National Park After Dark - Finders Keepers: Yellowstone National Park

Episode Date: July 5, 2021

Forrest Fenn was dying when he decided to concoct treasure hunt. He had plans to give 2 million dollars worth of his gold and treasures to anyone that could find where he hid it. He wrote a poem with nine clues that would lead one lucky person somewhere into the Rocky Mountains. What he wasn't counting on was all the people that would die, the destruction it would cause, and the crimes that he himself would become a victim of.For the latest NPAD updates, group travel details, merch and more, follow us on npadpodcast.com and our socials at:Instagram: @‌nationalparkafterdarkTikTok: @‌nationalparkafterdarkSupport the show by becoming an Outsider and receive ad free listening, bonus content and more on Patreon or Apple Podcasts. Want to see our faces? Catch full episodes on our YouTube Page!For a full list of our sources, visit http://npadpodcast.com/episodes Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

What would you do with $2 million? Would you buy your dream home? Maybe your dream car. Would you use that money to travel the world? Maybe you'd decide to be a little less reckless and invest it and save it. Or maybe you'd use that money so you could finally go back to school and land that dream job that you've been thinking about for years. Think about it. If you found $2 million right now,

Now, what would you do? There would be so many possibilities, so many new doors of dreams that would just open up for you. If only you had that money. Now what if I told you that there was a treasure chest that someone had hidden worth $2 million? And all you need to do for it to be yours is to solve a riddle and find it. Listen very carefully, because I'm going to read that riddle to you right now. As I have gone alone and there, and with my treasures bold, I can keep my secret wear and hint of riches new and old.

Begin it where warm waters halt and take 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 will 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. The tarry scant and marvel gaze, just take the chest and go in peace. So why is it that I must go? And leave the 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 the title to the gold. There you have it. You have all the hints and clues now. You have the information you need to find this treasure and begin your new life. What will you do with this information? To what lengths are you willing to go to get this treasure? Would you repel 850 feet down into a canyon?

Would you be willing to commit burglary? Could you desecrate cultural artifacts and break the laws of our national parks? Would you be willing to sacrifice your life for this? This is a story of Forest Fen, his treasure, and the people who decided that the adventure and the risk was worth the reward. Welcome to National Park After Dark. Welcome back, everyone, to National Park After Dark. My name is Danielle.

And my name's Cassie. We hope that you all had a wonderful weekend. It's another Monday, and we're back. We have another story. And we also have some exciting information. If you are not friends with us on Instagram, a couple days ago, we did launch merch for the first time. And we have hoodies. We have tank.

tops. We have t-shirts, stickers. We have a wine cooler thing, a wine, what are they called? I think it's a tumbler. Yeah, a wine tumbler. One of those things. You drink wine out of. It's really cool. It's an upgrade from my coffee mug, I'll tell you that. Yeah. And we do have camping mugs, too. And we did try and find some products that were environmentally friendly. Not all of them fall into the organic, environmentally friendly, biodegradable section. Yeah, category. But there are quite a few that we were able to incorporate on there, and that's important to us.

So we do have that on there. If you're interested, you can go on to our website, mpaddpodcast.com, and there's a link there for our merch. Or you can go onto our Instagram and click the link in our bio, and there you can find our merch there too. Yeah. So that was very exciting, very new to. us so thank you for everybody for your support right out of the gate on that one we had quite a few

people reaching out to us for that next patreon it is cassie's turn this month to release a story and she has an awesome one lined up so she'll be releasing that within the next couple of weeks so if you're interested and want to sign up for more please go on to our patreon which can be found in the links through our instagram and our website as well but for today I'm settling in because Cassie is going to give us a treasure story today. And it is one that I know very little about, but did learn from a friend when I lived in Colorado about. So I'm really intrigued about this story today. And I'm ready to go on a treasure hunt because it's just a dream to come across.

You know, have you ever gone geocaching? Yeah, I have. And even stuff like that. It's like stupid little like figurines or like a note or something. But just even the whole process of getting coordinates or any sort of riddle to go out and find something in the woods and to come finally be like, I found it. You know, and I made it. Even a little geocash is exciting to find, let alone a treasure worth millions of dollars. Yes.

This is going to be, it's a real life treasure hunt and it's a real story. So it's, it's cool. I'm excited to tell it. So just with that whole introduction, I will tell you what we're talking about today. So we're going to be talking about Forest Fen and his treasure that sent thousands of people into the Rocky Mountains to find it. And for this episode, a lot of times we introduce the national parks that we're going to. And this one kind of flops around to a couple different areas. A lot of the story does take place in Yellowstone National Park.

And then we're also going to be heading into some national forests and also throughout the Rocky Mountains. So we kind of go a little bit all over the place, but I figured for this I would introduce Yellowstone. If you haven't listened to our Yellowstone episode before, we do touch very much on Yellowstone and all about it in that one. So you can listen more of the details of Yellowstone in that. Yellowstone is located in mostly Wyoming, but it also spreads into Montana and Idaho. Stone was the first national park that was created. It's nearly 3,500 square miles of wilderness, and it's actually a volcanic hot spot. Yellowstone is absolutely beautiful. It has huge dramatic canyons. It has alpine rivers, hot springs, geothermal pools, and there's lush forests in the area,

and not even to mention all the wildlife that's there. You're not going to go to Yellowstone and not see something. I can guarantee you're probably going to see a bison at the very least, which is awesome in itself. So Yellowstone is just this really magical place. We're going to talk about how Yellowstone and Forest Fen treasure combine. Awesome. I think it's really important for this story. Before we go straight into the treasure itself, we're going to talk about Forest Fen a little bit and his background and his story. So it can all kind of make sense to everybody. Forrest Fenn was born on August 22nd in 1930 in Temple, Texas, where he was raised there, his whole life as a kid. And growing up, he went to Yellowstone National Park every summer.

And it was really here where his love of adventure began, which I think is true to many people, especially you and also just listeners. I think Yellowstone is kind of the birthplace of a lot of people's wonderlust. I 100% agree with that for sure. Yeah. And how lucky was he to go every summer? I mean, that's the dream. Yeah. I mean, what a cool way to spend your childhood. And he spent there, he learned to fly fish there. He just spent a lot of time exploring the park and just had a pretty great childhood. So then in 1950, when he was older, he was 20 years old, he joined the Air Force. And from there forward, his military career really rose. He became a highly decorated fighter jet pilot, and he was actually awarded the Silver Star for combat missions that he performed in the Vietnam War.

After 20 years in the military, Forrest decided that he needed something completely new. He was worn out on this job and he decided solely on a whim that he was going to take his wife and his two daughters to Santa Fe, New Mexico. And he decided when he got there that he wanted to be an art dealer. And he had very little knowledge about art or anything like that at the time. And it was kind of just something that he decided he wanted to do. And he was a very charming person and got a job based on very little experience. So he was in this. job and after about 10 years, he became a prominent art dealer and antique collector in the area. And he was actually selling art and talking and had friends that were politicians and

celebrities. And he became very, very wealthy off of this new career that he had decided. And he was really successful. You know, he was making a lot of money. He had a great marriage. He had two beautiful daughters and everything in his life was just going perfect. It was going exactly how he wanted and exactly how he pictured it to be. Fast forward to 1988, Forrest was only 58 years old and he was diagnosed with kidney cancer. They found a cancerous tumor under his right kidney and doctors gave him about a 20% chance of survival. This wasn't the first time that he faced death or terrible odds. You know, I mean, he was a fighter jet pilot in the military. This wasn't his first rodeo of bad news or bad odds of survival. But this took him a lot of time to process.

He couldn't wrap his head around the fact of why would he survive this horrible war that he was part of just to later die of cancer. So he became really angry about what was happening to him and he was trying to figure out why and accept it and was just going through a lot with this. So just as kind of a background of him of his years after the war, he spent his whole life traveling around the world and he collected ancient artifacts and little treasures. He collected gold and jewelry from all around the world and he kept all of these memoirs in his study in his home. Ralph Lauren, who is the famous fashion, designer was at his home and with him in his study. Forest had collected a particular indigenous

people's artifact that he had acquired in his travels, and this really caught Ralph Zey, and he asked him if he could buy it from him. And Forrest refused. Ralph Lauren was like, why not sell it to me? You can't take this with you when you go, and he was kind of referring to that he was going to die soon. He should get rid of these belongings. and Forrest made a joke about it and he said, well, you know, if I can't take it with me, then I'm not going. And they moved on from this conversation, but that conversation with Ralph Lauren really resonated with him and he started thinking about ways that he might be able to take the treasure with him when he did die. And just as kind of a background of his life, a few years before this, Forrest's father had been diagnosed with terminal pancreatic cancer. and the doctor gave him six months to live at this time, but 18 months later, his father was still alive.

But at this point, his father was really sick, and his father came to a point where he decided that he was too sick and he was suffering, and he actually told Forrest that he was planning to take too many sleeping pills, and he would commit suicide, and he called him on the phone and told him he was going to do it that night. His father did take the pills and he did die. To a lot of people surprised, Forrest wasn't angry or upset at his father for his decision. He understood that he was suffering and he was really sick and he was going to die anyway. It wasn't something where he wanted to die. He just didn't have a choice.

So he actually saw it as a dignified way to die and saw that his father was able to take kind of control of his life and his own death in a really horrible situation. So his father's experience mirrored for himself now. I was going to say I'm sure he saw a lot of similarity. Exactly. That's just so awful. That's just so awful. You sympathize with what his father went through and now what Forrest is going through. His father's experience mirrored a lot of what he was going through now and what he was feeling right now.

And Forrest really liked the idea of having control. over his own life and having control over when and how he would die, especially since he didn't have a choice in the matter. He was told there was a very slim chance that he was going to survive. He decided that when he died, he also wanted to take his treasure with him. So he began to think of all of these different ideas and all these different scenarios ran through his mind, but one seemed especially appealing to him. He wanted to fill a chest full of his art. He was a heart, artifacts and treasures, so it would be gold, jewelry, any artifacts that he had, and he would seal this chest. He then wanted to create a poem, and within this poem would be a riddle on how and where to find this

treasure chest that he was going to leave for people. This riddle, however, wasn't going to only lead to the treasure chest. This riddle was also going to lead to Forrest Fenn. He was going to pick a place in the wilderness that he wanted to die, and just like his father had done, Forrest planned to take too many pills and die right next to his treasure. And then he would create this treasure hunt to find him and his treasure. My God, okay. Yeah. So what I was thinking when you were like, he wanted to take it with him, like the different Egyptian tombs and ancient Chinese tombs of the huge elaborate, you know, all your treasures and all these different sacrificial things, like all within this huge room.

Buried with you. And obviously the tomb. Right. And obviously the tomb. And I know there are different beliefs associated with that. Like there are different guides and things to help you into the afterlife. And that's a lot of the reason for that. But when you said that, I kind of had that in my mind.

So I guess in a way, it's kind of like that. I mean, his body was going to be right there. Yeah. It's kind of like that, but he, I feel like he was kind of trying to make this a story with him when he went and his treasure was going to be a huge part of it and he was going to create this huge adventure out of his death. Imagine if you're, you finally, you figured it out and you got there and there was just like a corpse on top of the treasure. I don't know. That's what he wanted. Yeah, that's what he wanted.

Okay. All right, Forrest. He was described as being very eccentric. So, okay. Well, I mean, I like him. I think it's into, I mean. Yeah. Interesting person. For sure. It's his, it's his treasure. He can do what he wants. Yeah. Do whatever he wants. Whatever he wants in his will. How it goes. For his cancer, one of his treatments for it was to remove his cancerous tumor and they had to remove his right kidney. So they did that and that was when he really started putting this whole plan together. And a friend of his had a 12th century bronze Romanesque lockbox that was 10 inches by 10 inches by 5 inches. And he decided that this was perfect for what he wanted

and he paid $25,000 for it. And he began to fill it with all of his most valuable and prize treasures. But then something very unexpected happened, which changed his plans entirely. Against all the odds, Forrest Fenn beat his cancer, and he was given a clean bill of health. Oh, total turnaround. Total turnaround. He was not expecting this. Now he has this whole plan, and it's kind of shattered. With his clean bill of health, he still could not let go of his dream of the treasure hunt. And he believed he had created a really beautiful adventure with this treasure.

He thought he was giving a reason for people to go outside. He was giving people a reason to explore an adventure, and he was giving people a real-life treasure hunt, and he thought that his idea was just beautiful, and he had really big plans for it, for what it would mean to people. So he decided that he was going to continue with the original plan. But instead, he planned to live to see someone actually find the treasure. So he spent the next 20 years filling the box with different items that would make. it into one spectacular treasure to find. And he knew exactly where he wanted to hide this treasure. And so he started writing instead of just a poem, he started writing an entire memoir of his life. By the time he got all of these things together and the treasure chest was ready, the chest consisted of 265 gold coins, dozens of gold nuggets, a gold dragon bracelet with ruby eyes, that was studded with diamond emeralds and rubies. He had two gold frogs, a Mayan gold bracelet, a 17th century emerald and gold Spanish ring,

two Colombian gold mirrors, gold dust, gold nose rings, an ancient gold necklace, which was thousands of years old, and more. This treasure chest was worth over $2 million, and inside this treasure chest, he included a copy, of his memoir that he had written. And inside this memoir, small little stories of his whole life and things that happened through his whole life. And at the very end of this memoir was the poem that I read at the very beginning of this episode. And in that poem, there are nine hints of where the treasure is hidden. Okay, yes, it's worth $2 million. But what am I going to do with two gold frog nuggets?

So inside of this, they're all cultural artifacts. They all have titles written in his name. They're all sellable. Okay. That changes things. So it's not like, here's a gold frog, good luck. It's, they're actually very valuable, sellable things that you can exchange for real money. Not to say that that wouldn't be life-changing to find either way. Just for the cultural significance and, you know, just the fact that you found the treasure. And it's obviously very valuable items are in there. Anyway, yeah. He did create a real treasure chest for it.

And he put the last item that was needed in it in 2010. And at this time, he was 80 years old. So he's been really working at this for a long time. He in 2010, he got the last item in. He had his memoir. He had all the clues. and one day without telling anyone where he was going or what he was doing, including his wife, he set out into the wilderness and he hid the treasure.

And hiding this treasure took him one afternoon. So it took one afternoon for an 80-year-old man alone to hide this treasure, which, based on your description, probably pretty hefty. I think I read somewhere that it weighed 45 pounds. Right. Like it's not a light hardboard box filled with, you know. So that leads me to believe that it's in an area that is somewhat, quote unquote, easily accessible. But based on your face, I feel like that's not the case.

No, I think what you just said is really important for the rest of my story. Keep in mind that he's an 80-year-old man who it took him an afternoon to hide this treasure. and it would be in an accessible location for an 80-year-old man. Once he had hidden the treasure, he went home to print his memoir that he had been writing, and he printed 1,000 copies. And as I said earlier, it was filled with stories of his life, from his early days in Yellowstone to his career as a fighter jet pilot, to his life with his family, and also his battle of cancer.

And at the end of this memoir, he had that poem, and like I said before, it did contain nine clues for where the treasure was hidden. He titled this memoir, The Thrill of the Chase, and he sold it in a small bookstore in Santa Faye, and he sold it for the price that it cost him to print it, and he asked that any profit that the store made off of this book, they would just donate to charity, and he wanted it to go to a charity for cancer. And the reason he did this was one to help cancer charities, because he obviously had a strong tie to that. And he also didn't want any profits for himself because he didn't want it to seem like this was a ploy for him to get money. He strictly and wholeheartedly wanted this to be an

adventure for people. He wanted this to be an adventure of a treasure hunt and he wanted this to be a life-changing reward for someone. What he didn't realize when he started all of this was the lives that it would take, the destruction that it would cause, and how he himself would become a victim in the midst of it all. When the news got out of his treasure, it attracted some attention, and people started looking for it. And as searchers began looking for the treasure, Forrest began speaking with them, and he would talk to them frequently, and he actually became a large part of the hunt for this. He loved talking to people and hearing their ideas and hearing them try to debunk his poem and figure out what was going on. And he was really careful in all this

not to give any information away, but he enjoyed having conversations with people. And it started out as a few hundred people, maybe a thousand people that were searching for it. But then more major news sources came across the story and it became bigger and bigger. And then on February 27, 2013, Forest Fen and his story was aired on the Today Show. So what started as a riddle in a book that was sold in a small bookstore in Santa Fe is now nationwide news? Yes. And not just nationwide, but it went global.

And at this, thousands and thousands of copies of his memoir were printed and they were sold just in that day. This story brought people from all. all over the world and all over the country to search for this treasure. It's very enticing. $2 million. $2 million. It's essentially being like, hey, there's $2 million laying out in the woods somewhere.

Come and get it. The mad rush of people that that would attract is probably mind-blowing. And I think about when I lived in Colorado, there was a Facebook page that I followed called Colorado Treasure Hunters. And I think just a single person runs it. and they'll literally just take a picture of like a $20 bill in like a tree or stump or under a rock or something and kind of just give a really small picture of where it is. And they'll post it and be like, happy hunting, good luck. And it's only $20. But I mean, he has thousands and thousands of people

following him. So, and that's for $20, you know? Like imagine what $2 million. I mean, it's such a fun idea. And I mean, $2 million, of course people are going to get excited for that. that's going to fix any financial problems you have. That's going to bring a lot of dreams and things your way that weren't accessible before that, especially if you are not really wealthy. Right. I mean, $2 million is a life-changing amount of money for a lot of people. Yeah, including me. Including me. But so they hear about it on the Today Show and his book explodes. And now everyone is on to this. Everyone is on to this and everyone wants to be the person to find it.

And this creates a significant boom in tourism, especially surrounding the place where forests lived. So Santa Fe area was starting to get more tourism that it had ever seen. And it also created a huge number of treasure hunters that were heading into Yellowstone National Park. Many people after reading his memoir and reading his stories from his childhood, in reading the poem, believe that the treasure may be hidden in Yellowstone National Park. And another big reason why they thought that was because at one point in Forest Fenn's lifetime, he actually moved to the west entrance area of Yellowstone, and he lived there for years.

And in his memoir, he talks about how much he loved it there. So this created a huge boom in tourism in Yellowstone National Park. So people are taking not only clues from the poem itself, but also trying to decipher the memoir itself. Yes. Okay. Just to kind of like pull clues from his life story and to see if they can incorporate it versus just reading that poem and going off of that. Yeah. And he did say that there are small clues within his memoir along with the poem as well. So people are really picking apart everything at this point. And there were so many. people flooding into Yellowstone National Park that the park surface actually had to come up with

an entirely new set of rules, flyers, and signs specifically for the treasure hunters. Because these hunters were going into protected wildlife zones. They were trampling over protected vegetation. And there were even instances where they were digging deep holes in the ground in Yellowstone for their own bathrooms. So they were making their own outhouse bathroom areas because they were staying in Yellowstone for a long period of time searching for the treasure. Oh, it's like chaos. Yeah. And obviously you can't dig your own outhouse in Yellowstone National Park.

Like, it's a national park. You can't do that. And I would imagine that Forest wouldn't, it's like I know him. I'm like, Forest wouldn't do that. But like, I feel like he wouldn't place his treasure somewhere where people would have to break the rules of a park that he obviously cares about. about and spent a lot of time in, you know? I have the same thought as you.

So I was also kind of like, what are these people thinking? There's no way that he would want this to be the outcome of his treasure hunt. But also for this, search and rescue efforts for these hunters became a normal thing for the rangers in the park. The searchers were often making mistakes. They were so blinded by the idea of finding this treasure that they often found themselves stuck somewhere out in Yellowstone in the wilderness, whether it was due to weather conditions, they didn't bring enough supplies, or just injuries that they were getting. And at one point,

they actually ended up detaining two of the visitors who they caught using a metal detector and digging holes wherever they pleased. And the reason that they caught this couple doing this was because they started a small forest fire inside the park because they were camping without a permit it and started a campfire. Yeah, I would think that just taking a metal detector in the middle of Yellowstone is like, you don't even have to look up the rulebook. The answers, no. But even the metal detecting, like, okay, whatever, they started a forest fire because they

made their own campfire. I'm like, you can't, in the West, you can't just make a campfire wherever you want. So while Yellowstone was dealing with more difficulties than perks of forest fence treasure, Santa Fe, as I said earlier, was experiencing a tourism boom. And the mayor actually even went as far as to create a day called Thrill of the Chase, which was in honor of thanking Forrest for bringing so much money and tourism into their town. So they basically had this day where all of the hunters came together and just celebrated, had barbecues, had food, talked about the hunt, the poem,

and just a lot of treasure hunters coming together to talk about all of this, and it became a big day there for them. This adventure as a whole, I just talked about some bad things that were happening, but some really great things were happening too from this. This adventure was bringing explorers from all over, and there were a lot of stories formed. There were a lot of friendships that were formed. There's a lot of people who found their spouses during this search.

There's a lot of love stories that were formed in this. So there were negatives to this and there were these huge positives that were happening at the same time. And the positives are what Forest Fen was trying to go for here. However, with lots of tourism and lots of attraction into the wilderness, as we know from previous stories we've told on this podcast, there can also be devastating consequences. Some people became so obsessed with the chase of this treasure that they ended up blowing their entire life savings. Oh, my God. that hits me hard. Like, I can spend all this money because I'm going to get two million back.

It's fine. It's a big gamble because are you going to find it? When this all started, I mean, the trouble first really began in 2013 very shortly after the today's show was aired. And the first noted thing was that a man in New Mexico dug underneath an iron cross, which was a memorial of someone. and it was actually considered to be a cultural artifact, and he was searching for the treasure in this area. So he was later charged with damaging a cultural artifact, and then there was also another person

who actually started digging up grave sites in search of the treasure. People were going to all different lengths for this, and Forrest became really worried that the next stop in this was that they were going to try and dig up his father's grave. I just don't understand where that's coming from. Like where in that poem that you read points to that? Like I just don't understand. You know, it's all about perspective, I guess.

People look at everything a little differently. But I did not read anything in that where I thought it would be in a grave. Also going back to your comment earlier, something that's easily accessible for an 80-year-old man. to do and I I would cross off digging six feet under in the ground I would check that off as something an 80 year old man probably couldn't do right so at any point did he intervene like when he saw all of this happening was he kind of a little discouraged or worried that people were going to are kind of veering off track a little bit and yeah did he say anything to like get people back onto the right path Yeah, so he actually, when this started happening, he decided that it was time to reveal a little bit more information about where this treasure was hidden.

And he decided that he was going to narrow down the search a little bit. And previously, he had told people that the treasure was somewhere within the Rocky Mountains. So that was always widely known. But the Rocky Mountains are huge. They go across several states, so it doesn't narrow it down that much. So he decided to tell people that it was either located in New Mexico, Colorado, Wyoming, or Montana, and that the treasure was not located in a grave. And telling everyone this, this canceled out a couple parts of the Rocky Mountains.

So this canceled out going into Canada, Idaho, and Utah. He also revealed that it was at the very minimum 8.5 miles north of Santa Fe. And they thought that he might have told people this because he wanted to deter people. from searching his house for this. Also told people that it was above 5,000 feet in elevation, but it was below 10,200 feet in elevation. And he was telling people this because people were getting injured and he wanted to discourage searchers from climbing to the tallest peaks of these mountains in search of his treasure.

Like it's on the summit somewhere. Yeah. Again, 80-year-old man. I don't see him scaling a 14er. Yeah, exactly. And that's what he was trying to tell people too. And he also revealed that the treasure was not going to be able to be found in the wintertime. And I think this was another thing where he was like, please do not look for it in the wintertime.

This is really dangerous. These are my rules. These are my stipulations. Don't do this. His whole idea of this was he wanted this to be a really great adventure. He wanted to get people outside. He wanted to get people exploring. People weren't supposed to be getting injured.

He also asked that when people were searching, that they were. never to go alone. He wanted everyone to go in groups. Also, according to CBS News, he told searchers, quote, not to look anywhere an 80-year-old man couldn't put it. But despite what he asked of these searchers, searchers didn't listen to him, and it resulted in multiple tragedies. The first death looking for this treasure happened in 2016. Randy Billew moved to Colorado after the story of the treasure aired on the Today Show. And he became obsessed with the treasure and he believed from what he read in his research that it was somewhere along the Rio Grande. If you're not familiar with the Rio Grande, it is a major river that runs from Colorado down to New Mexico through Texas.

It actually goes right through Big Bend National Park in Texas and it goes down into Mexico. So he believed that it was somewhere along the Rio Grande, and he told his family of his plans to raft the river and search for the treasure. His family and his children had asked him to wait and go in the springtime and not do it in the wintertime, and he told them that he would wait. However, he actually confided in a few friends that he actually planned to set out on January 5, 2016, and he would go towards the Santa Fe National National. forest. His friends begged him not to go and against their advice and their concerns on January 5th. He brought an inflatable raft. He grabbed his dog Leo and he set out to find this treasure. And it was a really cold day. It's January. It's the middle of wintertime. And he brought his small, wiry-haired terrier dog with him. He dressed him up in a little sweater to stay warm.

and the two were said to be inseparable, and Leo often went on adventures with Randy. And this was supposed to be just a quick day trip down the river. After he left, no one was able to get in contact with him. And after several days of Randy being missing and no one being able to get a hold of him, a missing report was filed on January 14th. Rescue teams went into the search area and they brought a helicopter to fly over and see if they could get any view of his raft or where he could be. Two days later, on January 16th, while they were flying overhead, a medical nurse, Aaron Johnson,

was inside the helicopter, and she was looking out in search of Randy. And according to CBS News, Aaron stated that she believed that this would be a recovery mission at this point. The weather was really cold the past two days, and she didn't believe that there was a chance that he could still be alive with the weather that way. So they were flying really low, and Aaron and the pilot came across Randy's raft, and it was upside down, and it was deflated, and it was on the side of the river. They landed the helicopter, and they approached the raft, and there they found his dog, Leo. He was barking at them and growling, and there was no sign of Randy at all, and Leo was very upset.

He was barking, he was acting very, very aggressive towards them. They couldn't get anywhere near him. He looked very mangy. He was dirty. Just was not the same dog. He was that Randy brought in with him. But he was still wearing his little sweater. They believed that his sweater was probably the only reason that he was still alive because it was so cold out the past few days.

The pilot that was there, he happened to have a cliff bar with him. and Erin approached the dog and held it out for him and after several tries she was finally able to get Leo to come close to her and start eating the cliff bar. She was able to get a hold of him. She wrapped him up in a little blanket and she carried him over to the helicopter. So the whole helicopter flight back, he sat in her lap and he was no longer aggressive towards her. And during that search that day, they were not able to find Randy at all. So after there were no signs of Randy, the search was eventually called off, but that didn't stop fellow treasure hunters to try and find him. There were treasure hunters in that area that would go out and search for him all the time, and they would bring drone cameras and they would hike along the riverbanks.

They were doing a lot to try and find him. After six months of searching for him, his body was finally found and it was washed up along the river bank. Kind of a little bit of a happier side of this story. Aaron Johnson, the woman who rescued his dog, ended up adopting him. And today he is still alive and living with her and he's doing really well. So he was the very first person to die that was looking for the treasure. But he was not going to be the last. Four more people would die searching for it.

After Randy's death, for the very first time, there were a lot of of people who outwardly spoke out in opposition of the treasure hunt. They actually asked Forrest Vend to call off the search and just end it for everybody. It was too dangerous. Now, someone had died. People were very upset. But Forrest held his ground and he refused. And he stated that it was not his fault that Randy died and the treasure was not his fault that Randy died. He didn't listen to his rules at all. He went out in wintertime. He didn't, go with any friends. He only went with a dog. He went to an area that an 80-year-old man probably wouldn't go to. So he really held his ground and he said, you know, he didn't listen to any of my

rules or stipulations on this. It's not my fault. I'm not calling off the treasure hunt. So going into a story of another person who was searching for the treasure, Jeff Murphy was like many other people. He had heard of the treasure and he became very intrigued from it. So from his own research and trying to solve the mystery of where it was, he, like a lot of other searchers, believe that the treasure was inside Yellowstone National Park. And he also, like many other searchers, contacted Forrest Fen via email to tell him of his thoughts and where he would be searching for the next few days before he headed out. And that was really common among the searchers because Forrest was really involved with everyone who was hunting for the treasure.

and he would talk back and forth via phone or via email. So it was really common for someone to send them their itinerary for what their plans were. So he left his home in search of the treasure in early June 2017, and he left from Chicago, Illinois. His hike was supposed to take only half of a day, and after not hearing from her husband, Jeff's wife called Park Rangers and reported him missing on June 8th. The Rangers immediately initiated a massive search party for him. They sent out eight hiking teams, four horse teams, five dog teams, and a helicopter. Forrest, who had known of his mission and who had heard that he was missing,

offered to pay for the whole rescue mission, and he offered to pay for any helicopters and anything to try and locate him. That's extremely generous. Yeah, and I don't think I mentioned this before either, but for Randy who is missing in the Rio Grande that I just talked about, Forest Venn actually rode in the helicopters in search of him for many days as well. So he was partaking in these rescue missions to try and find these people as well. So on June 9th, they found his body and they found that he had fallen 500 feet down a steep slope

near the north entrance of the park. At almost the same time as Jeff Mercer, Jeffrey's death, another man was out searching for the treasure in an entirely different location. Pastor Paris Wallace from Grand Junction, Colorado, set out towards Taos, New Mexico along the Rio Grande. When he failed to show up for a meeting, his wife reported him missing. Search and Rescue Team searched the area, and they soon found his car. They started scouring the area for any signs of Paris, and shortly after they found a backpack that they believed was his and it was in the river. Not far away from this backpack, they found a rope that

was tied to a rock and they had found a receipt inside of his vehicle earlier that day that made them believe that the rope belonged to him. Shortly after this discovery, a dive team was sent into the river looking for him, but the search had to be called off because the water levels of the river became too high. It was the following day on June 14, 2017, that they found Paris's body in the river. Eric Ashby, another man who moved all the way to Colorado in search of the treasure, went missing in Colorado's Arkansas River, only one month later in July 2017. On July 28th, his river raft was found capsized and his body was later found in the river. These river accidents. Yeah. So at this point, a few people had died and people were begging for us to call off the search.

and they were just saying there's too many people dying now. And Forrest continued to hold strong in his treasure hunt. And he stated that the people who were dying were very clearly not following his rules. And he reiterated that the location of the treasure was not in a dangerous location. And while there were people who were dying in search of this treasure, people were also going to some other extremes as well. They were breaking the law. and Forrest Fenn found himself to be a victim of some of these crimes. In October 2018, a man from Pennsylvania by the name of Robert Miller hopped on a plane and flew to Santa Fe, New Mexico.

Robert Miller had heard of the treasure hunt and read the poem that Forrest had written. His family at this time was in a very desperate financial situation, and he later stated that for him, his wife and his children, he only had $130 in their bank account. So he was in a very desperate situation, and when Robert Miller read this poem, he decided that the treasure had to be hidden somewhere on Forest Fenn's property. When he flew into Santa Fe, he headed straight to his home. He kicked in a small wooden gate that was located near the front entrance to get into his backyard.

And when he was walking along the property, he found a small black axe. and he used that axe to break a door window to the guest house, and he went inside. Inside the guest house, he found a small wooden treasure box, and he grabbed it. That same day, Fen had had a dentist appointment, and his daughter had brought him home afterwards. So she noticed that Robert was on the property. She called 911, and she let them know that there was an intruder there, but instead of sitting around and waiting for the police to arrive, she grabbed a revolver. She went outside and she approached Robert with the gun and pointed it at him.

She told him that she had called police and he could not go anywhere. And Robert, in response to this, started immediately sobbing and apologizing for breaking in. And when the police arrived, she still had him at gunpoint and he had been crying and And she told police while they were there that they had had several other instances of break-in since the treasure was announced. So this wasn't new at all. So sad all around. I mean, you can't just break into somebody's house.

And he said that it's like 8.5 miles from Santa Fe or something like that. Yeah. It's not there. Yeah. It's not there. But, oh, God, that really is such a shitty situation. Like, all of a sudden, you're just immediately like breaking down and. crying. I'm sorry. I'm just so desperate. That's a really, really bad situation to be in. But

God damn, just listen to the rules. It's not there. Yeah. And like I feel for him in that aspect, but at the same time, so I read the article about him and I saw his mugshot. And I am telling you, he had a grin on his face in his mugshot. And I'll post it because it actually made me laugh out, He is smiling from like ear to ear in this mugshot like, oops, sorry, you got me. Like he does not look like he cares at all that he was arrested. So while there were crimes like that that was happening, some people in search of the treasure were just flat out reckless and they disregarded their own safety and they put the safety of our National Park Rangers at risk as well.

In 2020, a man by the name of David Christensen was convinced that he solved the mystery of where Forest Fenn's treasure was. He was on a mission to find it. He stated that he was trying to find the treasure to stop the search efforts because too many people were dying. He stated that he had no interest in the treasure otherwise, but he knew exactly where it was located and he was going to go find it. In late December, he scouted out the area that he needed to be in and he planned to return with all the correct supplies that he would need. He was going to come back prepared and he was certain that this treasure was located at the bottom of the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone National Park. So the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone National Park is a large canyon on the Yellowstone River.

The canyon is approximately 24 miles long and the area itself. has complex features and beautiful colors. There's steam that arises in certain areas and this reflects the hydrothermal regions inside the canyon walls. This area is a very large attraction in the park and many people come to visit it. So David decided that the treasure was at the bottom of this canyon and he was going to repel down the canyon walls 850 feet. David had little to no experience in climbing and he tied his rope to the railing of the Grand Canyon overlook. David had miscalculated how much rope he needed to get to the bottom of the canyon and he ran out before he got to the bottom. So he decided to scoot himself in the snow all the way down to the river. But at that point,

it was too icy and snowy and slippery for him to climb back up to his rope to get back up to the top. and he was stuck at the bottom of the canyon, and he had to call in a rescue. A rescue team of 11 Rangers came in to save him, and this operation was incredibly dangerous. There were snowy conditions. It was extremely cold, and the location where he was was extremely dangerous to get to. When the team got down to him and they brought gear down, David was going to have to help himself climb out, and they were attaching him to a rope and he needed to climb out on his own with the rangers to the top of the canyon. After starting the climb back up, David announced that the climb was too strenuous

and too difficult. He couldn't do it and he couldn't make it any farther and he asked for a helicopter to come in to save him. However, a helicopter was not an option because of the snowy weather conditions and also just the location. I mean, from past stories that we've talked about, we've learned a lot that it's dangerous for helicopters to fly into smaller areas and cliff sides, anything. It's a difficult task and a big maneuver, but he was asking for a helicopter to come in because he didn't want to hike up.

And, okay, what's the name, David? Yeah. David. You put yourself in this position, and now you're putting a lot of other people at risk. That's not fair. Buck up. Let's go.

Let's go. Let's go. Get those trail legs on. You're climbing. You're climbing today. So they end up rescuing David, but the park ended up pressing charges against him for his negligence. And in court, he apologized for what he did, and he apologized for putting the Rangers' lives at risk. But in court, he was adamant that the treasure was in fact stashed somewhere.

on the canyon floor. And he said, quote, you might call me a lunatic, whatever, but I feel wholeheartedly I solved that fen treasure thing. I still feel it's down there, Your Honor. I mean, when people get their mind on something and they think that they solved it, it's really difficult to break that. Yeah, absolutely. And he was sentenced to one week in jail, and he did have to pay for $4,000 for the rescue mission because that's what it cost and he has been banned from Yellowstone for the next five years. Shortly after this whole incident with David, another man died in a snowmobiling incident in Utah when he was in search of the treasure and he actually died in an accident. He was with a friend and his friend survived. Now with all these stories and years and years of searching,

thousands of people heading out into the wilderness and with these five people dying, someone did eventually find this treasure and they found it in 2020. It was Saturday, June 6th, 2020 and a devastating email came across to hundreds of registered treasure hunters and this email was from Forest Fen. He wrote, The chase is over. The chest has been found. The news of this spread fast and peas. were devastated. They also had a lot of questions because in his email he didn't say who found it and more importantly he didn't say where. So in this email where Forrest Fenn wrote that the chest has been found his email also read in regards to the treasure. It was under a canopy of the stars in the lush forest of vegetation and the rocky mountains. It has not moved from the spot that I hit it more than

10 years ago. I do not know the person who found it, but the poem in my book led him to the precise spot. I congratulate the thousands of people who participated in the search and hope they will continue to be drawn to the promise of other discoveries. I listened to a book on Audible about this, and it's called Chasing the Thrill, Obsession, Death, and Glory in America's Most Extraordinary Treasure Hunt by Daniel Barbarisi and one of the women at the end of it, she was talking about how she called Forrest Fenn when she got the email and she was like, this can't be real. Tell me this isn't real. Someone didn't find this and he was like, you know, it is real, it is real. And she was like, oh, that's such a bummer. He was like, well, did you get anything out of this adventure?

and she said, well, I got my husband out of it. And he said, well, that's something. So there were a lot of really beautiful things that happened. I mean, there were a lot of love stories in this. There were a lot of lifetime friendships that were formed in this. There were people who went out on these magnificent adventures that aren't written down in a book for us to look up and read, but they have, but people have years and years of this goal and these adventures that they were doing that I mean, there were these horrible tragedies that obviously happened, and there were definitely good and bad things. I agree. Now, for six months, the finder of this treasure, Chess chose to stay anonymous because he didn't want the craze of the hunters to affect him.

He didn't want people emailing him and calling him. He didn't want to have to worry about someone trying to break into his home. He didn't want all this attention. But he did finally come forward with his name, and his name. is Jack Stouf. He is a 32-year-old medical student from Michigan and he spent two years searching for Forest Treasure. He has a blog and he wrote in his blog that he figured out where the treasure was back in 2018 but it took him a few months to actually figure out where the exact spot was. And he realized that the treasure was hidden in the same location that Forest Fen wanted to die in.

According to his blog, he spent 25 days in the location where the treasure was. He knew that it was there, but he could not find the exact spot, and he spent a lot of very tiring days looking for it. In regards to searching for the treasure, he wrote in his blog, there were a few times when I, exhausted, covered in scratches and bites and sweat and pine pitch, and nearing the end of my day's water supply, sat down on a down tree and just cried alone in woods in sheer frustration. This wasn't all fun in games. This was really hard for him too, and he found this treasure in an undisclosed location in the Rocky Mountains in Wyoming. Forrest Fen died in September 2020, so fairly recently, and with the blessing from Forest, Jack has decided to keep the location

of where it was found anonymous. He does not want crowds of people heading to that area and ruining it. and he kind of explains this a little bit more in his blog. He wrote, If I were to reveal where the treasure was, the natural wonder of the place that forest held so dear will be destroyed by people seeking the treasure that they hope I dropped on my way out or that forest could have dropped on his way in. He continued to say, getting to the wilderness location where the chest was is not dangerous in the conventional sense of the word. but it very quickly can be when people do not take basic precautions or go out in the wrong weather conditions. It is not an appropriate place to become a tourist attraction. I want to say beautiful, because it really is. Out of all the people who could have found the treasure, not saying that he's like the perfect fit,

but I feel like he respects and has a lot of the same values that Forrest did and had. and I feel like respecting the area that it was founded and kind of honoring the space is really, it's awesome. It's, it really is because I totally can see that area, like he said, becoming a tourist attraction. Not only in my mind, like not only from people coming in and out in hopes that there's like a little something dropped, but even just for the sheer like this is where it was factor. You know, like even for just that sole purpose, like I think that. He's right. It would have turned into kind of like a circus.

Forrest Fenn, he hid this treasure because he thought this was a beautiful place and he treasured this location and we would be sending thousands of people into this specific location and it would be. It would be ruined the magic of whatever Forest Fenn loved about this area would be gone. If this story has sparked the adventure spirit within you and hearing that the treasure was found is as devastating for you as it was for the treasure hunters, please do not fret. Right now, there is another treasure hunt currently underway, and it is happening in Utah. Two men in Utah recently revealed that they buried $10,000 somewhere in the wilderness near Salt Lake City, Ogden, or Provo, Utah. On June 19th, they revealed a poem of their

own with clues inside of it. 19th of this year like three weeks ago yes very recent yes what this is just happening right now dude are we going to utah you know i have my own thoughts of the poem a little bit and little things in it not that i have any idea where the location i'm not telling anyone i'll tell you um not yeah after here okay hold on a minute that is so exciting okay a couple questions that I don't know if you know first do you know if they were inspired at all by force I'm pretty sure it is inspired by forest fen they actually had a treasure hunt already it was for five thousand dollars and their first one they did during COVID and their whole thing was they wanted to get

people outdoors during COVID and it was a COVID friendly activity you weren't in crowds to do it and it was getting you outside and the clues that they left were really easy and the treasure was found within like four days they decided to put this new went out make it a little bit more difficult and now it's 10 grand instead of 5 grand and it's two men who are realtors in Utah. Here's the deal. If any of you go out there and find this treasure, you got to at least let us know. We're taking 10%. We won't go as far as to say there's a finder's fee. Whatever it may be, you heard it from us so you got to throw us at least some credit. Seriously, if anyone is in Utah or now is planning on going to Utah to try and find that 10 grand, best of luck.

And please be safe and go in pairs or in a group. And what an adventure that would be, you know? Yeah. Where did they announce that? Do you know? It has been posted. There's an Instagram called On the John. And they post information about the treasure.

They post little hints and clues on there and they have their rules that set up there. So like Daniel said, if you want to go check it out, please be safe. So now, what if I told you there was a treasure chest that someone had hidden worth money and all you need to do is solve a riddle and find it? Listen very carefully, because I'm going to read that to you right now. Begin your search where hikers rest. Majestic slopes all facing west. Through the tunnel of Emerald Green, follow the river creek or spring.

When the blackbird clicks turn to port, if you reach the end, you've come up short. Begin to climb when your path swings north, picking your way back and forth. Soon you'll find you're not alone. Greet the bear made out of stone. Along the bottom of the cliff is key. The chest awaits beneath the tree. With treasure in hand, enjoy the views. The sun-kissed reds and the salty blues.

There you have it. You have all the hints and clues now. You have the information you need to find this treasure. Now what will you do with this information? To what lengths are you willing to go? go to get this treasure. Happy hunting. The next time you're out there,

enjoy the view. But watch your back. Bye, everyone. Bye. It seems a little more involved as far as location-wise. It seems like there's some switchbacks, there's some climbing, there's some ton of... Stop telling the hints of the poem.

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