u/irontechy

If you take the underlined or overlined letters in the Hopi calendar and match the positions of the letters to letters in the corresponding Hopi ceremony name you get a, o, i, a, a, and a. Put those in the letter pool with all the letters from each month in the calendar and you get 23 (Michael Jordan’s jersey number) states. 4 of these states are the smaller boxes and one is the lions box state.

Alabama
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Florida
Idaho
Indiana
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Michigan
Minnesota
Missouri
Montana
Nevada
North Carolina
Ohio
Oregon
Pennsylvania
South Carolina
Tennessee
Utah
Vermont

Apply the Forrest Fenn coin to the middle of the calendar and it tells you to remove August and November from the pool. The following states are left:

Alabama
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Florida
Idaho
Indiana
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Minnesota
Montana
North Carolina
Ohio
South Carolina
Utah

Apply the Pokemon coin to the middle and it tells you to remove November and leaves these states:

Alabama
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Florida
Idaho
Indiana
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Michigan
Minnesota
Missouri
Montana
North Carolina
Ohio
Oregon
South Carolina
Tennessee
Utah

Apply the past and future coin to the middle of the calendar and it tells you to remove July and December leaving these states:

Alabama
California
Louisiana
Maine
Michigan
Minnesota
Missouri
Montana
North Carolina
Ohio
Oregon
Pennsylvania
South Carolina
Tennessee
Utah
Vermont

Apply the Appalachian coin to the center and it tells you to remove August leaving these states:

Alabama
California
Colorado
Connecticut
Florida
Idaho
Indiana
Louisiana
Maine
Maryland
Minnesota
Montana
Nevada
North Carolina
Ohio
Pennsylvania
South Carolina
Utah
Vermont

If you already know the 4 smaller box states you can remove them from the list leaving 19 (number in the wordsearch) candidates for the lions box. The tie all the boxes to 5 months and take the birthstone colors and tie them to the Olympic Rings. When you overlay that with the mainland US map the ring not assigns a state will reveal the Lions box state.

Hope this helps!

If you take all the letters in all 12 months of the year and put them in a pool you can spell the following 18 states:

Alabama
Colorado
Connecticut
Florida
Idaho
Maine
Maryland
Minnesota
Montana
Nevada
North Carolina
Ohio
Oregon
Pennsylvania
South Carolina
Tennessee
Utah
Vermont

I think the 4 smaller boxes are in 4 of these states and when you find those using the Olympic rings separation Thats will pinpoint the state the lion box is in.

Forrest Fenn can only be in Montana, Wyoming, Utah, or Colorado from my understanding. Only three of them are in the list.

Pokemon box can only be in states that are between North Carolina and Texas. Quite o few of those are not on the list.

Past and Future box is in a state mentioned in Ready, Player One, which two I think are most relevant: Ohio and Oregon.

Appalachian Trail box can only be in states with the Appalachian Trail in them. About half of them are not on the list.

I hope that helps :)

I recently watched Detective Pikachu with my kids. I think elements in the movie might be part of the solve since there are movie clues. R might explain why the picture is purple. Mewtwo might have combined humans with Pokemon in the story and we need to figure out what humans or in Jon’s case, what pokemon did he merge with?

I think I have an idea of what treasure will be in each box.

Forrest Fenn: Most if not all the gold treasures and the olive jar.

Pokemon: Shiny Charizard card, Jade jewelry, and emerald jewelry.

Past and Future: One of the bitcoin, Amelia’s autographed photo, and the Jackie Oannasies diamond sapphire brooch.

Appalachian: Michael Jordan rookie card, rubies, Thoreaus journal pages and Washington’s Jelly Glass.

Lions Box: The other bitcoin, 1st edition Charizard card, Citrine necklace, the gold not in Forrest Fenn, Olympic medals, some rubies, and Mike Scott’s sapphire .

I know there are some I didn’t mention but if you’re catching on to them you’ll know where they go.

I believe we line the coins up in the center of the Hopi calendar to give us clues about the lions box. If you take the past and future box and line it up with the line on the middle of the Hopi calender you’ll notice they match. This only helps if you know how to apply the Hopi calendar.

The froakie is the doorman from Jon’s story at the beginning. He is a bouncer and represents Clubber Lang. The greninja is his corner manager. The wise golem is Apollo Creed. Jon is Rocky Balboa.

A bar? Maybe a sand bar?

In Pokemon Red and Blue you find Mewtwo in Cerulean Cave. What does Cerulean mean?

Cerulean (/səˈruːliən/) is an adjective describing a bright, vivid shade of blue, like a clear, unclouded daytime sky or the deep waters of a tropical sea. It comes from the Latin word caeruleus (dark blue or blue-green), which is rooted in caelum, meaning "heaven" or "sky".

So maybe the pictures only purpose is for us to ask where do I find Mewtwo? The answer somewhere like Cerulean Cave but not an actual cave.

My Cerulean Cave candidate? Blue Hole Trail in Savage Gulf Tennessee.

Real version of the Pokemon picture?

Quill Feather on right side of map = George Washington

Nose picture by the dog = Anthony’s Nose which ties to George Washington defending it in the war

McAfee Knob bottom left corner = Goblers Knob Vermont

Feather = Hermit Thrush which can be found at Goblers knob

Skier = Burlington Vermont home of the University of Vermont Anthony Lamb played here. He scored 23 points (Michael Jordan) against Quinnipiac University and 28 points against the UNBC Retrievers. 28 points is a Jon’s basketball story reference. Pascal triangle reference.

Mountain Lion = Catamounts University of Vermonts mascot

Black feet = Tar Heels and Michael Jordan

Dog = UMBC Retrievers and Springer Georgia

Golf Club = Green Mountain golf club

Little bear = Little black bear

Little rocks = little rocks lol

The bear and rocks could be a call to Bear Mountain New York. There is a bridge here and I think this is be symbolic of a microsolve part of the trail.

Apple barrel = Wild Apples by Jon Thoreau

Bald head = big bald

Fish by compass = Pike (Thoreau)

To the left of the magnifying glass I think the words are Lets fetch. Above the magnifying glass look that is formatted to look like 100k. Below the magnifying glass the word around. Inside the magnifying glass a picture off a little black branch. All together?

Let’s fetch 100k around little black branch.

We find this south of LRP whereas far as I can tell without being botg is the easy part of the trail.

This box I haven’t followed as much but I would really like to know if this is why people have been within 200 feet and have missed it going to Little Rock Pond.

If you shine a light through the back of the map page there is what looks to be a little leaf in the dead tree in the magnifying glass. I take this to mean the box is around this distance away from the start here triangle. I think there are two missing lines because of the magnifying glass.

The begin here triangle is at the 1727 elevation which the only thing I could find close to Little Rock pond is on the Appalachian Trail south of the pond. The other triangle is Little Rock pond shelter which is NE of the 1727 elevation location. Since it is a campground that is why that triangle looks that way.

There are 58 dash lines in the trail if you account for two missing. If you think there is just 56 then you can adjust my calculations and apply it. There is an arrow pointing the line 54 or 52 depending how you see it. It’s .9 miles, give or take 25-50 feet given the difficulty of triangulating exact elevations, from the 1727 elevation to Little Rock pond shelter. So 327.72 feet from the 1727 elevation is our search location.

That location should be here (43.3872331, -72.9562864). Again there is probably a 50 foot variance but Jon did say one method was mostly exact.

We should be looking for the box in a hollowed out tree trunk to match how Henry Thoreau burned down that forest. If not that then a rock or an evergreen tree of some sort.

Feel free to let me know if you’ve looked within 50-100 feet of this spot and haven’t seen it but I am guessing this is why hunters are walking right by it. It’s over half a mile south of the pond which I don’t think has been peoples focus.

Be strong, have grit
Sparkle even as you pine
Here lies Joy divined

I think this part of the poem is referring to mineral families that help identify a final hide landmark since it shows up over the x on the book cover.

Corundum is the second hardest mineral outside of diamond. Ruby and sapphire are part of this mineral family. Corundum is used as an abrasive because of its hardness. So this family is the first line. I think this indicates the boxes being hidden by rocks/stones.

Beryl is a mineral family that contains aquamarine and emerald. Aquamarine = sparkle and emerald = pine. I think this indicates we must also have water and a tree by the final location as well. The story of Daphne asking to be turned into a tree by her father, a river god, makes me think we are looking by a river.

So the combination of rocks, trees, river, and a trail is the final solve location. Since most trails by rivers have bridges I would think we may be looking for those in some locations.

Ready, Player One reference. Leads to the Jade key (birthstone). Eventually Wade has to leave his physical home to find the Easter egg from some other physical location. The same location some would say he finds Joy.

Potential search locations (35.4480523, -85.6538273) and (35.4481119, -85.6538370).

Clues that make me think this is a place to look.

The two charizard cards at the beginning = Route 66.

Ash’s Charmander evolves into Charmeleon in episode 40 = I40 which I believe is part of the statesville and Texas loop.

If you head north east on I40 you pass fiery gizzard state park in Tennessee.

Our target general location is Stone Door Tennessee. The door is a callback to the jazz bar story. Stone door is also a 10 foot fissure in rock. This is a callback to Pokemon episode 46 when Charmeleon evolves into Charizard in which ash falls through a fissure into a cave and battles an Areodactyl with charmeleon and it eventually evolves. Also froakie looks like a machop, which like to move large boulders, and froakie indicates the start of our micro solve.

Applying the Greek mythology chapter we know that the nymph Daphne had her father (a river god) transform her into a Laurel tree too stop Apollos advances. Laurel Falls is close to stone door.

North of stone door is Rock Island state park and I believe to be for the golem reference so we need to go North past Laurel Falls.

I think one of the coordinates I posted will remind us of this picture. I am in Utah and won’t realistically be able to check myself.

I post this for anyone to check if they want. I just want to know that the puzzles of the book are teaching a progression and for this box it’s evolution.