About 10.30am today, one of the crews found Mr Gordon about 2.5km from his original camp site.
Mr Gordon, who is a manager of a water treatment plant, had a dislocated and swollen knee and cuts and scratches on his face
Detective Sergeant John Wilson, head of the Rotorua police Land Search and Rescue team, said he delivered the good news to Mr Gordon's sister, who lives in Murupara, and other family members who had gathered there, this morning.
"I've never been hugged so much in my life," he said.
"I think the word would have to be they were ecstatic."
Mr Wilson said the volunteers and police officers did an amazing job considering the atrocious wet conditions.
"I didn't think it was going to end this way, not after three nights. It's fair to say I had grave concerns."
Mr Wilson said police were initially called at 3.45pm on Thursday and told the hunter was overdue after going hunting on Wednesday.
He had been flown into the area on Sunday with six others and was due to be flown out again on Saturday.
"The weather was rubbish and was fast getting worse. We elected to send in a team of three - a policeman, a Land SAR volunteer and an advanced paramedic. They tramped eight hours into the night to reach the campsite arriving at 5am."
Three more teams were sent in on Friday morning and teams using vehicles from the Rotorua 4WD Club.
One of the teams came across hunters who had seen the missing man and had redirected him back to his campsite.
"We managed to get a radio repeater installed so we could get communications between the search parties.
"With the information we managed to get from the hunters, we could redirect our search. We redeployed our teams to focus on intercepting him going back to his camp."
At the height of the search there were 34 people involved.
Mr Wilson said the hunter was found in surprisingly good spirits. He said what saved the hunter was the fact he was an "optimistic guy", was wearing good clothing and the temperature was relatively mild.
"This is a big pat on the back for Land SAR volunteers and police who have been out there since Thursday night.
"Everything was stacked against them and they did an amazing job in appalling conditions. It's one of the best searches I've been involved in."