Despite all the odds, we have just been lucky enough to enjoy a beautiful, sunny Bank holiday weekend in north Norfolk – our favourite place, as you know, if you have read my previous posts. We always go out for plenty of walks while we are there, as we are simply spoilt for choice for stunning places to exercise the dogs – and ourselves! Our favourite haunts are Brancaster beach, Holkham beach and pine woods, Wells-next-the-Sea and Burnham Overy Staithe. This weekend, though, I decided to “spice it up” a little with a Treasure Trails mystery, to keep us entertained on our walk.

If you haven’t tried a Treasure Trails hunt before, they are great fun – and I absolutely love them! You can buy a trail online at www.treasuretrails.co.uk – there are over 1200 self-guided themed treasure hunts all across the UK to choose from – and either download it instantly or request for it to be posted to you. Each trail is either a murder mystery, a spy mission or a treasure hunt, so, by solving the clues, you will be uncovering a murderer, completing a mission or discovering the location of missing treasure – what could be more fun? In a nutshell, it is an imaginative way to explore areas of the UK, following simple directions, cracking the clues and finding some interesting sights and facts along the way.

So where did this fantastic idea begin? Well, Treasure Trails started in 2005 in Cornwall when a Treasure Trail was written around the founders home town for a charity event –  this was so successful that he decided to write more trails around Cornwall and sell them at craft shows. Someone who had completed one of the trails then entered him into the Cornwall Tourism Business Awards, in which the silver prize was won. This then led him to believe that perhaps they could be written for all areas of the UK, for plenty more people to enjoy!

We have previously completed trails in Burnham Market in Norfolk and in Melbourne in Derbyshire, both of which were treasure hunts, but, this time, we opted for a murder mystery, which involved a longer walk and the challenge of discovering both the murderer and the murder weapon. We chose the trail around Burnham Deepdale and Brancaster Staithe, with the brief of solving the mystery of the murder of Captain Johnathon C Gull (see what they did there?).  We followed the directions and solved the clues as we went along – the answers to the clues were located on buildings, monuments, signs and memorials, each one allowing us to eliminate suspects and weapons, to leave just one of each. The directions were perfectly clear and we really liked the variety of clues – sometimes we had to look out for images, sometimes dates on buildings, other times we had to count letters or words on signs to solve the puzzle. The trail booklet also provides snippets of information about the area as you go along, which is a bonus.

We were completely successful all the way around – until we came to the final clue! Arrgghhh! We looked and looked and couldn’t find the map we needed in order to eliminate the final suspect. However, Treasure Trails also have this covered. You can, if you get completely stumped as we did, text the reference number and clue number to them and they send the answer back to you. Be warned though – you can only do this three times! Fortunately, we only had to do this at the end which enabled us to solve the mystery – a satisfying feeling for all!

So we had a great afternoon. It’s always good to get the children away from screens and spend time together outdoors, and these trails involve us all working together, negotiating, solving problems and following directions, along with learning about and appreciating the local area. We find that, due to constantly searching and scrutinising, we look up more and take far more notice of the area around us. For example, although we have walked the coastal path countless times, we noticed several houses which we haven’t spotted previously!

Thank you, Treasure Trails, for a great experience. We’re already looking forward to the next one!