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WanAus 105 - Don Rhodes Museum Traditional Cache

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WanderingAus: Gone for good.

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Hidden : 10/20/2009
Difficulty:
1.5 out of 5
Terrain:
1.5 out of 5

Size: Size:   micro (micro)

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Geocache Description:

Should be an extremely easy find at the local Mining and Transport Museum.

This cache has been placed as a reward to Port Hedland for getting us "On The Road Again". We had limped along for the past 1,600 or so kilometres, with the V6 geoChallenger running on four cylinders , mostly in second gear with occasional bursts of third gear on downhill sections (in a four speed plus overdrive automatic transmission) , finally arriving in Port Hedland just before midday on a Tuesday. The only mechanic with Mitsubishi diagnostic equipment North of Perth, henceforth to be known as Werner The Wizard, only took a couple of hours to identify the faulty ignition control transistor causing the problem .

There were no new ones available in Western Australia, and probably in Australia ("they never fail, so nobody carries them"), but he managed to locate a secondhand one in Perth, which he was promised "missed the plane, but got on the truck to Port Hedland minutes ago". At 4:45 PM the very next day, Werner The Wizard rang to say the part was in, and he was ready to fit it. I immediately raced to his premises, stopping only to claim a find of GA0978 Train Spotters by NTSTROM at the Don Rhodes Mining and Transport Museum (well, you have to balance your priorities don't you - I expected it to be dark on my way back, and it was). Some time later, I parted with a small sum of cash, and drove out of Werner The Wizard's gate exactly 28 hours and 5 minutes after first driving in through them, with all six cylinders firing nicely .

On the way back to the caravan park I placed the cache in the dark and took a flash photo to remind me of the place. Please note it is NOT on this train.



The locomotives have all been enclosed by higher fences, so the cache is no longer a T1. The presence of a large number of muggles meant I could not retrieve the existing cache and log, so I replaced it instead.

The cache has been replaced with a magnetic Eclipse mint tin hidden near the Western end of the "Goldsworthy 2" locomotive, on the side furthest from the road, under the edge just forward of the hoses. It contains a stash note, two Write In The Rain logs, Finders Cards, two pencils, and a pencil sharpener.

Based on the number of DNFs logged before Moosehunter303 found it on 09 Aug 15, cachers are obviously confused about which end of a locomotive is the front and which is the rear, or perhaps they are confused about what is a hose and what is a pipe. Moosehunter303 kindly confirmed to me that my description was correct.

Subsequent logs in 2016 and 2017 indicate that the fence may have changed, and I still had the wrong end, so I have changed it to the "Western" end. There is a possibility the cache has suffered "End Creep", so if you can't find it at the Western end please check the Eastern end, and confirm in your log which end you found it. It would be very helpful if you also returned it to the spot described - Western end, on the side furthest from the road.

Passed through on a maintenance visit on 27 Jun 18, found that the fences had indeed changed. It is no longer possible (for anyone under about 8 feet tall) to reach in to grab the cache, but there is now a gate towards the East end of the fence, and even better, a gap in the fence a little closer to the cache, so you can pass through the gap (or the gate if the gap is fixed) and walk in a Westward direction to find the magnetic Eclipse mint tin.

Take the opportunity to explore the Mining and Transport Museum, which features three locomotives as well as trucks and other equipment used in the development of the mining industry in the Pilbarra Region.

First To Find Award Congratulations to
geo smurfs
on the First To Find.


Magwing has kindly offered to be local maintainer for this cache.

Additional Hints (Decrypt)

Jnyx guebhtu gur tnc va gur srapr (be gur tngr vs gur tnc vf svkrq) naq jnyx va n Jrfgjneq qverpgvba, gva vf haqre gur rqtr ng gur Jrfgrea raq bs gur genva.

Decryption Key

A|B|C|D|E|F|G|H|I|J|K|L|M
-------------------------
N|O|P|Q|R|S|T|U|V|W|X|Y|Z

(letter above equals below, and vice versa)