The Tuia Mātauranga Pōkai Whenua GeoTour follows the footsteps of early explorers of Aotearoa New Zealand taking you to places where leaders of the past searched for food, resources and ways to adapt and survive in this new land.
Use the Pōkai Whenua GeoTour as your classroom to explore the stories of the past, in the present, to preserve what is unique in Aotearoa New Zealand for the future.
Collect the codewords to get the Geocoin puzzle pieces
To be able to complete this GeoTour and receive your special Geocoin collectable, remember to take a note of the codeword placed in the cache. This will need to be recorded in your passport which can be downloaded here.
63 of the 150 Pōkai Whenua GeoTour caches will contain a randomly placed special FTF token (a replica of the Tuia Mātauranga GeoTour commemorative coin). This is yours to keep! If you find more than one, you might consider leaving it for the next person who finds the cache.
Prospectors discovered a quartz reef in the hills behind the Blackwater in 1905, which led to the establishment of the South Island's richest mine in the nearby township of Waiuta.
Blackwater also flourished with a sawmill to serve the mine, as well as a post office, a police station, a store, a butcher shop and a hotel.
When the mines closed in Waiuta, the population of Waiuta and Blackwater dwindled.
The Blackwater school was built in 1913 to serve the small mining, sawmilling and farming Blackwater area in the upper Grey Valley and closed in 1949. It sits on private land. After standing derelict for many years, the building was gifted to the community by farmer Jack Burrows in 1980. It was well maintained inside and out by neighbours Jack and Barbara Birkbeck before they died 10 years ago. Their daughter, Rosie Wilson, said she and her husband had since taken over maintaining the school and allowing visitors through.
Wilson said the school was unique, with its desks, ink wells, display cabinet and old photos around the walls.
The school is listed as a historic building and it looks like the children have just left for the day.
No night visits please.
