What If?

Oh, no!

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Forrest thinks “The treasure may be discovered sooner than I anticipated.”

{Here’s a link to Jenny Kile’s blog where you’ll find her new Six Questions with Forrest Fenn, and the above quote.}

 Ever get that sinking feeling?  How will we searchers feel once the treasure chest is found?

Forrest Fenn's Treasure Chest

Forrest Fenn’s Treasure Chest

Early on, I emailed Forrest and asked him not to give out any good clues until I got a chance to head west.  (Beginner’s Confidence.  Some of you know what I mean.)

Then, after a month or two of ridiculously obsessed behavior, I actually wished someone would find it.  I wanted my life back.

(Okay.  That didn’t last too long.)

I’ve wavered back and forth since then.

IMG_0431 It hasn’t even been a year of chasing for me.  I think I first heard of The Thrill of the Chase last March or April. But I don’t want it to end.

Not yet.

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Serendipity II — Right Time, Right Place, Right Stuff

How much pure luck or chance do you think it will take to find Forrest Fenn‘s “blaze“?

So often, it’s the unanticipated that turns out to be the treasure.

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A full moon.

A shuttle launch.

A fortunate location.

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Beaches

White Sands

White Sands

Winter beaches.  Summer beaches.

Driftwood Teepee

I have my favorites.  If I were a travel writer, I’d tell you about them, but really, I’d rather keep quiet.  Nothing like a crowd to dampen the specialness of a secret spot.  Just ask Forrest Fenn.

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Favorite (secret) lobster dock/restaurant in Maine

Today’s high will be about 0 degrees Fahrenheit.  I’m using my imagination, picturing running on a beach.  Well, maybe just strolling.  With a metal detector?  Since I’m imagining, sure.

Treasure is where you find it.

Treasure is where you find it.

(I think I’ll pick up a real one before my next treasure-hunting trip.)

Blue Water

Blue Water

No travel plans this winter, but I’ve gathered lots of memories.

Loose Ends

Loose Ends

There was a kid who had a grandpa who every morning said “It’s a good day for it.”   Didn’t matter if it was hot or cold, sunny or rainy, it was always a good day for something.  As often as could be, that might be fishing.

So, today was a good day to make blackberry jam.  Much better than heating up the kitchen on the hot, steamy July days when I picked, washed, pulped and put them in the freezer.

(Yes, I know I skipped the Oxford comma.  I don’t believe in them.)

Raspberry Trove

Raspberry Trove

Also, I made a pot of tea and sat down to blog.  Is it writer’s block?  I should be well into a revision at this point, but things have only just now settled down around here.

The bonus of the super cold days — it’s usually sunny.  I can get my vitamin D through the window, right?  Then, back to work.  It’s a good day for it.

Blue Dusk with Pine Tree

Blue Dusk with Pine Tree

Inquiring Minds

Arches in Shadow

Another Q & A with Forrest Fenn

I’d been considering lately what other questions I could ask Mr. Fenn.   I know clue/hint type questions are out, as well as topics he’d like to keep private.  What to ask, what to ask?

One item that piqued my insatiable curiosity came from a recent comment on another blog —-  Douglas Preston was originally going to write the ‘Thrill of the Chase’ story.

Wow.  Was that true?  Was it going to be 85% fiction or 85% memoir, I wondered.Underground

I’ve read four of Preston’s books now, and I’ve got to say …. Well, I think I won’t.  Just be prepared for a little horror with your mystery/thriller reading experience.

Click on the Q & A Heading/Round Two to learn more.

Forrest Fenn's Treasure Chest

Forrest Fenn’s Treasure Chest

TorchDon’t you wonder if THE POEM would have been easier to solve if someone else had been the one trying to keep the secret?

Stairway for horse and rider

Milestones

Misty morning in Glacier National Park

Misty morning in Glacier National Park

“How glorious a greeting the sun gives the mountains” – John Muir

John Muir, American conservationist.

John Muir, American conservationist. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Good morning all, and best wishes for the New Year.  2013 is wrapped up.   Thank you everyone!

 Stats for my first blog:

12, 643 views

175 followers

52 countries

(Small potatoes compared to Dal’s blog but fun for me.)

Stats for my first treasure hunt:

countless hours

4000 miles

1 trip

zero bronze chest of jewels and gold

2 entries and zero prize in Dal’s Shadow contest

a free education in history, geology, geography, etc., etc.

a few nuggets of wisdom

a priceless visit with Forrest Fenn

August 2013

August 2013

This and That (Updated)

Don’t be left out in the cold
Intrepid's Accommodations in the Boundary Waters near Canadian Border  (NOT where warm waters halt)

Intrepid’s Accommodations in the Boundary Waters near Canadian Border (NOT where warm waters halt)

Only 9 more days until someone’s lucky number gets pulled  out of Forrest Fenn’s cowboy hat —  at Collected Works Bookstore in Santa Fe  —  2 pm Mountain Time, January 7th.

Toby will be broadcasting a live feed. Sign up at his blog, A Gypsy’s Kiss.

Latest numbers from Dal’s blog:
RenelleAS OF DECEMBER 29th, 4PM OUR “DO GOOD” CANCER FUND FOR RENELLE HAS

$14,709.34

{Updated–$17,999.09 as of 6pm January 2,2014.  Way to go, Chasers!)
jar

Click here for more on Raffle for Rennelle.

Click here for a list of the contents of the prize jar.

Next item of business—  Intrepidy

(NOT to be confused with my daughter, Intrepid or the crazy guy in the airplane….)

Forrest sent me this just before Christmas.   Very cute.  You may have seen this on the other blogs.  Are there hints in it?  Cautions?icy waterfall

A fun read, in his words —

“This is one tough gal. I asked her not to join the marines because it would not be fair to the enemy. f”

Click here:  http://dalneitzel.com/2013/12/21/scrapbook-fifty-three/

And finally.  What have I been doing over Christmas break?

A Norwegian Christmas, 1846 painting by Adolph...

A Norwegian Christmas, 1846 painting by Adolph Tidemand. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Trying to fit in a couple more Douglas Preston/Lincoln Child thrillers.

Rennelle

Here is the story behind the January 7th Raffle for a fellow Fenner.   Posted on Forrest Fenn’s Old Santa Fe Trading Company.  See Dal’s blog, Thrill of the Chase for updates:

Salute to a Warrior….

BY FORREST FENN

When Renelle Jacobson stepped out of her car in my driveway, and walked toward me, I was charmed at first sight. Her smile telegraphed a timeless message: “Look out world, because here I come.” She had read about my hidden treasure in Hemispheres, the in-flight magazine for United Airlines, and, she said, “I ripped out the pages, stuffed them in my bag, and told the passenger sitting next to me, ‘Oh, I am SO going to find this when I get home.”

With a treasure-hunting partner, she soon hit the road for Yellowstone. “I was bouncing off the walls with an overload of excitement. This adventure is for every little girl and boy who have desperately wanted to look for a hidden treasure. I know I’m silly, but some of us are lucky enough to never completely grow up.” She returned from that first road trip empty-handed but, “We had a blast. I’ve since gone back 3 or 4 times.”

Warrior1
However, there is one small problem; Renelle, 41 and single, has a rare bone cancer called osteosarcoma. A few years of chemo and several surgeries didn’t kill the disease, so, in 2011, her left leg was amputated above the knee. She has a prosthetic leg but the ongoing cancer changes her limb shape. “Sometimes I can walk quite well and sometimes I can’t.”

Warrior2

A friend loaded her in his Bell helicopter and they searched the far reaches of Yellowstone Park.

Warrior3

“We discovered some top secret waterfalls (at least that’s how I romanticized them in my mind). They were out in the middle of nowhere.”

“We also flew over Hebgen Lake and had lunch in West Yellowstone. What a grand day for a cancer patient who is trapped inside most of the time.”

Warrior4

Renelle, whose constitution is made of sinew-tough fiber, is now in her 5th year of chemotherapy. With an expression that reflected her longing, she said to me, “I’m sick 3 to 4 days a week, have low energy the rest of the time and my sleep schedule is often turned upside down. Working on this treasure hunt has given me a way to occupy my time when I’m awake after midnight. When I work on your puzzle for an hour, I can say that I worked toward a goal.” She added, with a voice as soft as her eyes, “I’ll keep working on the poem every night until the moment when I can call my hunting buddies and say, ‘let’s hit the road.” Imagination is her pleasure and faith is her nourishment.

Renelle Jacobson inspires me in a singular way; her spirit holds me in thrall. Each day she tests the extremes in ways I can’t even imagine. To know her even a little bit, as I do, is to love her a lot.

To paraphrase Charlotte Bronte:

Her human heart has hidden treasures,
In secret kept, in silence sealed;
The thoughts, the hopes, the dreams, the pleasures,
Whose charms enrapture when revealed

Sharing and Caring

Mr. Fenn signing my TTOTC.

Mr. Fenn signing my TTOTC.

I thought I’d pass along news of this effort in case you missed it.

Click here for the original post by Forrest Fenn — Salute to a Warrior.

Click here for Dal’s post regarding a raffle for Renelle’s benefit.

Forrest Fenn has donated one of his cast bronze jars for the prize and filled it with treasures found at San Lazaro pueblo.

2012.07.17-IMG_5034

2012.07.17-IMG_5034 (Photo credit: martin_kalfatovic)

Suzanne Sommers is flying in on January 7th to draw the prize-winning ticket from his cowboy hat.  That event will be held at Collected Works Bookstore in Santa Fe.

Heartwarming how the searchers band together in this cold season!

English: Photo of a stone fireplace.

English: Photo of a stone fireplace. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Wind, Sand and Stars

Wind, Sand, and Stars, front

Yes, it’s the title of a book by the author of The Little Prince.  Antoine de Saint-Exupery was a pilot not unfamiliar with the Sahara.Dive Bombers Daily Drover

I’d only learned of the book back in high school because of a friend in the next town reading it in french class.  (My little school only offered 2 years of spanish.)

I stopped at 2 libraries yesterday to find a copy of The Little Prince.   The 2 copies at the first one were nowhere to be found.  The second library, rather new and planted absolutely Too Far for anyone To Walk to, had none.  When I said I thought it was a classic, he said they didn’t really carry the classics.  Something to do with only putting brand new books in there, ones with tracking chips.  New World.

I stopped at my friend’s.  She looked for her french and german copies but thinks her sons may have them.  Not that my french and german are that adequate anymore, but there are on-line translators, right? (See Forrest Fenn’s Scrapbook # 47.

Okay.  I do have a copy or two myself—-in a box, in a barn, inaccessible at the moment, and I wanted to read it now.

I’d tried my Kindle, but it wasn’t available for download.  Last stop last night on my way home, Barnes and Noble.  Yay.

Oh.

It’s a new translation.  New cover.

Cover of

Cover via Amazon

Choice:  Paperback.  Hardcover.  Set with recording by Viggo Mortenson.  Very tempting that, but I went with the cheapest version.

Okay.  Why go to all this trouble for a book I read ages ago?

Let me try to explain how mind mind works:

Mind Map …..   Free Association …..  Word Play

Case in point —-

Since Forrest used the word “fling” in his talk at Moby Dickens,

and reading the story of the sunken storage jar in Too Far To Walk,

and my earlier reading of Thunderhead, with its kivas,

and remembering the snakes writhing in the Indiana Jones movie,

Plant in White Sands National Monument, New Me...

Plant in White Sands National Monument, New Mexico, USA. The plant’s roots hold a pillar of sand in place, while the surrounding sands are shifted by wind erosion.

and someone I know opening the door to an old underground bunker at White Sands, intending to descend until he saw the floor moving; again, a mass of writhing snakes,

and finding a place called Snakeden Hollow,

and buying snake boots after stirring up a snake while morel hunting, actually, I should use a hiking staff instead of my bare hands to rake through leaves next to fallen trees next time.

Oops.  Getting off point there …. but, okay.  You get the idea.

So, I couldn’t remember the details of the story but I knew there was a snake and a star and a desert involved in the sad conclusion of The Little Prince.

the little prince

“What makes the desert beautiful,” said the little prince, “is that somewhere it hides a well….”

So, back to “fling”.

I know there’s been a recent notice to disregard what Mr. Fenn might say in interviews, just rely on the Poem.  I think Dal believes, maybe Forrest said somewhere, that the treasure is hidden in the original spot he had chosen to rest his bones.  I know he’s said it’s a place “dear” to him.  And somewhere he mentioned desert.

Forrest Fenn's Treasure Chest

Forrest Fenn’s Treasure Chest

Can I reconcile all these ideas?

Not easily.  I think it would take me more than four Xanax, a staff, and snake boots to fling myself into anyplace that might have a ‘moving floor’, even if there was a certain treasure chest in the middle of it.

“It is such a mysterious place, the land of tears.”

English: Saint Exupery monument in Tarfaya Рус...

English: Saint Exupery monument in Tarfaya Рус…

Gimbles and Gymbals

Cover of

Cover of The Jabberwocky

“‘Twas brillig and the slithy toves

did gyre and gymble in the wabe;

All mimsy were the borogroves,

And the mome raths outgrabe.

“Beware the Jabberwock, my son.””

from Jabberwocky by Lewis Carroll

—Fenn knows someone who has the entire book of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland memorized.

Gyroscope with arrows

Gyroscope with arrows (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Thanks to Toby’s video, I got to enjoy Forrest Fenn’s  book signing event in Taos last month at Moby Dickens.  Fun and, as always, fascinating to hear the man himself.  He reminisced,recited poetry, and remained cryptic when it came to where the treasure lies.

Gyroscope-9-4

Gyroscope-9-4 (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

New insights?  Yes and no.  “Fling” was new to me, but then I have no trouble in finding clues in everything he says or writes.  I suffer from mental gyrations following each and every post.  Tabasco?  Mace?  Curlers?  Head spinning.

Also, hearing him talk about the deal he made with his granddaughter regarding med school expenses reminded me of conversations I had with Intrepid.

As high school graduation approached, her friends were all getting piercings and tattoos up the wazoo.  She was inclined to follow suit, until I asked her if she wanted help with college.  A deal was struck.

She got early acceptance into the only school she applied to, (UW-Madison

English: University of Wisconsin "Sifting...

English: University of Wisconsin “Sifting and Winnowing” plaque Located on Bascom Hall, University of WIsconsin Photographed July, 2002 by Daniel P. B. Smith. Copyright ©2002 Daniel P. B. Smith. Licensed under the terms of the Wikipedia Copyright. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

) ((I was very jealous.))

One time, when she was home on break, she asked what would happen if she got a tattoo.

Me:  You’d turn that gift into a loan.

Her:  Oh.

Me:  Anything you want to tell me?

Her:  No.

At one point in those years, she was set to join the military because they would pay for med school and she’d get good experience.  I suggested she wait until she got accepted into med school before taking that route, because once she joined she may not get the choices she expected.  Or something like that.

So, she waited.  Got into med school and through it, on student loans.  Now, this was a surprise to me— the interest rates go up the higher your level of study does.  Undergrads, the lowest, and med/dental students the highest, like 7 to 8 per cent.  How, I wondered, could this be, in a time when banks pay you virtually nothing on your savings?

Early forms of stethoscopes.

Early forms of stethoscopes. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

Well, she is now in a 5 year residency, and owes about twice what our first home cost.  I think there are underserved areas that are willing to trade tuition for services, kinda like Rob Morrow’s character ending up in fly-in Alaska in Northern Exposure.  She does love to travel.

About the tattoo(s)?  She’s now old enough to know what forever means (longer than the life of her loans), and if she wants the rod of Aesclepius indelibly inscribed on her body, she’s earned the right to choose it.

Aesclepius

Aesclepius (Photo credit: santanartist)

{{Note to self:  Let Dal know that, if by a slim chance my entry won his contest over at Thrill of the Chase, not to ship the prize.  I need a way to convince Mr. W that I have to return to Santa Fe!}}

Related articles

River’s Edge

Ooooh, ick.

(From Yahoo)  Man finds stash of cash in river.   Story here.

Dog walking might pay, but I’d really rather find Forrest Fenn‘s hidden treasure chest —-

—-  Gold nuggets and emeralds don’t get soggy.

Forrest Fenn's Treasure Chest

Forrest Fenn’s Treasure Chest

Kryptos

English: Low-res image of the CIA's Kryptos sc...

English: Low-res image of the CIA’s Kryptos sculpture, provided by the sculptor, Jim Sanborn (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

How is it that I’ve never heard of this???

I was visiting Jenny Kile’s blog, Mysterious Writings, and clicked on Codes and Cyphers.  Fascinating.  Right in the CIA courtyard.

 http://mysteriouswritings.com/the-mysterious-unsolved-code-of-kryptos/

deciphering  kryptos

During World War II, the Germans used the Enig...