Australasian Bittern - Peat Lake Birds (Waikato) Ohaupo, North Island, New Zealand
By Cats&Dragons on 20-Oct-12. Waypoint GC3Z1D3

Enough Already

Cool little hiding spot, found her nice n easy. Photo may contain hint

Once I'd spotted the cache I was delighted to see the coordinates were spot on. I'd been following a group of intellectually disabled people who were taking great pleasure in being here so I walked around the lake a couple of times so they didn't spot me and try to wander here too. It gave me as much pleasure hearing their laughter and enjoyment as I walked around and I saw them trying out the activity stations as they moved around.
What a lovely place to walk and I'm sure families also love being here and not just because of the open spaces but the interactive stations as well. Def a Fav point from me today.

Dad nearly feel over it quickly realized that it wasn't a bait station.
TFTC

Thanks for the find, well hidden! 2 happy boys with their first find!

Great^^

I was ready to curse the CO for committing the cardinal geocaching sin - you know the one I mean - a certain plant? - then I spotted the clever camo. TFTC.

Have wanted to wander around these lakes for some time but they didn't seem obviously open to the public. Enjoyable walk due to well-kept tracks and information, in a place you wouldn't even know was there. TFTC.

Will add this to my best list

Great camouflage. GPS pretty accurate.

Spied it after reading a couple of previous logs so knew to leave the track. Realised we had no pen so photo log attached. Tftc!

At first it seemed to be a 'vegetational' challenge, but further scrutiny and a latitudinal approach produced results. It just required concentration to unearth certain valuable concrete facts in order to determine the whereabouts of that which we sought.
TFTC

Juty Bug & I are on a road trip from New Plymouth to Ohaupo specifically for me to pick up the nearby Earthcache on the occasion of International Earthcache Day.
Fortunately the promised weather stayed away and we had an enjoyable walk in this sanctuary Reserve. We have a similar one in Taranaki at Lake Rotokare.
JB was rapt to pick up the nearby NZ Shoveller duck that previously had eluded him twice and I grabbed both Trads while here. Just a shame the other Peat Lake birds have flown or waddled their coops. TFTC. Clever hide.

Down for the day working at the airport so headed out afterwards for a quick cache find. Not suitable footwear for the EC nearby, so will come back, but this one was all good. TFTC

A quick find but nearly ignored the obvious.

A quick find while exploring the reserve. TFTC

Very creative disguise love it!!

Glad of the gunboots today. Good size cache too! Tftc always wanted to explore this lake.

A few meters off track but A good find

A second visit to this reseve and manged to find this one. Very hot walking around here. Tftc

Back from one bird the kiwi to another but it was Australian TFTC

Came over here with a friend to collect a few smileys but didn't have a lot of luck today. However we found this one without too much effort - TFTC

Good

Was having a geocaching day with Nahkins. She was doing the driving as I have a broke elbow. We had 14 on our list. #8. Took some time to find this. Didn't know what to look for. I was looking in one place as I wasn't sure whether GPS was working properly. I turned around and there it was. SL. TFTC.

Out geocaching with NZPatoto (AKA 1 Arm Bandit.) I was doing the driving as NZPatoto has a broken elbow. We had 14 on our list. #8. Took some time to find this. Walk & Walked. Finally found by NZPatoto. TFTC.

all good

all good

Even though this cache was disabled I decided to have a look for it anyway. There was no signs warning of any pest control happening so I walked around the enclosure, the tracks were a bit overgrown. I found the cache quickly once at GZ but not bittens in sight. Tftc

First cache found with my new GPS. Picked up travel bug.

Temporarily Disabling while DOC site rodent eradication takes place

First for the day, great day to be out & about. Dropped off a TB. TFTC

My afternoon meeting was postponed to next week so I was able to leave work early and head out here for a nice walk late in the afternoon. Shame the weather wasn't a little nicer. Nevermind. I had no issues spotting the cache, was tempted by some swag but ended up resisting the urge to swap something for the Snoopy. I have enjoyed all my visits out here and will have to make the jouney at least once more.

good to go

Very conspicuous ... when you know what it is Haven't seen any birds yet, but unlike me, they are probably staying out of the hot afternoon sun. This chick ain't so smart. Cheers C n D.

Easy find after doing the nearby EC.
Nice area.
TFTC

Found together with KiwiLeon. Once saw a Bittern in the Whatipu swamp while I was looking for a cache, quite distinctive looking when they fly. The cache is very conspicuous - I think the dry weather might have made it more so. T4TC

Found this cache in a nice area, it was very well camuflaged
TFTC SL

Loved this reserve and rhe cache. Will get a fav. from us. Thanks

Out for a walk with some friends this morning, nice easy find
thanks

Nice walk, and another new place found

The slightly beaten path is the way to go.

590 Enjoyed the walk around the enclosure.

Cool lid nice camouflage TFTC

Out of action for 6 weeks due to pest control. Will inform when the lock comes off the gate.

Another great fined loved the walk around the enclosure

Having completed the fence inspection it was time to find a few geocaches. Found quickly thanks to Google Earth. TFTC

First find with my new phone. Finally got a device with GPS. Nice camo!

Another good cache find while heading to the Auckland MEGA event.

Good area but could do with more work on walkways.
SL TFTC

Nice to see all the hard work show here, great area and will return when in the summer...Thanks for setting these up...TFTC

Had planned on nabbing 4 caches here today, but settled for 3 trads.
The 4th was 18m on the other side of the impenatrable fence! And I was on orders for small walks only!
So did the 2.3km loop within the fenced area.
Wonderful wide boardwalk was admired as we headed to this cache.
Bonus - a pen on the ground nearby - that was returned to the owner at the next cache!
Great to see effort put into waterproofing this cache.

Great place to take the grandkids for a bit of Geocaching got four in this area today.
TFTC

It's all safe, hidden in full view, a great big cache with triple protected log book that was a pleasure to sign. We left Snoopy and a plane. A favourite for us.

The track is VERY muddy and there has been a new fenced enclosure built close to where we think this is. There was a lot of ground clearing and we assume the cache may have been buried amongst this. Otherwise a clue as to which side of the fence it is would be helpful.

3.30pm - Quick find even though cache was out in open. SLTFTC

A quick run around the lakes today, looking forward to seeing the progress in years to come. Dropped off a TB

It was such a great day for a walk and this was a great place to come for a bit of bird watching. Great to see all the work going on to improve the walking track around the lake. This was a reasonably quick find for us. Thank you for showing us the hidden and unknown walkway. TFTC.

Theres been a digger working here recently clearing scrub.
GC fine but it is fairly visible.
Thanks for bringing us out here.

WOW a maze within a maze

Found today in conjunction with the wet land clean up day.
Nice to put some faces to the pseudonyms.

Very enjoyable day, albeit a warm one.
This was a nice hide, tree cover and everything considered, walked in circles a bit, but you see more that way.

Out for the day with Squirrel Nutcase. What a team we made.

After pulling up a hundred stakes as our part of the clean up the lake, we went looking for the caches that are hiding around the lake. Didn't see any bitterns but with all the activity they had probably gone somewhere quieter. Nice hide. Well done Cats and Dragons. Nice to meet you.

Great day out in spite of the heat.

Happy to be able to lend a hand and now we want to try and organise something similar in Rotorua.

Out on a cache drive with Spiderhouse. A brilliant day filled with good company, a CITO, and some cache hunting in between.

The walk into this cache was not so well defined. However, we soon realised that the stakes outlined a makeshift path. Mr Spiderhouse found this with his gps. Our iPhones were not so accurate. TFTC.

After the CITO was over and everyone had packed up and gone, we had the place to ourselves for a little geocaching. However, the GPS battery was below 20% and I didn't like our chances here. Luckily I had done the Marsh Crake earlier and as soon as I spied this one I knew exactly what it was. Nice big cache here.

Wasn't sure if there was a proper path to follow, but I got there and back without having to PAF to come and rescue me. Great camo.

10253… An enjoyable bush bash to find no Australasian Bitterns… however, we did find a nicely camo’ed cache, many thanks.

After a jog/hunt/walk around Ngaroto here to get the caches

Love the hides

A cross country wander to get this - co-ords spot on. Grabbed TB. TFTC

What a beautiful area here. It was a bit of a walk in my short dress hmmmm should have put some trousers on. Nice camo, I almost fell over it, but doggies found it. hahaha
Left Passion TB

Sensing a pattern here. Followed what we thought was a path. A quick find at GZ, and going a different way and finding the "proper" path. Oops. Still fun!

Took a bit better route and again a great hide - all found quickly so far - hardest part is getting there lol TFTC

Trees provided much needed shade from afternoon sun. Bit of wading through more long grasses. TFTC.

Wow, I found the most difficult route in ever! Fellow cachers, if you get to the large sign about the Lake and the birdlife, don't go down to the right like I did - you'll thank me for it...! Cache #3 found of the series, and #3 with bang-on coordinates, thank you Cats&Dragons!

Was thinking of leaving this one for another day when I needed a cache on a calendar day. However Im just not able to leave a cache when Im so close to it so ended up grabbing.

Was a nice gentle walk to GZ and cache was spotted quickly. This lake area is really beautiful.

TFTC

Had fun grass bashing my way to these caches. Recognised the cache, so no issues here. Left BUG!

Another fantastic hide by C&D and another enjoyable walk around the lakes

Looking at the logbook for the previous cache I could see that 4 other caches had visited today so it was an easy task to follow their trail through the long grass. Doesn't look like this area gets visited very often apart from geocachers of course.
Many thanks

Another peat lake bird down and the last in the series for us. Many thanks for these caches and the informative cache pages, giving a fav for this one on behalf of all the others. Thanks

Out with team Welsh and Tufty after the event for a walk around the lake. Before these birds were protected they were keenly sought after for their feathers for tying into "Matuku style" trout flies. I still have a few from years ago when they were tied and given to me by an old boy in Taupo. It is also much prized as a table bird by the Taupo Maori. Thanks.

Trout-fly, Team Welsh and I ventured south from the event into the Peat country to locate and sign off these caches.

Lucily we were following a geocaching trail laid by the previous cachers which led us directly to the cache.

Cheers for the cache.

Found me way in , a bit wet under foot. Nice area for a walk
IN TB Pingu the Penguin

Discovered the hard way that there's more than 1 way to GZ, lol. Finally stumbled upon the geotrail (thanks, folks!) & then a straightforward find. Great camo again. Finland TB looks to have moved on already, dropped off a weta TB instead. TFTC

Joint FTF with Psychrn, very wet with all the long grass but luckily able to follow geo trail to GZ as there is no actual path.
Well hidden, I actually walked right over the cache several times during the search.
Thanks for the great effort.

Found with cosclan for a joint ftf . Nice area & education on birds. Had been eying up this location as part of my peat lake themed caches

This entry was edited by psychrn on Sunday, 28 October 2012 at 22:27:13 UTC.

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