r/FindingFennsGold

IDK the exact time-frame, but in the time around the end of the Chase, Forrest's collection of topographic maps were being offered to the public. Do we know how or to whom those maps were disposed?

Digging a bit deeper into that area stretching from the Caldera Rim Picnic Rest Spot, then through the Gibbons Falls (aka Wylie's Lunch and Permanent Campground) and past Madison Junction, then out to West Yellowstone an interesting idea emerges.

It appears that because the Yellowstone Erupted at least three times, there are several Caldera Rims: from a non-professional viewpoint I think that there are some were places where the rims overlapped and intersected with one another.

Is it possible that the Secret Creek Valley is actually what formed from the space between the BORDERS of two Caldera Rims? On GE it looks like the top of this valley ends near Purple Mountain, overlooking Madison Junction.

So getting back to our exploration of the "more than 66,000 links north of Santa Fe" comment, the third version of Forrest's comments relating to the geographic location of the chest, and, by far, IMO, the most interesting.

The original comment was:

>"Since Richard mentioned the olden days lets harken to 1620 when universal land measures first became law in England and America. As you rode your horse into town you had to pass 80 telephone poles in order to reach a mile because they were 1 chain apart, or 66 feet. And each chain had 100 links, if you wanted to break it down further. Road rights-of-way also were 1 chain wide. And 80 square chains made a square mile, or 640 acres – and that was 1 section of land.

>But if you’d rather count fence posts you had to pass 320 in order to reach a mile because they were a rod apart, or 16.5 feet. And since everyone knew that an acre was 10 square chains (43,560 square feet) it was easy to tell how many acres were in your neighbor’s farm.

>Some aspects of those measures are still in use today in the horse racing business because a furlong is 10 chains in length, or 660 feet. You should feel smarter now because that’s so easy.

>If you want to apply those important figures into the thrill of the chase I will give you an additional clue. The Treasure chest full of gold and precious jewels is more than 66,000 links north of Santa Fe."

In parts I and II, I've shown that:

- At 217 words, this comment stands out as exceptionally long and complex compared to all other comments Forrest made about the chest's basic location.

- The comment seems to be making use of a fairly classic distraction technique, whereby a speaker introduces a lot of "fluff" for a listener to caught up in analyzing in order to prevent them from focusing in on something the speaker doesn't want them thinking about.

- It seems to contain an unprecedented number of hints regarding what I believe is the poem's most likely route through Santa Fe (7 clues + the blaze) - almost the entire route (!) - making it the single most helpful comment I believe Forrest ever gave, save for...

- Simultaneously containing the first known (and, importantly, for the four years that followed, only known) use of language setting the chest a specific distance north of Santa Fe. Since we can deduce from Forrest's actions, with a fairly high degree of confidence, that the chest had to be "in Santa Fe" while also somehow being "66,000 links north of Santa Fe", this gives this comment a weird "push-and-pull" quality, where it appears as though he's simultaneously trying to help and hurt someone's chances of finding the chest - the key, I think, to understanding why this one comment was so different from all the rest and what might have prompted it in the first place.

This also means that any wordplay present here is of a different sort than the Sierra del Norte reference ("hidden in the mountains north of Santa Fe") that appears to be at the heart of the most commonly used version of the "north of Santa Fe" comment (version 1), and which was, by comparison, much easier to explain (mountains north of Santa Fe = the Sierra del Norte of Santa Fe).

So that leaves us with two major problems to be resolved:

1. How could a location be both "in Santa Fe" and "more than 66,000 links north of Santa Fe" at the same time?
2. Why the push-and-pull?

Let's start by tackling the question #1...

First, it is important to understand that the deduction about the existance of wordplay in the puzzle stands independent of any conclusions regarding the poem's specific route, save for the fact that the chest must have somehow been "in Santa Fe" while also being "hidden in the mountains north of Santa Fe" (version 1), "more than 66,000 links north of Santa Fe" (version 3) and "at least 8.25 miles north of Santa Fe" (version 4).

Now, sometimes when you know someone is engaging in wordplay, there's value in trying to figure out the nature of the wordplay, because it can act as a shortcut to solving their riddle.

Othertimes, it makes more sense to simply ignore it completely and to depend on other hints to get you where you're going. This was my approach during the Chase - the general implication of the wordplay was obvious (the chest had to somehow be "in Santa Fe"), and Forrest had made so many other comments over the years that it seemed easier to explore them and trust the route than to try to figure out the specifics of his particular wordplay mechanism.

Now - there are a several different ways a person could do this, and I'll be honest - I'm not at all confident which one Forrest was using: only that, when it came to saying the chest was north of Santa Fe, he had to be using something.

So it may be none of these - and I'll rule a few out myself - but here, at least, are some possibilities.

Possibility 1) "Santa Fe, Wyoming": The first possibility we must consider, of course, is that there is some "Santa Fe" in Wyoming (easily at least 8.25 miles north of Santa Fe, New Mexico!), because that is where Forrest said the chest was in court. That would be by far the easiest way to resolve this apparent paradox, where Forrest's actions indicate the chest had to be in Santa Fe, New Mexico, but his words state Wyoming.

In this scenario, there could have been a town named Santa Fe in Wyoming, or perhaps it could have been hidden in the wreck of a Hyundai Santa Fe, at a "Church of Santa Fe", that sort of thing.

However, had the chest been in some sort of Santa Fe-named location in Wyoming, he still would have been safe - and strongly motivated - to say "it is not in Santa Fe, New Mexico" or even "it is not in the city of Santa Fe, New Mexico."

Therefore, we can rule this possibility out.

Consistent with this, in Forrest Gets Mail #2 (October, 2012), Franklin asked:

>"Forrest, I haven’t seen where anyone has asked you if you mean Santa Fe, New Mexico or another Santa Fe. I think we all assume Santa Fe, NM but there is a Santa Fe, TX as well as in other states. Have you specifically said New Mexico? Maybe we should expand our search area to in the mountains somewhere north of Santa Fe, Argentina. Once again, if I ask too much please forgive me and disregard this e-mail. I have really enjoyed this puzzle, thank you."

Forrest responded:

>"I didn’t think of that Franklin. But yes, it’s Santa Fe, New Mexico. f"

To be fair, Franklin doesn't explicitly reference the 66,000 links version comment, but only "the mountains somewhere north of Santa Fe" (version 1), but if it applies to the one, I think it likely applies to the other versions as well (esp. as version 3 was written earlier the same year this exchange with Franklin occurs, and version 4 more specifically references the city limits).

.... Also a quick shout-out for what I believe to be Forrest's delightfully direct choice of wording here in saying "it's" Santa Fe, New Mexico. :)

Possibility 2) Measured From Which Limit?: Another possibility would be that the 66,000 links/8.25 miles was being measured from the southernmost city limit - synonymous with Santa Fe County's northern limit (so, "north of Santa Fe (County)") - which could theoretically leave parts of the city in play. I tested this out, and 8.25 miles from the southernmost limit near Valle Vista would rule out most, but not all, of the city.

Locations 8.25 miles north of key points on the city boundaries. Interestingly, I just realized that 8.25 miles from the very southernmost point by Valle Vista seems to land you back up by what I believe is the poem's starting point at Hyde and Sierra del Norte, right by the city limits at the northeast end of town. I'm doubtful that was the wordplay at work, but if so, it could imply that in this case Forrest is using \"Treasure chest\" symbolically to refer to the city as a whole.

So, while it doesn't work for my own solve that ends next to the airport, it might be a possibility for other Santa Fe searchers.

A closely related possibility would be that the 8.25 miles north of Santa Fe isn't 8.25 miles north of the City of Santa Fe, but rather, the surrounding Santa Fe County via some other break in the County border. We know Forrest knew about Santa Fe County because he wrote a story about "The Iron Rooster of Santa Fe County" in Once Upon a While. Perhaps the County's shape contains some cutouts one could be north of.

Looking at the map, Santa Fe County is shaped basically like a big rectangle with the City of Santa Fe in the middle. There is one notable cutout - the triangle on the west side by White Rock - but it is already north of the city and therefore not in play.

The borders of Santa Fe County

However, the City of Santa Fe is considered a part of the County (not an entirely separate municipality which creates a hole in the county map, as is possible in some places here in Canada), and so someone standing in the City of Santa Fe is simultaneously standing in the County of Santa Fe as well.

So unless my understanding - or Forrest's understanding - of planning districts in New Mexico is off (admittedly, a possibility), I think we can probably rule this one out too.

Possibility 3) By Name: Another easy solution would be for the "Santa Fe" being referenced in this 66,000 links comment to not be the city or county, but the airport or river by that same name. Las Orillas is immediately north of the river, and about a third or so of the city looks to be north of the river as well. Airports are often referred to just by their name (e.g. "O'Hare", "Pearson", "Heathrow", etc.), but I would normally find "Santa Fe" meaning the Santa Fe airport to be a bit of a stretch due to specificity. However, since Forrest was a fighter pilot and presumably kept his airplane at Santa Fe, I would say it's fair game. Most of the City of Santa Fe is north of the Santa Fe Airport, though notably in my case, not Las Orillas due to a funny unsevered slice of land north of Paseo Real that is actually part of the airport land, but that's a whoooooooooole other can of worms I'm going to leave for now, as the implications would be quite messy.

So - another possibility for someone looking to engage in wordplay, but not my favourite.

Possibility 4) By Distance From Starting Point: If you read the 66,000 links comment, it's all about measuring distance by counting what you'll ride by on your trip. So Forrest is, I think, actually telling us how to use the information he is giving.

In real life, when people give distances, the travel distance and final location are actually treated as discrete pieces of information, even though they often seem otherwise in English text due to the way they appear side-by-side.

For instance, let's say we're standing at the Plaza in Santa Fe, and trying to get to Ski Santa Fe.

The Santa Fe Plaza at the centre of town (left) and Ski Santa Fe to the northeast (right)

(Photo credits: Santa Fe Plaza in Autumn by Jim & Robin Kunze; Ski Santa Fe by Scopulorum)

If you were to ask me how far Ski Santa Fe is, I might say "it's 17 km to the northeast of town".

The \"as the crow flies\" distance between the Plaza and Ski Santa Fe

Importantly, I do not subtract the distance between my "starting point" in the middle of town to the city limits in that distance.

If we apply this same pattern to his comment:

>"As you rode your horse into town (...) The Treasure chest full of gold and precious jewels is more than 66,000 links north of Santa Fe"

Forrest has given us:

1. A starting point (the point where you "ride into town" - i.e., the city limits)
2. The distance you'll travel (at least 8.25 miles / 66,000 links); and
3. Where you end up geographically (north of Santa Fe).

So there would be many locations just north of the city limit, but still southwest of what I believe to be the starting point at Hyde and Sierra del Norte and at least 8.25 miles from that point, for which that could be valid. (Basically, everything in the northwest quadrant of a map of the area).

As another example, here's Ski Santa Fe to the Office of Archaeological Studies. If one were trying to get there from Ski Santa Fe, one could say it is 28 km away "to the north of town" - even though one would be travelling southwest to get there.

Travelling southwest but landing \"north of\" (city limits shown in red)

It probably makes you twitch a bit, but it is still technically - from a linguistic perspective - correct.

Given the structure of this carefully composed comment - again, by far the most complex Forrest ever made - this is where I'd be putting my money in terms of the wordplay with this one.

Possibility 5) Wordplay Using the Word "North": It seemed to me that many of Forrest's comments included amused wordplay, which was often based in the origins of the words used. So, I thought I should look up the history of the word "north", and it turns out that the etymological root for "north" is "left".

Forrest spoke many times about standing at the "right" spot - like many others, I'd always assumed by that he meant the spot the chest was hidden. But it occurred to me after looking up the origins of the word "north" that, if I'm correct that the Forrest's map is designed to be "pole-to-pole", then the "right" spot in Santa Fe would be the "north pole" at Hyde and Sierra del Norte (located on the east side of the map), which arguably would make South Polo at Paseo Real the "left" spot.

Putting two \"spots\" on the map - the symbolic \"North Pole\" starting point at Hyde and Sierra del Norte and the \"South Pole\" end point at South Polo and Real

When applied to Santa Fe, the poem's \"North Pole\" stands at the right side of the city map, while the \"South Pole\" stands at the left.

And actually, when I went back to get an exact quote, it was this one from Business Insider (2017):

>"The treasure is out there waiting for the person who can make all the lines cross in the right spot.”

So technically, he didn't say that the treasure is waiting where all the lines cross; he said that it was waiting for someone who was able to make all the lines cross the "right spot". So that could be the starting point, rather than the end point.

I don't think this north = left is an especially likely explanation for the wordplay at hand (I don't think it's really "fair game" myself to treat a word's root as synonymous with its definition myself), but it is one other way it could be done.

Anyways! That's all I could come up with. I'll address the question of why I think Forrest might have constructed such an odd "push-and-pull" comment shortly, but if others have ideas for how something could be both "in Santa Fe" and "66,000 links north of Santa Fe" via wordplay, I'd be very interested to hear them.

Fenn told us that every word and its location was intentional; that all words and punctuation had a purpose (to aid in finding the chest.)

He was challenged with the enormous task of reducing the search area from the Rockies to a more manageable region by the fifth line and first clue without the casual reader recognizing it. Absent that, looking for a geographic place he described as WWWH was unmanageable.

The first seven words of the poem may have accomplished that.

"As I have gone alone in there....." A casual reading is that Forrest went by himself into a place with boundaries. He adds that he has with him his 'treasures bold'. So the saga of Forrest hiding the chest and its contents had begun or had it...?

His use of word choice was exquisite. Reading the first seven words in the context of TTOTC and asking, 'What does it accomplish, what is its purpose?' brings a more subtle interpretation.

As= 'as' also means 'when', meaning 'going on at the same time'. Ex: When I was alone

I = ff

have gone =present perfect. The 'going' happened before now, but the statement is being made from the perspective of now, emphasizing ff's present experience, while acknowledging his past.

alone= an adverb telling us the condition or status of ff when he went. The definition for alone includes: unattached or unmarried. (Forrest refused to answer the question about when he found the location saying that it would be too much information.)

in= a directional movement for the motion verb 'gone', Fenn is describing a boundary crossing.

there=Here and there are deictic words, the meaning depends on ff's perspective. It implies that Fenn recognizes a 'here' and therefore a 'there' as being a place other then here where he imagines himself being.

Now rephrased we have, 'When I was alone and unmarried I went into a place with boundaries.'

These words along with his memoir suggests that Forrest was referencing the act of going from West Yellowstone into YNP as a young unmarried man, most likely using the West Entrance road. A huge reduction of the 'search-verse.'

He would make this trip both, alone on his bike, and with his Dad many times, "So dad would take the car just inside the (west entrance) gate and park it so we could get up at 0500 and go fishing, before the gate opened."

In seven words he effectively reduced our search area and path........ nicely played.

JMT

From the Gold Old Days

https://npgallery.nps.gov/MUSEUM/AssetDetail/758a7ff4-d567-4d1f-9c5f-e6bb8c05521f

https://www.nps.gov/subjects/yellowstonetravelexhibit/early-tourism.htm

I think you are partly right. The new bridge abutments have encroached on what used to be wider spot. This construction narrowed the remnants of the old road as it descended to travel alongside the Gibbon.

IMO when scouring through some good old maps, which have now been put behind a paywall, it looked to me like the Old Loop road in the Gibbon Falls area, had run along the North side of the Gibbon through this area.

This route hugged the High Water Line and didn't cross the Gibbon til a good piece farther upstream.

This old road was the main pathway until they built a sturdy bridge down there, which allowed the Loop Rd to ride on the higher ground on the South Side of the Gibbon. Park managers had to change the traditional route to the higher side to engineer around frequent washouts and road closures.

For fun read about the places where WILEY camps were situated back in the day. (Near Gibbon Falls)

Forrest was very aware, that landmarks and manmade items, and some geological features will change.

But, the High Water Level alongside a Stone Cliff Face is more durable for pirates and their treasure maps.

I can't go, and I don't have the good old maps which trace the history of development in Yellowstone.

But if I did, I know I would surely explore this area.

Forrest was direct with his readers about the impact that a Bridge had on his life. From GE this Riparian Stretch along the Gibbon (a banana collector if ever there was one) could be where once upon a time a young man could go alone. As if entering a church. Carrying his Fishing kit. Treasures Bold, and finally His Indulgence.

With Forrest's extraordinary imagination, he might have seen the figure on a pedestal that I 'saw'. Maybe to him It was watching over him and his Church in the woods: Were some of his posts about mythological entities tied to this place? A solemn place, a sanctuary to immerse himself in memories, emotions and imagination. Why was Forrest sure that his Father would know the place?

Others may visit here, but it would always be his place Alone.

Even the embellishments on the Chest hinted at Elevated Figures ascending a metaphorical castle/temple.

Also interesting, perhaps Forrest consulted with his lawyer to nail down the practical Legal rules which would pertain to the traversing and ownership rights on Riparian Land.

"Maybe there is no problem"

"I know it's wet"

The photos of the recovered treasure chest really looked like it had seen some High Water; JS said it was covered in mud. Good thing it was a Heavy Load. Some clever, imaginative, creative yarn spinner may have actually thought of everything.

Just now, it feels like a good yarn, cut to pieces by those with more greed than imagination.

Maybe this will change.

God Bless Forrest.

So far, in the first part of my analysis of Forrest's comment about the chest being "more than 66,000 links north of Santa Fe", I showed how this particular comment was very unusual in terms of both its length and complexity, as well as in how it also appears to have been purposefully designed - for reasons unknown - to distract, an idea I will come back to later.

But for now, we'll park that in favour of looking at question #2...

COULD THE COMMENT ITSELF CONTAIN ANY HINTS?

The 66,000 links comment was very detailed compared to most Forrest gave about the chest's location. With the would-be gravedigger, Forrest shortened his comment - omitted "in the mountains" - presumably to hurt that searcher's chances: an instant comeuppance, as it were. Here however, he's added a lot of words... so maybe he's trying to give some extra hints, and actually help someone somehow??

I've explained in an earlier post a few reasons why I am convinced the chest must have been somehow in Santa Fe, despite the strong evidence in support of Wyoming.

Assuming Forrest was 1) honest and 2) made no errors in his understanding of the area's geography (something I am actually not 100% certain of right now), then it must somehow be possible for the chest to be "in Santa Fe", while also being "hidden in the mountains north of Santa Fe", "66,000 links north of Santa Fe", and "at least 8.25 miles north of Santa Fe" - a conclusion this series of posts is meant to explore and, hopefully, resolve. I've also documented the particular "pole to pole" route I believe the poem follows through the city, starting at the parking lot at Hyde at Sierra del Norte (so it would be literally "hidden in the mountains north of Santa Fe") and ending at former apple orchard on the southwest end of town called Las Orillas (265 Paseo Real, off of South Polo Road).

From Pole to Pole and \"Hidden in the Mountains North of Santa Fe\"

\"The Nature of My Game\": Proposed Nine Step Route Through Santa Fe

(Full version here)

End Game: The Old Apple Orchard, Las Orillas

I've also observed what I believe to be a pattern in Forrest's comments: that he seemed to take it as a personal challenge, at least in some cases, to squeeze as many hints in as few words as possible - basically aiming for something that is "all wheat, no chaff", same as with the poem. When things are moving too slowly for your taste, you start to come up with games for yourself: this seems to have been Forrest's.

So, that's the lens I've used when looking for hints in this 66,000 links comment, which again, is:

>Since Richard mentioned the olden days lets harken to 1620 when universal land measures first became law in England and America. As you rode your horse into town you had to pass 80 telephone poles in order to reach a mile because they were 1 chain apart, or 66 feet. And each chain had 100 links, if you wanted to break it down further. Road rights-of-way also were 1 chain wide. And 80 square chains made a square mile, or 640 acres – and that was 1 section of land.

>But if you’d rather count fence posts you had to pass 320 in order to reach a mile because they were a rod apart, or 16.5 feet. And since everyone knew that an acre was 10 square chains (43,560 square feet) it was easy to tell how many acres were in your neighbor’s farm.

>Some aspects of those measures are still in use today in the horse racing business because a furlong is 10 chains in length, or 660 feet. You should feel smarter now because that’s so easy.

>If you want to apply those important figures into the thrill of the chase I will give you an additional clue. The Treasure chest full of gold and precious jewels is more than 66,000 links north of Santa Fe.

I also want to be clear before I get going that I didn't bother with this particular analysis of the 66,000 links comment until well after I finished my proposed solve ("The Nature of My Game"). This is not a case of me coming up with a route through Santa Fe based on this comment. My proposed route followed from:

1. My deduction that based on Forrest's actions, the chest not only could, but somehow had to be in Santa Fe;
2. A realization thanks to the help of a friend that "the mountains north of Santa Fe" could be a reference to Santa Fe's Sierra del Norte (literally: the mountains of the north) which meant Forrest could have been referring to a location within the city;
3. That the stop sign at Ten Thousand Waves Way and Hyde Park Road in the northeast end of town was most likely "where warm waters halt"; and
4. A helpful comment made separately by two of my friends on two different occasions which prompted me to consider a southwest-bound, rather than northeast-bound, route through town.

Letting going of the belief that the route had to be northbound resulted in a sudden and dramatic change in how easily things started clicking into place, which, I have to say, was a lot of fun to experience on the ground. All eight remaining path segments - one clue per segment - just flow from there. (And if it is of interest to anyone, I've shared my explanations for each of the nine clues here).

I feel fairly confident about my solve up to the end of clue 9 (South Polo Road), and that, given the limited options available along that road, the property the chest was on must have been Las Orillas (especially after coming across Forrest's comment about the treasure being a chest of tomatoes!) But, I am less confident about how one was supposed to get to the hiding spot from South Polo, though I have a few ideas. So for now, we'll just focus on how this 66,000 links comment appears to relate to what I believe are the 9 clues through Santa Fe...

First, the numbers-heavy "voice" in which the comment is written matches the one used in "My War For Me", which Forrest said was the most important in The Thrill of the Chase. As I've noted in another post, that chapter appears to have been written in the voice of author Jules Verne - a man most famous for his books Around the World in 80 Days (à propos for a pole-to-pole puzzle!) and 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (in which the learned fisherman-pirate Captain Nemo travels to the South Pole in order to declare himself its emperor).

And then in terms of specific wording and clues...

1. Within the context of Santa Fe, "66,000 links" actually appears to hint at several clues all at once. These include 10,000 Waves Way (the "warm waters" referenced in "where warm waters halt", part of clue #1, and a number Forrest mentioned quite often), County Road 66 (Agua Fria, clue #7), and the golf links at the Santa Fe Country Club, which stands at the intersection of Paseo del Sol W. (the blaze) and Airport Road (clue #8). The "66" could also be taken to be a reference to Route 66, AKA "The Mother Road", which in turn could be a reference to Acequia Madre (clue #4). That's already five clues (!) hinted at in this one comment in a mere two (!!) well-chosen words. If this was intentional, then it was a masterpiece of wordsmithing on Forrest's part.
2. Forrest signed this particular comment not as "Forrest Fenn", but as "Forrwst Fenn". I believe the letter "W" in Paseo del Sol W. is the "real" blaze, and so this twist aligns with that as well.
3. He opens his comment by talking about someone riding their horse into town in the early 1600s; Paseo de Peralta (clue #5), is named after the founder of Santa Fe, who rode into town around this time. I suspect Forrest may have explicitly mentioned the year 1620 - after Peralta's arrival - because it coincides with the arrival of the Pilgrims, perhaps hinting at the idea of foreigners arriving at a site with the purpose of establishing a colony. A 1620 date also makes more sense for some of the discussion around English land surveying units that followed.
4. He mentions that "some aspects of those measures are still in use today in the horse racing business". At the end of South Polo Road (clue #9, in my proposed solve) sits HIPICO, Santa Fe's equestrian centre, formerly the Santa Fe Horse Park. South Polo also sits right at the edge of town (presumably how Las Orillas got its name), so where he talked about "riding their horse into town", that comment could also be in reference to the idea of horses at the town/city limits.
5. The first unit Forrest mentions in his comment are telephone poles - a very odd inclusion for a comment set in 1620! I believe that, based on the route the poem seems to chart through Santa Fe, there is a pattern in the poem of "things which contain their own opposites", which is alluded to in the line in the opening stanza talking about the "hint of riches new and old". The poem contains many match-pairs of words (warm/cold, begin/end, up/down, etc.). Only a few words are missing an obvious pair word, including "answers" in the stanza which goes "So why is it 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." I believe the missing pair word isn't the more obvious "question", but rather "call", as in "call-and-answer", such as is used in call-and-answer games like Marco Polo (South Polo Road, clue #9, again).
6. And last but not least, by far my personal favourite... The post Forrest decided to make this comment on was titled "Forrest Fenn - Land Surveyor". The name "Hyde" - as in Hyde Park Road (clue #1, the only place where 10,000 Waves Way stops) - comes from an old English land surveying unit, equivalent to about 120 acres.

Nice.

That brings us up to seven (!) of the clues plus the blaze being referenced in a single comment - practically hinting at the entire route through Santa Fe, albeit in no particular order.

Taken all together, that would make this the single most complex hint I've noticed Forrest giving anywhere, if the poem is indeed a map of Santa Fe. Not only that, but it spans the first clue (the one Forrest suggested was most critical) right through to the last. So not only would it have been the most challenging to design, but it is also wildly generous.

... But - ONLY if the reader thinks to try following the poem down through the city from Hyde, rather than heading north - something which the message of this comment seems engineered to prevent.

And that's where things get really interesting, because, what that last sentence of the comment was doing - for the very first time in the Chase, a whole two years after the whole thing started - was to use distance-based language that could be read as excluding Santa Fe from the viable search area.

So now we've got this weird, conflicting push-and-pull setup, with Forrest cramming almost every clue into a single comment while also designing it to put people off his trail... all of which was then combined with what appears to be an attempt at distraction!

I cannot stress enough how weird this single comment was among all the hundreds Forrest made.

Who creates something like that?

What was he trying to achieve?

And was the comment made to make the Chase easier... or harder?