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There are a few things that I\u2019ve never really thought would be in my wheelhouse \u2013I have weird fears, I usually respect them.<\/p>\nThere are a few things that I\u2019ve never really thought would be in my wheelhouse \u2013I have weird fears, I usually respect them.<\/p>\n
Except when I decide that it\u2019s time to look them in the eye and see if I can face up to them: such as when I challenged myself to go down in a submarine and cruise around a shipwreck in Hawaii a few seasons ago.<\/p>\n
We were wandering through Grand Cayman last cruise (there\u2019s not a whole lot to do there) and we happened by a relatively simple sign reading \u201cLocked Inn: Live Escape Rooms\u201d.<\/p>\n
Those of you who know me well, know that I \u2026don\u2019t do escape rooms. I don\u2019t do anything where I don\u2019t know 100% know how I can get out, and the escape rooms back home? Most of them don\u2019t readily offer that reassurance. But attitudes are much more laid back in the islands, so I figured it would be worth asking about. And so we came back today, and confirmed that yes, they have an emergency key in each room, and the first thing they point out when you enter your challenge is exactly where it is.<\/p>\n
But if you use it, the game is over<\/em><\/p>\n Oh, that\u2019s fine, I just need to know it\u2019s there<\/em><\/p>\n And I looked at Amras<\/p>\n Ready?<\/em><\/p>\n Ready.<\/em><\/p>\n So we walked down an unassuming hallway and listened to our cheery guide suddenly get serious<\/p>\n The Cayman Island asylum closed down years ago, after rumours of terrible experiments, it was condemned shortly after the physicist accused of torture disappeared. Today we offer tours of the asylum, but be careful, some say that the grandson of the physicist is carrying on the tradition of torturing and experimenting on the patients\u2026<\/em><\/p>\n And then she opened the door, escorted us in, showed us where the key was\u2026and left us there. For a minute we just stood there, because the whole room is supposed to be a clue, literally anything<\/em> could be a clue \u2013 and then we start poking at things. Actually talking about details is a bit difficult here as I don\u2019t want to give away secrets in case someone amongst my readers actually finds themselves visiting the Cayman Islands (and given that a large portion of my readers are cruise ship people that\u2019s not an unreasonable possibility) so I\u2019ll try to be as vague as possible.<\/p>\n Amras found a clue right away that as it turned out usually the monitors have to give away at the end since no one gets it (which resulted in a ping pong ball nearly hitting me on the nose, but also opened up our first lock\u2026).<\/p>\n As for me, I found myself continually distracted by the writing on the walls. Most of it was gibberish, put there to emphasize the story-line, but that was just it \u2013 it was all gibberish, except this one string of words that was repeating itself over and over again.<\/p>\n That means something<\/em>, I thought, that is important. That<\/em> doesn\u2019t fit the story<\/u><\/em>.<\/u><\/p>\n Turns out that that was the other<\/em> clue that most people normally miss.<\/p>\n What amazed me about all this was not just how calm I stayed (if you tell me where the door is, I will gladly forget it\u2019s there and just play the game) \u2013 but how engrossing it was to be in the center of a great big puzzle. Amras and I think very differently, but the way<\/em> we think meshes together \u2013 in scenarios like this Amras is very much an analytical thinker, the one looking at the numbers and sequences, the little tiny details; which works great for when you’re trying to do things like figure out lock combinations. I on the other hand am a writer, which means that I\u2019m plunked down in the middle of something like this \u2013 I apparently look at the big picture, I saw the whole thing as a story, and anything that didn\u2019t fit the story\u2026well that must be a clue. Which works great for figuring out where the lock combinations *might be*. In fact I didn\u2019t even realise that that was what I was doing until we were finished.<\/p>\n They issued us with a walkie talkie so we could radio in for clues if we needed them (which we only had to do once, and that\u2019s because I utterly suck with seeing certain types of patterns) \u2013 but even finding the walkie talkie took more time than we expected. That one they gave us for free, about ten minutes into our time just trying to figure out where we were, we heard a little electronic voice from the corner<\/p>\n Let me out. Let me out.<\/em><\/p>\n So that lock we didn\u2019t exactly solve on our own.<\/p>\n We cracked the final lock with just over two minutes to spare. Which involved me dashing across the room to get the key in the lock\u2026which may have been the only time that I was actually a little bit stressed, because the last 5 minutes? Went incredibly<\/em> quickly. Especially when we were very close to stuck on the last puzzle.<\/p>\n So it looks like we\u2019ve found another cool thing to do in different ports\u2026.<\/p>\n And another fear is that much closer to biting the dust.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" There are a few things that I\u2019ve never really thought would be in my wheelhouse \u2013I have weird fears, I usually respect them. Except when I decide that it\u2019s time to look them in the eye and see if I … Continue reading