Esto Perpetua 5 - 1st Bonus Cache - Gold Letterbox Mystery Cache

ESTO PERPETUA 5 - 1st BONUS CACHE - GOLD

This cache is not at the published co-ordinates and there is no reason to go there. This is the first bonus cache for the Esto Perpetua series can only be found by picking up the clue words at the caches 1,2,3 and 4 in this series:

Esto Perpetua 1 - Tribune's Journal- GC8XEA5

Esto Perpetua 2 - Sacrifice - GC8XE8Q

Esto Perpetua 3 - The Secrets of Caesars - GC8XE9M

Esto Perpetua 4 - The Last Fortress - GC8XE9V

NOTE: Although this cache is listed as a 'Mystery' cache type, it is in fact a Letterbox cache, however due to restrictions on Bonus caches only being allowed to be Mystery ones, it has to be listed as that cache type. For all intents and purposes it is a Letterbox cache, and contains all the things you would expect of a Letterbox cache type. More on that below. It will of course show up on your stats as a 'Mystery', which is also a good description of the restriction on why Letterbox caches can't be bonuses! . Thanks go to the reviewer for helping me through these restrictions.

Finding This Cache - The Hunt For The Golden Casket

Read The Journal of Tribune Marcus Caelius below as he describes more wrongdoings by those pesky Caledonians, and look at the further information below it. Then you will have to use your puzzle-solving skills to help Marcus find a missing golden casket.

How Do I Use the Clues I've Picked Up To Find The Golden Casket?

1. Look at the word clues you have picked up in Caches 1-4 of this series, and the numbered order of the caches they were placed in.
2. Then look at the Caledonian's coded 'map' below which Tribune Marcus Caelius discovered.
3. Then look at the trail map view of Kinneil Estate on the Geocaching app. You'll see the many paths from the original Kinneil Estate gardens layed out in the southern part of the Kinneil Estate - they mostly run in straight(ish) lines and criss-cross each other at various junctions. They are shown as white lines on the app trail view. There's a picture of them in the gallery too.
4. Starting at N 56° 00.359 W 003° 38.005 - (the car park near the stream-side path leading down to James Watt's Workshop and Kinneil House) - follow the coded 'map' around the white line paths of the southern part of the Kinneil Estate, shown on the app. The 'map' will tell you which way to turn at each junction, (tip - north is always 'up'). The starting point has been added as a waypoint for this cache.
5. After the last junction on the coded map you will find yourself walking along a long straight path, about half the way along you will see a wide cleared area to your left heading up a slight incline, toward a long tree trunk and a stump (sitting to the right of the long tree trunk). The stump has an unusual design painted on it. There's a picture of the cleared slope up from the path, in the gallery. You'll know if you gone too far and passed the stump clearing walking down the path, because about 30 ft past it you will see a tree with '2' painted on it on your right. 
6. Leaving the straight path, continue up the clearing slope and step over the long tree trunk, keep going until you're about 50-60 metres or so from the straight path. The clearing stops around there, and you'll see traces of a faint path on your left heading East. Follow that for a few seconds and you'll see a part of a pale tree trunk on the ground. There's a picture of it in the gallery.
7. Look for the cache at the base of a fallen tree opposite the pale tree trunk, about 6 metres north.

Please replace the camouflage items to ensure the cache is well hidden.

The Caledonian's Coded Map

You can find a copy of the Caledonian Coded Map in the gallery on this cache page too. To avoid too much wandering around in the woods, you can check whether you have the right idea about the cache location by using the checker below - just add in where you think the cache will be and the checker will confirm whether you are correct - within an accuracy of about 30 feet.

Checker

You can validate your puzzle solution with certitude.

Info On Letterbox Geocaches

This Mystery cache is essentially Letterbox Hybrid Geocache. They are based on an older kind of container search, called letterboxing. Because letterboxing began in (Dartmoor, England) 1854, before GPS existed, the finder of letterbox geocaches sometimes have to follow other types of instructions/clues to discover the container. Each letterbox contains a logbook, and a rubber stamp. When letterboxers find the container, they stamp the logbook with their personal stamp, and also stamp their own notebook with the stamp from the letterbox, as a souvenir of their visit. There is often an inkstamp in the cache but it's best to bring your own because they often don't hold up well in the field. Sometimes the CO puts a separate stampbook in the cache to act as a collection of the stamps of visiting finders.

The stamp and logbook must remain in the letterbox for the next person to use.

In geocaching, cachers can treat letterbox geocaches just like a traditional geocache, and the stamping element is not mandatory. But having your own personal 'stamp collection' is part of the fun so if you have a stampbook of your own and a personal stamp, please remember to bring it along, to give you something to remember the cache by. In this case because of restrictions on bonus caches, this cache has had to be listed as a 'Mystery' and will be treated as such in statistics.

Esto Perpetua Series Letterbox Stamp

Shown below is the stamp for this cache, add it to your collection!