Greetings, adventurers! We’re overflowing with gratitude for everyone who participated in the Seven Paces Grand Forks Treasure Hunt! We trust everyone had a rip-roaring time!
A big round of applause for our swift and savvy winner, Megan Brown! She nabbed the treasure right after we let slip the second of our three clues! Now, for the moment you’ve all been waiting for… let’s dissect the solution!
True to form, our riddle was split into three segments. This time, we shook things up a bit by choosing to reveal each part at spontaneous intervals, instead of releasing one piece daily like in previous hunts. With only 25 hunters, we wanted to keep the adrenaline pumping, and didn’t want to leave you all hanging a whole day between clues.
Saturday – Clue One “Grand Forks has many of these North? South? Midtown? So many choices. In fact, more than 30.”
Explanation: This clue was meant to point to two things:
- “Grand forks has many of these, in fact, more than 30.” This may have got you thinking about parks, but we were actually hinting at statues/monuments.
- “North? South? Midtown? So many choices.” A vague clue, for sure, but with some sleuthing, the words “North & South” could have led you towards the prize. “Midtown” was just there to throw you off the scent!
Saturday – Clue Two “For whom the bell tolls Been known to divide families Do not wait for Sunday”
Explanation:
- “For whom the bell tolls.” This could refer to both a novel about the Spanish civil war and church bells.
- “Been known to divide families.” This was a nod to the civil war (and, if you stretched it, possibly church as well!).
- “Do not wait for Sunday.” This was our cryptic way of telling you it wasn’t the church. Keep moving!
Clue Three “Although you won’t see lions or elk, you are close A place to honor fallen soldiers A grand M.U.”
Explanation:
- “Although you won’t see lions or elk, you are close.” This was a subtle hint towards the Masonic temple, just to guide folks who might have strayed off course.
- “A place to honor fallen soldiers.” A bit of misdirection to see if hunters would venture towards Veteran’s memorial park.
- “A grand M.U.” A grand Memorial/Monument Union. More misdirection, but it also hinted towards our chosen hiding spot.
The Hide: The treasure was nestled under a paving stone, snug beneath the Grand Army of the Republic Monument on Belmont, just across from St Mary’s Catholic Church!
Our Approach:
The hunt, overall, unfolded pretty smoothly! We made the shift to a fresh platform for our website and email distribution, which led to notable improvements in our outreach and communication strategies. Yet again, some hunters found themselves wrestling with site login issues. It’s becoming apparent that completely eliminating this hurdle may not be possible. However, email has proven to be a reliable fallback for information delivery, so we’ll stick with that. We acknowledge, once again, that the riddle may have been on the simpler side. As we plan to boost the prize value in subsequent hunts, we’ll also aim to ratchet up the complexity of the riddles.
Final Words:
And just like that, we have another fantastic hunt in our chronicles! It was a sheer delight to finally witness this hunt unfold. We concealed this treasure quite a long while back, and it’s truly gratifying that we could orchestrate a successful hunt. As ever, we’ve gleaned many useful lessons from this experience and are excited to incorporate these learnings into our future endeavours!