Train School (Canterbury) Christchurch, South Island, New Zealand
By TheStationMaster on 19-Feb-14. Waypoint GC4YWTT

Unique puzzle and cache hide.Found with Baktrak despite doggie friends.Thanks TheWanglers

Hmm, you live and learn. Another we'd solved in past weeks and we came prepared for the find. I went with the GPS but after having no luck for a while, Mummypenny too a digaonally opposite approach and quickly spotted where we needed to get to. Thanks TheWanglers.

Solved this one quite a while ago, but when I realised the area the cache would be in sounded too hard. Recently I asked a friend for a hint so I could find it quickly, and then came with Maus1 a couple of weeks ago to suss it out. We soon spotted the cache, and then made a plan for retrieval. Today there were some muggles about, both of the hi vis vest variety and the dog walking variety, so we waited until the dog walkers left and then hi vis vest ones were distracted then went over with our retrieval aid, quickly retrieved, signed and replaced the cache. Success!

Thanks to Osc for the heads up that this cache is indeed still in place (on other side of things)I was able to avenge my dnf from about a year ago. I did a recce the evening before to figure out specifically what would be needed, rigged up a simple but effective contraption, grabbed my tall muggle partner and headed back to make the find and sign tonight. An interesting puzzle and hide even after all these years.TFTC

It is so long since we solved this puzzle that we don't recall what was involved. Today we went for a look, but were unable to see the cache, then discovered the terrain rating, and decided that even if we could spot the cache, retrieving it would probably be beyond a couple of geriatrics.

Found with ObnoxiousSpaceCat after attending an event and getting a couple of others nearby. Bit of a tricky retrieval/replace but we got there in the end, TFTC!

Absolutely chuffed to get this one signed off! I had struggled with the puzzle for a bit, for no good reason because I knew what was required but couldnt get the checker to agree. I stopped by with GummiVenus after the Mt Pleasant event (happy 10000th Jude_E and ivss_xx!). We quickly caught on to how its hidden but couldnt spot it. I made a check on the other side and spotted it straight away. With no TOTT on hand, we made do. We tried to send GV up first but we were structurally unsound so we switched. She got me in position and it was still out of reach. I used a certain attribute of my phone case and had it in hand. Signed, replaced. Over the moon to finally get this lovely DT combination. Great puzzle and cache. Thanks CO!

I solved this puzzle quite a while ago- easy once I found the correct source material.

I have been to GZ twice, with two different sets of extra eyes and some pretty thorough searching with head lamps and other TOTT and cannot see a cache.

No finds for over 2 years- I think it may be missing

This sure took a while to work out for this student, sure helps finding the correct info. Very happy to get the green tick. Out today with a group and the necessary TOTT to find you. We were all very happy to sign this log. Thanks for the cache TheStationMaster.

Have to give a big thankyou to Coconuts3 for the solve of the puzzle. Group find and sign this afternoon, several of us joined up and had a fantastic time. TFTC

Continuing group caching with the lovely Coconut3 team, busy paws et al - it was great to be able to claim this cache.
Thank ou for the puzzle and the cache, TheStationMaster.

A joint effort on a great afternoon of caching.

We found this on the way down from finding GCKDAR Morgan’s Valley with NosyNel and Jude_E. We had a great adventure.

Signed NE (I think -I was rather tired). A favourite given for the puzzle and for the location of the container -excellent. T very much FTC.

***[======== NZ Mega 2020 ========](http://nzmega.com)***

Planning for the [NZ Mega 2020](http://nzmega.com) event is well underway. It will be held in Auckland over Labour Weekend, 23 to 26 October 2020. It's going to be a massive celebration of geocaching:

* 20 years of geocaching worldwide.
* 20 years since New Zealand had the very first geocache hidden outside of USA.
* And it's 2020 - all the 20s!

Talk to your geo-friends and start planning to be part of [this event](http://nzmega.com) - you won't want to miss it!

Look out my friend Ethness is in town. We had just got back from a mega adventure up to Morgan's walk. Then we arrived at the gz at a perfect time. Thanks TheStationMaster for placing this geocache it is find 8175 for me.

Sadly there was no large event in New Zealand in 2019 but there are a few Mega events planned in Australia. New Zealand will have another large event in 2020 in Auckland. 
======== NZ Mega 2020 ========
Planning for the NZ Mega 2020 event is well underway. It will be held in Auckland over Labour Weekend, 23 to 26 October 2020. Thanks for hiding this geocache.

Day 4 in Christchurch for the long weekend with the crew from Dunedin and South land. On the list for the day of finds to find. Found with KJR, TFTC

In Christchurch for the long weekend with some of the crew from Otago and Southland. Today was spent targeting specific caches with Gadget169 before heading home. This was one to fill in our D/T grid and it was solved very easily from home. Knowing the area somewhat after numerous visits to Ferrymead as a child I had an idea of where this was going to be. Sure enough on arrival at GZ my assumption was indeed correct and with a bit of manoeuvring with a "special tool" Gadget169 soon had cache in hand...very clever! TFTC

One of our targets at the moment is to fill our D/T Grid. We were down here for a few days break and though we had some time and so we headed off to GZ arrived to a not so nice day but had a bit of a search but once I had a bright idea it all became visible. YES not only a smiley on here but on our faces too. Quickly signed and put back before the next waves of muggles came thru. TFTC

Looked last night while staying in Woodend at our D/T grid and a quick search flagged this cache as being an option - so set about the solve which would have been much easier if the Geochecker with the right numbers punched in (on Both mine and Stretch0's laptop) gave us a wrong - so we went back and wasted a lot of time not finding any alternate answer - re punched in the same figures into Geochecker and it gave me a correct - go figure !! So today even with it raining we decided to go for it - hoping that the logs saying we didn't need a ladder where correct - spent a little time toing and froing before Stretch0's bright idea paid off and we had a cache in our hands -Stretch0 lived up to his name log signed and cache returned to its hiding place - Smiles all round Thanks for the puzzle and the cache

I have been sitting and waiting (not literally) for a suitable occasion for this one, and today we stopped by with the whanau! Youngest one did the honours of retrieving! Very cool, TFTC!!!

Have looked at this one and put it to one side. Received a very helpful shunt from a fellow student and answers found and test passed. Took a bit of shunting back and forth but finally got into position to be able to sign the log and replace back in its station. Thanks W for the help. TFTC

Had to have a head's up once the web page disappeared, but once found the answers came quickly. Enjoyed the puzzle and the chase. Went prepared and did not need much in the way of extras. Appeared at GZ on a Sunday thinking it would not be busy!! Wrong;--every man and his dog (literally) going walkies. Had to explain caching more than once to passers by. Thank you T.

Solved this a long time ago but couldn't find it. Today being Easter Monday and relatively quiet I was able to spot the elusive cache. I brought a ladder so no issues and pretty much muggle traffic free. Phew! Thanks for the hide!
#4123

We were in the area with a ladder for another cache (which was again a DNF), so this time well prepared. But did not need it at all. Replaced the cache as found, but assume it must have been harder to reach when placed. Thanks for the puzzle and the cache.

Found with Trifolia Argentea on the last day of my holiday in Christchurch. I have picked up a trackable that wants to visit different train-related caches, and TA suggested a visit to the Heathcote valley before I took the train trackable to Australia.

Train School: TA needed this one for a particular challenge, so it was a must have! Reading the description and logs, we brought a ladder just in case we needed it to retrieve the cache (imagine the sight that would be - the street was much busier than I thought it'd be!). Fortunately, it was much less unreachable than we'd feared; indeed as a tall person I could probably have reached it simply by jumping. In the event TA gave me a boost to retrieve it.

TFTC!

Found with Ilmari the Red. Given the logs we had brought a ladder in the car just in case but it would have been far too exposed, with lots of traffic and muggles in the area! In any case the last person had left it not so high that we could not get it by quick team effort. TFTC

Found today with some help from Mr Weka, as we didn’t quite have it worked out correctly! ??? Silly us! Headed off to the final and Mr Juju had to put Bworm08 on his shoulders to grab the cache!! Soon had the log signed and replaced where we found it. Not too busy along this road today so we were able to search unhindered. TFTC

Found after a little bit of help from Mr Weka today, I spotted the hide first. Caching with JuJu54 and Ralf06 today. TFTC

Found with juju54 and Bworm08 after a bit of help from Mr Weka today TFTC

We were passing by today and would have been rude to not stop and collect this solved one. A quick gander around and it was spotted. Then a bit of help from Karma Reprint and it was in my hand. Not sure how I'd do that on the solo but not a problem today. Cheers, a fun puzzle.

When we lived in the UK I used to commute to work by rail so I have a bit of a soft spot for trains.
I knew that the retrieval of this one would probably pose a problem for me but, as I had the tallest family members in the car, I thought it would be doable.
We took a detour on our way home from Sumner and parked up right by GZ. I quickly spotted the cache and they worked together to do the rest. TFTC.

As my family were associated with British railways (GNR, LNER, BR) for about 130 years, they'd be turning in their graves if I didn't get this one! Hopefully be down to collect on my New Year road trip (oh, the shame - ROAD trip!).

Over from the UK with my wife, parents and daughters to celebrate my 50th birthday. We are in NZ for Christmas with friends in Hawkes Bay.

I am trying to complete my DT grid using just unkown cache types. This is one of just 4 combinations left that I need. I have seen a similar puzzle to this in my home city in the UK. So the puzzle was straight forward to solve. Today we enjoyed a trip in the gondola. Then the rest of the family headed back to our accommodation whilst my eldest daughter came with me to look for this cache in order to help with its retrieval. Once at GZ I had an idea of where it may be hidden and I spotted it in about the 6th place I checked. Then I got my daughter on my shoulders to retrieve it. Not done that in many years as she is now 25. It had been replaced fairly high so even so was hard to reach but we got it. Then dismounted to sign the log before repeating the process to replace it. TFTC

If my daughter piggyback in order to reach this at Geocache from its hiding spot

#8336 @0805
The first find while on a caching mission with AngelG27, Fox in Jox and IVSS_XX to find as many of the D/T81 caches as possible in a day. I easily solved this about 3 years ago, but wasn't equipped to retrieve it. Back in Christchurch for a few days, and as we were passing, and being equipped with a human ladder, we took the opportunity to grab this. It took a while to find it as the GPS was jumping around, but then it was a quick retrieve, sign and replace. TFTC.

8:03
FITW TikvaNZ, Fox in Jox, AngelG27 [Team F.A.I.T.]

Our warm-up find for the D/T series day. Took some time to spot the container. First, we found a packing slip with enclosed delivery docket for the metal constructions here. It was conveniently located at about the same class as the cache, just a different seat. But with more poking around we finally got the right seat for the cache and it was soon at hand with a little elevation of Fox in Jox from our side.
Got to say I was a bit confused about the puzzle at first but it was just the matter of reading the bold words more carefully.

#5245

AngelG27, TikvaNZ and I have travelled from Canberra to find caches from the D/T 81 Series that we had managed to solve by ourselves, or as a team (some with nudges along the way from COs or previous finders). We were joined by IVSS_XX, so we decided to log as team F.A.I.T. for brevity.

This was the first and the warm-up act on the way south. TikvaNZ had solved this a while back, so I have now completed a post-find solve. Didn't take long once I had located the right research spot.

At GZ, we roamed a bit, until TikvaNZ spied the container. I was elevated to the collection point for a quick sign. TFTC The StationMaster

Cache 2985 on 2/10/17

This trip to NZ was long planned, with the DT 81 series the main focus. TikvaNZ, Fox and I did lots of puzzle solving in preparation, many solved individually, but others solved cooperatively and some with a little push. Today was the day to make good on our solves and we headed out with Ivss_xx (signed as FAIT) to collect a stack of them. It was a long day, but we grabbed around 50 of them, with a few others thrown in for good measure. Unless otherwise indicated, caches were found in good order and in accordance with the hint.

A quick solve, but a tricky find. We did need elevation to the top of the class to log this one.

Thanks TheWanglers for the cache!

Oh, THAT side. The GPS seemed sure it was the other one. Plenty of potential assistance nearby, but no pen, so I'll leave it for another night.

A quick solve and find. All quiet on a sunny Sunday.

Found on a quiet weekend caching around Christchurch.

Thanks to all the CO's for their hides.

Nearest cache to home so better crack on and solve. Went out in the middle of a drizzly afternoon and collected no problem.

Reperio at 2335.

Day 2 of my New Zealand caching tour in the lead up to the NZ mega, and the day started out nice and early to finish off the horse series, and find a few others along the way. This was the final cache for the day, and although it was late when I arrived at GZ, I was greeted by electrical workers fixing the street lights 50m away. As I was headed out to do the D/T series tomorrow, I decided to wait it out, and so after approximately 45mins later, they left, and I had the place to myself. I wandered over to GZ and soon saw the problem at hand...so with a bit of applied friction in the right spots, I worked my way up to make the retrieval. Jumped back down to sign the log, and then repeated the process to replace it. A fun little challenge indeed.

Gratias TheWanglers.

Learnt some things, had a helping hand, then snatched the cache. TFTC

Had an enjoyable couple of hours caching with Bald Ed. We came prepared with the right equipment to attack Dead Man - but the said came in useful for this one too - although Ed showed me another retrieval method. Last time I was out here, this area was closed off for road works, so good to get this one off the tracks.

I passed the "extrance exam way back near publication and today I thought I was going to graduate train school, but I flunked the final exam so will have to resit that part. You'll know why . We'll be back and hopefully a lot sooner than it's taken for this attempt. Interesting and I had fun with CatMad9 in our failed efforts. We'll be back

21/08/2014 07:49PM
# 4630
I think I left the couch today less times than I can count on my hands... so not feeling too flash!

There was no way the streak was being broken though - never!
So once the fiancee was home from work, and we had had dinner, it was time to go head out for a cache. And what better cache to get on a sick day than a high terrain one!

Haha, well, I figured from the logs that the only way I'd be able to get this one was if we worked together, so may as well find it when we are both going together now!

Still though, we barely made it together! But we did!! So yay!

Consec caching day # 655

TFTC!!

----------------------------------
For more info on the next NZ mega event, and to pre-register, go to:
www.nzmega2015.com

Back for another visit today and this time better prepared to do battle with a devious hide. The last time I visited, it was late evening and I felt really exposed searching about with my torch. People kept walking past during which time I tried looking nonchalant which is not easy when you were shining a torch about a few seconds before. Thankfully smartphones help as you can pretend to be up to something.

So before departing this time, I stopped by my laboratory for tools. Yes, I have a lab, but I only use it for good caching. Then off to look for the cache. Thwarted in daylight. Sigh. Finally armed with more, I went looking and I have no idea how I kept missing it. Tools out. Wait for muggles. Log signed. Wait for muggles. Cache replaced. Tools to the car and wonder why none of the muggles challenge me because they must be wondering. Sitting in the car when a pack of muggles approaches and begins to do work in the area. Whew. Just got it then in time or I would have had to return again.

Cheers TheWanglers!

#7429. We teamed up with Lo Vista for a couple of TW caches before heading to a TW-organised event. GZ has changed a lot since I was last here. Took a bit of searching before I spotted the container, and it turned out we had come suitably equipped (a result of good training?). TFTC.

We had arranged to meet up with Lo Vista at GZ before the Frosty event for a joint assault on this cache, hoping we had the appropriate tools with us. Took a wee bit of to-ing and fro-ing before StreetWalker spotted the hide (nicely camoed) and he soon had the cache in hand. Took a wee bit longer to replace, though, but once StreetWalker took Lo Vista's advice, it wasn't too hard.
This was a must-do cache for us as it fills another blank square in our D/T grid. TFTC.

I was obviously in the right train of thought when this puzzle was published but decided to leave the find until in area, like today between CO's 2 events.
Had arranged to meet SW&T team in case I wasn't up to the task on my own. Fortunately SW made a great Station Master & took charge of retrieving cache, while Troodles & I had quite an easy ride on this.

oooh I found this one early last month but got distracted and forgot to log it so here it is, I did have some fun at the GZ, but manged to find the right tool to complete the mission, TFTC. Cheers Bo

Ain't it amazing what one can learn whilst geocaching? My studying at Train School was obviously very good as I received the excellent mark of 100%correct from the examiner. Was passing by as I made my way home from caching nearby. Mmmmm.Where is the cache? After a little tooing and froing I spotted something. Just as well I had my geocaching equipment with me. Thanks for the cache.

Got it! Solved the puzzle easily then, ignoring the CO's advice in the cache description, headed to the GZ. Nope. Not getting THAT on my own. Saw Tim at a local event and told him off (tongue in cheek though, really)
Today we made the assault as a team. An attempt was made as a daddy daughter gymnastics team but no joy, then we decided to make use of the Prado. It worked! Log signed, we high-tailed it out of there before we got questioned.
TFTC

Hmm, puzzle solved, GZ near home, FTF gone and tomorrow's a dot day. I think it can wait 24 hours!

FTF 10am.
Nice puzzle...as for the hide: Mrs G doth say "argh, Tim's a nuisance"

TFTC. This cache title caught my eye this morning as I am attempting to get more caching training going. I have not been doing much solving of puzzles over the last few months and it is taking a bit of re schooling to get back into gear. This was a pleasant wander about the key board. I have to confess one of the red marks was me - less haste and more speed was required! Anyway a cool puzzle framework. I am impressed with your creativity MrTW.
Having gained a green tick I decided to investigate in the cool of the early evening - the opportunity to have company presented itself and resulted in 4 big kids looking about at GZ. The coords were a bit to one side and had us looking here there and everywhere - nothing to be seen. I have to put that down to the really bad light or maybe failing eyesight by all of us. A phone call to CO for a hint and we moved our focus - RogoWhiz noted something out of place. How could we have missed it earlier? We were prepared and soon had a log signed with our group being second to find.
A favourite vote from me.
Thanks TheWanglers for more fun and games for us big kids.
#3172

Published