Honeymoon Hilton

Geocaching

Some of you will know what Geocaching is, others will have no idea until now. Basically it's a game of hide and seek using GPS units to find the hidden treasures. Typically Tupperware style containers but sometimes large ammo boxes or tiny vials like you might use on a carrier Pigeons leg.

I've got just over 100 Geocaches hidden in Southern Australia which help to make up the over two million worldwide.

This latest cache is the hardest I've made and easily the hardest to find in this area.

Carefully bored into a rock and covered with an *auto filler cap held in place by a super magnet, this rock is then placed among many others in a typical bush fireplace. The whole thing is then blackened with flat black paint (it's total fire ban here so I'm not allowed to light even a small fire) to make it look used. To add further to the difficulty there are an array of camping items for potential finders to search. To make it worthwhile there is a dry milk tin full of trinkets and swaps and a hidden bottle of (fake) gold nuggets so Geocachers can take one as a memory. Add a plastic snake and centipede to make you jump and lots of bits for you to search, with the area cleared a colony of ants moved in and made it home adding further to the difficulty.

I've built the entire camp in the local fauna park, carting in every single thing to make it look entirely authentic. It's a copy of an historic camp now on army land and therefore out of bounds for Geocaching. The Honeymoon Hilton was used when the 85km trip from the next town was a two day Bullock cart ride through the bush, the camp was once the overnight resting place.

The cache became active a few days before Christmas 2012 and has caused much head scratching and more than a few phone calls from people looking for clues. The first finders took 71/2 hours to find it and two calls for clues

*car bog

 The camp as you approach it.

 Even things like this Shotgun cartridge is there because I placed it there and must be searched. One of my other caches is a Shotgun cartridge so this makes a few people think they have found it.

 An old milk can full of swaps, bottles and a fire blackened fire prod. (Painted not actually fire blacked)
On the log above the can you can see the small plastic snake.

 Even a bottle cap is a possible Geocache, every piece of wood may have a drilled hole for a tiny cache and must be searched.

 An old roll of Barbed Wire to search, under the bark is a small container with my phone number for clues and the special tool for opening the cache when you find it

 The Gold is stashed in the crook of this tree

The real hiding place..... 

Under a lower rock here. Again painted rocks and sticks to make the fireplace look used.

This rock.....

Turn it over..

Can you see the Geocache?

 How about now the special tool is inserted?

..and now the cap is removed? 

The hard sandstone rock was drilled out and the cap moulded to fit exactly. (What do you know, those years of moulding my own fishing lures finally paid off)

The metal rod holds it firmly in place with a super magnet glued into the bottom of the hole.

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