Overview
- Organizers confirmed Tuesday that a roughly $10,000 cash-filled chest was unearthed in a sea cave in the Marin Headlands and they published photos and the riddle solution to tell hunters to stop.
- The hunt began April 29 with a multi-stanza poem and strict constraints from the anonymous pair of organizers that the box would weigh more than 150 pounds, be buried about one foot deep, and lie within seven miles of San Francisco City Hall.
- Search activity over the weeks led to visible damage at multiple city parks, and the San Francisco Recreation and Parks Department is assessing broken irrigation, trampled plantings, and unfilled holes at sites including Ina Coolbrith Park, Francisco Park, and Washington Square Park.
- The finders are a trio of longtime San Francisco friends who say the puzzle pushed them to scour hidden headlands and sea caves; they have chosen to remain anonymous and organized digging trips that included multiple crossings of the Golden Gate.
- Organizers said this may be their final hunt and noted they purposely made the poem more ambiguous than last year’s quick solve, a choice that highlighted how the seven-mile rule allowed the prize to be placed outside city limits and raised questions about permits and park enforcement.