Preston Down Under (Canterbury) Traditional Cache
Team Jacers: Time for this cache to go. Its been fun but third muggling and now no longer easy for me to maintain.
Preston Down Under (Canterbury)
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Difficulty:
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Terrain:
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Size: 
(micro)
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This cache is placed in a new park in the Preston Downs subdivision. It is small with little room for swaps. It contains a log book only.
At cache creation the area was a low risk muggle area however with housing development, this will change and we ask that you wait for muggles to move on and please be subtle in your hunting.
West Melton is rapidly growing in population as two residential developments gain momentum.
West Melton is a farming district 23km west of Christchurch CBD.
The first real settler was Henry Trickett, a carpenter from Riccarton, who bought 100 acres in August 1863. Trickett named the district after his home town in England.
Historically West Melton suffered from a very uneven rainfall and had no natural water supply. This meant considerable hardship until the water-race system reached the area in 1886. This system still exists and can be seen running along Weedons Ross Road near this cache.
West Melton has long been associated with horse racing (trotting) and the main products of the area were sheep, wheat, small seeds and potatoes. (West Melton: A history of the district to 1971 by Colin Watson).
We moved to West Melton when it had a pub, service station, church, local hall, rural fire station, school and pre-school servicing a tiny township, lifestyle blocks and farms. Recently land developers bought up two farms and Gainsborough residential subdivision commenced. A second subdivision began a year or so later and along came more earthworks machinery, contractors, new amenity installations and Preston Downs subdivision was born. Nice walking routes, playground, park with a view, new families etc can be benefits for the locals along with increased traffic, loss of rural peace and fuller school classrooms on the downside.
Also, try our other cache in the area (northward further along Weedons Ross Road). Although classed as a Multi, this cache (Prepare for Landing) is simple with the two stages very close to each other.
Additional Hints
(Decrypt)
uvag vf va gur gvgyr
Treasures
You'll collect a digital Treasure from one of these collections when you find and log this geocache:
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