Please be careful for mineshafts in the area of Deep Lead Forrest
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The Letterbox
This cache is a Letterbox Hybrid - which pays homage to an older kind of scavenger hunt, Letterboxing. To do a Letterbox you need a set of clues, a stamp and a notepad. Well, here I have included all three for you.
To experience the traditional method of Letterboxing, you can follow these set of clues which will lead you to the cache!
Step 1: Go to the Posted Coordinates.
Step 2: You will find the key hidden within 2 metres to the East of the Cache.
Step 3: Unlock the cache, sign and stamp the logbook.
The History, Theme and Location
Gold was first discovered at Pleasant Creek in May 1853. In August 1857 more extensive prospecting and mining occurred at what became known as Commercial Street, Pleasant Creek.
Two Post Offices were later opened, Pleasant Creek on 19 October 1857 and Quartz Reef on 1 June 1859. In 1858 diggers opened the Great Western goldfield, which was worked by some 9,000 prospecters. The prospecting spread to nearby Deep Lead, about 6 kilometres to northwest, and it was reported that at the height of the rush there were over 25,000 people in the area. At the same time, shafts were being sunk around Big Hill, becoming known as the Quartz Reefs. Much alluvial gold was found in the area but the 'fossicking' petered out by 1859.
In 1861, the township was renamed to honour Sir William Stawell, the Chief Justice of Victoria resulting in the name of the Pleasant Creek post office becoming "Stawell". The town was created a borough in 1869. In April 2017, a Geocacher visiting his in laws placed a cache in the Deep Lead Forrest. Before leaving, his Father in Law, a retired miner, saw the cache and asked if he was 'going off fossicking again in the bush'. In Father in Law language, Geocaching>Treasure hunting>Fossicking.