> In 2021 Michel Becker became the official organiser of the treasure hunt, obtaining the sealed envelope containing the hunt solution from the family of Régis Hauser. Becker journeyed with a legal bailiff to check that the owl prize was still buried at the location revealed in the solution. He reported that when he dug at the spot he found the owl missing and instead found a rusty iron bird. He replaced this rusty b…
France's oldest treasure hunt has been solved
31–40 of 41 posts
Re: France's oldest treasure hunt has been solved
#32Re: France's oldest treasure hunt has been solved
#33Some people spent decades and counting on this hunt.
To some extent, it will be a relief to them that the hunt is over.
Re: France's oldest treasure hunt has been solved
#34Could o1 have helped the hunters finally reach it?
It is not crazy to imagine that LLMs could have helped explore the solution space.
(not necessarily solving it directly)
Re: France's oldest treasure hunt has been solved
#35Reminds me a bit of Alkemstone. I went snooping about old games magazines from the early 80s and there was an advert for the prize for that game (it really is just a maze with a series of clues). The ultimate solution was to be a location of the Alkemstone (presumably a fake gem) which one would exchange for the prize. I think the guy who created it died long ago and the legal office which was meant to verify the pri…
Re: France's oldest treasure hunt has been solved
#36> In 2021 Michel Becker became the official organiser of the treasure hunt, obtaining the sealed envelope containing the hunt solution from the family of Régis Hauser. Becker journeyed with a legal bailiff to check that the owl prize was still buried at the location revealed in the solution. He reported that when he dug at the spot he found the owl missing and instead found a rusty iron bird. He replaced this rusty b…
No, what is means is that at the location, the stand-in for the golden owl was rusted. The creator of treasure hunt didn't bury the actual golden owl, to keep the artwork clean and to force the finder to reveal that he/she has indeed solved the puzzle, and not just stumbled upon it.
Re: France's oldest treasure hunt has been solved
#37Re: France's oldest treasure hunt has been solved
#38Earlier quoted context omitted.
No, what is means is that at the location, the stand-in for the golden owl was rusted. The creator of treasure hunt didn't bury the actual golden owl, to keep the artwork clean and to force the finder to reveal that he/she has indeed solved the puzzle, and not just stumbled upon it.
Isn't gold pretty much the one thing you wouldn't need to worry about keeping clean if you buried it?
Re: France's oldest treasure hunt has been solved
#39We even had geotags that were supposed to travel the world but we somehow lost them. We also had a cache.
We do not do that anymore but when I am somewhere I sometimes check for caches, for the nostalgia.
Re: France's oldest treasure hunt has been solved
#40Reminds me very much of the Masquerade book in the UK: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masquerade_(book)
Also see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Perplex_City