Carlsbad ‘pirate’ sets new treasure hunt
A game showcasing haikus and riddles links a local buccaneer with the community, good deeds and a way to connect others to a fun and challenging adventure
CARLSBAD — The hunt for hidden treasure returns.
In the spirit of Blackbeard, Capt. Kidd, Charles Vane and Anne Bonny, a new pirate has emerged in Carlsbad. This one, the Haiku Pirate, though, has a fondness for haiku riddles for players to navigate and win a prize. Unlike the famous pirates of old, Carlsbad’s pirate doesn’t raise hell on the high seas.
Instead, Haiku Pirate delivers fun, joy and challenges through clever riddles, decryption, Carlsbad landmarks and, to a point, disconnecting from the digital world while encouraging players to tap into their imaginations and nostalgia of hunting for “buried” treasure.
Haiku Pirate, who asked to remain anonymous, said the first treasure hunt started in 2020 with Chapter 1 leveraging various landmarks across the city. Chapter 2 came in 2021 but with a new, albeit more challenging, based on the famed Dutch abstract artist Piet Mondrian’s paintings.
Now, Chapter 3 is on the horizon and starts in November. It incorporates a deliberate family, or team, element to the hunt. Pirate said the game is open to anyone, although online sleuths can’t crack it as the key clues are hidden in the city and required to unlock the treasure.
It is also Pirate’s last so-called treasure hunt, although another type of game may come in the future.
“The goal on Pirate for all the ones I did was enchantment,” Pirate explained. “The game is not fun if you know who person is who did it. It’s so much more fun if you don’t know who in the hell this person is. It’s a much better game, and that’s the enchantment. I felt like when a kid goes to sleep, they’re thinking ‘oh my gosh, there is a real treasure in my town, and I have to find it.’ Finding it was not an endeavor on the phone, but an endeavor in the real world.”
Inspiration
Pirate said the inspiration for the treasure hunt came during some troubled times. It was a way for Pirate to work through some problems by connecting a spiritual component with haiku poetry, code breaking and a sense of providing something fun and entertaining for everyone.
Pirate said experiences as a Christian and Boy Scouts troop master were also sources of inspiration, but slowly wandered into other areas of life. The anonymous good deed was powerful and a connection with God but carries over to the secular world.
Pirate created the game with the good deed being the game and paying someone’s mortgage or rent for one month. Pirate said the Chapter 1 required a lot of work from the players, but also Pirate enjoyed the “ridgeline” between the digital and analog worlds.
A fan of the Japanese poetry haiku, Pirate said it documents a moment in time in nature. Sometimes there is also an image paired with the haiku, although the poetry typically doesn’t explain, or define, the image.
Rather there is a balance between what’s in the haiku and the image, known as a haiga.
“I lived a Christian-oriented life, and I loved all that, but I just don’t believe,” Pirate said. “I was trying to distill out of the Christian experience the elements I felt would withstand the scrutiny of time, the sort of imperishable of good. The notion of an anonymous good deed struck a chord with me, especially against the backdrop of an anti-anonymous society. Everything is a brand and does permeate our thinking.”
Additionally, Pirate sought inspiration from the other famous artists, especially Andy Warhol and the anonymous Banksy. But most important are the riddles as all the information are in the poems and solvable, Pirate said.
The first two hunts
So, Pirate, along with a crew of several other “pirates” began crafting a game, or treasure hunt of sorts. Chapter 1 incorporated five haikus and images, all released at the same time, which told the player the exact location and items (if) needed to find a code.
Once a player went to the location, they would find the code on an object and enter the alphanumeric code into the website. After collecting all five codes and entering them into the website, an email address was unlocked and a QR code to a Venmo account was sent to the player with a grand prize of $3,499, according to Pirate.
“I embedded into the city, codes, physical objects you could touch and read,” Pirate added. “There was one rule — if someone tampers with the code, there was a sort of self-destruct button, and the code was revealed to all the players. Sequences kill treasure hunts because people get stuck and then they have nowhere to go. It can make them (codes or clues) of equal value because you can trade (other players).”
Adam Spragg said in a post on Reddit he was the first to break the code and won the prize. Pirate said the $3,499 was about the average price of a monthly mortgage.
Spragg also said Pirate’s concept of doing good for strangers struck a chord as Spragg would also like to do the same. In short, a kind, selfless act for others to enjoy. The game, though, also provided Spragg with a light during the dark times of COVID lockdowns and partnered with others he met during Chapter 1.
“Playing the Haiku Pirate game has changed and inspired me. I want to be more like them,” Spragg’s post reads. “I want to do good things for my community and neighbors, not because I want recognition, but because it feels like a Good Thing To Do (sic). I want to do more things that bring unexpected joy into strangers' lives, just for the fun of it. I have to admit I haven't achieved those goals on any sort of grand scale (yet), but the influence of Haiku Pirate remains a guiding star in my life. I will forever be grateful to them and the gift of wonder they gave to the residents of North County.”
In Chapter 2, Pirate’s prize was $1,000 and sent players out on another adventure across the city. Pirate said the goal was to return to the original form of haiku and “distill” authorship. Pirate pivoted to Mondrian and deconstructed 5 paintings into coloring books with five riddles and released five hints on X (Twitter).
The game, though, changed the positions of a line, color or form and were encrypted through a haiga. Breaking the code allowed the player to solve the puzzle.
The codes were triggered by an act of nature. For example, one location was a bridge and the players would walk 100 feet and look at the bridge and the beaming sun would reveal the code during certain hours of the day. Another one was only visible when it rained, while another was only visible at low tide.
Also, golden eggs were planted in various public places, such as a library, to get more players to scan the QR code and engage with the game on the Haiku Pirate website.
Pirate said traffic was increasing and would replenish the egg baskets under the cover of night.
The website saw a big spike in traffic after Carlsbad Councilwoman Priya Bhat-Patel posted a photo of one of the eggs.
But true to pirate form, Haiku Pirate was planting the eggs under signs with the city of Carlsbad’s logo in a cheeky move to increase the hunt’s visibility. Pirate said the police department confiscated the eggs and sent out communications the hunt was not an official city program.
Chapter 3 — X marks the spot
The game will be released sometime in November, although no official date has been set, Pirate said. Over a three-month period, there will be controlled reveals with the final two being “dark” and “light” clues based on the new and full moon. The final two clues will be released after 90 days, Pirate said.
Pirate said the likely landing spot for Chapter 3 communications, other than the website, is Reddit. Pirate said maps will be provided at a specific location and available to print out and tape together.
“I want to take over the dining room table,” Pirate said of the goal and them of Chapter 3. “I want to park myself in the middle of a family with this treasure map … and just tell a fun little story in Carlsbad of buried treasure. You solve it all in your dining room, coloring in a map and solving riddles, and going to places in the real world that provide you with the information you need to solve it.”
The map is a rendering of Carlsbad and adjacent to the map are hundreds of letters. Pirate said it’s a slow process of reading through and encrypting the letters to unveil the haikus.
In Chapter 2, Pirate recreated a makeshift Engima machine using a Pringles can, although there are online versions. The Engima was a famous cipher device used to protect communications, most notably by the Nazis during World War II. The code was broken by Englishman Alan Turing and helped turn the tide of the war.
“The entire game of Pirate, the five haiku, are all encrypted in the same mechanism,” Pirate explained. “But this time I omit a certain series of letters, and the game is about finding those letters. Once you find them, you can decrypt the haiku, and it tells you were to go.”
Out in the wild, Pirate will place five Xs for players to confirm the riddles and then players place a pushpin into the map of the exact location of the X. Then players will take a length of string and wrap it around four pins and where the string touches itself is the final location, Pirate said.
Pirate said there came a realization with the money as a prize and it wasn’t in the spirit of haiku, but rather branding and to draw interest. Pirate said if the game is stimulating and fun, people will play regardless.
But it begs the question, who can match wits with Carlsbad’s pirate?
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