Central local Troy Murley and his two sons have found and recorded a good number of the objects hidden around Cromwell, playing the Geocache game.  

The game is a sophisticated take on the old-fashioned treasure hunt, which requires cracking codes, orienteering, and recording your finds.

“The most fun is when you are close to the cache and see it, but people are around,” Troy told The Central App.

“My sons feel like little spies – they pretend to do a shoe up or something, and retrieve the cache.”

Caches are usually small, water-proof containers which are hidden (never buried), containing a logbook that you record your find in and return to its original spot for the next adventurer to discover. You can log your find on the Geocache website to be rewarded with points and see how many others have hit the jackpot. 

Just some of the hiding spots around Cromwell

Some of the hidden objects contain a ‘trackable’, a moveable item which travels from geocache to geocache. Each trackable includes a six-digit code somewhere and this unique code tracks its specific journey around the world.

Troy’s sons have both found a trackable. His youngest son’s find travelled 30,724km and is currently in Australia, via the USA. His other son’s trackable has done 7,530km ending up in Australia too.

“We usually fill out the notepad with our name and a thanks for the cache (TFTC),” Troy said.  

“There are quite a few people in Cromwell who play and when we see the same people, we know we’re on the correct path to victory.”

Geocaching (Geo for Earth, Cache for hiding place) originated in Oregon, USA in 2000 and has grown to more than three million active geocaches in 191 different countries, including New Zealand.  

In the early days it was a handful of computer enthusiasts using GPS equipment, but today playing the game is as easy as downloading the app on your smartphone.