The second in our 4WD only caches. Although this one has a little twist in that in good weather the road in from the south (dirt) from the Hyden Lake King Rd. (bitumen) could easily be traversed in a 2WD vehicle in good weather (16kms). Any further and the rocks would stop you without any ground clearance. This area known as Emu Rocks was our first overnight stop along the track, and a nice place to stop it is especially when we had the entire area to ourselves.
We placed this cache in recognition of John Holland's epic journey to make a direct route from the goldfields in Kalgoorlie to the ports in Albany. Originally the track started in Broomehill and finished at Gnarlbine rock just south west of Coolgardie. This 500 km track was slashed through the bush and finally connected these two cities. In September 1892 when the first gold find at Fly Flat, Coolgardie started the exodus from Perth, but the docks at Albany had the biggest crowds with hopeful clerks, shopkeepers, farmers, etc, etc made their way from the eastern states and beyond.
There had been several previous attempts to connect these cities but they had failed. In 1892 a prospector named McIntosh departed Katanning on horseback but was never heard of again. So on 14th April 1893 John Holland, David Krakouer, Rudolph Krakouer and John Carmody set out where others had failed. Each morning John Holland set out alone on horseback to scout up to 30 kms ahead and find water, whilst the rest of the team cut the track through the bush. They finally reached Bailey's find on June 18th 1893, 2 months and four days after setting out.
The cache is located in a small bush area located via an easy climb on top of the rock. There are some great views to be had and you can visualise how helpful these rocks would have been in planning the trip across the vast area to be covered by the first explorers.
On the first to find issue as always with our caches there is the usual FTF Collectors Card but from this series on we have come into possession of a large quantity FTF Ammo Box enamel pins.
Geocaching Australia Link.