Waihuka Wander (Gisborne) Puha, North Island, New Zealand
By Beauty & The Beast - maintained by GC community on 09-Jan-05. Waypoint GCMJDY

Thanks for the surprise. And thanks for the very sheepy track. Nice walk. Greets from germany. Team Heidihase

Started off in the wrong direction and had to backtrack to the correct waypoint. Tag has been vandalised so struggled with the first 3 numbers but went with our best guess. Quiet walk to final coordinates. No problem finding the cache with the clear hint. Walked on to the end of the track. The walk was longer then anticipated. The distance was 5.6 km in a straight line by my GPS and the track does some steep zigzags through the bush at the end. Well worth it. TFTC

Tagged along with 11HPG11 & C&D, leaving Hamilton at some ungodly hour, to meet up with HKCB at Opotiki pre-breakfast for a drive through the gorge in search of lonely or unloved caches. Cheered by finding H1, we stopped off here in the hope of uncovering another infrequently visited cache. Lovely wander along the rail track (apart from having to step around a decomposing sheep!) & then negotiated the taller cachers going the last few metres for the final. Thanks for a great placement. TFTC

When Cats&Dragons suggested a wee day trip to grab a few caches in this area, I cleared the diary and set the alarm! We set off at 3.30am to get there with plenty of time to find this and a few other caches. We teamed up with Kiwi69 and collected HKCB along the way. Good to get the old HOAC team back together for a crazy mission.

On the drive down we got to see a bit of the damage caused by Cyclone Debbie. A lot of water around!

First WP needed a bit of deciphering but we soon guessed what it should be and were off on our way... well sort of, missed the start of the track initially but got there in the end. A nice flat walk along the farm land meant we could all catch up and have a good old chat along the way. The river was a little high so sent the taller half of the group over to make the find.

Thanks for the nice straightforward multi.

In the Company of 11HPG11 & Kiwis69 we set off at 3.30am from Hamilton as this one had been on our radar fro quite some time. We met up with HKCB at Opotiki and from here set off for the great adventure.

Having been successful with H.1. GC2MPQZ this was the second on our radar and so with the weather gods playing their part we got the crew back together for this as its not every day in your geocaching life that you are going to find a cache that hasn't been found for over 850 days (a very unloved cache).

So a great drive over after keeping an eye out for any damage left by "Debbie" with only a few signs while travelling through the gorge.
We arrived at the starting point and worked out what we needed to and set off for the long lost location of this cache. A very pleasant walk along here and even managed to locate an only railway spike and have taken it for a souvenir of the journey. It was a great walk and not too hard with the weather staying fine and warm. Thank you for this great location

Thanks for the cache, thanks for the placement

Was down this way with C&D, Kiwis69 and 11HPG11 giving out a little love to so not found for a while caches. After a successful find on nearby H.1 which hadn't been found for over 2000 days we thought we'd better give this multi a crack to as it was 2 1/2 years since it was last found.

Took a few moments to get started on this one but as it was a 3am start for all of us (the others driving from Hamilton and picking me up on the way through, and me to watch the rugby) we were all needing a caffine fix. With the tag a bit beaten up it took a couple of looks before we worked out the number and the calculated coords looked fairly likely. A easy enjoyable walk through the farm land, and with all the rain in the past few days the river was going a bit quicker than normal, but again easy enough to navigate. Thanks to the great clue once we were at GZ the cache was soon spotted and it really great condition.

Thanks for the nice simple multi and bringing us to this part of the country.

wp1 a little beaten up but readable, a nice walk through the feilds and a cool walk through a river was a hot day, wish we brought our swim wear could have stopped for a dip. TFTC

A BIG THANKS to nzkeko and Canaryz for doing maintenance on this cache and updating us on the status of the cache, and providing alternative waypoint details. Without you, we would've had to archive this cache, which would be a shame. THANK YOU!

Went on the walk with Nzkeko to replace the rodent destroyed cache. Beautiful place for an easy wander. Enjoy, TFTC

Found it with Canaryz. Walked from the Gisborne end.
Replaced container and took new coords for CO to recreate a new WP1.
Have also emailed CO about Otoko Walkway not being closed by DOC, but the stairs on the Otoko side are going to be repaired and so the walkway maintained.
Cheers
Nzkeko

Catching up forgotten logs - Found broken container and log bits with Shellnz and nzkeko - nothing with us to replace it unfortunately. TFTC
Cheers
Mr Chillipips

Found it...at least the rodent bitten container and some chewed and rain sodden old bits of the log, with Mr Chillipips and nzkeko (who emailed cache owners in the hope we can 'log' the find and also make a plan to replace cache container in the future)

Went with shellnz and Mr Chilipips and found old container damaged by a rodent. Emailed owners with a plan to replace the cache and permission to log
Cheers
nzkeko

Talking to gencuster about the issues.

12:15 Closed 'til Labour Weekend for Lambing. No access to WP1. See photo

Entire area closed for Lambing. Could not access WP1.

A quick find on our todays scenic tour. The landscape is amazing...

Cheers
Dschuko

The track is now definitely open and although it no longer passes near the ‘surprise’, it is accessible. We saw….. some lonely red bulls (fortunately over the fence), some paradise ducks, one sheep, one grey heron. The track was hard and fast, the stream only ankle deep and the cache was quickly uncovered.

Was going to do this cache, but arrived at the carpark to see a sign stating that the walkway was still closed, , BUGGER!!! Oh well maybe next time

Officially, the walkway is supposed to be open. If you happen to drive by here, can you confirm that please??

After asking about the earthworks around the first waypoint, I received an email from the authorities: "The tunnel at the Sth end of the walkway has been re-opened by the farmer this improves his ability to move stock around his farm and then under the state highway bridge thus avoiding safety issues with stock on the road. The Tunnel is not part of the walkway. The issue of the pine trees has also been sorted out and the walkway will re-open in labour weekend" (that's fourth Monday in October).

Walkway still closed. Went and found the stairs, but the bottom part is washed away. There are also huge earthworks going on on the old track and one cannot cross it at present. Have contacted the owners and will see what we can do.
Cheers
nzkeko

Stopped off at the published coordinates this morning.
The "Closed" sign is still up!

Went with GECKOH, and quite literally lost my pants going down the very steep hill. Will no longer take advice from GECKOH. Great cache though, lovely location! TFTC

#335

Oops, We did notice a small closed sign at the start (sth end) of the track but there were no baricades up so we continued, found the waypoint on our way to Gisborne with the idea to get the final on the way home. On the way home we were running late so decided to flag the 2km walk, on driving past we got to within 300mtrs of the cache and stopped and did a naughty bee-line straight to the cache. Probably easier to do the track i reckon as it was straight down this STEEP STEEP paddock. and straight back up again!!

TNLNSL TFTC!!

Hi all - I emailed DOC asking about the track closure and this is what they said: "Due to logging of pine trees at Nth end of the walkway and a large amount of debris/slash on a steep hill side which the walkway goes through the walkway is closed. Sorry if this has caused any in convience. It hopefully will re-open by March" ... so the part of the walkway for the cache is unaffected (both stages), but since there are "closed" signs, we recommend not to proceed until the signs are taken down by DOC.

Decided to try give this one a go, drove out to the starting point only to find a wooden "CLOSED" sign there and some broken "do not enter" type tape, not to sure if was there from lambing season and not changed or if the track needed maintenance, decided not to risk it with our lil ones so we headed back into town.

Second visit. I found the "numbers" again and this time I found the final too. It took me a lot longer to get to the cache this time as there were lots of large cows on the track, some of which had calves that I detoured around. They mostly seemed quite placid, but I wasn't keen on getting too close.
There was even a cow guarding the cache which kindly moved away after some gentle persuasion.
I found the cache very quickly this time.
Thanks Beauty and The Beast and also thanks to YuGeo4.

YuGeo4 offered to check this one out and replaced the missing cache. Cache in the same spot. Hint updated. BIG THANKS TO YUGEO4!

#959
Found whilst on a maintenance visit on behalf of Beauty and the Beast. Original container not there, so hid a replacement 35mm film container in the same spot, chest height behind a stone door. Nice walk amongst the farm animals in the late afternoon, took us 70min return. Saw a couple of nice surprises on this walkway.
TNL(cache)SL, TFTC

Found the surprise. Found the first waypoint and coordinates for the second waypoint. Found the cows, sheep and horses. Didn't find the cache.
Perhaps it has been swept away by the river or burried by dirt slipping down the bank?

308th cache, 8th NZ cache and I think my 53rd FTF.

This was a pleasant walk and just what was needed after a large supper and breakfast.

The water was only just above ankle deep, Beth rolled up her trousers and took off her shoes and socks, I just went for it. I wished I hadn't on the rest of the way home, my wet feet felt it in the air conditioning.

Saw cows, sheep and plenty of birds and aslo a couple of stick insects that I disturbed retrieving the cache.

Many thnaks for setting it.

Thank you for your comment - we have now updated the listing to make people aware of this. "Please call back"!!!

Hi All we went to seaech for this cache but found the 'walk' Closed. we should have checked with visitor info I guess first but can only assume due to lambing!!
Did this walk a while ago wish new about geocache then!!
SO check its open before setting out!!!