A Touch of Gold Sebastopol, Victoria, Australia
By davidt on 13-May-01. Waypoint GC930

As there's been no cache to find for months, I'm temporarily archiving this to keep it from continually showing up in search lists. Just contact us when you have the cache repaired, and assuming it still meets the guidelines, we'll be happy to unarchive it.

This cache seems to be missing and needs to be archived. The last three visits (way back in March/April 2004) are DNFs, and the owner hasn't visited the site since 15 April 2004, when he presumably 'temporarily' disabled it.

Searching area, geoharps & spice of life geocachers arrived as well all searched with no result.Area graded,trees felled etc ? cache dammaged or relocated,needs to be checked by davidt.

Came across the Hall family when looking for this cache. With Team Geoharps, the Hall Family and half the Spiceoflight team, we had 9 people all looking under every bush that was left standing after grading and harvesting the area. What wasn't disturbed by muggles in the area was scrutinised intensely by the combined teams.... No luck!

This was my last attempt for the day before getting back to go out to see 42nd Street, which we greatly enjoyed. The road has been newly graded over where ground zero is and I could find no evidence of the cache. I hope this is just displaying my ineptitude at the search though.

Thanks davidt,

Peter

Lots of rubbish around this one. Co-ords out slightly but found it OK. This cache needs a pen as if there was one in there it has gone walk-about. We took a padlock and left a rubber ball. [8)]

My 3rd cache for the day. So glad this didn't take me as long to find as my previous 2. Found this cache at 1050am. Swapped 2 padlocks for 2 photo frames. Like the previous visitor said the area the cache is in is surrounded by rubbish. What a shame some people have no respect for the beautiful out doors. I'm sure this area would look quiet spectacular without the rubbish. Loved the container you used. Changed the rude comments that were on the log book to flowery comments. Looks quiet good now .
Thanks Davidt for the cache.

Found by stumpyspud & Lisa and Jeremy on our first day of caching

(aka lisa and jeremy) we found this one with stumpyspud

Maybee you have to live in Ballarat to enjoy this one? For an outsider who's just driving by it seemed like a rough place (junk every where in the forest).

No swaps.

The area looks superb with the broome flowering and providing that Touch of Gold. We thought the cache was about 13m from where we thought it would have been however it may have been moved to make it more difficult for the yobs to find. Took the chocies and left a screwdriver. Thanks davidt.

[last edit: 11/13/2002 5:58:30 PM PST]

Co-ords a bit out for this one, but still easily found. Unfortunate that it gets raided by someone, but at least they only steal stuff and write offensive notes, rather than destroying or removing the cache completely. The pea flowers in bloom certainly did provide a touch of gold, very spetacular.

Couldn't take a photo as the camera was gone, but swapped the post-its with some froggy energy boosters.

Team frogger

Found By Team Piggy (SA).
Had to look for ages for this one, was totally invisible even when right on it ! Good cover job by last finder !
Took keyring, left ?? something !

Found this one as my fourth of seven for the day. Once I found the right road to take, finding the cache was easy.

That's one solid container for a cache. Well done.

No Swap was made. Thanks for the cache, davidt.

First find for us. Cache in good condition.

Found at about 1450 on our caching holiday from Adelaide. Walked in from the main road, found the cache after a short search - it was quite exposed when looking from the right angle.

It took a bit of effort to get the lid off, once inside it appears that someone has raided the cache - there were some obscene comments on the back of the logbook, but most of the cache contents seemed to be intact.

Took a spider magnet, left a BP keyring from Allan Ostock B and a blue monster. Tried to hide the cache a little better before we left, but there was limited material in the area for us to use.

Thanks for the hunt!

Found at 1800 by Mary & David, on last light with torch on standby. Took Rosebud box with small bracelet and left spider magnet and no junk mail sticker. What a great container! Thanks davidt

Relieved to find that other people drove to this cache! Lots of rubbish and charred branches has spoiled the area. Great container, took a mantis and left a magnetic chess game.

[last edit: 2/28/2003 4:10:13 AM PST]

User's web page
Found easily, impressive container.
No exchange made

Found 14:15. Nice cache container! Took kid's sunnies and left mantis.

Found by Kevin & Meredith at 2.00pm
Interesting cache container that was very exposed.
An easy find but co-ords were approx 10 m out
Took key rings and put in Golf ball
We covered cache with branches and leaf litter.

Surrounding area was littered with rubbish - shame for a pretty area

K&M

After a late lunch on the shore of Lake Wendouree we could not figure out the best approach to this one so we just followed the GPS. This turned out to be great fun as it took us twisting dirt road that looks like the locals used for rally driving. The strange thing about this route was every time we approach a fence thinking we would have to turn around. But only to find someone had made a hole in the fence so they could drive through. This path led us straight to the cache.

Nice one, davidt.

User's web page
We practically drove right over the cache! Thanks for the massage, Port0076. Pictures on our website.

User's web page
Found by Team GeoCoopers. Were looking forward to taking our pictures with the in-cache camera but looking at the logs it's long gone. Took a Party Popper to help celebrate the end of 2001 and left a Massager. Before we leaving we hid the cache under some loose branches as it was quite visible to non-cachers.

User's web page
Our Third and Fifth cache for the day - couldn't find it the first time after 30 mins of searching..

Received an APRS message from David as we were leaving Bunnies&Beyond - we were pretty much on top of him! Spoke to him simplex, and mentioned that we couldn't find the cache.. - went and had dinner, then got back to the car to find another APRS message confirming that the cache was still there, so went off to have another look.. - thanks David

This time, the GPS led us straight to it - about 30m from where we were initially looking.. grrr.

Mel popped a party popper, and left something (yes, my memory sucks), we wrote in the logbook, then covered it up with lots of wood and grass with about a 5cmx5cm section visible end-on.

Found by Jo&Damien Jnr Gardner, Peter&Karen&Melanie Roach.

A great end to a great day!

'73s

VK2TDG Mobile VK3

Second of the Ballarat quadrella, this was a neat little cache, using the poly pipe container - swapped a toy butterfly for keyring holder. Still in good condition.

Didnt like the mossies and realised we could have driven closer to the spot but it was fun ducking the local bikies and keeping the cache secret, allthough it has allready been found by some not so nice people who have left a note for the rest of us on back of the log book, the cache was in good condition. Gps was about 15m out. Took the puzzle which kept the kids and adults amused as we journeyed to the next cache.

User's web page
Found by Dave, Ross, Sandra, Sofie & Ian on Sunday afternoon. We kinda brute forced this one, approaching from the west (I think) and driving the Subaru up/down some rather dodgy mud trails. The cache was well concealed but not too hard to find. Not so good to see was the amount of rubbish that had been dumped in the area by some inconsiderate people. We took nothing and left nothing but a log entry.

Found this one with the embi team.

Number 3....somebody stop us.....this is infectious......this one proved tricky...only because we had looked at the last log... George (Kylies husband) joined us on his lunch break for this one. We did find the cache after deciding to look in the area that we were supposed to and can reassure everyone that this one is in its proper location.....once again cant say enough about the Garmin etrex.....right on target....this is a good cache...good strong and sturdy. It does seem to have been found by a non ceocacher but is safe and sound despite some minor language on the back of the log book. I spoke to the owner of this one and he had been out to check it as well.
We took one of the wire toys and a Eureka pencil and left a mini shovel (for the gold mining fairies) and a TY beanie baby butterfly

Once again a sucessful find. Were off to number 4 Where the eagles soar

Mark, Bec, Kylie, George, Zach and Jess

Last for the day. Hard to find. Think the location might have been off a bit? Parked the car when the GPS said 100m away, turned out to be next to the car!!! Duh!! Think some non-geocachers might have found this one, it was just sitting on the ground, uncovered. There was no camera and there was some bad language on the logbook. Amy loved the pencil case and so left 2 wire puzels. Terry took the eraser and the last milky way and left 2 toys. I put a few more logs over it when we left. The owner might like to think of a better place to hide this one, its very exposed. The pipe is a great container. We are off home after this one, and will tell mum all about it.
Ben, Amy and Terry.

Found it with no great problem about 1230 Saturday pretty well spot on the coordinates. It's an excellent container, sturdy & waterproof. There was no camera there unfortunately so no happy snaps. I took the Eureka booklet, interesting, and left a folding ruler. After covering the container as it was I went for a wander among the mullock heaps trying to imagine the scene 150 years ago.
Thanks.
- Alex

Hi David, We found this Geocache with the use of the Wanderers GPS. Found it with ease and noticed it had been visited on the same day by Tony & John. Must have just missed them.
Great spot.
Took the clock and left Key holder. Darn, would have enjoyed the 'milky way'.

Found by Ross (Wesburn) & Diana (Junee NSW).

Excellent cache container and contents. Found this one after doing the Medieval cache. Took a Eureka cloth patch and left a clock.

Tony and John.

Found in the company of pyrenees kid as part of my introduction to this great sport. A recent weekend trip to this area reminded me of this so i thought i would add a log of my own.
thanks davidt

[last edit: 4/13/2003 8:18:06 PM PST]

After 2 days of dirty weather we woke up to find Sunday had come up with the goods. The sun was bright and the cold had lifted. We followed the GPS after having hidden our 2nd Cache for the weekend. Medievil Brierley along with Bunnies & Beyond were our effort for the weekend, check then out. After having approached from the public accesss viewing area we decided to see how close we could get from another diretion. After just about parking the car on top of it and a restart of the GPS my Daughter Charlotte found your Cache. It is in great condition and i took a group shot of everyone (24 shots on the counter). Nothing was exchanged as 4 kids wanted exactly the same thing, so we left a Milky way bar and logged the find in your logbook. Good time had by all. Thanks for the fun. The Brierley Family + The Jones Family.

Hi, David. Your cache was found at 3:37PM on Sunday 20th May 2001 by Ray and Maya (Nomads) with friends Darryn, Mike and Betty, after we had finished placing our third cache further north. Your cache is in a nice area and an easy find. On this occasion we didn't use maps or computer to display the approach route, but relied entirely on the GPS for direction. We stopped on the track next to the cache and within minutes Maya had located it. Maya took the Soverign Hill Place mat to entertain the grand children, and left a pencil case. Darryn took the ruler and replaced it with a Steak Knife. Thanks, Ray and Maya (Nomads).

Hi David, we found your cache on 19th May. It was really easy to spot in the bush so we placed a bit more cover over it when we left. It will be great to see the photos when they are placed on the net. This is the first one we have found with a camera in it. The container is a good idea - you should have no trouble with water. We walked around trying to find the viewing platform mentioned on the sign at the entrance but had no luck. I assume it hasn't been built yet.
Bev and Greg