty much the majority of my lunch hour around GZ, looking, looking, thinking, looking, looking... I still don't get the hint!

Arrived at gz and there was a car full of muggles near gz. Had a look around without looking too suss but decided we could not do a more thorough search. Will come back another day it nite.

second time looking, again no luck!

third time lucky! well hidden cache!
TFTC, found with benny.t

After my series of DNFs and time spent getting familiar with the shelter, I contacted the CO for a hint. With this extra clue in mind went back to the shelter and soon enough had CIH. Thanks for this very seamless cache.

After all the recent finds for this cache I thought I'd give this one another go. Arriving at GZ looked high and low, trying to spot something that may look different since last visit. Still no luck.This is a tricky one.

Returned for a second go at this one encouraged by the found log of Gazmag. Even so we looked and looked in the same spots as last time before finally making the find. Don't know how many times I must have looked at that. Pretty quiet there for a Sunday so we didn't have muggle trouble. Signed and replaced. Glad to convert a DNF to a found.
Thanks!

My 3rd trip to this one and finally got it... Needed my handy removal tool to get to the cache ..................
Very nicely done
SL
TFTC

After my DNF yesterday I was very please to make contact with one of the COs for this cache. He very kindly made a few thing clear to me and after a look on Google Earth it was back out there this morning to do the business.

Arriving at GZ again and with better information than before, the search began. I checked a few locations and then remembered another cache which was of similar design. Dingo!! What a very well designed and placed cache, for most of the world can look right at it and not know it's there. Fantastic

Tks ... Hammerman, Trixter and extremepc ... GazMag

#811

DNF

Yes well that's a DNF for me today. My only consolation is that I'm in company with a lot of very good cachers, who also could not find it. Think I'm grasping at straws!!

Tks ... Hammerman & Trixter ... GazMag

Hammerman went and did a cache check and all is well, still there, hiding in plain sight.

First DNF for the day and we should have known if we wanted to clock up some numbers not to rely on quick finds of H&T caches! Had a good look in all what I thought were the right places but no luck.
One to return to.
Thanks.

no luck!

Had another look for this cache although school kids were approaching the park fast and had to bail. Will look again soon.

2nd day still no joy. Know where to look but not where it is.

No idea about the clue, so I sat around thinking and thinking... still no idea. I'll be back!

HAd the clue sorted and used my PAF but still had problems .... BUT had good fun searching

maybe another day

As I drove up to this one I saw a family near GZ with what appeared to be picnic stuff all over one of the picnic tables. Well I thought I would try anyway, and as I got closer they seemed to be very interested in the structure, aha, cachers!
It was Team Sunderland, so we teamed up, and with my paf info and their help we soon had the little critter in our hands.
By the way the picnic stuff on the table was left over beer from a booze party, they even left an unopened 6 pack of bottled beer behind, a next to find prize I guess. Thanks Hammerman & Trixter.

This entry was edited by Rainbow Spirit on Monday, 25 July 2011 at 00:02:16 UTC.

This entry was edited by Rainbow Spirit on Monday, 25 July 2011 at 03:01:24 UTC.

This entry was edited by Rainbow Spirit on Monday, 25 July 2011 at 03:01:49 UTC.

wow what a hide, finaly found this one with rainbow spirit thanks to the co for the extra clue.

After an extensive search I had to PAF and then the clue became evident and the cache was in sight.The work you put into your caches is extraordinary and they are caches to look forward to.Although they can be frustratingly well hidden.Another fantastic hide TFTC SL

its been 4 trips to this cache 3hrs in total i think i need another hint from the co,i shall return.

Shelter From The Storm was transferred from extremepc to user Hammerman & Trixter

I was well on the way to finding this one, it was what I thought it would be and after a P.A.F I confirmed what I thought. However time got the best of us today and the particular one to check just wouldn't show itself..I will return.

Unlike some cachers (based on their logs), I was able to make sense of the clue soon after reading it, but it still took me a while to make the actual find. A well hidden cache, worthy of the caching challenge, thanks.
One note to future cachers, there is one knot in the wood that has many "digout" marks around it, but it is NOT the hiding spot (just trying to avoid more damage to that spot).
Lucky for me no-one was at the park, and the cars passing were all busy learning to drive, so ignored me under the shelter.

Even with some telephonic help on this one I came up without the find. I will return.

i spent a good 40mins on this one due to the night time antics of the young after hours muggles who kept interupting my search tonight,i think i will need some time on this one,i shall return.

#for today: 3, TOD: Night, Conditions: Fine, Cache Condition: Excellent, Others: Nil, Notes: Nil.

I couldn't help myself after meeting the CO at another cache tonight and receiving a couple of clues, I headed over to this cache (instead of going to the gym).

Made quite a quick find although retrieval required a bit of ingenuity.

A really clever hide and construction - well done Extreme. Gets a favourite from me!!!

SL TFTC

Stopped at the owner's house on the way here. We offered him some entertainment so he came with us. We surely entertained him looking for this one. Eventually he helped us along.

I think the difficulty needs a cranking up on this one. Well hidden!

TFTC.

Tried again on an early morning ride. Again no luck.

I started to get that sinking feeling after about 15minutes that this was going to be tough. Searched for another half hour and decided to call it quits and go on to hopefully greener pastures as the night was getting late.
I'll be back. Have no idea about the hint??:(

This entry was edited by Purplepeopleater on Saturday, 02 July 2011 at 11:25:01 UTC.

After getting a slightly better hint from the CO, I soon had the cache in had and I couldn't believe how similar this cache is to something on my mind. Oh well back to the drawing board.
I had worked out most of the hint, just not the beginning. Thanks Extremepc for the extra hint.
Cheers
dkmacca

Now this the second time I've been here after reading the hint and thinking it might be something that we consume. No it's not what I thought it would be, so I checked again everywhere and still no success.
Cheers
dkmacca

Happy to make this one my 200th find! TFTC.

We pondered on where it could be hidden while we ate our lunch at the shelter. After a fairly extensive search we decided to move on only to be bamboozled by the next two as well! We will be back!

had fun trying to find this one with 3stars...tftc

What a top hide....wouldn't expect anything less from extremepc.....and yes we too now know this shelter very well.....we didn't find the hint helpful either....good luck to the next victim you'll need it.....TFTC.....

Wow what a hide. We were determined not to give up on this one as we have heard of how hard it was. Great hide tftc

This evening was my third search in the two days (two nights, actually) at this site, and I can tell you that I've got to know the famous 'shelter' very well indeed!

I actually gave up this evening, and tried to PAF, but couldn't reach either of my two friends. So I was forced to soldier on by myself, employing my 'brute force search' method! (The CO's new 'hint' is still a mystery to me. I have no idea what it means!)

When I finally located what I was looking for, I think I was well into my third hour of intensive shelter examination.

Anyhow, this geocache was a good one, to say the least. As always, when you find a cache, it looks a bit easier . . . I'll be interested to see how often this one is found.

The container was in good shape and the log scroll was dry. TNLNSL.

Many thanks to extreme_pc. I'll leave a 'favourite' point as soon as I accumulate another one.

This is a cache to remember . . .

I made two separate searches for this cache this evening, so probably should log two DNFs!

First I had a 40 minutes look by myself, only to give up when two young couples showed up at 'the shelter' and hold an impromptu 'party' of some kind.

Then I ran into Steveishere at the new cache at The Ponds, and we decided to drive back and try again.

Same result!

We had a very, very good look around -- this second time for me more or less undisturbed by visitors -- although a few cars drove by and a few stopped.

Good one, extremepc . . . Will be very interested to discover the hiding place. We thought we looked absolutely everywhere.

Ok so after bumping into pjmpjm back at the other cache we decide to try and find this one with a good chance of another FTF.
After looking every where and I mean every where my torch went flat and my back went out so that is 80 mins combined with no result.
Well done. but a clue would help.
Steveishere

As I was driving back home I noticed a red car at the Ponds cache that I just FTF on so I thought why not go and see if it was a Cacher?
I drove into the car park and met who??? the CO of course and Dragonsj so after telling him our story he told me that he should check if it was still there so we drove back to this cache GZ. I was distracted by Dragonsj while extrempc went to check for it. With the all clear I had to go back and look for this.
So with not much to go on I was told were the GZ was and I spent the next 15 mins being larrrrrffed at while searching for this nemeses. Until I found it with a ????. So I bet you want a clue from me well all I can say is the clue I got from the CO is the one I think he is going to add to the description.
I feel bad that pjmpjm was not with me so I will be giving him an extra clue for all his all his efforts.Once again it was a pleasure in meeting you pjmpjm.
Now as for extrempc well I told him what I think of him [:0] it was great to meet dragonsj as well, these two guys put together are a hand full. I do look forward to the next hide from them. Very clever in deed.
Oh did I mention that I was ***FTF*** yeee harrr 2 in one night that will do me!
SL TFTC
Steveishere

Logging this more as a formality. It was great to meet Steveishere. I'm sure at some point he wanted to kick my and the CO's asses with all the encouragement we were providing ....or was that laughter.... Steve great meeting you, PJM sorry we missed you . TFTC Extremepc

Yep this is the clue that I got ???
Steveishere

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