A Valiant Effort Horsnell Gully, South Australia, Australia
By Dik: on 07-Apr-07. Waypoint GA0728

HISTORY

Long long ago, at the start of a new millennium, while out bushwalking, we spotted across the valley something big and yellow. Now it wasn't plainly obvious what it was, but one thing was certain, it was in a place where big yellow things should not be.

And so mindful that bushwalkers are often the first to find all sorts of strange things, UFOs, Yetis and the like, we decided it may be appropriate to report it to the authorities. You know, in case they can correlate it with a report of a lost aircraft, balloon etc.

It turns out they need to take these things seriously, and even though there was no report of a big yellow thing being lost, someone had to take a look.

And so a police officer was duly despatched to investigate.

He had probably got a couple of hundred meters up the trail when I received a phone call from his mobile asking just HOW far it was? I assured him he needed to go further.

Half an hour later and the phone rings again. Huffing and puffing he asks again. It's HOW FAR? Well just to the top of the hill.

A little later and a wheezing voice confirms he has it in his sights and high powered binoculars confirm it is neither a plane, nor a balloon. But it did fall from above!

And so to our police force, I dedicate this cache, for truly A Valiant Effort.

A couple of weeks later we decided to confirm the observation and made our way to GZ. This was one of the first expeditions with the new fangled GPS thingy. In the valley the coverage was pretty much useless, so we made for higher ground and traversed the base of cliffs high on the valley side until we reached our yellow target. There the find was logged and we took a GPS reading with the Garmin GPS12 of S34 56.335 E 138 42.347 on 16th August 2000.

That co-ordinate has been checked using a new GPSmap 60CSx with SRiFIII technology and it holds up perfectly.

THE CACHE

Seven years later the yellow object is still there, although faded to a dull orange, and you can see it for yourself while you log the cache.

The cache itself is quite large, though not technically a "large" cache, and easily found once at GZ. Getting to GZ is another matter.

Whatever direction you approach from, this terrain is not for the faint hearted. It is steep, loose and populated by prickle bushes. Although the cache may apper to be only a few metres away, be prepared to spend a long time achiving very little distance. Difficulty rating is based on the difficulty in picking an approach. Terrain speaks for itself.

You may wish to take a look from S 34 56.183 E 138 42 523 first. If you find getting there is hard, then it's time to turn round and go home. Once you see the terrain you will probably give up anyway.

If you decide to go ahead, once on the approach, if the going starts to get too tough, STOP, do not go on. You now have two choices, either raise the terrain to 5 and belay or rappel in from above, or better still just go home.

All things considered, I recommend you don't even attempt this cache.

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