Huff'n Puff Owens Creek, Queensland, Australia
By Myra Howerd on 07-May-06. Waypoint GCVYQW

The gorge was the main reason for our visit and it didn't disappoint. Lovely walk, not too hard and a very fresh pool up the top. The cache was found without counting anything, just a geocachers eye is enough.TFTC

A tough search in the dark, took a good while but I was still recovering from the walk up, gave me a good chance to rest a bit! Sacada spotted something and thankfully came up with a cache.Last night we meet up and stayed with friends in Bowen. A sociable morning but a nice relaxed one before heading back out on the road. Just a short distance of travelling today, stopping for caches as we passed and a few targeted earthcaches. Finch Hatten was a delightful location late afternoon. Out to the falls, a beautiful walk to them, returning after dark for the walk back but an opportunity to see fireflies, that was great!The showgrounds made for great camping, although a bonus country music festival on site had it a bit busier, but free entertainment for us with it so balances out nicely!

Finished another long trip around Australia. The 6th. Next up to Townsville to grab the Palm Island LGA. Only 2 LGAs to complete Australia.Firstly heading back south for some Canberra time.TFTC. Started the day at Bowen and followed a few Earth Caches down to Finch Hadden. A nice quieter day.A bit of a tough search in the dark. Good if I had a couple of the fireflies.Looked under the broken path and also down that side. Dangerous in the dark.Gave up and started to leave and 10m down the path I saw a stick out of place on the hill side. Awesome.

GPS was out so I had to rely on previously loaded logs. Once I read a few it was an easy find! Thanks!

Enjoyed the walk and even more swimming in both locations. What wonderful places! We were lucky to have the circle of fire all to ourselves.TFTC

OCW PelDroedGwin

Id heard about this walk a few months ago and absolutely loved loved it.

Spent some time checking out the views and taking photos before looking for the cache, as PDG mentioned we almost left without the smilie, then as we turned around…..there it was !

Tftc

Ocw the Bebes. A fabulous walk up the gorge and wonderful scenery. Took me a bit of searching as no GPS signal. I had pretty much given up and started to head back when I noticed a SPOR and there it was. Tftc

Thoroughly enjoyed the stunning walk up to here. Glad we took a screen grab of the hint before we got there though as no reception up there.
That being said, we looked for the cache on the way back down. Don't know if we missinterpreted the instructions, but we counted from the 1st pole heading back. Got to 20 and spied a possible hide but nothing there. Ended up giving up and continued on. A little bit further on, Mr TiedyeSmileys realised there was more than 10 still coming up, and there was somewhere looking like a great hiding spot and bingo, there it was. Counting from the 1st pole at the very end and heading back down, it was between the 25th and 26th pole (which equalled 10th going up). Reading back through past logs, it seems quite a few people have trouble counting coming back down and think they have miscounted at 20.

Have another fav point for the location

TFTC and greetings from Tassie

Definitely a huff and a puff up the stairs
Tftc

TFTC

It was a very wet and drizzly walk today, even so, there were still quite a few muggles on the track. We stopped to search for this cache on our return walk when no-one was around. Not sure if we miscounted but we couldn't find the cache at first. As we continued our downward trek, Mr Herbz spied something suspicious and soon the container was discovered. TFTC

Out and about with TBU1Bikesu for some more smilies.
Thanks for the cache.

Couple of years ago, we had been here for the first time: no Cachers then.

Today we returned to refresh our memories and to find an oldie.

As previous finders, GPS was playing up. So after couple of attempts (in vain) we decided to walk down. Yesss, there the container is! Lucky we!!

We didn't puff to much, but the crossing was today a bit crazier than in our memories .... with a lot of more water flowing.

Tftc Myra Howerd

We decided to head up to the gorge today and while there grab this cache. My counting was a bit off and I was walking down when I thought that's a likely spot and found the cache.
TFTC

Tftc. Took me a moment thought I couldn’t count but just looked straight past it. #207

Such an amazing place. We loved the walk and it was a bonus that there was a cache here. Thanks

Nice to pick up a large oldschool find in such a beautiful area. The cache was the other side of the trail where the gps was telling me to go but the clue is certainly helpful. Who doesn’t know what a stanchion is? Sheesh.
Thanks Myra Howerd for the chance at a smiley. Happy to have collected this one, for sure.
If you are wondering what to do for the Easter holidays 2022.. Maybe head to Townsville, North Queensland as it is going Mega!! GD9BVWD.. Woo hoo. Plenty of caching for anyone and with only a bit over 6 months to go.

After motivating me to get going this morning I was glad to get there in the end. It was actually pleasant in September to complete this walk. Wow! What a GORGEous location. Even met another curious muggle!

LTF

A great hike today. The clue was crucial in finding the geocache, the GPS was jumping around a bit.
Well worth the walk up

I'm out for an early morning hike to explore the Finch Hatton Gorge. I don't think I've ever been as far as the Wheel of Fire falls since I'm pretty certain they were closed to tourists when I was a child living in Mackay due to the deaths here. Early morning is a good time to be here searching for a geocache as I was all alone here.

Thanks for find #2122
TNLN

Ooh what fun. Beautiful walk. TFTC

18/7/2021 Went for a drive out to Finch Hatten today and did the hike to Wheel of Fire. Had a search with gps and co-ordinates were bounching around dud to tree cover. Had a read of the hint and had a further look. Following the hint performed a 2nd look around and after a brief search found the cache container. Cache in good condition and all of the hint makes sense. TFTC SL TNLN

We went for a drive out to Eunglella today and on the way back decided to call into finch hatten and go for a walk and swim. The water was freezing but the pictures michael took look great. We had trouble finding the geocache as out phones kept changing the values. We remember reading the hint and this really helped. Found the container and signed the paper with cachequest11 and mackcacher1208. thanks for the fun :-*

we had a really long walk today and found the cache and signed the paper. thanks

found it after reading the hint. took a photo to show we did. very bad mobile reception out there but some great photos of the waterhole taken. lots of people out here today

Oh my goodness we search so hard for this one as we didn’t think we would be back to it.. so disappointed leaving without it. Had the most amazing 3 hrs in the area.

Find 9 on my adventure day with Tinkstar23. Awesome swim at the end to cool off.

Found with AlphaCharley
TFTC

Actually 10th find of the day

Great swimming spot.
Tftc.

Found after a cool swim.
Tftc

What a beautiful gorge. Well worth walking all the way to the end. Plenty of picturesque swimming holes and cascades.
Finding the cache required a bit more effort. At first I was searching in the wrong area even though I made sure to be at the right post. However, I must have counted from the wrong end and ended up in the greenery for no reason. The moment I wanted to leave I spotted the ENVIRONMENT and got the price. Finding such an old cache in such good condition is great. No need to leave the path!

LOG: 12:40
OUT: TB
Hier war ich von mir selber überrascht, mit dem ersten Griff konnte ich das Döschen enttarnen und mich ungestört in das Logbuch eintragen. Mega Location, leider hatte ich mein Handtuch im Auto vergessen. TFTC!

Nice walk, lots of steps thought.
We used the hint as GPS is bouncing and had GZ about 20m off
Took two TB's and left one, still two there

We did huff n puff but we made it to the end. After admiring the view we back trached to get the cache, as it was far too cold for swimming. I grabbed a TB and left a couple I have had for a while. Good hide.

No internet and no idea what a stanchion is, but a pair of sharp eyes in the team.
Thanks.
TB in.

Hier war ich nach unser Übernachtung im platypus Bushcamp mit einer neu gewonnenen Freundin Tanja. Ein atemberaubender weg führte uns zum Cache. Hier habe ich ein travel bug entnommen.
Danke für den Chache

Absolutely stunning scenery... Beautiful walk, not to hard to find at all really. We left a trackable, hopefully he arrives at his destination ️

great cache

15 July 2018 Thanks for the cache!

What a beautiful part of the world this walk is. Such a glorious day has brought a lot of folk, young and old, here today. We spotted the cache no problems (thanks to the good hint) then waited for a gap in the passing walkers before retrieving it. After a few minutes we had a good opportunity to get the cache, sign the log and replace it carefully back where it came from.
Thanks Myra Howerd for placing this cache - top spot!

We have not been out geocaching in quite some time and I have just relocated our missing GPS'r. I am finally getting around to log caches stored on it we have previously found. Thanks for the hunt

Lovely place . We were alone at this beautiful gorge. The cache is A1 Favorite point for sure. TFTC Merci pour la cache Greetings from Montréal Québec Canada

It was a nice walk up ... and down. However, the location of the cache remained obscure to us. Of course, the GPSr could not be trusted too much. But the hint did not bring us much help either - we did not know the term! But nevertheless, thanks for bringing us here

I have been looking forward to walking the Hatton Finch trail and finding this cache. We had thought about walking the previous day as we drove with our caravan in tow to Eungella, the low cloud and rain stopped that from happening so an afternoon run "in the clouds" through the rain forest was quite a treat instead, coming from northern WA we don't have anything like this - running through the desert is our usual training zone.

The following day we woke to find the clouds cleared to a beautiful day, after visiting several other geocaches we worked our way down the range, this time without caravan, until we reached the carpark of Finch Hatton where we paired up with pprass to attempt the cache and trail.

We couldn't believe the number of people on the trail, obviously it draws a lot of locals from MacKay on weekends. I arrived at GZ with Pprass to find Ian had already spent 30 minutes trying to find the cache. With three pairs of eyes and an extra two brains it wasn't long before Pprass spotted the cache which we had feared might have aluded us! A break in the tourist trafffic and we were able to sign the log and carefully return it to its safe spot.

thanks myra howerd for such a great experience

Ian & Sue - Team Pathfinder uses T.P. to sign smaller logs.

Found at 3:02 PM GAFF3 in the company of Ian&Sue - Team Pathfinder.
A nice shady walk and we enjoyed the river crossing. Got to the top and it was impossible to find GZ due to the narrow rock walls - as a matter of fact if it wasn't for the explicit hint we would not have found the cache.
The pool looked inviting, but it was still a tad cool when we sampled it.
Thanks Myra Howerd.
Feedback: Why is the cache size shown as an unknown (?) It was actually a regular - a nice sized plumbers pipe.

Yep, gotta love those stairs..thankyou

Found at 10.55hrs. Love these walks and not too strenuous.
TFTC. SL
TNLN

jg

Found it

Loved the walk to this one! Found it quickly, too. As we looked for it on our way back down, we were nice and relaxed, though it was quite the huff and puff on the way up. Thanks for hiding the cache! Greetings from Germany.

Found. As with everyone else it seems we crossed the creek before reading a previous log saying " If you cross the creek you've gone to far."
The Cache was 20 m shy of my gz coordinates. ..in fact i was going to climb up the mountain beside the falls when my companion brought common sense to the table. So here i was sitting down to read the previous logs when he returns triumphant, cache in hand...or you could say arms it was so big.
My tip "You'll find it when you give up. "

Thanks for the cache. Found after checking out the nearby Earthcache. It took a while to find. Notes in the description and hint saved the day. A beautiful area. Will be back here one day to indulge in some swimming.
Cheers

After searching for quite a long time, we found out that we werd searching from the wrong side. Beautiful place to be, thanks for the cache!

Thank you very much, Regina-32 for the nice trip to australia.

Thanks for the cache.

Always enjoy the going back down part of this walk!! Thanks for a cache that added incentive to head up!

Found it with mike9268 and regina32

Finally arrived in Eungella National Park. bineundyves, Regina32 and me found nice caches. TFTC

Today we are in Eungella Nationalpark. Of course we do some geocaching. This was one of them we found.
Thanks for the cache and many greetings from Germany!

Great walk up in the rainforest to the fantastic wheel of fire pool.
Hot and humid but the canopy made it shady and pleasant.
Found the cache in no time and just had a wait a bit before replacing it.
After signing the log we went for a swim in the beautiful pool, amazing scenery!
FP and a big thanks for the cache
R

What a fabulous place for a cache. We had a great walk up here with lots of fantastic scenery. There were a lot of muggles around but we managed a find, sign and replace without anybody else seeing us. We're surprised this hasn't had more finds but I guess it is a bit of a hike to get to it. A favourite point from us for the location and the experience of grabbing this one. TFTC

TB dip. Cache is still good.

#3
Out for a walk with mom and dad - though they did all the walking for me...and signed for me...

I had been here twice years before but never all the way up to the top. had a swim a 3:30 pm very cold. thanks.

An absolutely stunning walk through the Gorge and a paddle at the top after retrieving the cache. Great hide in a fantastic location, TFTC.

Today we went from Stoney Creek to Eungella NP and Finch Hatton Gorge for a 1-day visit. Meanwhile we did some geocaching too. This one was found after a little search. Now we know what stanchions are !
Thanks for hiding such a large container at this beautiful place. We'll give a favoritepoint for this one.
Greetings from the Netherlands!
TFTC

Gotcha!!! TFTC

We loved this whole walk and found the cache easily due to the excellent hint. Got wet feet crossing the river.

On our [trip around the world](http://www.hoppundweg.piekar.de/) we came to Australia as well. We started in Tasmania, rented a campervan in Melbourne and went up the Eastcoast to Cairns. Then we drove all the way to the Red Centre. We finished in Darwin. We searched many caches and found almost every cache we searched for . Thanks to all the owners of these caches. Now, 2 years later, we recognized, we will never be able to log every cache seperately... So: Sorry for this standard logtext and thanks for one of the caches, which accompanied us on our journey.

For the last eleven years I was looking for, finding and hiding geocaches as a part of the Muggefuerz-family. Now it got time to create my own account and as I already found this cache as a Muggefuerz, I‘m gonna slowly catch up on logging the caches I remember finding. I surely remember the caches found in Australia as I was living half a year in Brisbane and then went on a roadtrip with my whole family for nine weeks exploring places, meeting people and looking for geocaches wherever we went! I hope for your understanding and that it’s okay! Thank you for this cache!

#5273

On our trip trough Australia with the hole family we looked for lovely places. Mostly the caches show us these. Thanks to all owner who kept the geocaching still running .

As we headed to this gorge we didnt see, that there is a cache here. On the road we made an other cache and my phone took the nearest caches also on the screen. When we overnight at the platybus-camp (realy nice here) we saw that we didnt have phone-connections... I only saw, that there should be a cache somewhere in the gorge.
On the next day we went to the gorge (after the flying forest ) and went to the first pool with the hole family. After a cool bath I speeded alone to the second pool to look for the cache, but with no coords and no infos [B)]. I already thought I dont find it and went back, as I found on a good spot the cache!!!
I was lucky and ran back for a second cooling bath.
Really nice gorge here. We liked it very much.
Greetings from switzerland .

TFTC

By the way... the waypoint 3 is not anymore there . You have to cross the river over the stones.

went out to grab the new earthcache in the Gorge
so decided to stretch the legs a bit more and check on this one whilst out there.
... actually I was chasing bugs
no bugs present even though one is listed
but cache is fine.
logged some TB's through

This entry was edited by dandent on Friday, 29 August 2014 at 07:28:06 UTC.

Found during our stay in Finch Hatton gorge and the eccentric Wazza at Platypus Bush Camp. Great walk, the boys enjoyed themselves in the upper swimming hole, while I tried to solve the 'stanchion' puzzle. Shame on me, but as we are no native English speakers, we didn't know that word. Luckily another visitor of the falls did, and with that info, retrieving the stash was a piece of cake. Many thanks for the great walk and the box, and greetings from Belgium.

Dam, we've found the other half of Mackay!

Again not many muggles on the way up but a never ending stream as we made our way back down.

TN Left PT SL TFTC

Great walk

We stopped by Finch Hatton Gorge after a couple of nights camping in Eungella. We arrived at the car park at midday and it was so hot and it was already quite a hike from our car space back at the bus turn around point up the dusty road past all the cars both sides of the road to the start of the official track. This was always going to be an effort with geobaby strapped to my front and it was tough but it was cooler in the trees and we quickly made it to the turn off for the lower falls or the wheel of fire. We thought about going to the lower falls but we figured it would be too popular today and I don't think I've ever been to the higher falls. Anyway we wanted to find this cache. We decided to leave the cache until after we had a swim because that's all I was thinking about when we finally arrived. There was still a lot of people there, one group arrived with a baby just after us with a stroller! Anyway we were lucky to find some shade and we could cool down and think clearly again. I wish we'd brought a little picnic snack. After we'd had enough we packed up and went back looking for the cache. We had the hint with us and straight away we were confused whether to count from the falls or the final approach to the falls. We did do some scrambling based on the terrain rating but in retrospect we realise now that that refers to the total trek. In the end the cache was actually a quite easy reach from the path except for a bit of a fright from a lizard when I went to retrieve the cache. No Jumping Rabbit TB unfortunately. Thanks for the cache in a beautiful location.

During our journey through Australia we passed and stopped here.

tftc

nice trip to the waterfall
tftc

Cool! TFTC

No muggles arount, so we could search quite well. GPS-Zero was a bit off, so we searched first at the wrong place. But becouse of the hint and some other logs, we found the cache finaly (aud we learned, what "stanchion" is

#665

16th of 36 finds on a four night holiday to Mackay for a wedding. Pipzi and I found this cache at 14:47.

This was the last stop for Pipzi and I on our day at Eungella National Park,

I had last visited Finch Hatton George in November 2009 for a swim in the pools. I didn't attempt this cache then because we were pressed for time. We only visited the lower pools. Given we visited on the weekend it also probably would have been busy on the path resulting in an unattempted due to muggles.

A visit on a Friday during late autumn proved a much better day for not encountering muggles. We only encountered seven other people on the path, despite there being several cars in the car park.

Not having been on this path before I was surprised to see that we had to wade across the river. That certainly was an experience. Thankfully, Pipzi and I managed to get across without falling over and only getting our feet/lower legs wet. The last people we saw on the walk we met on our way back to the car. They crossed the water very slowly and got a lot more wet than we seemed to.

After walking up the path which was slightly wet from recent rain we met the second group of people as we got to the GZ. They advised us we were nearly there. After finding the cache we realised that we were nearly there and the pool was just up the steps.

After searching for the cache in a couple of wrong places Pipzi noticed the hint within the hint and promptly counted the stanchion which turned up the cache. I retrieved the cache. After signing the logbook we replaced the cache and continued onto the pools. I had been looking forward to a swim all day but given the time of day and season I had to contend myself with only putting my feet in. The water did look very inviting though.

TFTC Myra Howerd

This entry was edited by Triam on Wednesday, 29 May 2013 at 12:05:31 UTC.

In the area for a walk in the gorge.
Shocked to see this coin still in the cache, so I grabbed it to get it moving again.
Great spot !!!

I really enjoyed my walk through this gorge! So much wildlife - I spotted a goanna, two snakes and hundreds of butterflies and dragon flies. As other people were at GZ I joined them swimming before searching for the cache.

Hi,
thanks for this enjoyable location. Children had a ball on the track, especially the tricky creek crossing.

Amazingly our gps kept telling me this cache was only less than 5km from our place. It may well be but we went the long way via the road and not down the hill through the scrub then, we huffed and puffed, passed heaps of muggles going up or down and yep, we found it too.
signed the log, took Marge the body builder and left a kangaroo.
no sign of the travel bug sorry, heaps of swaps thou

We had no intention of doing any walking today. Arrving at the parking the cool forest beckoned. Well, we couldnt NOT go for a walk now...

Walking through this forest, is easily one of the best caching experiences Ive ever had !!
Arriving at GZ and with a dying battery the GPS was quite jumpy but soon the cache was in hand. What an epic walk/place/river/pool/view/forest...you get the picture.

Signed the log and dropped off the USA Geocoin to continue its travells from South Africa. The hot work done, we hit the pool ^10 It was well worth the walk - really enjoyed every aspect of this cache.

A favorite of mine !! Thank you and greetings from South Africa 10/10

Had a experience on the way to the pool. TFTC

Muggle but finally successful. Great location! TFTC

Quite well hidden! Pool was too cold, though. TFTC

Beautiful walk up to the pool. TFTC

I kindly ask the next cacher to have a look if the "Jumping Rabbit"-TB is still in the box. Otherwise I will mark this travelbug as missed.

Thanks and regards from Germany,
hosi

Our first cache in Australia. Even for a rain forest cache it has been quite a wet find. Thanks for showing us this fantastic spot.
out: coin

Waoh, really great walk!!! we enjoyed it a lot, and especially we had a lot of fun swimming in the river with the waterfall!!!
We had a lucky hand, fortunately we found it very fast, even if the gps signal was really bad and we didn`t have the hint... okay, the hint would not really helped us
One of our best places of Australia what we saw until now - thanks a lot, really great!!
In/out: Coin

We decided to do the walk in the national park and then saw that there was even a cache to be found. Sadly we didn't read the description and this way we weren't able to get the hint. But anyway we enjoyed the walk and the great waterfall at the top. Of course I went for a short swim (the water was pretty cold) and even climbed almost to the top of the waterfall hoping to find the cache.
Then after reading all the description again properly we made our way back and looking next to the way I spotted a container (good old cacher instincts ). So I was finally able to log this one and to drop off the TB which I had been carrying for too long now. Thanks to the owner for showing us around this great spot.

TB in

-- Manni

We did the walk first thing in the morning as we had camped near by. The track is well maintained and the walk is nice and really very easy. Thank you for taking us there.

What a great area! The Finch Hatton Gorge was one of our highlights of our trip!
We stayed at the camp site nearby and even if it looks a bit ruffed, we still can recommend it. Where else do you have to heat the bath stove to have a shower? And the shower compartment just has three walls -- the missing one is just dense rainforest! And for dinner a BBQ....
We couldn't ask for more...

TFTC
Roland aka tasdevil13

Huff 'n' Puff is right!! I have been meaning to try and find this cache now that the walking track is open again and today I finally had the opportunity. It really is a strenous climb especially after the challenging creek crossing. I gave some advice to a young female muggle who was trying to cross the creek behind me as to the easiest way to get across. Once across she left me far behind. The hint was helpful as the GPS had me about 10m out from GZ. After some thinking and searching I located the cache. The log book is damp but still usable. Signed the log book, took the purple calculator key ring and dropped off a Marge Simpson in body building pose wearing a bikini plastic figurine. The young female muggle was sitting at the nearby rock pool in the sun with her nose in a book. Didn't see any other muggles at GZ but saw some on the way back. The walk back down is a lot easier. Thankyou Myra Howerd for placing this cache.

This entry was edited by The Owl The Raven on Wednesday, 11 August 2010 at 17:34:08.

We won't log this as a did not find as the walking track that leads to the cache is closed at this time; most likely due to fallen trees from Cyclone Ului. Will come back later and try again. Hopefully next time all will be ok. Had a lovely walk through the rainforest so it wasn't all bad.

The family and a few friends decided to check out the waterfall after all the rain we've had. It was worth the trip. I've not been there for years but it was interesting to see the foot bridge has been washed away. Glad we were wearing only thongs (Aussie word for slip-on shoes, I am not reffering to underwear!) as it didn't slow us down since we could simply wade through calf height. Anyway... Son and I found it in the pouring rain and Glad to report the cache was dry as was it hidey hole. If it's not wet now it never will be.

Took plastic Capsicum & Pyramid TB, Left Storm Trooper key ring, SL.

Found after a really nice hike? My mother with two artifical knees made it nearly to the cache (only about 20 metres away, but that was far enough for her.) Took four kids with me so had to keep them from running ahead. Fun for all