New Thing #40 - The Golden Egg

Today I went on a treasure hunt in Forest Park to find a golden egg worth $500. Betsy found this company that hosts treasure hunts throughout the year in St. Louis. We knew it involved clues and a puzzle, but we had no idea what to expect. Our friend Aaron joined us as well. Unfortunately, his wife Natalie wasn't able to join us, so it just ended up being the three of us.


We started by heading to Tower Grove Park near our houses where everyone was to meet up. We signed up and got our wristbands that were required to play. We were team T, and since we had signed up for 4 people, we were T4, but that changed to T(4-slashed-out)3 instead. So, we called ourselves Team 43. Hey, we thought we were cool. Once everyone arrived at the start site, we were each given our Easter basket that would help up solve the puzzle. It included a packet with 7 different colored sheets of paper, three small colored strips of paper, an ink pen and a small wooden frame. Each clue would lead us to an egg that would give us clues to find the golden egg worth $500. The individual eggs also had random money stashed inside some of them, so we could win even more money. We weren't allowed to open up our packet of paper until the hunt began. After a little bit of smack talk with some of the other teams, the hunt began.




Here we are, ready to win $500 big ones!



I'm not sure why we're standing so far apart! (This photo was taken by the event photographer.)

3...2...1...and we were off. I thought it would be a great idea to park towards the front of the pack so we could get out early, but it blew up in our faces. First, we had to run further to our car than other people did, and then all the people in the back drove away while we waited for an opening in the line. Oops. Those people were crazy too, they weren't letting us in at all! Good thing Betsy was our driver. She's more aggressive than I am. :)


We decided that Aaron would be the navigator so he rode shotgun and held onto the Forest Park map. I was in charge of reading the clues and keeping track of all the puzzle pieces. We made a pretty good team. I ripped open our clue packet and started reading the clues while we headed up to Forest Park. The only bad thing about this being such a nice day is that everyone and their mother decided to head to Forest Park. So it was a bit of a cluster trying to get there.

Our clues were holiday themed on 7 different colored pieces of paper. Each clue led us to find that colored egg. They didn't have to be found in any particular order either. Inside each egg were small Scrabble like tiles that had clues on them to lead us to the golden egg. The first clue we headed towards was the green egg.


A green egg for St. Patrick's Day,
will help you win this game.
You'll find them near a body,
that contains an Irish name.
On the north side of the park,
is where your team should roam.
Across the street and down the hill,
from very lavish homes.


Aaron checked out the map and quickly found Murphy Lake on the northern side of the park. Betsy made a mad dash for it, and we pulled over on the side of the road and headed down towards the lake. There were about 3 or 4 cars that pulled in behind us, so we made a run for it. Bad. Idea. Good gravy I should have stretched first. We went tearing down a hill filled with holes, branches and lots of other obstacles in our way. I'm not really sure how I didn't fall flat on my face. Graceful I am not. But, we could see the game official with the shiny green bag in front of us. The rules of the game required all members of the team to be present to get our egg, so we couldn't leave the driver in the car. Once we reached the official, we grabbed a green egg and went tearing back up the hill. Well, sort of. I wasn't prepared for all the cross-country running.


We hopped back in the car, and amidst heavy breathing, I opened our egg. Inside were four wooden tiles, all with numbers on one side, and some with images on the other. No money though. In the hubbub of the day, I don't remember which tiles were in which eggs, but I'll list all the images later on. These images were supposed to help tell us where the golden egg was.

I was reading all the clues really quickly, so we were easily getting confused on which ones said what. We were trying to go so fast! There was one clue that mentioned a building of stone and glass, so we naturally headed to the Jewel Box next. We hopped out and again went speeding up the hill, but couldn't find a person with the eggs, or the rest of the clue we were looking for. We did, however, find what we thought was one of the clues for the orange egg. After a few minutes of looking around, we gave up and headed back to the car to try to find the blue egg.


The clue for the blue egg was:

This man is the main author,
of our declaration creed.
And also our third president,
an accomplished man indeed.
In honor of Independence Day,
we've hidden eggs of blue.
But before you go, you should know,
there's something you should do.
Find his statue in the place,
that bears his name up high.
A museum made of glass and stone,
it's several stories wide.
Near the base of where he sits
is where your team should go.
Tell us what he called St. Louis,
many years ago.

We had thought this was the Jewel Box, but there was no Jefferson statue there. So, instead, we headed to Jefferson Lake, hoping to figure out where the statue might be. We drove around for 10 minutes trying to find that damn statue. We did spot the game official and his shiny blue bag, but we couldn't get our egg until we found the Jefferson statue. We had to write down the clue in order to claim our egg.


So dammit, we're driving around the lake, which is by the Planetarium part of the Science Center, trying to find the damn statue. We gave up, and decided to try out another egg. The pink egg's clue was this:

Valentine's Day is a lover's day,
not to be alone.
Also a day of massacre,
just ask Al Capone.
The pink eggs that we've left,
are at a place that couples share.
Where single go to find a match,
and love is in the air.


The first, and only thing, we could think of had to be the Boathouse. It's a pretty romantic place, and they have a fire pit for love birds. We raced over there, and jumped out and confused the hell out of all the people waiting to take the paddle boats out on the lake. I'm sure we looked pretty crazy running around looking in every nook and cranny trying to find a guy with a shiny pink bag. No luck there either. Dammit. Four tries and only one egg to show for it.

We had immediately figured out the purple egg clue, but we hadn't had a chance to make it over there yet, so we thought now would be a good time. We knew this was a guaranteed egg, so we hopped back into the crazy traffic and away we went. On our way though, we figured out the white egg, and thought we should stop and get it so we didn't have to back track.

The white egg clue was:


The pine tree is a Christmas symbol,
known throughout the land.
Within a grove of real pines,
you'll find one made by man.
It's where we've placed our snow white eggs,
your team can find one there.
Just to the north of the giant cage
that was present at the fair.


We figured out that the giant cage meant the World's Fair Bird Cage at the zoo and directly north of that was the World's Fair Pavilion. It's a giant stone building with an open base. Out we go again and we race toward the open base only to see chairs set up and girls with updos sipping champagne. Damn, people are getting ready for a wedding. We figured the egg would not be in the actual pavilion since it would interfere with the wedding. So, we took a few minutes to look down the steep hill and see if we can see anyone. Aaron somehow spots a shiny white bag down at the bottom of the hill amidst some trees. Yes, at the bottom. Of a steep hill. Crap. He takes off and Betsy and I follow him down two dozen or so steps and then across a small field and down the hill. Good times. We get our egg, and the fun begins of getting back up the hill. At least I don't have to go to the gym later today. As we make it to the top of the hill to our car we see another car of girls that are doing the same race we are. Ha, they have to get down the hill too.

We zip out and get stuck in some monster zoo traffic. Damn the officials for making us go anywhere near the zoo on a day like today! Because of all the Highway 40 construction, there aren't as many routes into the zoo as there used to be. And, of course, our way to Turtle Park is blocked by a gazillion cars all trying to get into the zoo. Son of a bitch. We can see Turtle Park, but we can't get our egg without Betsy and it's not like she can just ditch the car somewhere. Parking close to our targets was one of the hardest parts of the day.

Here's how we figured out where the purple eggs were:

The search for eggs is a favorite task,
for kids on Easter Day.
Now you must search for purple eggs,
to help you on your way.
Guarded by giant reptiles,
that all have been man made.
Just cross the pass and grab one fast,
among the eggs they've laid.

Fortunately, the trek from where we parked the car to where the egg holder was was fairly short. Just a short jog this time. Woo-hoo, we have 3 of the 7 eggs! And roughly an hour or so had gone by. We still had no idea where the golden egg was though. Some of the tiles in our eggs were blank with no clues, so we didn't have much to go on. We were hoping with a few more clues we could search for the golden egg.

In the midst of these other clues, we figured out where the orange egg was.

Hitchcock's Psycho son,
brought him movie making fame.
Find the statue in the park,
that bears the son's last name.
Tell us the kind of animal,
that stands upon the base.
The answer that you've written down,
will help you win this race.
For you must have this answer,
to get our egg for Halloween.
They're not close by, so take a drive
to another scary scene.
They're hidden near a statue
that contains a witch's name.
Although this "Project" was a fake,
it also garnished fame.


While we were at the Jewel Box, we thought we found the "animal" we had to know in order to get the egg. We saw a statue with birds/ravens at the bottom, so we assumed that was the animal. It fit the Hitchcock theme of the clue. While looking at the Forest Park map we found the Blair statue and knew instantly that was where the egg was. Ironically, the Blair statue is very close to the Murphy Lake where we first started the race. And of course, there was no close place to park. My butt was tired. I was running on a bowl of cereal and a half bottle of water. And I'm not a runner. At all. We're all getting a bit winded by this point and are looking forward to lunch and a cold beer at the end. We apparently found the wrong statue in the beginning though, because the correct answer was eagle. At least they accepted our answer of birds!


We're finally over halfway to the end and Aaron has a brilliant epiphany. While plotting our route to the Art Museum for the yellow egg, he sees the tennis courts on the map and instantly realizes that that is where the pink egg is. "Where singles go to find a match, and love is in the air." Brilliant. I never would have come up with that one. It's really funny to get to these places and see all the other teams running around like we are. When we got to the tennis courts, we saw another team running towards the History Museum, and again Aaron showed us why he was on our team. There's a Jefferson statue inside the museum, and that, of course, is where the quote is that we needed. I knew we brought Aaron along for a reason. So, we all grabbed our pink egg, and we sent Aaron running towards the History Museum to get the clue while Betsy and I grabbed the car and met him over there. We figured since he ran like a gazelle, he was much better qualified to run over there. I ran like a bear thrashing around in the woods. The quote we needed was "The center of our western expansion."


Back to Jefferson Lake we went to get our blue egg by reciting the Jefferson clue. At this point we had 6 of the 7 eggs and 24 of the 25 puzzle pieces. We thought we'd try to find the golden egg rather than going for the final egg. The clues in our puzzle included: The Leaning Tower of Pisa, a group of trees, a parking sign, a knighted centaur, Jeff Bridges, a column, a cross, a bus and Beau Bridges. Our first thought was the Grand Basin at the bottom of Art Hill, but Aaron's thought of the Muny seemed more plausible. It's surrounded by bridges, they have a bus parking lot, it's surrounded by a ton of trees, and has lots of columns in the architecture. We weren't really sure where the Tower of Pisa, the knighted centaur or the cross came into play, but we were intelligent people. We'd figure it out.

But, we didn't. We spent nearly an hour combing every single inch of the Muny, its parking lots, bridges, trees, rocks, holes, trash cans, you name it, we looked at, under or around it. We started with the Muny structure itself, trying to figure out where it could be hidden based on the clues. We called the game creator and found out that it was just one golden egg, and that it would be hidden with no official around it. We knew it wouldn't just be sitting somewhere, so we proceeded to move leaf piles, look up in trees and even went hunting around the stream running right by it. We thought we had hit the money spot when we saw the bridge with crosses on it. That had to be it, right?! Right? Apparently not, since we combed every inch of it. We weren't the only team that thought the Muny was the right spot either. At least four other teams came and went while we were there searching. One girl even picked some trash out of the stream thinking it was hidden in there. We were just certain that it had to be at the Muny. We went over the clues a billion times trying to figure out what we were missing.

After nearly an hour, we still didn't have a call that the egg had been found, so we decided to go after the last clue, the yellow egg:

Prior to Thanksgiving
these two groups did dine apart.
And you must find them both
in the museum of fine art.
To the main floor galleries,
is where your team should go.
For Indians and Puritans,
that have been put on show.
Find the captive painting
that is hanging on the wall.
It shows a group of Indians,
four of them, in all.
Tell us what they've captured,
it will help you earn an egg.
But not so fast, there's one more task
before you're on your way.


Again, they sent us to one of the busiest places in the park. The Art Museum is near the zoo and is at the top of Art Hill where people like to go for a picnic, to fly kites or to throw some frisbees. It's also close to the golf courses. So, everyone and their mother was trying to drive where we were going. We figured it would be easier to park it and hike our asses up the hill to the Art Museum. I had a pain in my knee that made stairs difficult, Betsy's hammies were on fire, but Aaron was still pushing through with no problems. I hate him. Aaron has done everything he can to avoid the Art Museum at all costs, at least up until now. Apparently fine art is his kryptonite. Fortunately for him, we just barely walked in the building when I got the call that the egg had been found.

What the hell? We just spent an hour at the Muny! If someone had found it where we had looked, there would be hell to pay. It took us quite awhile to get back to the car and out of Forest Park, but we eventually made it to Tower Grove park. We didn't really want to go back, we were pretty hungry, but we had to know who found the egg, and where they found it. When we got back, we immediately found the head honcho and he told us that the egg was found in Tower Grove Park. Yep, it wasn't even in Forest Park. We spent all that time looking in the wrong spot. Son. Of. A. Bitch. Are you kidding me? If it wasn't so funny, I'd be really ticked off.

We may not have found the golden egg, but we did have a lot of fun. Note to self though: wear jogging pants and stretch next time. Thanks to Betsy and Aaron for joining the fun with me. Maybe we'll do better next time.


Update: The Egg people posted the results of all the clues and how the golden egg should have been found: The team's map was a photo map reading Tower + Grove + Park across the top, Centaur + Cross down the left side, Column + Bus down the right side and the Golden Egg between Jeff & Bo Bridges in the center. The Golden Egg was hidden in Tower Grove Park between two bridges which were located approximately 1/2 way between Center Cross Drive and the Columbus Statue.


Here's the puzzle box.