ShreyaThe Recession
When Fenn was planning his big adventure America was going through the “Great Recession”. People were losing jobs every day and they had no surety of getting another one anytime in the future. They had not only lost hope but were in despair. This was the perfect time for Fenn to plan an adventure that could take people’s mind off their despair and that was also why he planned the whole thing.
Ray Of Sunshine
The driving force behind Fenn’s idea to hide the treasure apart from keeping his legacy alive was that he wanted to take people’s mind off their despair. In his own words, he wanted to give “someone else the same thrills I’ve had all of these years to look for the chest. I think that idea is a stroke of genius.” Here is a fun fact, the treasure box has 265 gold coins among other things!
The Treasure Hunt Begins
With these intentions, Fenn buried the treasure and the rumors began to take shape. He gave wind about the hidden treasure to someone and from there the news spread like wildfire. It was a myth- a treasure somewhere in Santa Fe but without saying a lot in words he gave hints to people in his memoirs The Thrill of the Chase and Too Far to Walk.
How His Family Reacted
Before burying the treasure Fenn did not tell a soul about it and when he did, this is what they said to him- “what kind of a person would do a stupid thing like that.” This was his answer- “no one would do a stupid thing like that except a person that was in my skin.” From his talks itself, Fenn comes off as a strong-willed person who does not care about anyone’s opinion. He went on with his little idea, which was going to backfire soon.
Clues
Even before hiding the treasure Forrest Fenn had penned 5 books. To make it easier for the treasure hunters to locate the place of the chest full of riches, Fenn scattered clues in the form of cryptic notes, maps and even a poem in his books. But the puzzles are not easy to solve. At the end of one of the books, the adventurers found a map.
Where Is It?
The Rocky Mountains are a large mountain range. So that people do not scatter all around the place rather than moving towards, move away from the radius of where the treasure is hidden. Fenn closed the boundaries for them. Somewhere at the end of The Thrill of the Chase Fenn specifies the location of the chest as somewhere in the eastern Rockies. This could mean any of the places from Colorado, New Mexico, Wyoming or even Montana. But that is not too specific, is it?