treasure hunt forrest fennI’m  always so happy to share Words from Forrest and feel very honored to do so.  They are a way we all get to read and enjoy his thoughts together.  Thank you for being here.

I love how they encourage each of us on our own journeys of The Thrill of the Chase treasure hunt.

Here they are:

The bitterness of the cold outside is bettered by the warmth of the little fire at my side, but much more comforting is the ambience of it. f

 

Forrest’s hidden million dollar treasure filled with gold and other incredible relics waits to be found– somewhere out there in the Rockies.  Who will find it and when?  I wonder if those thoughts were passing through his mind while he was sitting peacefully by his fire.

We know Forrest hid his treasure for those of us who would be daring enough to ‘Chase’ after it.  His treasure poem inspires many of us to explore places and things we have always longed to do, but just didn’t take the time.  And although there are many side paths we can get lost along while doing so, we know we can always return to his Treasure Poem when we realize we might have strayed off too far.

Many of us can recite Forrest’s treasure poem by memory, but it is nice to read over it for mind a new thought might fall into place of an old one, and lead us to the end of his rainbow, and treasure.

Forrest Fenn’s Treasure Poem:

As I have gone alone in there
And with my treasures bold,
I can keep my secret where,
And hint of riches new and old.

Begin it where warm waters halt
And take it in the canyon down,
Not far, but too far to walk.
Put in below the home of Brown.

From there it’s no place for the meek,
The end is ever drawing nigh;
There’ll be no paddle up your creek,
Just heavy loads and water high.

If you’ve been wise and found the blaze,
Look quickly down, your quest to cease,
But tarry scant with marvel gaze,
Just take the chest and go in peace.

So why is it that I must go
And leave my trove for all to seek?
The answers I already know,
I’ve done it tired, and now I’m weak.

So hear me all and listen good,
Your effort will be worth the cold.
If you are brave and in the wood
I give you title to the gold.

 

Best of luck with all that you seek!  Treasure the Adventure!

117 Comments

  5. What a strange coincidence. I mentioned to him a week ago about how hard self publishing this book is for me ( a first time author), and now these words. Why is that strange you ask? Allow me to explain…

    I image googled the fireplace, and the first result was….

    Best guess for this image: createspace independent publishing platform fireside poetry by girley tegama

    Which has the same image on the front face of the book named Fireside Poetry ( little fire at my side ), which just happens to be Ambience Poetry ( is the ambience of it )

    Well it just so happens I am using CreateSpace for the book, but I never told him that much. So either it was advice on getting it published easier, or a lot of coincidences wrapped up together that have nothing to do with what I mentioned 🙁

    Just to support the Nothing to do with it notion , that is also a stock photo you can buy to use online. :\

    Iron Will

  10. Bitterness Bettered
    Warmth Fire
    Much More
    Comforting Ambience

    Sounds like a place to heal, are you all right Mr. F ? Did you take a trip to some very cold place? Made a wrong turn ? I know its winter in Santa Fe but the weather is far from bitter.

    jl

  12. Only just starting to decipher but here is my first impression. I take one word at a time. I start at the end (yes I’m backwards..I write in my journals from back to front, I read magazines and the paper the same way lol)

    Ambience – root word is the Latin Ambo or Ambio meaning ‘both’ or ‘around’ ‘about’

    For fun (maybe, maybe not) I also see Bambi LOL ! Can’t upload a picture here..but google ‘fawn in a nest’ and see what you get.

    Just getting started…Ramble On..”Now’s the time, the time is now.”

    lifesablaze

  16. It is nice at times to sit back and just listen to the snap crackle pop of a nice fire in the fireplace. Turn down the lights and enjoy the rhythmic flickering shadows. Breathing in the auroma. It feels so good to tune out the world and focus on this simple fire for awhile. Thank you Mr. Fenn. 🙂

    HeadedDown

  17. The bitterness of the cold outside

    Yes, Forrest, the TC is having to withstand the bitterness of a harsh winter

    is bettered by the warmth of the little fire at my side,

    But is warmed by the brightness of the contents inside the box

    but much more comforting is the ambience of it. f

    But even more comforting is the beauty (atmosphere) of the place that it resides.

    Just a thought. JDA

    JDA

  19. If every word every time random words come out, how many clue to the chest are there now? This comment from Forrest made me read it several times though. If you read it like your The Rocky Mountain something at least to me a couple things jumped out to me, first he mentioned the outside weather but when he talks about the fire at his side he didn’t mention the inside. Again read like your The Rockies, this really looks to me to be a big clue, not straight to the chest but at least narrows the search area to the east side of the Rockies, The Front Range and the warmth of its side, could also be what Forrest means where warm waters hult, The Rocky Mountain Front is such an important geologic feature that it affects the weather in North America. Warm air masses moving from the Gulf of Mexico are blocked by the front from moving west, causing hail, thunderstorms, tornadoes, and other kinds of violent weather which then move east.

    Thomas

  24. Thank You Jenny and Mr. Fenn,
    This is so interesting, move away from the BITTER COLD. Like I can feel your bittercoldness from afar. Reminds me of “Border line Biddie” when Mr. Fenn was young and the Biddie was there taunting him. As I recall he also said something to the effect boys never did those things until girls came around and started causing trouble. Trouble could be considered bitter coldness, ask any explorer, once a person has been frost bitten the numbness never goes away. He also mentioned something about lessons learned and long term lasting effects. Or could this be a reference towards the environment. Enjoy the ambience, if you have a perfect solution don’t contaminate it with less desirable elements. Or maybe warm and cold water, alligators and sharks prefer warm water, trout cold, in reference to life many times we must learn to swim with or against both. I remember Mrs. Fenn had no trouble handling different species of little sharks in Florida. My best guess is leave everything alone, find your peace, a small warm fire will provide lasting comfort. Knowing the key to a perfect solution is a relationship, a relationship from above, below and by your side. Find your blaze, and cozy up close, know you can rely on the warmth of a best friend for support. But then what do I know, I’m just a dog dressed like a knine and wise enough to know that all things, although unique, remain equal. Enough of my lathering spoof, so two da loo, you can find me structurally within the framework, where my addition, grant you not flawless, has been perfected. Love your new proud space you Jenny, salute!

    Strawshadow

  26. If you are crazy enough to chase after the treasure in winter, understand that bears have been coming out of hibernation in February due to warmer weather. Best to have a side arm. Pack some heat, you know, just in case.

    Iceman

  28. A notable synonym of bitterness is tart, while the antonym sweet. FF’s favorite dessert is strawberry shortcake. It’s the perfect combination of both. What can you conclude from this? The treasure site in the poem is the real thing and not a substitute. -TTOTC.

    Iceman

  30. I was also trying to point out that in the decryption of the poem, synonyms and antonyms are viable interpretations of the words in the poem. And that complicates life for searchers because it increases the possibilities you have to consider.

    Iceman

    2. I used to work at the Palace Cafe in NOLA…we had the BEST (besides my own) white chocolate bread pudding! But my all time favorite desert is Banana’s Foster…also created at the Palace and named in honor of Mr. Foster who used to come across the street and have lunch every day. Mrs. Brennan created the desert just for him. One time I was preparing it at the table and lit the flame too high. VERY IMPRESSIVE for the guest but almost caught the Mardi Gras decorations above me on fire. After that, the management watched me very closely every time I had a B.F. order. LOL!

      lifesablaze

          1. I liked getting the baby as well. One year, when it was my turn to buy the cake, I placed all the babies I’d ever gotten inside the cake so people couldn’t couldn’t cut around the baby to avoid getting it (whoever got it had to buy the next one). We got 8 cakes that year 🙂 I miss Mardi Gras!

            nmc

        2. Iceman, have you gone searching since you’ve started the Chase? If so, which state have you searched? As for me, I’ve searched three, and had a blast doing so. I wish you the best of luck and have a lot of fun along the way.

          pdenver

  33. Bitter, Bitterroot is the Montana state flower, On Google map I started at Warm Springs and went south on Interstate 90 and was going to head towards Bitterroot National Forest what was crazy is before I reached Butte I ran into Brown Gulch so I turned to the right after that ran into Wise River, there at the little town of Wise River I found the Pioneer Trail Road , Pioneers blazed trails right? Got stuck from there, winter time fun you got to love it!

    Thomas

    2. Sorry for butting in I was just reading up on the weather, looking for wwwh you know, my earlier post I wrote about the front range and the way it halts the warm moist air coming from the Gulf of Mexico , while reading more it took me to Meeker’s peak and Longs peak two twin mountains, the French trapper called them The two ears, ( Hear me all and listen good ) and exporters found a secret way through The Key Hole, they started in Estes Park. Just a cool story and I just had to move back to Missouri from Loveland, had to leave a good job with Tharp’s Cabinets too, bummer

      Thomas

      1. Hello Thomas. I had not known the two peaks were called as such. I’ve lived in Colorado since 1977 and feel horrible that I don’t recall Meeker’s Peak. I know of Rabbit Ears Pass, which seem it could fit the “Hear me all and listen good.” Estes Park is my favorite. Sorry you had to leave such a beautiful state, but I do recall a little bit of Missouri while traveling through the state and it was beautiful; July 1977.

        pdenver

        1. Hello, pdenver this is what I was reading, A couple of French trappers called Longs Peak and Mount Meeker Les Deux Oreilles (French for “two ears”) in 1799.[4][5] The name Mount Meeker was first suggested in 1873 when the Hayden Survey was performed. Present were William Byers, Anna Dickinson, and Ralph Meeker, the son of Nathan Meeker.[6] It was officially named Mount Meeker in 1911.[3

          thomas conrad

        2. I’m glad Jenny put the poem up this week, I’ve been really studying the words to it again, something just eating at me about it. I’m the type of course that can’t leave it alone till I have some sort of answer, I never looked at the poem as hidden words you have to decode but I’ve looked at it like the words being locations and landmark, that said, the first four sentences give no clue of a Person, Place, or Thing. The next of course has WWWH, the starting point, but just looking for WWWH there are to many places this could be to pen point one spot. So for WWWH I looked at it as one big WWWH, the weather and how the warm moist air coming up from the Gulf of Mexico and how the Rockies effect the weather by the front range halts ( stops ) the warm air from going any further west, the thing is the next word in the poem that is a location or landmark would be home of Brown, again even looking for that on the front range only could be anywhere. Not one word in the poem can I pen point a single one spot. If someone solved the first two clues and even if they don’t know how come the third clue don’t jump out to them by now? There is also canyon down but again how many canyons are in the Rockies? After that are there enough words left in the poem to describe places or landmarks? You find simple words like meek, paddle, creek, heavy loads, water high, wise, blaze and ext. There are just too many places that these simple words could fit to send you in the right direction. Just frustrating I guess, I think I might just look at it as nine hidden words to unravel that describes one spot. Sorry had to get that off my chest.

          thomas conrad

          1. Hello Focused. I did not see the beautiful snow sculptures in Breckenridge. My husband is a truck driver and he drives throughout the state, and sometimes, out-of-state. When he has his mountain runs, he deals with the ski traffic and by the time he’s done with the week, he’s done driving distances. Sometimes one can sit in traffic for 2-3 hours, that would normally take about an hour or so to get home. The next time I’ll see any snow sculptures is when I’ll go snow tubing in a couple weeks or so and tip the tube over and plant my body into the snow and make a snow angel. 🙂

            pdenver

    2. You know, just talking things out solve problems. We should all talk things out and there’s no place like where to start, everyone should give the place they believe the starting point is and why they believe that is the spot! Icman , how in your mind did you come up with, the words radiator, walkers, hot,and geyser from just the words warm, waters and halt, just for me to understand to if you don’t mind?

      thomas

  42. I finally looked at Fenn’s Poem in another way, he likes to reveal secrets at the end, with that said, ” I give you title to the gold “. A title is a name of a book, READ THIS AND FIND a title to a book that may tie Forrest to the story. ……Brown’s Park, originally called Brown’s Hole, is a valley some forty miles in length along the Green River bounded on the south by Diamond Mountain of the Uintah Range and on the north by Cold Spring Mountain. Brown’s Park lies roughly half in Utah and half in Colorado with some of the northern extremities reaching into Wyoming.

    Geography and nature endowed Brown’s Hole with certain characteristics that in large measure dictated man’s response to the area. Nature provided mild winters which would attract red men at first and provided ideal shelter for white men and their cattle herds as time progressed.

    Geographically, the surrounding mountains kept out certain elements while attracting others. A centralized position in the middle of a rich fur bearing area made the Hole a natural rendezvous site for early mountain men and the proximity to great overland trails tied Brown’s Hole to the wider world beyond via both northern and southern routes. The Oregon Trail to the north tied Brown’s Hole to the northern Rockies while the Old Spanish Trail to the south tied it to Santa Fe and the Southwest. When lines were drawn and the Hole was divided among three states, it became a natural harbor for men who wished to avoid capture by merely crossing one of those lines.

    Most of the earth’s great cities developed because of locations along coasts or rivers where they became ports or developed harbors and became important keys in the transportation and trade networks. Brown’s Hole functioned as a safe harbor also, although the men it sheltered did not create an urban society. They sought out her harbor, created by nature and geography, for specific purposes and when those purposes had been fulfilled, they moved on leaving the Hole a relatively isolated and unspoiled region to this day.

    While geography and nature provided the setting, the explorers, traders, and mountain men of Brown’s Hole brought the area into the mainstream of American development. They exposed it to the forces that were shaping the country and made it an integral part of it. They discovered its secrets through exploration and, with the mountain men, peopled it with characters who made it uniquely American.

    Thus, during the years that Manifest Destiny grew into an American ideology, the men who explored, traded, and trapped in Brown’s Hole and, indeed, the entire West provided substance upon which supporters of the ideology could act. By the right of customary usage, Brown’s Hole became part of the myth and reality of America’s westward expansion. In this remote and isolated area, we can see many episodes from the pageant of the settling of the American West. Indians, fur traders, cattlemen, explorers, settlers, and outlaws all figure in the history of Brown’s Hole.

    From its earliest history, Brown’s Hole has been a place of controversy. Even the origin of its name is shrouded in mystery and contention. The list of possible namesakes seems as endless as the debate it arouses. A traveller in 1839 said, “The place was called ‘Brown’s Hole’ from the fact that a number of years before a white man named Brown had been murdered by the Indians there.” [2] Rufus B. Sage, who camped in Brown’s Hole in 1842 while searching for a fabled tribe of white Indians known as the Munchies, said it was named after a trapper by the name of Brown who came to the Hole to hunt in the fall. “During his stay, a fall of snow closed the passes so effectually, he was forced to remain till the succeeding spring before he could escape from his lonely prison.” [3]

    Major John Wesley Powell, in 1869, said Brown’s Hole was named “in honor of an old time trapper, who once had a cabin there, and caught beaver and killed deer.” [4] Ann Bassett, the first white child born in Brown’s Hole, believed that it was named after a French trapper called “Bible-back Brown” who had strongly recommended the sheltered place as being a good place to “hole up” for the winter. From this the name Brown’s Hole became fixed, she claimed. [5] Other possible Brown’s include Henry “Bo’sun” Brown, one of Ashley’s men, Charles Brown who trapped the Green with Henry Nidever in 1831, and the colorfully nicknamed “Old Cut Rocks” Brown.

    Others believe that a French Canadian trapper by the name of Baptiste Brown is the rightful claimant. One writer claims that “Two years after Ashley’s visit…Baptiste Brown, wandered into the Hole,” and “did something a voyageur rarely did; that is he decided to settle down. Choosing a site not far from the confluence of Vermillion Creek and the Green River, he built a cabin for himself and his Blackfoot squaw.” [6] Another account says that Baptiste Brown was one of Henry Fraeb’s men and had participated in the last pitched battle between Indians and trappers on the Little Snake River, just east of Brown’s Hole. Fraeb and three of his men were killed along with forty or fifty Indians. [7] University of Wyoming history professor Dick Dunham supports the Baptiste Brown theory saying, “There are no records to prove it: but tradition, passed on from mountain men to early settlers, is so strongly established there seems no reason for doubting it. So to Baptiste Brown we give the credit for being the first white man to settle in…the whole intermountain West…” [8] Some historians, however, doubt the very existence of Baptiste Brown. Janet Lecompte of Colorado Springs argues convincingly that Brown was a fictional character invented by Colonel Henry Inman in his book The Old Santa Fe Trail originally published in 1897

    thomas

  43. I now have in my possession, a wet suit …. in which I intend to use on Superbowl Sunday! I have a commercial break coming up, or down…. so I must go for now. Thank you Mr. Fenn and Ms. Kile for these recent words. Keeping in mind, I appreciate the latter on the 27th, as well. 🙂 Bigger smile enroute soon!

    Chesney

  48. Sharing the elixir of that solitude is one of Redford’s greatest pleasures, as a host, an arts patron, and a father. Years ago, when his children were growing up, he encouraged them to go into the mountains for a day alone. They were allowed to take a sandwich, but nothing to read or to play with. His challenge to them was that of a treasure hunt, and the treasure was a sense of connection—through the wilderness—with themselves. “It was a challenge,” Redford explains, “that was part of every young Indian’s initiation into his culture.”
    Redford has studied Native American culture most of his life, and an Indian blessing opens each summer session of the Sundance Institute. “The Indians have a sense of balance—a sense of awe, humor and scale in relation to nature—that we lack,” he says.

    thomas

  50. Seven, yep 7 years searching.
    This has been thee smartest, intellectual endeavors I have ever been apart of.
    Forest is so clever. 15 years writing the poem. So the accompanying stories in the book also have a lot of time put into them as well. I love this guy.
    Something to notice, there are no chapter numbers.
    So how many chapters? How many lines in the poem? There is a direct correlation.
    I have not seen any searchers at the starting point yet. But once you get the starting point it all goes a bit faster. And when you nail a clue, it becomes nearly obvious in hindsight.
    He speaks in visual concepts, hard core art language. Like negative space. Thee absence of a thing is standing out. When he is at the top of the waterfall. You’ll think a river pouring over an edge. Yes, but it is the vista, the view, the looking out from on high. The thing not said. warm water halts.
    So hints are always by the reoccurring themes Fathers and death. This is totally about fathers all the way through. Well that’s enough.
    My plan after I go and find it; is to sell the story and put the treasure back. Then sell google maps on putting on their own treasure hunt in every state.
    If it takes dangling a carrot to get the high school drop out, dyslexic guy to read for 7 years this has to keep being out there.
    I am Just waiting for the ice to melt a bit. Then I will face time this out the world.
    Love and luck to all.
    David

    David

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