Logs for CacheTrainer 

On just our last day in New Zealand, and after finding the cache "Where Fairy's Fall", we got the tip from a guy from Denmark, who told us that we should definitely use our last few hours of daylight in NZ to visit the wonder that is Piha Beach.

So we threw our other plan (visiting the oldest part of Waikatere Forest) overboard and drove down to Piha Beach. We really enjoyed the strange look and feel of the black sands, as daylight faded. We didn't concern ourselves with climbing up the scary looking Lion's Rock for the geocache there, but little did we know that a found would nearly hit us in the face.

We walked back to our campervan, when I saw two guys and a lady conducting in a "suspicious" manner. So the question was easily asked: "Are you guys geocaching?" And yes, we had a whole new find for free in this great spot. We had a nice geo-chat afterwards, the guys told us were there were more great walks and caches to find.

Unfortunately, daylight was fading and Miss Bij really wanted to check if we could spot little blue pinguïns, who rumoured to held up at Piha Beach. We went but did not see any pinguïns... So sad! But we had an amazing time in New Zealand nonetheless and really want to return someday for longer.

Thanks for the cache!

#1923 - 4.30 PM 

I'm proud to put a favorite and a found at a cache on a spot as beautiful as this... On our last full day in New Zealand we were able to do some walks in this forest, off which this was the most beautiful. It was though climbing back up the hill, but definitely a pretty nice walk.

Yeah, the description of the cache fits, the coordinates were all over the place. Walking towards the cache we were at the supposed place, which fitted most of the hints, but no cache was found. We only got very dirty in the rainy mud...
We walked further down, a bit dissappointed, but amazed by the view anyway. On our way back up we tried again and this time the GPS took us to a whole different place. Now not just a part, but all hints fitted and the cache was found quickly.
We also got caught by another cacher, who declared she had found this one years ago.

Thanks so much for showing us where the fairy's fall!

#1922 - 2 PM 

Our shoes were blue nor suede, I guess just a bit muddy because of all the geocaching... But we figured it would be ok to put our names in the logbook anyway!

Cache is in a great hidden spot in a beautiful garden. Even in NZ Winter very much worth the walk. And considering "Blue Suede Shoes", in Rotorua we visited the Tamaki Maori Village, where one of the Maori's turned out to be a very good Elvis-sing-a-like...

Thanks for the cache!

#1921 - 5.25 PM 

So I guess we missed the invite in December 2010, but here we are on our "sort of" honeymoon ourselves, to find your cache.

Miss Bij and I got legally married on October 14, 2014, and also celebrating that we both finished our studies and both got a great job an bought a house, that all seemed way reason enough to make a great holiday from our small little Holland toHong Kong, Australia, New Zealand and Fiji.

In New Zealand we travelled to Coromandel, Rotorua, Waitomo, Hobbiton and now back towards Auckland do some bushwalks and so on. We also decided to go to the botanical gardens and find some caches here. This was the first one. We searched and slipped on the slope for a while, when I finally saw the cache hanging. Ooo, said Miss Bij, "I saw that hanging a while ago but didn't realise it was the cache..."

But hey, we got it!
Thanks for the cache and we wish you guys a long life full of happiness together.

#1919 - 4.50 PM 

After a longer search at R&M's Weddingcache, here we had a quick find. While my love was still googling what the hint might be, I already spotted the stash. We didn't really understood why the cache is named as he is named, but yeah, we love to dance. In a crazy happy way, not anything worth looking at.

Opening the stash, we found a Dutch packing with a bicycle light repair set. Funny, since we are Dutch as well. And because we were short a headlight. Unfortunately, not of a bicycle but of our campervan. But hey: no worries!

Thanks for the cache.

#1920 - 5.05 PM 

Found this cache on the way from Hahei / Cathedral Cove / Hot Water Beach towards Rotorua. Offcourse a visit to New Zealand is not complete without some essential things: Maori's, Kiwi's (bird), Kiwi's (fruit), Kiwi's (people), Kauri's, Glowworms, Geothermal things and something about The Lord of the Rings. We are proud to be able to say that we did it all.

This was our first (but not only) encounter with the Kauri's. It struck us a bit that there is a vicious Kauri decease spreading. How sad it is that as soon as everybody realizes that logging 900+ year old trees is a very sad thing - such a new disaster presents itself.
We washed our shoes well and did the short walk - because we already did a long walk at Cathedral Cove. We did not spot any Kiwi's (birds), although that's only logical because they are nocturnal and sleeping for 18 hours a day.
That, according to a Maori guy we met, is the main reason that the Kiwi is this nations national symbol... One can only be jealous of such genius!

Thank you so much for putting the cache here!

#1918 - 1.10 PM 

We planned on taking one of the boat tours to Cathedral Cove nearby, so we came to Hahei Beach in the morning to find the captain of the cruise. However, since we forgot to book in advance, we found ourselves on a completely deserted beach. Which, offcourse, was no punishment at all.

So after missing the boat, we decided to do the walk to Cathedral Cove instead. We drove up to the parking lot and did the beautiful - but a bit intense - walk down. We really enjoyed the amazing views and surroundings. The short but severe showers that washed over us, made us realise that the statement "New Zealand has all four seasons in one day" is actually true. As soon as we covered ourselves in our garbage-look-a-like poncho's, skies cleared and the temperature rose to summer-like heights, chilling back down to a wintery feeling just an hour later.

After the walk, we walked a bit further than our RV was parked, to grab the cache. A beautiful rainbow coloured the spot, which was the first of many bows we would see on our trip in NZ.

Thanks so much for putting the cache here in a great spot!

#1917 - 12.40 PM 

Yes, offcourse we'll put a favorite for this cache! Not only was it our very first geocache in New Zealand, but also because we were amazed by the volcanic wonders of this beautiful country. Considering what we experienced here, we actually think we had better switched our holiday time (longer stay in NZ, shorter stay in Australia).

So, Miss Bij and I came from our home in Holland to the greatest journey we had ever made, after a few beautiful weeks in Australia we found ourself here in a even more beautiful landscape. The wonders of New Zealand woke up a wish for a next journey, somewhere in the future, to visit this amazing country in Dutch Winter / NZ Summer and for longer, so we can visit both islands in stead of just a part of the North Island.

Anyway, we came in to Auckland on the 27th, and travelled to Hot Water Beach on the 28th. We stayed overnight on the Holiday Park closeby and set course for Rotorua the next day. Hot Water Beach was really beautiful in the daytime, we spotted some surfers trying their luck on the wild waves. But it was high tide, so no pools were to be digged right then.

We returned at 9 PM, where we joined an enthousiastic family who already start digging a family sized pool. Really amazing, these geothermal things, we were also amazed further on in Rotorua. We tried answering the questions asked and sent them in an e-mail to the cache-owner. And tonight or tomorrow I will add photo's with this log.

Thanks so much for the cache!!

#1916 - 9.00 PM 

On the sad day that we had to leave Australia, we decided to make things a little happier by finding some geocaches. We didn't plan our departure very smart, so we had to be at the airport at ten in the morning to drop off our rental car, but had to wait until five in the afternoon before we could catch our flight to Auckland (and a week later, Fiji). So we had spare time for geocaching, which I always love to do.

For us in Holland, Australia is really "Down Under". So everything seems to be upside down here. For instance: our summer is your winter. Although the temperature still reminds us of our summer . You drive on the other side of the road. And where in Europe I myself always seem to be very lousy at sports, physical challenges, handicrafts, everything that involves moving, in Australia it was the other way around. I proved to be all of a sudden capable of riding a horse in the Outback, driving a motorcycle and - right out here - climbing right up a tree like a monkey, to find this great geocache.

Thanks so much for the cache, I put a favorite on it for the experience.

#1913 - 11.40 AM 

After the other Troll @ Wolli Creek, we took another stroll trough the park to this troll. We found it in a clever spot, luckily just after a little search - thanks to the good description.
There were a lot of spider webs around, so - scared as we had been made of the funnelweb spider - very carefully we performed a quick grab and wrote our names to the logbook.
And yes, there were some bikers cycling around, so we took extra care and stealth was applied. Mission accomplished!

Because the next cache turned out to be a DNF, this was our very last cache in Australia! G'day mates!

Thanks so much for the cache.

#1915 - 1:55 PM 

Before we went on the Monkey Business Mission, we tried to find the Troll of the Princes Highway. Well, this little troll was guarded well by a worker man in his van, who stood right by the coordinates of where the Troll was rumoured to hang out.

So we walked on, climbed up the tree and found the monkey cache, and afterwards we returned and caught the Troll anyway. This Wolli Creek dude didn't even put up a fight!

Thanks for the cache.

#1914 - 1:05 PM 

Spending some time between our Rental car dropoff and our flight to New Zealand, we found a couple of geocaches. Completely in alignment with our entire trip from Cairns to Sydney, there were more caches we didn't find... Good hiders, these Aussies!

In this case, reading also the logs of other guys, I guess it was not our searching skills that were the problem. We tried, I'm pretty sure we were at the right spot, but there was no cache present.

No worries, thanks anyway for placing the cache! 

Even though we are not really "big city people", we really enjoyed our short stay in Sydney. Our stay in the Cogee Beach House was a great spot. We did a little trip to Harbour Bridge and Opera House, spend some time on Cogee Beach itself and did a little walk towards Bondi Beach. On this walk, we found this cache.
We saw the memorial for the appearance of Mary, and a wedding actually taking place on the cliff very close to this cache. The view over the little bay here was amazing.

Thank you so much for the cache!

#1911 - 1.45 PM 

After finding a cache at Cogee Beach, we decided in the evening that on our last full day in Australia we had to go and see some of the famous sights. In our own country, Holland, we always see on the news when Newyears has found it's way to Australia because of the beautiful fireworks right by Harbour Bridge and the Opera House.
That's why (and because of the easy parking at night) we decided to wait until dark to come here. And really enjoyed taking some pictures and selfies and so on.
Also we found this cache to mark the spot on the found-smiley's-map of the world! It was really funny that there were roadworks starting just as we wanted to find this cache, so all muggles who wanted to pass us by were redirected. The workers didn't see us, so it was a muggle-free find.

Thanks for the cache!

#1912 - 10.30 PM 

And so again I feel I can do nothing else than putting a favorite for an Australian cache... The caches here are sometimes hard to find but they sure do brought us to some amazing spots!

Here in the Blue Mountains I was very proud of my girl Miss Bij, who is scared of heights, but did some of the trails very bravely. On the search for the Elysian Rock cache, she let me do most of the work and she also didn't dare to stand on the far end of the lookouts and the bridge over the deep gap here. I have to admit that I really understand why, the wind was fierce out here and I really had to grab hold of the fence to keep standing. If I was only a bit lighter, I would have feared the wind would've blown me right over the edge...

So a big favorite for this cache and many thanks!!!

#1910 - 12.20 PM 

After finding three caches already on our walk through Coffs Harbour and a beautiful walk in the botanical gardens, we also found the stash hidden here.

It always makes me feel a bit uneasy when a geocache is on a cemetery, but here it is done with respect for those who lie here. We also found the way it was hidden to be very good!

Thanks for letting us find our first multi-cache in Australia!

#1909 - 4.15 PM 

Three finds on a row here in Coffs, a bit unique for us Dutch cachers out in Australia! We spotted the cache after just a short while searching, I guess the hint helped us to the right spot. The cache was guarded by some kind of vicious insect, which I left alone and spoke sweet little words to in order for him not to attack me. It worked!

After this we went into the gardens, which were very beautiful even we did not spot the Koala's and Owls that rumoured to be there somewhere.

Thanks so much for the cache!

#1908 - 2.40 PM 

On our road trip from Cairns to Sydney (and New Zealand and Fiji), we experienced so much that there was little time left for geocaching. Here in Coffs Harbour, we took some cache-walking-time and found a few. This was the first one.

On our walk over, we spotted a couple of Kookaburra's from up real close, which was a great opportunity for us to take some pics of this big bird. Kangaroo, Koala, Crocodile, Kookaburra, all the "K" sounding animals were spotted during our trip Down Under.

The Creek Walk was a bit of a detour from our route to the botanical gardens, probably because I was navigating and I should leave those tasks up to my way more capable love, Miss Bij. Well anyway, we got to find some caches which always makes me happy.

It almost was my first Australian find, but unfortunately my girl shouted: "I already see it!" right before my hand grabbed the stash. So the credit goes to her... I don't really really mind

Thanks for putting the cache!

#1906 - 2.15 PM 

After finding the Creek Walk 1, we also found the cache hidden here. This was actually my first own find in Australia, as my girl Miss Bij seems to have the best nose for caches Down Under.

Being here all the way from Holland, I really enjoyed the fact that on this day we could actually find some caches, because we already had a lot of DNF's.

We didn't stop for some fishing, but walked on towards the botanical gardens.

Thanks for the cache!

#1907 - 2.25 PM 

On a journey of a lifetime with my beautiful Miss Bij, we travelled from The Netherlands to Hong Kong, Australia, New Zealand and Fiji.

Offcourse with so much to do and so much to see, there was not always a lot of time for geocaching. We did many tours on our route from Cairns to Sydney, and took only small leftover bits of time to try to find some caches along the way.
After a find in Cairns and two in Townsville, this was only our third geocache in Australia so far. We visited the Sarina Sugar Shed and did the tour there, as being a nice break from our trip from MacKay to the Myella Farm Stay near Rockhampton. Such a long drive requires a good stop, which we really experienced here.
And while out here, I turned on my GPS to check if there would be any caches available. Well, that was the case, just about 60 meters from where I turned it on. So it was a quick search and find, so we can mark this nice spot in Aussies' Sugar Central.

Thanks so much for putting the cache!

#1905 - 10.45 AM 

So already the fifth cache or so we did not find in Australia... I thought of myself to be an experienced geocacher, with 1900+ finds and all, but it seemed not to be the case here.

Together with Miss Bij, took a lot of time searching this spot, which was right across from our hostel. If you don't mind the effort, I'd really would enjoy recieving a message how it's hidden, because if I read the other guys logs it is probably a very nice cache.
And it still has me puzzled, even though I'm back home now far far away in Holland.

Thanks anyway for the cache! 

After three DNF's in Cairns (Relax by the tree, Monkey Muscles and Bats, Bats, Bats), I only got more eager to at least find one cache in Cairns. It was our first place-to-stay in Australia and we stayed here for five days. Although our amazing trip from The Netherlands to here was about more than just finding geocaches, I at least wanted to find some of them.

This cache was found pretty quickly by my wife, Miss Bij. She sometimes just has a nose for getting to the right spot... One can only be happy about that, offcourse.

So happy with my first cache in this continent!

Thanks for putting the cache and showing us to this amazing place, we otherwise would have completely overlooked for there are a lot of amazing things to see and do around cairns. We did the skyrail and the kuranda rainforest, we cuddled the koala, we went to a croc farm and went out diving with CDC on the GBR, where we also spotted a killer whale. Just to name a few of our Cairns-highlights...

Thanks so much! 

Yeah, well, errr... I put a "Found it" log even though I know and realise and discovered that the physical cache is not really here.

Together with my sweet love Miss Bij, I went on the holiday of a lifetime. We travelled from The Netherlands to Hong Kong, Australia, New-Zealand and Fiji. We just arrived home when I'm writing this log. The duration, distance and cost of this amazing journey, makes us realize that it is not likely we'll be able to do this again in the years to come.
Normally, I'd take my losses if we encounter a geocache that's not really there. In Cairns for instance, it happened three times. However, in this case I decided to send a request to the cache owner, since this was a really amazing spot, with a great view, and the cache is a great reward for the physical challenge we went through to grab it. It's definitely worth the effort, but I really wanted this spot to be on my finds-list.

So I know the owner has the right to decline or aprove these kinds of requests and I will offcourse change this log in a DNF if he does not approve. I will put some photographic evidence of us being at this spot with this log today or tomorrow. And I'll give this cache a favorite.

So how did it come to be that we wanted to find this cache? When heading for Townsville, we wanted to visit Magnetic "Maggie" Island 'cause we heared it was very beautiful and because of the change of seeing Koala's in the Wild (in stead of Wild Koala's, since they don't exist). That mission succeeded the very next day.
But upon our arrival, we put our suitcases in our room at the Civic Guest House, and my girl told me the mountain we looked at was called "Castle Hill". I say mountain, because in our Holland everything is flat and here everything seems to us like being a mountain. We like visiting castle's, in Europe there are many left standing. We didn't know that in Australia there also would be castle's, because in our recollection the settlers arrived way past the castle-building-age. So we looked if there would be a cache somewhere - which there was - and decided to make te climb to see the castle.
We were offcourse a bit surprised when we got to the top....... But hey, we got our goat on and really enjoyed this hike. Thanks, thank you, merci, dankjewel!

We got our goat on!

Thanks for the cache!

#1903 - 17.10 

Wot a view!! Together with Miss Bij (not logging the cache 'cause she's no PM), we climbed the Castle Hill. For a longer part of the story, you can read the log we put at cache GC3F3Y2 "Get ya goat on!!!".

Yeah, this cache was truly the summit. We went all the way to the monument, being very exhausted of the goat trail, being in our touristy lazy condition, and wondered if we would be able to do the last 600 meters required for this cache.
So we took some time to rest and enjoy the views up there, and then decided to make the last meters as well. Evening came, so most muggles started their way back down so we could search freely. Miss Bij found the spot but wouldn't dare to search in case there would be any (funnel web) spiders around. So I crawled in and found the stash.

Thanks so much for putting the cache, and even keeping it to be an ode to the previous cache there. I'll put a favorite for this one too, because the view was just so beautiful. In dusk, the area became even more pretty and we had a great time here. So also thanks for the memories we made!

#1904 - 5.30 PM 

Trying to find my first Aussie cache, travelling from Holland to beautiful Cairns, I first had three Did-Not-Finds... That was a little bit frustrating.

This was the third DNF. We were very amazed by these beautiful and huge bats, I finally know where the Batman-logo comes from. Back home in Holland, our Bats are micro-bats compared to these winged creatures!
We searched for a while, although maybe not very thouroughly because of the muggle-activity. After we both got pooped on by the bats (ieuw!), we gave up.

Thanks anyway for putting it here on this great spot! 

Trying to find my first Aussie cache, travelling from Holland to beautiful Cairns, I first had three Did-Not-Finds... That was a little bit frustrating.

After a great trip to Kuranda and surroundings, and after a dive on the Great Barrier Reef, we tried our luck for the second time here @ the Muscles cache. Very nice to see al these work-out spots put here for everyone to enjoy, and to see that a lot of people make good use of them. Made it a bit harder to find a quiet time for a search..... And found nothing unfortunately.

Thanks anyway for putting it here on this great spot! 

Trying to find my first Aussie cache, travelling from Holland to beautiful Cairns, I first had three Did-Not-Finds... That was a little bit frustrating.

This one I tried on our first day in Australia, dizzy and tired from the jetlag we tried to relax... and sleep a little... on a bench right by this tree. Turning on my GPS I saw there should have been a cache, so I went for a search. A bit annoyed by all the very fit muggles sporting around, all I found where hundreds of those big scary green ants...

Thanks anyway for putting it here on this great spot!