Blue Rata (Taranaki) Tumahu, North Island, New Zealand
By Adopted by Phronimos from hunt2r on 02-Feb-06. Waypoint GCT9E2

That was a bit of a mission, track not clear with trees fallen on it.....cool old tree. Thanks for the cache.

A bit off route but an oldie (ish) and in-theme for the day. Headed carefully through the ford (first one since we left the South Island) and parked at an obvious place. Headed in and missed the turning initially, then rectified and headed along the occasionally marked track. Over and under some occasional tree fall is part of the game and soon in front of the marvelous specimen. Round and round etc etc and couldn't remember where I'd come from but still no find, Delved my hands in 'all' possible options. Read some logs which suggested 6m away from the tree and other stuff. Checked again and felt the container, gotcha!Added my name and replaced as found. Luckily remembered which way I'd come from! Back to the car and vowing to add a 'car' WP 'next time"It's head home today after a couple of nights at Urenui beach. A nice long weekend in Taranaki was just what I wanted, too many times previously it's just been a time-constrained day visit and have never really scratched beyond the surface of the area, or the caching. I was keen to head home via SH45 surf highway and a couple of other caches. Also keen to up my cache finds by the CO Phronimos, and this was a Pheeding Phrenzy as I got a few of his, as a CO I'm aiming to get finds by him up to triple figures, today will help with that aim. Phanks very much to all regional COs for their placements and maintenance/choices of awesome places to get people to visit.

Spent an hr looking no luck

TFTC!

Stony river swim and finish up with a Geocach find

The winds have calmed so an outing out here was in order for todays trad dot day. Crossing the ford made me nervous on approach but slowly goes it and we made it through! A cool little track that the youngest cacher took lead control of. Found the large beautiful tree easily enough but Im not sure if the cache is in the original spot as if not for the last 2 logs we would never of found it. My hint for the next cacher would be..orange. A hero moment for AlmaWoody today for this one. TFTC AND STREAK DAY #100!! Hmmm too carry on or not to carry on is the top question right now.

After an awesome day at school earning myself a prestigious principles award for this semester.I was happy to go along on this cache hunt today. After picking up AlmaWoody we headed here for this bush walk..luckily we did as the adults had no sense of direction to get us back! TFTC

Excited to be included by Trayc.G & Gigiev on today's hunt. Naturally, being front seat passenger & H&S Officer for the day, I had to hop out & and assess the deepness of the ford, no problem for the trusty Dodge.A magnificent specimen of a tree, the cache not being in an obvious spot, had us scratching our chins, but we were determined & kept fossicking. A chance touch & lo & behold there it was. We squealed in delight, it was like we had found the crown jewels.TFTC, it was a lovely walk in the bush, where Gigiev (being a star student) guided us out safely

Such a place! Thanks for bringing me here.
Spotted at bearing 135 from a Tree. Brand new log.
I've found this cache during my third day of the Queen memorial weekend in Taranaki.
TFTC

Tftc what a mission GPS and phone app jumping all over the place.i looked low and high could not find so followed track to see the river, then stopped on return to tree, able to match pic with tree, looked around on ground and found cache about 6 metre from tree ,sign a damp log and placed back in tree.

On our way back to our accommodation, we decided to stop here. As we parked, we noticed some people used it as toilet, and picked up a few tissues. It was late, we took a torch. The trail was marked, but we'll maintained. A tree was in the way. We found a way around (under when we came back). at gz, what a great tree. That was worth walking here, with the slippery rocks. Little cacher spotted it right away. Both container and logbook were in good condition. Thanks.

An Exellent Walk In The Shade For This One On A Very Hot Day ,Some Branches Off A Tree Have Fallen Over The Path To The Rata But You Can Crawl Under Them To Get To GL,She Is One Big Tree.

The road seemed to be good quality and there wasn't much water in the ford so it was fine in our AWD car. The track to the cache was also ok, although you had to keep your wits about you to stay on it. The massive tree was obvious, but it took a wee while to spot the cache (small, not regular). TFTC

Lovely little walk through the bush and found in no time when I got there! TFTC

Last log was almost 1 year ago, thought I would go grab this one so it has at least one find for this year

A short walk along a beautiful track to this amazing tree. Oh I sooo love trees. A hug from me then on to finding this one. Container wet but log OK and now tagged. Fav from me for the tree

Day 6- Thursday 19 December. Hawera to Okato and back the inland route. Then back to pick up Zara and head to New Plymouth.

The Seagnoid, Zara, Toby and I are spending Christmas exploring Taranaki via geocaching. Its been an amazing 3 week adventure. Rattls BBQ was a great event, meeting many other cachers. But also managed to fit in a few more events, especially New Years Day celebrating the start of 2020. Lots of caches - over 500. Lots of cache maintenance. Lots and lots of kilometers. And lots of amazing places visited along our journey. Mt Taranaki remained elusive for much of our travels and the caches on it at the top. Loved Pukekura Park Night Lights Show and the the Wooden Mechanical toy exhibition at NP Info centre.

An amazingly beautiful walk through native bush. Gets a favourite. The track is pretty faint in places and on the way back we lost it so made a bee-line for the car park. Picked up the track again a short time later. Blue-tinged rata timber? I do not think I have ever seen that.

Day six of Taybeedragon's and my big 3 week circumnavicaching trip around Mt Taranaki, starting from Palmerston North. Today is Manaia to the cape lighthouse along the coast and back to Hawera via the inland route - it's a slow trip!!
Highlights:
* 3 weeks, 536 caches
* Mt Taranaki had been removed for washing, which was a bit of a shame. Even after it had been returned we were only allowed to see it for it was less than half an hour a day.
* High percentage of caches with crappy coordinates
* Amazing Pukekura Park
* AMAZING Pukekura Park light show!
* Pukeiti Gardens
* 3 notebooks full of cache notes for later logging
* Lots of cache maintenance!

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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](https://coord.info/GC87777) - you won't want to miss it!

Rough road? Have you ever been caching on the South Island? We would love to have unsealed road like this one (at least for some caches). Great short walk, not maintained for a while though (hehehe). Once at GZ quick and easy find. Thanks

Heading out in the company of HKCB for a quick 24 hours down to Taranaki collecting caches around the mountain to try to tidy up the area.
We departed Hamilton at 7pm Friday and made it back home 7pm on Saturday with a haul of 70 caches and 820kms traveled. A great drive through the night, clear sky's and a fantastic day on Saturday to view the mountain in all its glory, a calm sea along the coast. Together these factors made the trip memorable as we could not have asked for better conditions to cache in.
A big thank you to all the CO's whom have placed these caches for us and continued their maintenance.
Continuing our journey around the mountain it was time to get moving and make up some distance between all those caches. a pleasent little walk along an unkempt path to a magnificent tree.
First rain we encountered on our journey but it was all over in 15 minutes.

Thank you for the placement, thank you for the cache.

In the company of Cats&Dragons for a quick 24 hour blast around Mt Taranaki, with the aim to tidy up as much of the area as possible. Leaving 7pm Friday night and returning 7pm Saturday we managed the loop and found about 70 caches along the way, with a couple of hours sleep thrown in as well. The weather also played its part with fantastic vistas throughout the day of the mountain.

With some well hidden and maintain caches found throughout the day a big thanks must go to all the CO's for the placements. What an amazing tree, thanks so much for showing us. A few wind falls on the track, but I don't think this track get maintained often, but they were easy enough to get around. Took as a bit of a hunt to find the cache, but a bit of persistence we located it. On the way back to the car though I wasn't taking enough care in where I was going and ended up taking a large chuck out of my shin on a broken of branch on a windfall. A bit of blood but not too much damage, another caching memory added to the shin's.

Last looked for this before cache ownership changed and it wasn’t there. Back in New Plymouth for a few days and this was the cache I most wanted to knock off. TFTC

Found tree but nothing there sadly

On the road to Opunake with a dot day to fill. I have had this on the list for a while. Took a little time to find. The tree is magnificent and well worth the little bush scramble regardless of the cache. TFTC.

Once upon a time there was finally a sale between CHC and NPL, and I managed to grab a seat! The anticipation of the holiday was killing me, as this was to be the first time I set foot in Taranaki, the last unchartered territory in NZ for me. Since the wait for the dates was unusually long, I even got a chance to do some planning and pick a few nice caches to look for. I was hoping to go for a few walks also.
Today, the weather was not looking too good, but I decided to wear suitable clothing and just suck it up. I still managed to find a few good ones!
I did not trust to take the rental car on the road, so i walked from the turnoff. Nice spot, and a quick find - not sure how I found my way out though, the path is non existent in places, and the gps was having a fit under the canopy... TFTC!!

Struggled with this one due to looking too hard learnt a lesson on this cache and not to look too hard and take a step back thanks Peter

Found whilst on a wonderful 3 week tour of this beautiful country. Many thanks to the COs for placing caches in great spots to visit and make our holiday even more special.
Took the TB.

Great spot and a nice short walk with the kids. Dropped a tb. TFTC

Nice walk there Phronomis. A couple of trips but found after all that. TFTC

Holy moly Peter what a track tftc

Lovely bush walk! Cache found quickly, although make sure you keep to the track, it's a little neglected. Amazing hearing the birds flying overhead! TFTC

Great cache in a beautiful spot. Out and about researching the blue rata for a school project. And did a spot of caching while here!

Found the cache, thank you
What a beautiful blue rata forest, loved it in amongst the trees and loved the fantails following us.

Headed west for a day of geocaching, filling in some gaps in the geocaching map. Crossed the ford, have not seen of those in a while, then off up the road to the carpark. Wandered off into the bush and made our way to GZ. A little bit of debris to climb over but a straight forward dawdle where the cache was located on a magnificent Blue Rata.

Enjoyed the walk and saw a kereru which cleverly dropped a half chewed berry on me, great aim. Thanks for the placement at this great little spot with some great trees. Gets a FP.

In response to the recent DNFs I've come out today to replace the cache, etc. it is in the same location as previously and the coordinates are accurate to within 2 metres.
The signage for the track has long gone and the track has a couple of windfalls, but is fairly easy to follow. Saying that, this **is not a walk in Pukekura park**. Sturdy footwear is recommended as the rocks & fallen logs are pretty slick with moss.
I've also added a Parking waypoint due to the lack of signage.

Blue Rata (Taranaki) was transferred from hunt2r to user Phronimos

No luck today. Stood in a nice big cow pat though

Visiting from Australia I have been staying in New Plymouth for a week visiting my sister. This is my last full day here before heading up to the mega event tomorrow. So I thought I would do a southwards loop before I leave.

Unfortunately no luck for me today, found the obvious tree and past logs suggested some altitude was required but it wasn't anywhere I could spot that I was comfortable getting to solo. Spent about 20 minutes at ground zero before admitting defeat on this one. Probably just a case of an Aussie being unfamiliar with the local bush and at 52 years old maybe not being as sprightly as some! Thanks hunt2r, this is the sort of cache I do really enjoy (just a shame I couldn't find it on this occasion).

Had a really thorough look but sadly did not find. Will try again sometime

Nice walk bit over grown

Spooky rainy day find. Such a cool place

I stumbled across it after getting abit lost, found my first geocoin, got totally lost trying to get out, thought I would have to be rescued, and when I finally got out, I needed a stiff drink even if it was 10.30am in the morning

I first visited this rata when the cache was established. This time was much more of a scramble, and there were no compensating blackberries afterwards, but I did sign the log for myself. No wasps either. TFTC

Dropped off TB

Great walk...tho not so good in jandals! Almost got lost at one point, had to back track and managed to find my way back. Look Jeep TB.

Another with lady e who taught us to take care at the fallen tree where she took a tumble with the gnome reaching madly to save her to be save by the elastic in otherwise unmentioned garments thanks for the hilarity and no wasps to be seen today

Found today with Gnome62. I took a tumble at the fallen tree and landed upside down and laughed so much I couldn't get up. Gnome62 was really concerned but did think about taking a photo. Got back on my feet, brushed myself off and proceeded on... dignity intact.... well nearly. Left a trackable. Thanks.

Dropped off trackable

Well that turned to out to be a little more extreme then prepared for. Lost gps tracking so drove waaaaay past and got stuck walking into clay picked blackberries, got gps location again went back started walk location was under a wasp hive struggled to reach got stung so please be careful if taking kids wasps everywhere but yay found....got lost walking out

Nice walk in an area that we never would have visited otherwise. As we approached GZ it became pretty obvious which tree the geocache was going to be in! A couple of mins searching and we had it in hand. TFTC

This is a massive example of a rata tree strangling its host. Thanks for bringing me here.

Out: TB.

Cheers for the cache.

Great cache to do with kids! Dropped off a geocoin.

Many hiding holes in the tree but found and logged, nice little walk.

Looked in two wrong trees then finally found it with help of text by other geocacher.

Nice walk, carried on down to river after finding cache

Amazing find, had no idea these trees were just up the road!

Thanks for bringing us to this little gem of a place on our way around the mountain. TFTC.

Found with Geco72 on the return trip to New Plymouth airport. Some quite impressive trees here.

Out and about caching with davycrockpot in Taranaki today. Last time I came this way it had been raining and I wasn't keen to cross the water at the bottom of the road...this time no problem and after a short bushwalk, with some challenging obstacles we found the right tree and then the cache. Tftc

Found in an awesome hide. This tree is amazing. With help from a nimble wee Lilfishy we managed to extract the cache. TB Dropped

Found in a massive hideout. Wonderful walk to GZ in a creepy little forest. Found with Niscar.

one of my favourite trees in the naki thanks for bring me out here again tfc K.k

Very wet up near the Ranges today, but a pleasant enough trip and easy find, though I wished I'd brought a ladder. Another one of 'my' reserves when working for Lands & Survey Dept. Although in my day the road went further up river until washed out by massive flood waters in the early '80s. In the intervening years I've come here often to show off these magnificent trees. Good hide. TFTC

I really enjoyed my short walk through this magical place. I'd put the terrain level more at 2 stars as it was a short, gentle stroll through the bush with nothing too demanding. Cache was quickly located with my gps being surprisingly well behaved in the thick bush.

TFTC

Dropped a travel bug, make sure he is never alone

Nice walk, quick find TFTC

All good, nice wee walk, GPS had me going for a while, dropped tb. Tftc Blenheim Bear

We originally overshot the entrance to the track because we were looking for some sort of car park, but doubled back and stopped on a patch of grass.

Wow, what a walk. The GPS led us roughly in the right direction, and we scrambled over, crawled under and skirted round various obstacles but once we got deep enough into the woods it was pretty obvious where the cache should be. My wife did the scouting and I did the retrieving, as she was reluctant to put her hands into any crevices. The cache container was nice and dry, so we signed the log and left a small card game in a plastic baggie.

The amazing trees and the mini-adventure gets this a favourite point from us. Thanks very much for the cache.

Finally took the drive up and took the walk into the bush to see this impressive tree... A bit of ducking under and climbing over... But a nice walk... Found the cache on the 3rd circumnavigation... Signed log and returned... Thanks for bringing me here

What a nice walk track a little overgrown but was worth the walk left a bouncy ball TFTC

Staying with my brother in law just down the road I couldn't resist a dash to this one.

With the benefit of reading the logs I exchanged the BMW for a hilux and a pair of red bands.

Good call!

Track overgrown and has a few tree falls, but is accessible.

Quick find at GZ. Impressive tree.

TFTC + fav

Missed finding the track in so just used gps to guide me in. Found another Blue Rata nearby first.Easier coming out on the track!TFTC

Wow what an awesome hiding place. Another new place we've discovered. TFTC.

[^] I never knew this place existed. enjoyed walk

Nice spot for a cache, cool tree
Tftc

Not the most easy track to negotiate with a crutch. Left other half behind at fallen log. Took cache back to show her. Took mini 4x4, left drink umbrella to stop the drips. SL. TFTC.

Had us scratching our heads wondering where on earth to park/walk, but soon enough following our noses got us there. TFTC - Jackie and Grant (Nelson).

A great little walk in, parked the car by the gate into the metal quarry gee it was some climb to extract, easy to see from the ground many thanks

Great little track. Took a bit of finding as its not marked. Followed the orange triangles and took the opportunity to tell the boys about if you pack it in pack it out, respect the bush.
Definitely a favorite.Picked up a ladybug trackable.

Another chance to reinforce the notion we need a 4WD for our caching adventures... forded a stream with our wee car and were driving to the end of the road when the GPS indicated we had gone too far, a 5 point turn around but nothing to show a bush walk was on offer, so another 5 point turn to carry on up the road. The cache was being left further and further behind so we abandoned the thought of getting to the end of the road and did yet another turn around. This time the grass by the road's edge was closely examined as we closed in on the closest GPS reading - and what do you know a grassy trail (no sign) leading into the forest. Off we trot and follow a rather overgrown track to the marvelous tree which guarded the treasure. t4tc (A favourite from us)

#1,115, Had to be the favourite of the weekend. TFTC

Nice bush walk

One of the best. Trees like these are few and far between. Awesome tftc

Met up with some cows wandering down the road - not sure if they were meant to be there, but ended up chasing them back into the paddock next to where we parked.
GPS behaved itself - I was expecting it to cut out under the cover, although it did say we had another 15mts or so to go. But we spotted a likely looking place as we approached & sure enough it was GZ. Cache was very obvious, with no camo what so ever, but we replaced it as we found it. I guess it's not likely to be muggled here.
Left a pet rock - an elephant. TFTC

A great example of a place I would have never found if it wasn't for geocaching. Forest was awesome, overgrown with fallen trees all over the place. And at the GZ... all I could say was 'wow'

- Medieval Toy
+ Pirate Duck

TFTC!

Really enjoyed this area of bush - thanks for bringing us here. Took a little while to locate the cache though - maybe we should have gone clockwise. Picked up Cow Cocky and the Dog travel bug to move on (although it wasn't listed as being here). TFTC

I wasn't sure if I had the right track for a bit - but the orange markers were reassuring! Track was very overgrown, and home to some amazingly huge (and fresh!) cowpats, so I'm assuming there's a cow or two hiding in there somewhere! GPS really hated the trees and was no use at all until I reached a dry, sandy streambed. I then realised I'd overshot it, and the GPS got its act together and led me straight back to the cache. Certainly is a big tree! Spotted a TB in the cache but left it there as I'm not going in its required direction! TFTC!

What a great piece of bush thanks for bringing me here TFTC

cool forest, took on a rainy day on my way to raglan... TFTC

Nice walk. Lots of rata flowereing further down the road. TFTC

Nice tree, good clue! TFTC Cheers MM

Followed the road towards GZ, stopping at the ford to check for any fish crossing. Enjoyable walk through the walkway and a quick find once at GZ. Thanks for sharing this place T4TC.

Amazed that I am the first finder of this cache for more than 10 months. I overshot the track and had to drive a long way down the dusty gravel road to find somewhere to turn. Nice short bush walk to cache site. Found cache after a few minutes searching. Log a little damp but no real problem. SL TFTC

It got dark very quickly.

Was getting dark. We will return and enjoy this spot.

The drive out here kinda reminded me of driving in Africa, what with shallow stream crossings and all. Lovely spot! Foxglove in bloom! Curious cows and a stray bull added to the journey. Thanks for the cache placement and the detour it required.

Was visiting New Plymouth for a few days with Indiana Jill, BookwormMum and Kayaknkiwi. I really enjoyed the Blue Rata, and the trip into the woods to get to the cache was lovely, too. I spotted the cache first and alerted the others while they kept on looking. Turned out that what I had spotted wasn't the cache after all, so had to go back to searching. Turns out I was looking on the wrong side (go figure!). Nicely hidden cache. Contents nice and dry. Thanks for bringing us here! Took Coin (I have an identical coin!).

We parked up, and off we set. Enjoyed the lovely bush setting, magic. Nice hide. Thanks for the adventure on this one! TFTC!

In NP with Indiana Jill, Seattle’s Best and Kayaknkiwi for some caching and other fun. Seeing a bit of bush is one of the great things about caching - really enjoyed the wander. Stopped to say hi to a steer on the way, he didn't seem too impressed to be on the roadside rather than with his mates in the paddock. TFTC!

Mmmmm rally driving And a brief walk through the wet bush. Easy find once at GZ. Cheers Gav [4713]

We found it easy enough with GPS found awesome tree went back to the car to get a geo coin to drop off because of the tree Took nothing